Madeleine McCann: An Apology For Journalism, Desmond’s Reputation And Greenslade Scores
MADDIE WATCH - Anorak’s at-a-glance guide to press coverage of Madeleine McCann, Kate McCann and Gerry McCann
DAILY STAR: “’THE TAPAS SEVEN‘” - AN APOLOGY
The Sangria Seven, surely. Or the Tapas 9 (what happened to them?). But what of this latest apology? Ahem..:
In articles published in September and November last year we suggested that the holiday companions of Kate and Gerry McCann might have covered up the true facts concerning Madeleine McCann’s disappearance and/or misled the authorities investigating her disappearance.
Yes…
We also suggested that the McCanns’ friends had been identified as potential suspects.
And…
We now accept that these suggestions should never have been made and were completely untrue.
The Star is printed in Portuguese…
We apologise to Jane Tanner, Russell O’Brien, Fiona Payne, David Payne, Matthew Oldfield, Rachael Oldfield and Diane Webster to whom we have agreed to pay substantial damages which they will be donating to the Find Madeleine Fund.
Ah, yes, another donation. Well, at least the cash will keep the story going;, and the Express in news, and robots…
TIMES: “Express group to pay McCann friends damages”
How much?
Friends of Madeleine McCann’s parents are expected to accept libel damages of £375,000 today.
Express Newspapers has previously paid damages of £550,000 to Mr and Mrs McCann, from Rothley, Leicestershire. The group and other newspapers also paid more than £600,000 to Robert Murat, a former official suspect, and two other people.
Anorak broke that story. And what of the “other newspapers”, like the Times’ sister organs, the Sun and the News of the World. Why not mention them by name?
THE GUARDIAN: “Desmond’s papers back in court to apologise for more shoddy journalism”
It’s Roy Greenslade, fearless repeorting on bad jouslism. No, not the Maddy keywords. No, not the BNP adverts. The Express:
It is a further nail in the coffin of the reputation of the Daily Express and its pornographer owner, Richard Desmond.
Reputation? Does he care? And what fot Desmond’s newspapers? They might be full of bollocks, but people still read them, or at least they look at the pictures:
Guardian circulation: 348,878
Daily Express circualtion: 739,025
Daily Star circulation: 731,433
And you thought no-one read the Express…
Madeleine McCann: A child is missing, still missing. After a year and half of reporting, there are no suspects. The press has uncovered not a single lead. And the parents continue to search for their daughter…
Posted: 16th, October 2008 | In: Broadsheets, Madeleine McCann, Media, Tabloids Comments (359) | Follow the Comments on our RSS feed: RSS 2.0 | TrackBack | Permalink
Comments
October 17th, 2008 at 1:36 am
sam
Socialism stinks. There’s no way of organising it without it turning into a hierarchy with the ones at the top getting all the perks and the ones lower down getting shafted or lazy and as the state becomes a giant corporation it works like an out of town supermarket ruining all the smaller organisations and networks.
It stinks in the same way the Free Market Economy stinks and Britain is a combination of both!
I doubt there is an ideal political structure or social structure or economy though - so I just concentrate on hoping the world becomes glamorous, entertaining and generous.
October 17th, 2008 at 1:25 am
karen, i honestly don’t know as i don’t really do papers as such, as in the politics behind them, i haven’t a clue. not to sure what you mean by this royal court stuff. i read google news, i rarely buy papers unless they’ve got a cd i want, i kind of resent the waste of paper and resources as well as having to watch the pennies. i kind of tend towards socialism in some areas but we haven’t got it where it should be, what we’ve got it seems is some councellors earning 200 grand, what we’ve got is the public servants, those administrating the publics money, earning often far more than the people who go out to earn it.
October 17th, 2008 at 1:03 am
sam
The Independent is ok - but it’s considered a bit of a joke.
I still can’t get over the Royal Court still banging out it’s anti-capitalist stuff (not as much but still…) and they’re sponsored by some rich American banker (possibly not now….
