Smith Statement

Panda wrote:Morning mossman, well if it WAS Mrs Smith who said it...see how sloppy Reporters are? it makes all the difference.


However, here we are with the Crime of the Century as far as Portugal is concerned, yet the PJ made no attempt while he was in PDL in May and the McCanns were still there to take him around PDL like they did Tanner. Had he confirmed then that Gerry was the Man he saw , his Family would have backed him up and we wouldn't be writing this.

I believe Smith and his Family saw someone, but it wasn't Gerry.

Mrs Smith was even close enough to ask if she was asleep.
http://thepottingshedder.blogspot.com/2010/11/what-smiths-really-saw.html

Can't find Mary Smith's statement, anyone got a link to it please?

mossman wrote:Hi Panda, I went to find Mrs Smiths statement but found something else first which i have copied below. It is, for me anyway, interesting, in particular the phrases used, which i have highlighted. Now I know for a fact that when i became interested in all of this i read a document which said mr smith had stated he was saying he was only 80% sure it was mccann he saw because having discussed it with his wife he thought it better to leave a little room for doubt as he was aware what he was saying could ruin somebodys life and on the off chance he was wrong he was going to say he was only 80% sure. This is what he was saying in general terms, what i read was written far more clearly and eloquently than i am doing here. It was absolutely not from a press article as at that time i made a point of reading only the official files and not press articles so that i would have the background in my head and would know it to be true.

This evening i am going to go back and find that document along with mrs smiths statement which i cannot seem to find at the minute. But from below mr smith seems to be rather shaken and it is copied mr stuart prior. I assume returning to the uk is an error and should be ireland.

Still after all perhaps you are right and it was not mccann they saw. The fact that the mccanns don't want to talk about him though is strange.


Email from John Hughes to DIC Portimao, C.C. to Stuart Prior
20th September 2007

Subject: Fwd Smith family

From Lindsay Long to John Hughes

20th September 2007

Re – Smith family

Location : Portugal Out of Force Area

Origin: Mr Martin Smith Ireland.

Text: Reported that he had passed a male carrying a child in Praia da Luz the night Maddie went missing. Went and made a statement to Portugal police in Portimao on 26th May and returned to UK. Is saying that after seeing the McCanns on the news on 9th Sept when they returned to UK he has not slept and is worried sick. He states he was watching the 10 PM on BBC and saw the McCanns getting off the plane and coming down the steps. He states it was like watching an action replay of the night he saw the male carrying the child back in Portugal. He states the way Gerry was carrying his twin triggered something in his head. It was exactly the same way and look of the male seen the night Maddie went missing . He also watched ITV news and Sky news and inferred it looked like the same person both times carrying the children.

Is asking a member of OP task ring him back. He was with group of 9 family and friends the night he saw the male in Portugal. He sounded quite worried and shaken whilst speaking to me

Thanks mossman ....your'e so clever at finding stuff , see if you can fine the date the McCanns returned to the U.K. ...TA

http://forum2.aimoo.com/MadeleineMcCann/Individual-Topics/McCluskey-Smith-Statements-Similarities-1-966353.html


Hi Mossman...
I remembered reading the same sort of thing (someone agonising over the implications of making an accusation) and having searched, I think it was the McCluskey witness, not the Smiths who made that remark....



Apensos V, Vol 1 Page 136 (PDF Page 118)

Email from Stephen Robinson, Northumbria police to Leicestershire police

13th September 2007

Please find attached a witness statement provided by Richard McCluskey. Firstly may I apologise for the delay in forwarding but the system crashed at this end and the problem has taken some time to resolve.

Mr. McCluskey states he has already provided a witness statement in relation the enquiry having been on holiday in Portugal at the relevant time. He provided a statement in relation to suspicious activity he observed in the early hours of Saturday 5 May 2007.In the original statement Mr. McClusky states he described a male alighting a white coloured van and walking along a road carrying what appeared to be a motionless child. He then states he observed a distressed female run down a road and approach the same white coloured van.

Mr McCluskey did go into detail regarding the incident but then stated that all details were covered in his first statement, provided in May 2007. Not having had sight of the original statement it is obviously difficult to comment on the context and accuracy of the account given.

