A Dissection of the EBook about the McCanns

Like all of you I have been trying to understand what is going on here, the ups and downs and I can't make up my mind whether Redwood is the village idiot or a very clever Detective slowly unravelling this complicated case. The Press are at fever pitch with their reporting , especially, sky and the Sun, both owned by Murdoch ., the Sun being instrumental in persuading Cameron to order an investigation.

answers on a Postcard please.

They are circling alright!

Panda wrote:Like all of you I have been trying to understand what is going on here, the ups and downs and I can't make up my mind whether Redwood is the village idiot or a very clever Detective slowly unravelling this complicated case. The Press are at fever pitch with their reporting , especially, sky and the Sun, both owned by Murdoch ., the Sun being instrumental in persuading Cameron to order an investigation.

answers on a Postcard please. 

In my opinion it is not right to call him an idiot or other names. He may have had to take this case and not wanted it. If he does have some suspicion about the McCanns, he and his team would have to be very careful. Imagine what would happen if any accusation was made without 100% evidence? Their jobs would be finished.

We are in a different position because we can say our theories about the events, but he can not.

But the main things in my opinion that made the abduction story unbelievable are very obvious things, very simple things. For example, the apparent family problems before the holiday (airport bus and fact this video was kept and released), the very small amount of holiday photos when they had digital cameras (especially from the 3rd), leaving the children on the 3rd after the crying for no good reason (I do not believe even bad parents would take this risk of more crying being heard). Plus the strange behavior of the McCanns that many people noticed.

I think if someone is a detective, they would naturally notice these things and would consider anything strange to be important. So I do not believe any detective would consider it 100% sure that the McCanns were not involved. So whatever we see on television or in newspapers. I believe they will also be looking carefully at the McCanns.

morning all - they are circling alright - have they got the balls to dive down and catch their prey - and are they willing to share with portugal thats the big question

DavidA wrote:

Panda wrote:Like all of you I have been trying to understand what is going on here, the ups and downs and I can't make up my mind whether Redwood is the village idiot or a very clever Detective slowly unravelling this complicated case. The Press are at fever pitch with their reporting , especially, sky and the Sun, both owned by Murdoch ., the Sun being instrumental in persuading Cameron to order an investigation.

answers on a Postcard please. 

In my opinion it is not right to call him an idiot or other names. He may have had to take this case and not wanted it. If he does have some suspicion about the McCanns, he and his team would have to be very careful. Imagine what would happen if any accusation was made without 100% evidence? Their jobs would be finished.

We are in a different position because we can say our theories about the events, but he can not.

But the main things in my opinion that made the abduction story unbelievable are very obvious things, very simple things. For example, the apparent family problems before the holiday (airport bus and fact this video was kept and released), the very small amount of holiday photos when they had digital cameras (especially from the 3rd), leaving the children on the 3rd after the crying for no good reason (I do not believe even bad parents would take this risk of more crying being heard). Plus the strange behavior of the McCanns that many people noticed.

I think if someone is a detective, they would naturally notice these things and would consider anything strange to be important. So I do not believe any detective would consider it 100% sure that the McCanns were not involved. So whatever we see on television or in newspapers. I believe they will also be looking carefully at the McCanns.

If they are making any proper attempt to do their job, they most certain should be looking at the whole holiday group. They are more likely to get closer to the truth from one or two of the others of them, than they are from the McCanns.

DavidA wrote:

Panda wrote:Like all of you I have been trying to understand what is going on here, the ups and downs and I can't make up my mind whether Redwood is the village idiot or a very clever Detective slowly unravelling this complicated case. The Press are at fever pitch with their reporting , especially, sky and the Sun, both owned by Murdoch ., the Sun being instrumental in persuading Cameron to order an investigation.

answers on a Postcard please. 

In my opinion it is not right to call him an idiot or other names. He may have had to take this case and not wanted it. If he does have some suspicion about the McCanns, he and his team would have to be very careful. Imagine what would happen if any accusation was made without 100% evidence? Their jobs would be finished.

