A lesser evil/Blacksmith

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The Blacksmith Bureau

Tuesday, 31 January 2012
A lesser evil

Descent into irrelevance

Leveson is now shrouded in an increasing atmosphere of futility. The inquiry, with all the grand trappings of screens, massed lawyers, strong legal powers and a judge whose air of self-importance has become more risible as his proceedings sink into irrelevance, was based on sand—an assumption from the beginning that “something had to be done” about the press, rather than merely throwing a light on its workings.

Unproven prior assumptions make bad law and worse tribunals. Not only has the truth of the assumption not been demonstrated but it has looked more and more superficial and misguided as the proceedings have progressed. The industry witnesses have rightly pointed out—after a shaky and slightly shamefaced beginning—that 98% of the problems have been nothing to do with regulation of the press but derive from the failure of the police and prosecution authorities to deal with the clear breaches of the law which phone hacking and surveillance involved. The other 2%,say, involve two very unusual cases, the Millie Dowler and McCann affairs and this time hard cases, as the old legal saying goes, also make bad law. As for the showbiz celebrity “victims” who strutted and flounced their way through proceedings like stoned peacocks, their mere memory has become an embarrassment.

Lurking in the background but rarely referred to is the knowledge that the inquiry’s eventual findings will either be pre-empted or overtaken by what comes out at the criminal trials now in prospect and by the expected measures to crack down on political lobbying and the use of the back door to Number Ten by media bosses.

That leaves the inquiry with virtually nothing significant to recommend but recommend it will, oh but it will. And that is the final guarantee of futility: almost every witness from the industry and its regulators has seen the proceedings, despite the comical Lord Justice’s protestations, as a potential threat to the freedom of the press, if only by the imposition of quasi-legalistic and detailed regulatory powers to a new PCC equivalent. And they are right. As a result the industry and its professional advisors—the crowd of high-powered lawyers for the press sitting at the back of the inquiry, including probably the sharpest legal brain in England, James Dingemans QC—will be ready to deal with the recommendations when they finally arrive. With such disparate bedfellows as steamy Richard Desmond, the editor of Private Eye, Ian Hislop, and Christopher Meyer of the PCC all united in defending the status quo, the likelihood is that all but the most anodyne of recommendations will be fought and, eventually, buried.

Back to our blind spot

From our own narrow perspective, the McCann affair, we have gained rather more than we expected. We regret that we have to allude yet again to our supposed blind spot about hidden hands and conspiracies, something which disappoints some of our readers. Yes, we have written reams about the subject over the years but we’ve failed to convince some that the evidence for any conspiracy to protect the McCanns by UK authorities is exactly on a par with the evidence for abduction: there isn’t any.

This led, of course, to our regrettable falling out with S. Amaral and his team. We wanted to help the truth come out by actively assisting his cause rather than merely theorizing and to a certain extent we did so, though here isn’t the place to give the details of that collaboration. At times we had wanted to clarify certain episodes such as the Jane Tanner/Robert Murat surveillance operation or the sequence of events in police headquarters on the night of September 6, which we felt were the twin keys to the whole case, but we eventually accepted that while others were able to assist us S. Amaral was unwilling to commit himself, quite possibly because he wanted to keep his powder dry—from everyone.

But the issue of UK protection for the McCanns was critical. Here there was no question of S. Amaral holding back information because of its potentially explosive future impact (now, now Jane, don’t worry so much): he talked about it openly in his book, his press interviews and on television. Now S. Amaral knows a great deal more about detection than any of us ever will; on the other hand the Bureau has a pretty good knowledge of how UK institutions, including the secret services, actually operate and S. Amaral’s claims simply didn’t tally with what we knew. So, ultimately, we had to ask him and his team to produce a single item of evidence, just one, on which he was basing his claims, to give us the confidence to go with him all the way.

Well, they couldn’t do it. We were given examples but they didn’t stand up. From here we move from facts to speculation, in this case that S. Amaral certainly had felt pressure but in our view it came from within Portugal, about which we know almost nothing, not from outside. With such a basic disagreement about the dynamics of the case. collaboration, sadly, was no longer possible.