Having viewed recent media coverage regarding the investigation, M, McClusky now states that the female he saw and described is Mrs. McCann( the missing child’s mother). He states he is "almost certain" that they are the same person and has agonised for days over what to do and whether to contact Police. He is acutely aware of the possibly implications of his account. When asked why there had been such a time lapse in him making this "identification" he explained it as follows:
Mr. McCluskey states the thought had never crossed his mind that a child's parents could be implicated in such a matter. Media coverage over the past week or so has cased him to take a renewed interest in the case. The only thing which prevents Mr. McCluskey from stating he in 100% certain in his "identification" is the fact that he would , in his words, " hate to incriminate and innocent person."
Mr McCluskey appears to be a credible person and is not recorded on local intelligence systems.

The Smiths' daughter spotted the button detail on the man's trousers - like the ones above?

and as wintabells as pointed out as;
"It's very odd that until the Police files were released, the McCanns focussed on Tannerman and not Smithman, given that the latter was definitely carrying a child, whereas Tannerman initially was described (by Gerry) as carrying 'a bundle' that may have been a child."

so why was a sighting of a child-in-arms ignored
in favour of a bundle of anything?

its all so discombobulating, and I feel in purpose..

Autumn wrote:Can't find Mary Smith's statement, anyone got a link to it please?

Can't find it anywhere. Do we know for sure that she actually made one?

pennylane wrote:

Panda wrote:Morning mossman, well if it WAS Mrs Smith who said it...see how sloppy Reporters are? it makes all the difference.


However, here we are with the Crime of the Century as far as Portugal is concerned, yet the PJ made no attempt while he was in PDL in May and the McCanns were still there to take him around PDL like they did Tanner. Had he confirmed then that Gerry was the Man he saw , his Family would have backed him up and we wouldn't be writing this.

I believe Smith and his Family saw someone, but it wasn't Gerry.

So why didn't the McCanns get their pink mouthpiece to acknowledge it? He certainly managed to acknowledge pockman, eggman, bundleman, georgeharrisman, and toothyman, etc. But not a peep about the family who saw a man carrying a blonde child about Maddie's age with no shoes on shortly after the alleged abduction. Mitchell would have been all over Sky News with his flip chart pointing to the attire and direction of this child carrying man if the McCanns weren't scared to death of it!


imo

Morning Pennylane, I imagine no one except the Smiths and the Police originally knew about the Smith sighting initially and it was months later when he
had the second interview and the Press had got news of this that the Mccanns and Gerry would have known. My guess is when he phoned Leicester police, they told the McCanns . They all knew they could say nothing because this was a person near to home with a valid sighting and a Family who could support his statement so they sent Kennedy to Ireland to find out what he could as he was known to be bankrolling the search.
out exactly what Smith saw because Kennedy was supposedly bankrolling the search.

Wintabells wrote:

Autumn wrote:Can't find Mary Smith's statement, anyone got a link to it please?

Can't find it anywhere. Do we know for sure that she actually made one?

Morning wintabells, "Mrs smith declined to be interviewed" according to the Policeman interviewing Mr Smith in Ireland. However, if you go to my first
Post there are X's underneath his name and I think they might be the Family.

What I also found strange was in spite of the fact that both Jane Tanner and Mr Smith described the man they saw as wearing light trousers and a dark top, on the reconstruction for Channel 4 I think it was, the man was wearing light trousers and a light top. How very remiss. Just proves they should have left the reconstruction to the police.

Panda wrote:

pennylane wrote:

Panda wrote:Morning mossman, well if it WAS Mrs Smith who said it...see how sloppy Reporters are? it makes all the difference.


However, here we are with the Crime of the Century as far as Portugal is concerned, yet the PJ made no attempt while he was in PDL in May and the McCanns were still there to take him around PDL like they did Tanner. Had he confirmed then that Gerry was the Man he saw , his Family would have backed him up and we wouldn't be writing this.

I believe Smith and his Family saw someone, but it wasn't Gerry.

So why didn't the McCanns get their pink mouthpiece to acknowledge it? He certainly managed to acknowledge pockman, eggman, bundleman, georgeharrisman, and toothyman, etc. But not a peep about the family who saw a man carrying a blonde child about Maddie's age with no shoes on shortly after the alleged abduction. Mitchell would have been all over Sky News with his flip chart pointing to the attire and direction of this child carrying man if the McCanns weren't scared to death of it!


imo

Morning Pennylane, I imagine no one except the Smiths and the Police originally knew about the Smith sighting initially and it was months later when he
had the second interview and the Press had got news of this that the Mccanns and Gerry would have known. My guess is when he phoned Leicester police, they told the McCanns . They all knew they could say nothing because this was a person near to home with a valid sighting and a Family who could support his statement so they sent Kennedy to Ireland to find out what he could as he was known to be bankrolling the search.
out exactly what Smith saw because Kennedy was supposedly bankrolling the search.

