That Other Dog - Blacksmith Bureau

Blacksmith's latest (Thursday, November 13, 2014) is available at   blacksmithbureau.blogspot.com

The Blacksmith Bureau

Thursday, 13 November 2014
That Other Dog

sherlockWhen Conan Doyle wrote about the dog that didn’t bark in the night the development of radio, and therefore signal intelligence, was giving the age-old study of inference from silence and noise its biggest ever boost. Counter measures to defeat such inference* are confined largely to the military, intelligence and anti-terrorism sphere; they are too elaborate and resource-hungry to be used in the relatively unsophisticated information strategies of non-terrorist squads, such as those of Scotland Yard’s Operation Grange. **

So What Will Our Policy Be, Sir?

Given the crucial role that comment on the case had played in the original investigation Grange had to establish a communications policy in 2011. We know little about it or the discussions that must have surrounded its establishment. As far as the Tapas Nine are concerned, however, the primary information strategy has clearly been to announce that they are not suspects and then to say as little as possible about them.

But that virtual silence speaks louder than words. And it speaks of intentional misdirection. The price of such a policy has been the glaring absence of certain related information that we would expect to get if the “not suspects” claim was a demonstrably truthful one.

Look Over There!

The converse is also true: where the Yard’s apparent “likely suspects” in the case are concerned there is too much noise, whether it comes from leaks or Yard guidance to MSM correspondents. It is unheard of for a murder/kidnapping investigation to provide a window to a squad’s thinking while the fate of the victim is still unknown: such information, as many have pointed out, risks allowing suspects to flee and, even more important, virtually guarantees that the victim will not be found alive. Yet that is what the Yard has done: a clear picture has emerged from leaks, appeals for information and non-denials by the Yard both of techniques being used – local phone tracking, for example – and possible suspects, the smelly intruder, for instance, ex-Ocean Club employees or local petty drug users.

In contrast Tapas Nine “noise” is almost entirely absent from the Portuguese and British re-investigation squads. No information, for example, has been provided about what changed the status of the Nine to non-suspects. Have the questions in the Reconstruction Section of the archiving summary about the Seven been answered? Has the missing evidence “demonstrating the non-involvement” of the McCanns in the disappearance, referred to by Leicester police in their last formal statement on the pair, emerged? We don’t know because nothing has been said.

Shouting Their Innocence

If such information exists what possible reason could there be for not providing it and therefore releasing all Nine from the strange limbo in which they have lived since 2007? Six of them, at least, have continuing careers to manage – wouldn’t official exonerating evidence immediately make it easier for them to pursue promotion or new career directions? Or protect their children from rumour? Instead the cloud over their reputations remains, perhaps indefinitely since – as a Yard officer has said – the case “may never be solved”. In that case the files would remain secret – tantamount to a life sentence for all Nine. And what good reason could there be for not already acknowledging whether the Seven have given helpful information to Grange? Even in the liquidation of Bundleman, the single most important development in the case, the Yard are almost completely silent about Jane Tanner, what role, if any, she played in killing him off and what she had to say about the new development. Why would that be?

Again, close witnesses to a reviewed or re-investigated case are known to be candidates for “memory search”, detailed questioning in an attempt to prompt lost or half-forgotten memories to the surface. Some states even permit voluntary hypnosis, so important is the possibility of a hitherto un-regarded detail emerging via such a route. So have the Seven given any such assistance? The Yard haven’t said. The Seven themselves haven’t said. Why not?

These are witnesses, not suspects, we are told: there has never been any suggestion that witnesses in the case might be at any sort of risk requiring witness protection, so why the absolute blanket of silence that surrounds them still? Think about it: not a single “Now I can get on with my life at last” headline in the Mail from any of the Seven; and not a word from Jane Tanner saying how happy she is that the Yard have at last freed her from the suspicion of inventing Bundleman, by proving that someone resembling him really had walked by the apartment. This is the same Jane Tanner who cried publicly in frustration and pain that people could doubt her – yet she doesn’t announce her vindication. Whose decision was that?

Those Hidden Hands

Those who think that the absolute absence of comment in the UK media about the possible implications for the McCanns of Grange activities – the PDL searches, Bundleman’s destruction, the mooting by Redwood of death in the apartment – is due purely to fear of legal action or some other form of protection, must answer the question how come the silence about the Seven is even greater than the silence about the couple themselves?