Deep Waters, Watson, deep waters

So back to Leveson. As soon as the McCanns made their entrance we were reminded, once again, why so many people have felt there must be a secret explanation for the apparent untouchability of the pair. As we wrote previously Leveson himself was loftily dismissive (and if you dismiss you don’t learn) of the pressmen’s work and handled the McCanns with velvet gloves. It was, as we said, an unnecessarily excessive public display. But everybody else behaved similarly, including the very people who’d written the stories!

That is why we still believe that the Madeleine McCann affair is a psychological phenomenon, not merely a criminal one. How would any protection for the parents tally with these responses which we were able to watch live? That everyone was sworn to secrecy? That they were following a script? These questions will have to be answered, not because of opposing theories and egos but because the time approaches when they will be tested, and judged, in court.

We don’t claim to know the exact make-up of this complex psychological reaction but there it is, a gulf in attitudes to the pair as deep as the Grand Canyon between many people who have studied the case and “neutral” outsiders such as Lord Justice Leveson and the majority of the population. When describing the press reporting of the affair Sir Christopher Meyer, ex-head of the PCC, screwed his face up into an expression of disgust and called it “abominable”, reminding us of the way the good Lord Justice had thrown his head back as he muttered about the tittle-tattle. Why the intensity of the reactions?

Is it that back in 2007 both of them had allowed themselves to wonder whether the supposed leaks were right and now they are deeply ashamed that they ever had such thoughts? Just as the journalists who made their embarrassing apologies to the inquiry, for all the world like redeemed heretics, might be. And just as the most vituperative of the McCanns’ internet allies are when they talk of the bad old days — when they attacked the parents with the viciousness that they now reserve for the parents’ enemies. Those supporters actually talk in terms of having been indoctrinated into a quasi-satanic cult of hatred when they were sceptics and describe themselves as since being “saved”! Could anything more clearly demonstrate the psychological depths that lie beneath this investigation?

Meyer

Meyer barking

Meyer, by the way, an ex-ambassador to the United States, is a gentle reminder that intimidating behaviour by a diplomat, in Portugal or elsewhere, does not necessarily mean that they are using the secret power of the UK to subvert. It just comes naturally to many of them to bark at non-diplomats, partly because the only real power a diplomat has in this age of instant communication is the power to be rude and bossy to waiters, drivers, doormen and, possibly, overseas policemen. Or, as in this case, to counsel for the inquiry.

Meyer added that the parents were in “an impossible” position: they needed the press to help the search for their daughter and yet that exposed them to the damage that the press could do. It was, he said, a “Faustian bargain”, revealing, once again, the strange way that myth bubbles to the surface when people discuss the case. But was Meyer, a man given to the grand statement, correct? There are many of us who maintain that Gerry McCann should never have started the media ball rolling. The Portuguese police warned him he would be putting his daughter’s life at risk by doing so and for all we know they were right and she was slaughtered once her description hit the screens.

Oh no, says the chorus, people who know these things, experts, say that modern best practice is to give an abduction the widest publicity. Really? So Dr McCann just happened to know about this “modern best practice” on the night of May 3 when he started blabbing to the media did he? Why would that be?

And then Sir Christopher, who had been deeply involved in the affair, confirmed that experience and bullying doesn’t necessarily bring knowledge when he followed Team McCann’s untrue claim that in July 2007 the press were under pressure to create new and novel stories because nothing much was happening. It has to be repeated that this, however often and however loudly stated, is garbage: July is precisely when, as Kate McCann’s Madeleine confirms, things started happening as the police turned their attentions to the weaknesses in the parents’ version of events.

A free press—the lesser evil

What else did we learn at Leveson? Well, the Bureau has had to bite the bitter bullet and take the side of the journalists. The latter, and in particular, the tabloid editors, we had pictured as cynical exploiters deliberately supporting the McCanns early on for their own purposes; Medusa Brooks clearly is one but Colin Mylor equally clearly isn’t and the editor of the Mail on Sunday came across as a balanced and highly able professional. “Slimy” Morgan deserves his nickname but wasn’t involved in the McCann case. Such is the humanising power of TV, as it was when it brought The Pair to our screens.

