Friends of the parents of missing Madeleine McCann have been forced to issue a
denial over the allegations linking them to the key suspect.
According to Portuguese newspaper Sol, detectives are investigating a possible
link between chief suspect Robert Murat and two friends of the McCann family
who are key witnesses in the case.
The Sol report said Murat, 33, has been asked by detectives if he knew one
member of the group – hospital consultant Russell O'Brien, 36.
It claimed police spoke to Dr O'Brien after it was discovered the pair were
both in Exeter
days before Madeleine was kidnapped.
Murat spent 10 days in there, arriving back in the Algarve on May 1 - 48 hours before
Madeleine was snatched.
Dr O'Brien and his partner Jane Tanner, also 36, moved to a rented home in the
city four weeks earlier, it was reported today.
Find Madeleine campaign manager Justine McGuinness
denied that either O'Brien or Tanner met with Murat prior to the disappearance
of Madeleine.
"It is absolutely not the case that anyone in the party with the McCanns
had ever met Robert Murat before they went on holiday."
Miss Tanner was the key witness who saw a man rushing away from the Ocean Club
resort carrying a child wrapped in a blanket.
Dr O'Brien told police he saw Murat near the McCann's holiday apartment that
night.
He was one of three friends of the couple who confronted Murat two weeks ago in
a showdown set up by police.
Dr O'Brien, Fiona Payne and Rachael Oldfield were allowed to challenge Murat's
version of events.
Murat insists he met Dr O'Brien only after Madeleine's abduction, when offering
his services to family and police.
Madeleine was snatched from her family's holiday apartment in the Algarve resort
of Praia da Luz on May 3. Her parents were dining
with their friends at a tapas restaurant 50 yards away. |