We are in a different position because we can say our theories about the events, but he can not.

But the main things in my opinion that made the abduction story unbelievable are very obvious things, very simple things. For example, the apparent family problems before the holiday (airport bus and fact this video was kept and released), the very small amount of holiday photos when they had digital cameras (especially from the 3rd), leaving the children on the 3rd after the crying for no good reason (I do not believe even bad parents would take this risk of more crying being heard). Plus the strange behavior of the McCanns that many people noticed.

I think if someone is a detective, they would naturally notice these things and would consider anything strange to be important. So I do not believe any detective would consider it 100% sure that the McCanns were not involved. So whatever we see on television or in newspapers. I believe they will also be looking carefully at the McCanns.

Morning David 1, What bothers me though is the fact that 37 Detectives and 5 Clerical Staff have spent over 2 years and £5 million on this investigation and come up with virtually nothing. It's not even as if they had to start from scratch, all the information was in the Files prepared by the Portugese.

cass wrote:morning all - they are circling alright - have they got the balls to dive down and catch their prey - and are they willing to share with portugal thats the big question

Morning cass, what their remit is I can't figure out, some say it is to hold the lid down on the case for Governmental reasons , but what on Earth could be so vital for the Government to want this???? Tony Blair famously or infamously issued a D Notice on the Sunday Herald to stop them investigating pedophilia/homosexuality in Government . Could Gerry have info of some kind which the British government doesn't want aired?

Panda wrote:

DavidA wrote:

Panda wrote:Like all of you I have been trying to understand what is going on here, the ups and downs and I can't make up my mind whether Redwood is the village idiot or a very clever Detective slowly unravelling this complicated case. The Press are at fever pitch with their reporting , especially, sky and the Sun, both owned by Murdoch ., the Sun being instrumental in persuading Cameron to order an investigation.

answers on a Postcard please. 

In my opinion it is not right to call him an idiot or other names. He may have had to take this case and not wanted it. If he does have some suspicion about the McCanns, he and his team would have to be very careful. Imagine what would happen if any accusation was made without 100% evidence? Their jobs would be finished.

We are in a different position because we can say our theories about the events, but he can not.

But the main things in my opinion that made the abduction story unbelievable are very obvious things, very simple things. For example, the apparent family problems before the holiday (airport bus and fact this video was kept and released), the very small amount of holiday photos when they had digital cameras (especially from the 3rd), leaving the children on the 3rd after the crying for no good reason (I do not believe even bad parents would take this risk of more crying being heard). Plus the strange behavior of the McCanns that many people noticed.

I think if someone is a detective, they would naturally notice these things and would consider anything strange to be important. So I do not believe any detective would consider it 100% sure that the McCanns were not involved. So whatever we see on television or in newspapers. I believe they will also be looking carefully at the McCanns.

Morning David 1, What bothers me though is the fact that 37 Detectives and 5 Clerical Staff have spent over 2 years and £5 million on this investigation and come up with virtually nothing. It's not even as if they had to start from scratch, all the information was in the Files prepared by the Portugese.

I don't think it is so simple Panda. They had substantial amounts of info from the PJ, yes. But in the interests of fairness and good work practice, I would expect them to take nothing at face value and start at the beginning, verifying every single fact for themselves.

Never trust anybody but yourself is good advice and if this case ever gets to court one single answer by SY to a defence question along the lines of we know because the PJ said so could damage their case.

They, if they re doing their job correctly, should go back to the beginning and start again. This will involve manpower which will always cost money.

I firmly believe, as it stands today, the events of this past week have told us only what SY want us to know. Forget everything that is in the press, positive and negative, it's best ignored completely.

I'm going to believe Mr Redwood is doing the job he is paid to do in a fair and proper manner until we know for certain to the contrary. It will be a frustrating journey but it might just be worth it.