).
Is there no integrity though?
October 17th, 2008 at 12:48 am
karen, i read anything and everything in sight, dunno what that makes me. the indy had interesting articles often.
October 17th, 2008 at 12:45 am
Everyone I know in Academia and at the BBC and in the Theatre (mostly in Scotland but I know a few people down South) reads the Guardian.
Since they’re in positions of power isn’t that undemocratic and non-egalitarian?
October 17th, 2008 at 12:44 am
totje, never thankfully been in that situation. good night then
October 17th, 2008 at 12:42 am
Yes, Coco, that’s it exactly! I have been silenced and awed by your superior intelligence.
Meanwhile, back on Earth…
October 17th, 2008 at 12:38 am
Sam many questions -unanswered- I asked myself too.
Yet on the other hand, sometimes people see/hear things, and in hindsight think it was him/her or suspicious or whatever. The mind also fools people sometimes, people who only want to be helpfull and who are unaware their recollection of things is not what really happened.
And people can do strange things without other people reacting to it. Especially in Amsterdam they’re used to a lot of weirdo’s.
Have you ever been in a train where people [man, woman, children] are sitting and standing and a man suddenly gets his errmmm you-know-what out of his pants and goes playing with it? How many people ignored it and how many told him to stop exposing himself?
Didn’t I ever tell the story about us at an amusement park when my little nephew shouted “they’re not my parents” and nobody asked us questions or stopped us either?
Have to get some sleep. It’s been a busy week.
So nite nite.
October 17th, 2008 at 12:36 am
oh i see totje, got that wrong this mrs stam didn’t think anything of the situation until after seeing a report about missing madeleine .
October 17th, 2008 at 12:31 am
re: Churchill
He was a great War leader because he took part in the first World War, and in the Second War he did get into the thick of things with the troops on occasions.
he never lost his parliamentary seat, it’s just that the Labour govt got in. He was Prime Minister of a coelition Government during the war.
so,……. he wasn’t like the McConns because he did get off his arse and get among the troops, and at times put himself in great danger.
October 17th, 2008 at 12:25 am
totje, why do all these people who have these sightings wait days before contacting the authorities ? why do they wait until the persons can’t be found again, why don’t they at least follow them to see where they live ? why didn’t this mrs stam talk to the shop owner after they left and hindered the erasure of the cctv ? and so on and so forth.
October 17th, 2008 at 12:09 am
Oh Watcher how I hate you [and Stiggie] for tempting me into rereading the stuff about mrs Stam in the papers grrr!
Right here I go.
I could find the story in the online editions of some papers, like the Telegraaf [a journal that often carries 'sensational' stories, very popular, but not very high standards, simple words, sometimes looks like as if they're talking to children] and the Algemeen Dagblad [a little better] and Het Parool [used to be a socialists paper]. I could not find the story in the NRC [a very respected good paper].
On August 5th it was reported they’ve found the sighting by mrs Stam in the files of the PJ. Latest article[s] I could find were dated August 7th and it was about mrs Stam going to the UK to meet the parents of Madeleine. Nowhere any reports about that meeting.
Several versions of the story of mrs Stam, some more extended as others. Basics all the same.
All versions the girl [M?] spoke English, the woman who accompanied her spoke French, the man Portuguese [to the woman].
The English speaking girl said her name was Maddie and she’s said “That’s not my mommy. They took me from my holiday”.
The girl seemed to have dark hair, not blonde like Madeleine. No talking about the colour of her eyes or the coloboma [whatever its called] thingy.
One paper writes there were two other children with the woman, man and the little girl. The woman spoke French to these two other children and she called the English speaking girl “la petite”.
[Question of me : did she or did she not want to be called Maddie? Contradicting stories about that I've read].