Despite the fact that it suits internet blogs and journals to have the overground press hobbled by more legislation and regulation while we prosper, especially if we are located beyond UK jurisdiction, one has to hold one’s nose and say what most of the witnesses from the industry would like to have said and, in Richard Desmond’s case, almost did: f*** off lawyers and leave the press alone.
Posted by john blacksmith at 18:09

Interesting bit. Heads or tails of the story?


"This led, of course, to our regrettable falling out with S. Amaral and his team. We wanted to help the truth come out by actively assisting his cause rather than merely theorizing and to a certain extent we did so, though here isn’t the place to give the details of that collaboration. At times we had wanted to clarify certain episodes such as the Jane Tanner/Robert Murat surveillance operation or the sequence of events in police headquarters on the night of September 6, which we felt were the twin keys to the whole case, but we eventually accepted that while others were able to assist us S. Amaral was unwilling to commit himself, quite possibly because he wanted to keep his powder dry—from everyone.

But the issue of UK protection for the McCanns was critical. Here there was no question of S. Amaral holding back information because of its potentially explosive future impact (now, now Jane, don’t worry so much): he talked about it openly in his book, his press interviews and on television. Now S. Amaral knows a great deal more about detection than any of us ever will; on the other hand the Bureau has a pretty good knowledge of how UK institutions, including the secret services, actually operate and S. Amaral’s claims simply didn’t tally with what we knew. So, ultimately, we had to ask him and his team to produce a single item of evidence, just one, on which he was basing his claims, to give us the confidence to go with him all the way.

Well, they couldn’t do it. We were given examples but they didn’t stand up. From here we move from facts to speculation, in this case that S. Amaral certainly had felt pressure but in our view it came from within Portugal, about which we know almost nothing, not from outside. With such a basic disagreement about the dynamics of the case. collaboration, sadly, was no longer possible."

Jane Tanner must be worrid for what the future holds, any day this could all explode, and imo she will be right in the middle of it.

I remember the McCanns PDL reconstruction in their TV Documentry, Tanner was in tears, this made me realise imo just how much she was involved.

Lillyofthevalley wrote:Jane Tanner must be worrid for what the future holds, any day this could all explode, and imo she will be right in the middle of it.

I remember the McCanns PDL reconstruction in their TV Documentry, Tanner was in tears, this made me realise imo just how much she was involved.

Do you remember when she tried to back up gerry with the 'football comment' in this documentary, which gerry totally cut her off. It was all so obvious

Blacksmith still refuses to admit that there was government interference in the investigation, both British and Portuguese. This has nothing to do with being conspiracy nuts. Blacksmith has always insisted that the case was shelved due to lack of evidence, but he brushes aside the fact that the investigation was not carried out as far as it could have gone.

The Smith family was not interviewed. They were more than willing to come to Portugal to answer questions, but strangely the rogatory interview was sent to England not Ireland. AFAIK it was never forwarded to Ireland. Kate mentioned in her book that someone saw her and Gerry carrying a black bag on the morning of the 4th. AFAIK this was never properly looked into. I don't think they even investigated which apartment the couple was seen going into in PdL. Considering the cadaver smell and body fluids found in the McCanns' hire car why did the PJ not investigate their strange trip to Huelva? Paulo Rebel left the Leicester Police station just before David Payne's interview. Why? Was this a responsible thing to do as DP was the last person outside of the parents to see Maddie alive?

There was the immediate reaction of the British Ambassador, something never before seen. Why did Gordon Brown and José Sócrates the then Portuguese PM talk about the case during the Lisbon treaty meetings? This does NOT involve secret services and such. It's just government interference. Why did Pinto Monteiro call the shelving of the case "the solution"? This type of interference was very well portrayed in the book "Belle Famille".