Panda wrote:
Morning David 1, What bothers me though is the fact that 37 Detectives and 5 Clerical Staff have spent over 2 years and £5 million on this investigation and come up with virtually nothing.

... that we know about, yet.

I can't believe that all 37 detectives are "useless", statistics prove that there must at least be a couple with some brains. And I don't believe it's a whitewash, either; it only takes one of them to blow the lid. One out of 37. The chain is only as strong as the weakest link.

@ mossman and Iris......it doesn't account for the fact that after all this manpower, nothing, except a follow-up on Smith and established that the children were not monitored between 9pm and 10pm. SY are supposed to be the finest , Redwoods Efit is being ridiculed and only NOW has he decided Smith could be a useful Witness .!!!

[quote="Panda"]

@ mossman and Iris......it doesn't account for the fact that after all this manpower, nothing, except a follow-up on Smith and established that the children were not monitored between 9pm and 10pm.  SY are supposed to be the finest , Redwoods Efit is being ridiculed and only NOW has he decided Smith could be a useful Witness .!!![/quote


Panda, what you say cannot be disputed. I just think that at this point in time, it is good to draw a line under what has happened to date and give Redwood a chance. We are surely approaching an outcome, which in itself is progress. When we know the outcome, we can ask for answers to the questions you so rightly ask. Doing it now though, could be advantageous to those trying to cover up a crime, it muddies the water and clouds people's judgements.

Personally, if I don't take this approach I could go mad.

I agree Panda...seems nothing new to me so far on what we have been told ...just seems at the moment SY are plugging this Smith sighting and taking the credit for it as a " new development in the case"...something Portugal wanted to do years ago. Of course we can only comment on what we are told. So far not impressed. Hope I am wrong in thinking they are just trying to justify all the money spent to no avail.JMO

mossman wrote:

Panda wrote:

@ mossman and Iris......it doesn't account for the fact that after all this manpower, nothing, except a follow-up on Smith and established that the children were not monitored between 9pm and 10pm.  SY are supposed to be the finest , Redwoods Efit is being ridiculed and only NOW has he decided Smith could be a useful Witness .!!!

Panda, what you say cannot be disputed.  I just think that at this point in time, it is good to draw a line under what has happened to date and give Redwood a chance.  We are surely approaching an outcome, which in itself  is progress.  When we know the outcome, we can ask for answers to the questions you so rightly ask.  Doing it now though, could be advantageous to those trying to cover up a crime, it muddies the water and clouds people's judgements.

Personally, if I don't take this approach I could go mad.

It is a fair point Panda. But as Iris said, we do not know that they do not know more. I am sure that if Redwood came to the same conclusion as Amaral, that he would not want to say this in public at this stage.

However, what is fascinating in my opinion is that after a $5 million operation, they are re-confirming what Amaral initially suggested, particularly the Smith sighting and also that the timeline, that came mainly from the tapas group (whether intentional or not), was probably not correct.

At what point did GA start to seriously suspect the McCanns? Maybe Redwood has not arrived there yet. Or maybe he has but knows he can not say this with 100% proof.

The Crimewatch program was a controlled release of only certain information that they want to verify/get more witnesses to. Maybe a lot of the other lines of enquiry do not need any further input from the general public as they are already getting all of the ducks in a row.

SteveT wrote:The Crimewatch program was a controlled release of only certain information that they want to verify/get more witnesses to. Maybe a lot of the other lines of enquiry do not need any further input from the general public as they are already getting all of the ducks in a row.

As if .....Steve T:haha:  We have been told that 41 persons need to be found and eliminated, 13 in the U.K. and the rest in various Countries , yet after 2 and a half years only one Efit has been produced, what have SY been doing all this time???

I think it goes back to the same problem the PJ had - all the evidence shows them one thing, their experience and knowledge gained over many years in their line of work tells them the same thing, but having enough physical evidence to firstly get the CPS to agree to prosecute, then successfully prosecuting, is a totally different ball game.