The Seven don’t have the funds to keep a watching brief for libel and nobody has so far suggested that a hidden hand, or even a whitewasher (yawn), is at work on behalf of all Nine, so who can that leave as the cause of the silence and virtual invisibility? The police.

Lastly, readers in doubt should have a particular look at the Portuguese reporting of the re-investigation. British libel law doesn’t matter there and the opinion of the Portuguese majority is well known. And yet…Clearly some leaks have a closer connection with, or degree of blessing from, the PJ than others and it is just those – the ones claiming to know the details of the rogatory letters, for example – that are just as noisy about “the suspects” and just as silent about the “not-suspects” as the Yard squad is – indicating a shared and agreed policy. It is those outside the Yard/PJ, chiefly Goncalo and his associates, who are talking about the Nine while the others, along with the Yard, are leaving a silence, a void, at the heart of the investigation.

So why do you think that would be?

* It started with the military: since WW1 an army about to attack is ordered to observe radio silence so that a careless message cannot accidentally give away the date of the impending operation.

** Counter-measures: Since WW2 enemy army intelligence forces will scan for silence since complete silence is now recognized as the precursor of an attack. The attacking army will therefore provide a dummy silence elsewhere while deliberately creating artificial noise to disguise the original silence. All these rather dizzying measures lie at the heart of anti-terrorism operations – but not of Scotland Yard’s civil squads.

whatsupdoc wrote:
The Blacksmith Bureau

Thursday, 13 November 2014
That Other Dog

Shouting Their Innocence

If such information exists what possible reason could there be for not providing it and therefore releasing all Nine from the strange limbo in which they have lived since 2007? Six of them, at least, have continuing careers to manage – wouldn’t official exonerating evidence immediately make it easier for them to pursue promotion or new career directions? Or protect their children from rumour? Instead the cloud over their reputations remains, perhaps indefinitely since –  as a Yard officer has said – the case “may never be solved”. In that case the files would remain secret – tantamount to a life sentence for all Nine. And what good reason could there be for not already acknowledging whether the Seven have given helpful information to Grange? Even in the liquidation of Bundleman, the single most important development in the case, the Yard are almost completely silent about Jane Tanner, what role, if any, she played in killing him off and what she had to say about the new development. Why would that be?

Again, close witnesses to a reviewed or re-investigated case are known to be candidates for “memory search”, detailed questioning in an attempt to prompt lost or half-forgotten memories to the surface. Some states even permit voluntary hypnosis, so important is the possibility of a hitherto un-regarded detail emerging via such a route. So have the Seven given any such assistance? The Yard haven’t said. The Seven themselves haven’t said. Why not?

These are witnesses, not suspects, we are told: there has never been any suggestion that witnesses in the case might be at any sort of risk requiring witness protection, so why the absolute blanket of silence that surrounds them still? Think about it: not a single “Now I can get on with my life at last” headline in the Mail from any of the Seven; and not a word from Jane Tanner saying how happy she is that the Yard have at last  freed her from the suspicion of inventing Bundleman, by proving that someone resembling him really had walked by the apartment. This is the same Jane Tanner who cried publicly in frustration and pain that people could doubt her – yet she doesn’t  announce  her vindication. Whose decision was that?

nonsense.

Totally agree with you Marky.

As we say in French , B. "cherche midi à quatorze heures".
Anna, how would you translate?

I only C&P it to save people opening another site. I gave up reading Blacksmith some time ago.

frencheuropean wrote:Totally agree with you Marky.

As we say in French , B. "cherche midi à quatorze heures".
Anna, how would you translate?

translates looking 12.00 to 2.00pm but beyond that it's meaning is beyond me.

=complicate the issue, try to find a probleme when there is none.
Apparently the expression comes from Italie, in the past,when people counted 24 hours from the sunrise and not 12x2.

frencheuropean wrote:=complicate the issue, try to find a probleme when there is none.
Apparently the expression comes from Italie, in the past,when people counted 24 hours from the sunrise and not 12x2.

yup, that sums it up nicely.

I know Blacksmith is not popular with some posters but I just want to mention that he has posted Part Two "The Thirty/Forty Group".  It deals with Michael Wright, the McCann support group who monitor the internet and Brenda Leyland.  I found it interesting.