You are right Colonel.
About the word "solution", in Belle Famille, there is , among others, this interesting bit.
It's when the mother is nearly caught, everybody believes that she did it and Tony, her brother doesn't know what to do:


" La solution parvint, une fois encore du sommet, lorsque le ministre de l'Intérieur fit une déclaration publique en faveur de Laurence. Il n'y avait que l'Europe pour accuser la victime [i]avant d'avoir puni les coupables.L'humiliation faite à une mère était intolérable."

Very fast translation : the solution came again from the top, when the Interior Minsiter,spoke publicy in favour of Laurence. Only in Europe one could accuse the victim before having caught the culprits. The humiliation caused to a mother was unbearable.

He says,after, that the French police didn't coroborate the findings of the Italians who should better question how their democratie works. ch.34

When I think about this whole scam, I always question just what is the motive for this government inference to the unprecedented level they have shown. It can't be because of the mccanns, governments are not interested if 2 ordinary NHS doctors neglected their child or are covering up a fatal accident in a holiday resort. this is not the sort of thing on a governments agenda or interests. Which leads me to the conclusion that the government can only have 'something' they really need to hide, its the only logical answer for all this

jd16 wrote:When I think about this whole scam, I always question just what is the motive for this government inference to the unprecedented level they have shown. It can't be because of the mccanns, governments are not interested if 2 ordinary NHS doctors neglected their child or are covering up a fatal accident in a holiday resort. this is not the sort of thing on a governments agenda or interests. Which leads me to the conclusion that the government can only have 'something' they really need to hide, its the only logical answer for all this

That is indubitable. Which takes us back to earlier stories.
It is not even to protect a pedophile circle or such because they would just pick a scapegoat and set him up for the fall. It has to be something very controversial. Stem cell research is prickly for many including american presidential candidates. How would a child killed either accidentally or deliberately and it became known that the child was actually part of a cloning process. Hence the mystery of the many perplexing images of Madeleine that had a similarity but not an exactness.
If all the other children were part of the process they would be obliged to cover up the death in order to protect themselves. Far more likely than them being swingers and needing to cover that up. It is hardly such a big deal.

And the reason the government is covering up is because they have been behind the process......

To me this is the only reason they could have been protected as they have......,.
Rather look incompetent, corrupt, guilty of not caring for a 3 old rather than the truth be told.

I think its clear to the human eye its the government powers are pulling all the strings behind the scenes here

I have my own ideas what they are covering up but am not going to say here, there is one that ticks all the boxes but without proof then I am keeping it to myself. Hopefully Pat or someone will unearth some new facts next week which we can work on & point us in the right direction. If there is anyone that can discover something it is Pat

It's the kind of theorie ( clone) welcome by the pros to justify the insult of "nutters".

I think that the minister, intervened at the beginning to boost his popularity and , after, it was too late to come back.

frencheuropean wrote:It's the kind of theorie welcome by the pros to justify the insult of "nutters".

I think that the minister, intervened at the beginning to boost his popularity and , after, it was too late to come back.

To be honest I am not interested in the pro's or anything they have to say or insult people with. They are irrelevant in the whole scheme of things

The only thing I am interested in is getting to the truth, whatever it is

And from my life's experiences, people only do things for their own motivations & interests unless it is family related

I think that Artur Dreyfus has the measure of the McCann case.

As stated in excellent contributions above there was too much political interference from the outset - the McCanns et al through friends and relatives (the called in favours) had political contacts to help them. UK and Portugal have their skeletons in closets around paedophilia (if that is the main link) - and each country possesses enough dirt on each other to bury the other if necessary.

You do not need to be a conspiracist afficiando to recognise the potential for some leverage being applied.

Everything seemed to be going well for the McCanns and (lets call them) handlers until Eddie and Keela put a spanner in the works. From that moment on the bandwagon has run on 3 wheels at most - damage limitation - Kate McCann not answering questions which if she was truly innocent of any possible involvement in Madeleine's demise would have been easy to account for.