Morning Panda,

That's certainly a valid possibility. I still think the pink pimp would have leapt on it with gusto (if they weren't shaking in their shoes)... but he'd have finished with the usual rhetoric.... 'due to operational reasons I cannot go into any further specifics on this crucial sighting at this juncture.'

Of course he would have because he doesn't give a toss about 'the investigation' he's in the business of spinning EVERYTHING to their advantage... this was the biggest and most important sighting relevant to timing, but they've sneaked it quietly into their dodgy scenario through the back door (when the case was cold), and 'hey presto' morphed Jane's bundleman's appearance into the Smith's description as best they could by suddenly altering his clothes and slicking back his hair, as seen in their mockumentary. They had to finally say something, because their silence was deafening, and ultimately very damning. imo

MaryB wrote:What I also found strange was in spite of the fact that both Jane Tanner and Mr Smith described the man they saw as wearing light trousers and a dark top, on the reconstruction for Channel 4 I think it was, the man was wearing light trousers and a light top. How very remiss. Just proves they should have left the reconstruction to the police.

Morning MaryB they also had the abductor holding the child on the wrong side.

Panda wrote:

Wintabells wrote:

Autumn wrote:Can't find Mary Smith's statement, anyone got a link to it please?

Can't find it anywhere. Do we know for sure that she actually made one?

Morning wintabells, "Mrs smith declined to be interviewed" according to the Policeman interviewing Mr Smith in Ireland. However, if you go to my first
Post there are X's underneath his name and I think they might be the Family.

Ok, thanks :)

i am almost certain i read her statment, also the garda cover note clearly says she does not want to make ANOTHER, which means she must have made one.

Detective Branch
Drogheda
County Lough

Re – Investigation into the disappearance of Madeleine McCann

I took an additional statement from Mr Smith as requested. His wife does not want to make another statement.





[quote="tigger" What I totally fail to understand about JT's sighting is that it is down on the first two timelines, one of which was signed by Gerry. So who didn't know what when?[/quote]

morning tigger.

the timeline was done while waiting for the police as far as i know ?

because there was no re-construction we do not know for a fact where everybody went after kate made her discovery. yes, they say they all rushed back to 5a, apart from grandmother who stayed at the table. but surely thereafter, if there was an abudction, at least one member from each family returned to their own apartment,checked their own children and stayed sitting in their cots with them to keep them safe ! a child has been abducted so you leave your own children alone next door and pop round to kate and gerrys to sit down and write a timeline and wait for the police ? if it were me, the police could come to me.

so i do not think we really know who was party to the writing of the timeline. it may well have been only the mccanns and tanner with the others being given a quick look as they popped in and out of the apartment. does that account for the two timelines and the obvious errors where words are crossed out ? as different people were given a quick look at it they noticed things that were not right and pointed out the errors? tanner had almost casually mentioned the sighting to rachel, so perhaps this was so it was not a bolt out of the blue when she saw it on the timeline. she hadn't told kate at all, the childs mother, she didn't want to worry her !

you see, for me the possibility exists that only tanner and o'brien knew much about anything initially and i think it could be because of o'brien carrying out a medical procedure to try and save madeleine. i also think that is why tanner is the one who is most closely involved in all of this, her loyalties lie with o'brien, she was helping him. i would not be confident rachel and family had any idea of what was going one, in the early stages at least and the paynes were the mccanns good friends out of all of the group so they are the obvious ones to show them some loyalty, if thats what you want to call it. of course, this is just my story.

as vague and all as everything is for that night while they were at the restaurant, i actually think it is the aftermath that is key, if i can borrow gerrys phrase. who went where and did what in the midst of all of the panic. that is when the people on the streets would not have noticed anything other than a small child. that was their focus, look for a child. if a man popped out of a drain in front of you any night of the week you would have a heart attack. that night, there were a couple of crucial hours where a man climbing out of a manhole and saying she is not here would have aroused no suspicion whatseover for most people.

that is the part of the re-construction i would really like to see.

pennylane wrote:

Panda wrote:

pennylane wrote:

Panda wrote:Morning mossman, well if it WAS Mrs Smith who said it...see how sloppy Reporters are? it makes all the difference.


However, here we are with the Crime of the Century as far as Portugal is concerned, yet the PJ made no attempt while he was in PDL in May and the McCanns were still there to take him around PDL like they did Tanner. Had he confirmed then that Gerry was the Man he saw , his Family would have backed him up and we wouldn't be writing this.

I believe Smith and his Family saw someone, but it wasn't Gerry.