Coupled with all of those hurdles, we know without doubt there was, let us call it outside interference, which benefited the MCCanns. If the current team of detectives are fine upstanding citizens and wish to honestly solve this mystery, then they have to have much more than a standard watertight case. It needs to go one step further than beyond reasonable doubt.

I am not living in a parallel universe and absolutely acknowledge the potential for a whitewash. I would just like to give the detectives the benefit of the doubt until such time as I know for certain it has gone in that direction.

2007 in some ways was not long ago, in other ways it is a lifetime. Things have changed so much in such a short period of time, not least the progression of social media. This has played a large part in the recent spate of publicising of cover ups and scandals, those who enabled cover ups are becoming more wary. People will be less likely to put their neck out as a favour for a friend of a friend.

I think it could yet turn out that the most important piece of work the PJ did in this case was shelving it. The publication of the files was a stroke of genius something we should be very grateful for. SY know they have to disprove, satisfactorily, everything that is there. They know people will only be fobbed off with miracles like the crèche man once, they know they cannot continue to produce such amazing revelations or this case will never ever go away.

The PJ did not have a body, neither do SY. If they did, case closed, so they have to look and think outside the box very carefully.

It's going to be a waiting game, but people here are used to that. Just don't let frustration totally damn all of the police officers working on the case now, or else we are little better than those who damn the PJ and their work.

Trust needs to be earned and I know little has been done to instill trust in the system but I have to believe the majority of people are good, otherwise we should turn off the lights and abandon ship.

So think pink every time you read a newspaper from now on and wait and see what Redwood has to say for himself.

The McCanns could have been charged with neglect, or neglect causing harm which after a time was obvious. The Portugese Prosecutor asked a Judge if there was enough evidence to go to Trial and the Judge said "show me the body" which is the crux of this investigation surely, to find Madeleine's body . The dingo Baby was a similar case , the Parents were not believed , divorced , and years later a blood stained cardigan was found in the Outback and If you remember Jon Benet's case the Parents were villified and were forced to leave the State mossman. The Review and Investigation will be proved fruitless and it has been the McCanns demands that instigated it, not the British Government . The McCanns had £2 million in the Fund by Christmas 2007, yet instead of employing Private investigators with experience of searching for missing children, they squandered money on Investigators more experiencd ar money laundering. Theri arrogance is astounding.!!!

I know Panda but they were never prosecuted with neglect not least because they were protected. All I am saying is it is not over yet rather than driving myself crazy trying to read between the lines of half baked press reports and second guess what the police are or are not doing.

Things take time and yes it is going on and on and on, but the upshot is if they think she died at the hand of someone that she was with on holiday, under normal circumstances they would have a hard time proving it without a body. Add all of the outside interference to the mix and it is doubly difficult.

They will not have a second chance at this, it is all or nothing. The amount of money being spent is at a ridiculous level, there must surely be somebody somewhere who considers it justifiable. Otherwise why not carry out the review then say we have reviewed it, we haven't a clue, yes she was abducted but we cannot afford to spend anymore time on money on this. It is unsolvable. They could also have made up a likely scenario whilst reviewing it and hand it back to the Portugese telling them to solve it. We know their stance on it, so they could always lay the blame for inaction at their doorstep.

There were surely quicker, easier and cheaper ways to whitewash whilst it was still a review. Why are they bothering to carry on ? They did not have to progress the review any further. All they have done now is open a whole can of worms and given many more people more information which puts the parents in a bad light. Half the world have never heard of the Smiths, they do now.

The more people being involved in this, the more information being publicised, the bigger chance of somebody somewhere spilling the beans. A dangerous way to cover things up.

mossman wrote:I know Panda but they were never prosecuted with neglect not least because they were protected.  All I am saying is it is not over yet rather than driving myself crazy trying to read between the lines of half baked press reports and second guess what the police are or are not doing.