Rebelo was brought in to make it seem that something was being done to find a live Madeleine but a man of his status would have recognised the futility of that - like Dr Amaral he knew (as much as one can from available evidence) that Madeleine was more than likely dead before she left the apartment. Rebelo was politically hamstrung from both sides - the rogatory interviews were a sad joke, heavily weighted towards the T7 (I think that Rebelo was trying to catch the T7 out but it required rigorous questioning and follow up work) and even then the T7 made an absolute dog's dinner of answering questions coherently and with any conviction.

If this case was a television series you would just not believe any of it. Sadly it's real life and passes at attempting to get justice for a young girl.

It was on first reading these statements that I realised what a cover up this was. I have never read so much drivel or pathetic use of the english language in my life, and these are people who are perceived to hold good positions in our society. I counted 1,738 'you knows' in david paynes statement alone! staggering imo

One thing nobody can ever deny about life, is that dogs do not lie!!!!

jd16 wrote:

frencheuropean wrote:It's the kind of theorie welcome by the pros to justify the insult of "nutters".

I think that the minister, intervened at the beginning to boost his popularity and , after, it was too late to come back.

To be honest I am not interested in the pro's or anything they have to say or insult people with. They are irrelevant in the whole scheme of things

The only thing I am interested in is getting to the truth, whatever it is

And from my life's experiences, people only do things for their own motivations & interests unless it is family related

My post was for humanist. I haven't seen your post when I posted my comment. sorry for that

frencheuropean wrote:

jd16 wrote:

frencheuropean wrote:It's the kind of theorie welcome by the pros to justify the insult of "nutters".

I think that the minister, intervened at the beginning to boost his popularity and , after, it was too late to come back.

To be honest I am not interested in the pro's or anything they have to say or insult people with. They are irrelevant in the whole scheme of things

The only thing I am interested in is getting to the truth, whatever it is

And from my life's experiences, people only do things for their own motivations & interests unless it is family related

My post was for humanist. I haven't see your post when I posted my comment. sorry for that

That alright frencheuropean I am just not interested in the slightest what any pro has to say unless they are being adult and factual....I have as yet to see or hear just one!

jd16 wrote:I think its clear to the human eye its the government powers are pulling all the strings behind the scenes here

I have my own ideas what they are covering up but am not going to say here, there is one that ticks all the boxes but without proof then I am keeping it to myself. Hopefully Pat or someone will unearth some new facts next week which we can work on & point us in the right direction. If there is anyone that can discover something it is Pat

I'v recently read Pat's book 'The Profiler' and, having worked in that field for many years, she certainly knows her stuff. Whilst undoubtably Tony has been a huge thorn in the McCanns side they have over-estimated the threat he posed to them. By wasting time and money chasing him through the courts, I believe TM have taken their eye off the ball. The real threat to them imo comes in the formidable shape of Pat Brown. I have heard her talking at length about this case on tv and radio shows...Americans are sitting up and taking notice and, as she is respected for her work in profiling, she is not being dismissed as a nutter. Pat comes over as very credible and likeable with interviewers and audiences alike and her good sense of humour also goes in her favour. As well as having a large following in America she is becoming very popular in the UK. Try as they might, TM will find it very hard to discredit Pat or portray as a hate figure...she is way too smart for TM and believe she will be their un-doing in the end.

Autumn wrote:

jd16 wrote:I think its clear to the human eye its the government powers are pulling all the strings behind the scenes here

I have my own ideas what they are covering up but am not going to say here, there is one that ticks all the boxes but without proof then I am keeping it to myself. Hopefully Pat or someone will unearth some new facts next week which we can work on & point us in the right direction. If there is anyone that can discover something it is Pat

I'v recently read Pat's book 'The Profiler' and, having worked in that field for many years, she certainly knows her stuff. Whilst undoubtably Tony has been a huge thorn in the McCanns side they have over-estimated the threat he posed to them. By wasting time and money chasing him through the courts, I believe TM have taken their eye off the ball. The real threat to them imo comes in the formidable shape of Pat Brown. I have heard her talking at length about this case on tv and radio shows...Americans are sitting up and taking notice and, as she is respected for her work in profiling, she is not being dismissed as a nutter. Pat comes over as very credible and likeable with interviewers and audiences alike and her good sense of humour also goes in her favour. As well as having a large following in America she is becoming very popular in the UK. Try as they might, TM will find it very hard to discredit Pat or portray as a hate figure...she is way too smart for TM and believe she will be their un-doing in the end.