So why didn't the McCanns get their pink mouthpiece to acknowledge it? He certainly managed to acknowledge pockman, eggman, bundleman, georgeharrisman, and toothyman, etc. But not a peep about the family who saw a man carrying a blonde child about Maddie's age with no shoes on shortly after the alleged abduction. Mitchell would have been all over Sky News with his flip chart pointing to the attire and direction of this child carrying man if the McCanns weren't scared to death of it!






imo

Morning Pennylane, I imagine no one except the Smiths and the Police originally knew about the Smith sighting initially and it was months later when he
had the second interview and the Press had got news of this that the Mccanns and Gerry would have known. My guess is when he phoned Leicester police, they told the McCanns . They all knew they could say nothing because this was a person near to home with a valid sighting and a Family who could support his statement so they sent Kennedy to Ireland to find out what he could as he was known to be bankrolling the search.
out exactly what Smith saw because Kennedy was supposedly bankrolling the search.

Morning Panda,

That's certainly a valid possibility. I still think the pink pimp would have leapt on it with gusto (if they weren't shaking in their shoes)... but he'd have finished with the usual rhetoric.... 'due to operational reasons I cannot go into any further specifics on this crucial sighting at this juncture.'

Of course he would have because he doesn't give a toss about 'the investigation' he's in the business of spinning EVERYTHING to their advantage... this was the biggest and most important sighting relevant to timing, but they've sneaked it quietly into their dodgy scenario through the back door (when the case was cold), and 'hey presto' morphed Jane's bundleman's appearance into the Smith's description as best they could by suddenly altering his clothes and slicking back his hair, as seen in their mockumentary. They had to finally say something, because their silence was deafening, and ultimately very damning. imo

Pennylane, I think Smith might have told Kennedy that he was being pestered by Reporters, he told that to the Irish Policeman. Kennedy wiould have
advised CM and the Mccanns not to mention it because ths Witness was too close to home.

Off topic...did you know there is a thread on World News devoted to the Murdochs et al? It.s under "Armageddon."

i am wrong, if this link is to be believed, and i believe it more than i believe myself.

this link says mrs smiths statement was with held ! now i have no work done, i have not found the statement i thought i read and it is annoying me as to what it is i did read,

http://thepottingshedder.blogspot.com/2010/11/what-smiths-really-saw.html

i hope it is ok to post this link.

Autumn wrote:

The Smiths' daughter spotted the button detail on the man's trousers - like the ones above?

Oooh! Nice find Autumn!

Wintabells wrote:

Autumn wrote:Can't find Mary Smith's statement, anyone got a link to it please?

Can't find it anywhere. Do we know for sure that she actually made one?

It said she didn't want to make ANOTHER one, which would certainly imply that she made at least one before.

ETA sorry - Mossman just made the same point. Great minds and all that!

mossman wrote:i am wrong, if this link is to be believed, and i believe it more than i believe myself.

this link says mrs smiths statement was with held ! now i have no work done, i have not found the statement i thought i read and it is annoying me as to what it is i did read,

http://thepottingshedder.blogspot.com/2010/11/what-smiths-really-saw.html

i hope it is ok to post this link.

==============================================
There are photos of Madeleine in the Tennis Court with shorts on but I don't remember seeing any marks on her lower leg.

'MS isn't 100% sure
Apart from his wife, the others don't identify GMC
None of the members of this family said in May 2007 she/he would recognize the carrier

''A reconstitution of that crossing would have been useful. Though the Smith family goes to PDL on a regular basis, no reconstitution with GMC was suggested.''

UHUM ......what did I say??? They should have had me on the case, it would have been sorted now.

There is an early photograph of the bedroom of 5a with a pair of beige trousers thrown onto the bed. Imo Gerry panicked big time after his little walk down PdL and changed hurriedly. I believe into jeans and a fleece top.

I feel the trousers with buttons, Gerry having these trousers on at a time when he likely didn't know the button detail had been spotted and the trousers on the bed in the main bedroom on the night of the 3rd, argues pretty solidly for Gerry being the man the Smiths saw.

In addition, beige trousers and dark top were the uniform JT described. Consistency at least in this detail.

tigger wrote:There is an early photograph of the bedroom of 5a with a pair of beige trousers thrown onto the bed. Imo Gerry panicked big time after his little walk down PdL and changed hurriedly. I believe into jeans and a fleece top.

I feel the trousers with buttons, Gerry having these trousers on at a time when he likely didn't know the button detail had been spotted and the trousers on the bed in the main bedroom on the night of the 3rd, argues pretty solidly for Gerry being the man the Smiths saw.