Things take time and yes it is going on and on and on, but the upshot is if they think she died at the hand of someone that she was with on holiday, under normal circumstances they would have a hard time proving it without a body.  Add all of the outside interference to the mix and it is doubly difficult.

They will not have a second chance at this, it is all or nothing.  The amount of money being spent is at a ridiculous level, there must surely be somebody somewhere who considers it justifiable.  Otherwise why not carry out the review then say we have reviewed it, we haven't a clue, yes she was abducted but we cannot afford to spend anymore time on money on this.  It is unsolvable.  They could also have made up a likely scenario whilst reviewing it and hand it back to the Portugese telling them to solve it.  We know their stance on it, so they could always lay the blame for inaction at their doorstep.  

There were surely quicker, easier and cheaper ways to whitewash whilst it was still a review.  Why are they bothering to carry on ?  They did not have to progress the review any further.  All they have done now is open a whole can of worms and given many more people more information which puts the parents in a bad light.  Half the world have never heard of the Smiths, they do now.

The more people being involved in this, the more information being publicised, the bigger chance of somebody somewhere spilling the beans.  A dangerous way to cover things up.

Maybe at the end of the day mossman, Redwood will prove more canny than I give him credit for, softly softly catchee monkey approach. The problem remains though that without a body, nothing can be  proved. Why did SY think an unvestigation would prove more fruitful, they had already read all the information in the files ?

Panda, I would not bet against you:kiss: 

mossman wrote:Panda, I would not bet against you:kiss: 

mossman, I can't help thinking that Redwood is clutching at straws, he made the big mistake initially of becoming too friendly with the McCanns, giving them a Report on progress, that presupposed they were innocent in his eyes so he tainted the investigation from the beginning , see what I mean??

We have had a few discussions on here before now about the Smith sighting and I never believed that the way a Father holds his child is sufficient evidence to implicate Gerry. For what it's worth I believe Madeleine died in 5a accidentally and was hidden in Gerry's Tennis bag until he had a chance to dispose of it. Wasn't there a rumour that Gerry asked to borrow Murat's Car to go to the Chemist and get some Medicine for one of the children , can anyone remember this?

Thought part of Crimewatch would be an appeal for mobile phone numbers that were forensically found to be around the "hotspots" in the days leading up to & including 'abduction' night...but alas No
Maybe part of the CW reconstruction was giving known suspects(found through mobile phone forensic timelines)the chance to come forward & rule themselves out...was it a stroke of genius by Redwood in asking "SmithMan" to come forward & rule himself out of inquiries whilst Gerry was sat feet away?

matthew wrote:Thought part of Crimewatch would be an appeal for mobile phone numbers that were forensically found to be around the "hotspots" in the days leading up to & including 'abduction' night...but alas No
Maybe part of the CW reconstruction was giving known suspects(found through mobile phone forensic timelines)the chance to come forward & rule themselves out...was it a stroke of genius by Redwood in asking "SmithMan" to come forward & rule himself out of inquiries whilst Gerry was sat feet away?

Hi matthew, I don't remember that bit? Smith was never considered a suspect, more like a Witness. At roughly 10pm Smith passes a Man carrying a child and then months later seeing someone carrying their child in the same way at an Airport is a bit thin to suggest it was the same man. ie Gerry. There were 11 children in the Creche that night could have been any Father passing Smith. To carry any child on one side is easier than in both arms and gives a free arm if needed.

If the "abductor" passed the Smiths & he had a mobile phone on him then SY have or will be finding locations of where mobile phones were at that exact time...just hope the "abductor" had his phone on him.. iykwim
11 children in the OC creche had no right being carried down that road towards the beach & the Smiths sighting witnessed the child being carried upright...TannerMan was carrying the child with arms outstretched

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-13386785

4 October: Scotland Yard detectives say mobile phone records may hold the key to solving the case. There are 41 potential suspects, they say.

Justice will prevail.