I totally agree Autumn. Pat is one smart lady, and what the mccanns have totally ignored or missed is that in her book she was trying to make the facts fit to their abduction fairytale, only the facts did not & could not fit!! Banning her book on Amazon was their biggest mistake to date, they never thought she would be taking 'them' to court!!

As stated above, Pat Brown has come at this case from the original angle from which the parents reported Madeleine missing - ie as an abducted person. This follows the pattern set by both Amaral and Rebelo. It is hopefully how SY will conduct their review. Once abduction is ruled out as implausible then the problems start if there is, as appears, something untoward holding up the investigation.

Off the thread but I was amazed to see the Mrs Gaspar statement put out with the rest of the published documents - it is a real firebrand of a document. If the PJ and English counterparts were unsure of its provenance or the trustworthiness of the writer then I think it would have been held back from publication. The letter lurks there unanswered by the McCanns and Mitchell, newspapers have not picked it up and run with it - how often in such a case can something be put into the public domain by the investigators with such potential for journalists to have a field-day with it? And no libel case either - it's too hot to handle so it's ignored but it taunts them because anyone who wants to find it can do so - so don't draw attention to it is their motto.

One final thing - I was not fully aware of the Madeleine disappearance until 5 May when I read the Saturday Times - I had stayed up beyond midnight 3/4 May reading but with the Scottish Elections on the television. I did not watch tv on Friday morning and really have no recollection of seeing the McCanns on tv all in the first week or so after 4 May. The strange thing is that I seem to recall a news flash about a girl being kidnapped in Portugal - and it must have been during the very early hours of the morning of 4 May - on BBC. Am I suffering from some hallucinatory experience - under the illusion that what I thought had happened had not happened? I can't say that I became really aware of the way the case was unfolding until late August 2007 - I had discussed the case with colleagues but I had no idea of the intrigues going on. I tend to trust my memory - perhaps it let me down - darned odd.

humanist wrote:

jd16 wrote:When I think about this whole scam, I always question just what is the motive for this government inference to the unprecedented level they have shown. It can't be because of the mccanns, governments are not interested if 2 ordinary NHS doctors neglected their child or are covering up a fatal accident in a holiday resort. this is not the sort of thing on a governments agenda or interests. Which leads me to the conclusion that the government can only have 'something' they really need to hide, its the only logical answer for all this

That is indubitable. Which takes us back to earlier stories.
It is not even to protect a pedophile circle or such because they would just pick a scapegoat and set him up for the fall. It has to be something very controversial. Stem cell research is prickly for many including american presidential candidates. How would a child killed either accidentally or deliberately and it became known that the child was actually part of a cloning process. Hence the mystery of the many perplexing images of Madeleine that had a similarity but not an exactness.
If all the other children were part of the process they would be obliged to cover up the death in order to protect themselves. Far more likely than them being swingers and needing to cover that up. It is hardly such a big deal.

And the reason the government is covering up is because they have been behind the process......

To me this is the only reason they could have been protected as they have......,.
Rather look incompetent, corrupt, guilty of not caring for a 3 old rather than the truth be told.

I really cannot accept the cloning theory. As far as I know, one of the main problems with cloning has not be resolved, that of aging since the cells used generally come from adults. That was the big problem with Dolly the sheep: she developed physical conditions associated with a much older animal. Perhaps we should steer clear of theories that demand a background in genetics to back up our posing them.

I still favour the Useless parents cock up theory but find it hard to explain away the high level of Political interference without a lean towards something more sinister.
Paedophilia is a possibility and that would cross all party's and we've seen what can happen in Jersey.I for one have never ruled out stem cell research/cloning and i dont think i could ever be accused of being a 'pro',i think most people are very quick to dismiss it as a looney tune but it would be naive to suggest it is not happening,who would believe we have goats that produce spider silk ?