In addition, beige trousers and dark top were the uniform JT described. Consistency at least in this detail.

I recall a Portuguese poster called 'Onda' saw Gerry in shorter beige pants later that evening in a bar whilst waiting for the police.
He was in jeans and a fleece the following day when he read the first appeal with KM.

Wintabells wrote:

The entire history of the Smith family sighting and statements is charted here http://www.mccannfiles.com/id162.html

For what it's worth, I believe the Smith family saw a man carrying a blonde, pyjama-d, 'sleeping' child at around 9.50pm on the night of May 3rd 2007. They didn't connect this event with Madeleine McCann case until after they returned to Ireland. They didn't know the man they'd seen, but they did know it wasn't Robert Murat. They told the Irish police their story and each made statements to the PJ. In September 2007 some of the Smith family were disturbed by the images of Gerry getting off the plane, carrying Sean and felt that he strongly resembled the man they'd seen on May 3rd. They made further statements to this effect to the police. At some point they were visited by Brian Kennedy, with whom they refused to co-operate. I don't believe that the Smith family had or have any agenda other than to assist the police in whatever way they can to resolve the case.

'
My opinion is exactly the same as yours and I find this staement, along with the dogs' alerts, pretty compelling circumstantial evidence. How can it be a coincidence that a man, whose description fits McCann's, was seen in the back streets of PDL on the night of May 3rd, carrying a 'sleeping' little, blond girl ? Furthermore, Mr Smith was then willing to fly back to Portugal to make a statement saying he felt between 60 and 80% certain that the man he saw that evening was McCann. I'm afraid that I think it a very strong possibility that the Smiths saw McCann carrying Maddie's body which had to be removed from the flat before the police could be alerted to her 'disappearance'.

ann_chovey wrote:

tigger wrote:There is an early photograph of the bedroom of 5a with a pair of beige trousers thrown onto the bed. Imo Gerry panicked big time after his little walk down PdL and changed hurriedly. I believe into jeans and a fleece top.

I feel the trousers with buttons, Gerry having these trousers on at a time when he likely didn't know the button detail had been spotted and the trousers on the bed in the main bedroom on the night of the 3rd, argues pretty solidly for Gerry being the man the Smiths saw.

In addition, beige trousers and dark top were the uniform JT described. Consistency at least in this detail.

I recall a Portuguese poster called 'Onda' saw Gerry in shorter beige pants later that evening in a bar whilst waiting for the police.
He was in jeans and a fleece the following day when he read the first appeal with KM.

Aren't the buttons in order that the trousers can be rolled up into sort of long shorts?

jinvta wrote:"Anyone who has witnessed a crime, made a statement to the police and/or attended court as a witness, knows it's not an easy thing to do. Stating that the person you saw was definitely person X, especially when you cannot be 100% certain, has enormously serious implications. That person's life could be destroyed because of you. That person could lose their children, wife, job, home, freedom and hope all because of you."

Agreed 100%! Interesting though how easy it was for Jane Tanner, Fiona Payne, Russell O'Brien, and Rachel Oldfield to all positively identify Robert Murat, especially since none of them had ever even met him before.

'

Very good point, but, according to Kate's book, admittedly probably not the most reliable source, JT did not 100% identify Murat..Can't remember now if Amaral claimed she did in his book which I read a couple of years ago now.

Wintabells wrote:

ann_chovey wrote:

tigger wrote:There is an early photograph of the bedroom of 5a with a pair of beige trousers thrown onto the bed. Imo Gerry panicked big time after his little walk down PdL and changed hurriedly. I believe into jeans and a fleece top.

I feel the trousers with buttons, Gerry having these trousers on at a time when he likely didn't know the button detail had been spotted and the trousers on the bed in the main bedroom on the night of the 3rd, argues pretty solidly for Gerry being the man the Smiths saw.

In addition, beige trousers and dark top were the uniform JT described. Consistency at least in this detail.

I recall a Portuguese poster called 'Onda' saw Gerry in shorter beige pants later that evening in a bar whilst waiting for the police.
He was in jeans and a fleece the following day when he read the first appeal with KM.

Aren't the buttons in order that the trousers can be rolled up into sort of long shorts?

Could be, like 'clam pickers' as they are known, otherwise just for decoration. GM seems to have both long and shorter beige pants.

It's interesting to read Pat Brown's assessment of the short time it might have taken McCann to remove Maddie's body from the flat, hide her and return to the table before the alert, especially bearing in mind the fact that McCann is fit and a keen runner....