There’s no mentioning the exact date when the girl was seen by mrs Stam.
mrs Stam said she didn’t know at that time Madeleine was missing and she heard about it a week [/couple of days/couple of weeks] after she saw the little girl and then she went straight away to the police [not to the papers]. Police investigated, but no CCTV recordings as they get erased automatically after a couple of days. These people wanted to pay with a credit card, the shop doesn’t accept CC’s so the woman returned the next day with cash.
And no follow ups on the story over here either.
Nor mentioning the girl/group was identified and proven not to be Madeleine.
The sighting has been discussed over here on Anorak, and to be frankly honest I can’t recall if anybody else found an article in which the police stated it was[n't] her.
But early May 2007 there’s been lots of sightings of Madeleine, why would/could this sighting be more thrustworthy as any other sighting? Why would people who’ve got something to hide [a little girl] take her to a shop, want to pay with a credit card and even return the next day to pay with cash? Language matter also very strange imo.
October 17th, 2008 at 12:06 am
goodnight val and steve t : and anyone i’ve missed.
October 17th, 2008 at 12:04 am
anyway, my point was that the tapas group seem to think it’s everyone elses fault except their own that madeleiene hasn’t been found, it’s become a party line. i remember the mccanns complaining they couldn’t search for her properly whilst they were still arguidos and now fiona becries she hasn’t been found because the negative publicity against the adults in the group has hindered her being found.
so it seems we’ve moved on from incompetant sardine munchers being at fault (disproved by the information released on the files), to the press being at fault (proved by successfully sueing them) and then the general public who think negatively about them being at fault for her not being found, in short it’s everyone’s fault that madeleine hasn’t been found except those who ‘lost’ her in the first place. odd that isn’t it.
October 17th, 2008 at 12:00 am
Goodnight Val, Artemis, Connie and anyone else there.
October 16th, 2008 at 11:59 pm
Steve T et al
I”m going to watch a film now so wish you all goodnight……sleep well.
October 16th, 2008 at 11:46 pm
Connie
Sorry, but your post to Garth may not be answered, he”s already gone. By the way,
are you from Holland, your post is double dutch to me. LOL
October 16th, 2008 at 11:45 pm
Val,
People will not donate when they see how much they are getting from the papers.
October 16th, 2008 at 11:41 pm
Hi Garth,
Sorry but only now can answer you.
You are right, I come from hell,and be careful any time you can be burn.
Do yourself a favor and all that has quue lead with a person so inconveniente and dumb as you:
GROWING AND APPEARS ON. OK?
October 16th, 2008 at 11:40 pm
Steve T
The public are not really interested in the McCanns and would be very reluctant to donate to a fund that has already made almost a million pounds from suing the DE.
The Daily Mail last week printed an old Report on the sums paid to Metodo and Oakley
and in the midst of all the world Financial Crisis, would not look kindly on the way
the Fund has been wasted.
October 16th, 2008 at 11:39 pm
I like your style!
October 16th, 2008 at 11:39 pm
hah! that’s truely wikked. big grins
October 16th, 2008 at 11:39 pm
Come back Garth!
October 16th, 2008 at 11:38 pm
Artemis!
—-
M&A
Artemis
Yes?
October 16th, 2008 at 11:34 pm
Nite
October 16th, 2008 at 11:32 pm
Val
No i dont. And do y ou know why? Because i dont know all the facts. And anyway, if they feel they are doing the right thing then so be it? Who am i to judge? I know naff all. It was their daughter that was taken not mine.
October 16th, 2008 at 11:32 pm
ok Garth.I know he lost his phone…well thats cleared that one up
October 16th, 2008 at 11:31 pm
so who is Kern person…you know the one the Gerry phoned at 4am yeh that one .
October 16th, 2008 at 11:29 pm
Garth
that bollox she sent me to abyss for saying sperm
October 16th, 2008 at 11:28 pm
yossarian - My father was a chief and my husband too so I see how they operate. As for myself I haven’t made up my mind yet. Night Night.