BLOOD traces found in the holiday apartment from which Madeleine McCann
was snatched did not come from the missing girl, it was reported today.
The forensic results show the blood came from a man, according to the reports,
which come at the end of a fortnight in which speculation has been rife that the
little girl was murdered in the Praia da Luz apartment.
The technical analysis of the tiny spots of blood found smeared on the bedroom
wall show it probably came from a man from the "northeast European sub
group", it was claimed.
A male guest is known to have injured himself while staying at the apartment
after Madeleine disappeared. This could explain why the blood was not found
when Portuguese police searched the apartment after Madeleine's disappearance.
The blood sample analysis is said to be 72 per cent accurate, due to the
sample's degeneration. Further tests are being carried out by the Forensic
Science Service in Birmingham.
Minute spots of blood had been found on a wall by British sniffer dogs and sent
back to the UK
for testing.
In another development, it has been reported that detectives may soon name new
official suspects in the case. Police sources are reported as saying they have
a "new line of inquiry which has proved significant".
But newspapers in Portugal
have quoted anonymous police sources as saying detectives believe Madeleine
died in the apartment the night she went missing. Detectives officially
acknowledged she could be dead for the first time on Saturday.
"The possible death of the girl is the line of inquiry which is getting
most of our attention at the moment. However, no other possibility has been
ruled out," Chief Inspector Olegario Sousa said in a Portuguese television
interview.
Sousa declined to provide details, citing secrecy laws covering ongoing
investigations and respect for the McCann family.
Investigators say Madeleine vanished on May 3 from an apartment where she was
sleeping with her two-year-old twin siblings in a tourist complex on the
southern Algarve
coast while her parents were dining in the hotel's restaurant.
Her parents, Kate and Gerry McCann, both 39, have clung to the hope that their
daughter is still alive during the 105 days since she went missing.
Mrs McCann yesterday contemplated for the first time returning to the UK without
Madeleine. She said: "We know we will be going back and I guess one day we
will wake up and it will be right. We never thought that we would go before she
came back. Now we just don't know. We have the twins to consider. I just can't
imagine how we came out as a family of five and going back as a four."
But Mrs McCann has said that she would rather know her daughter was dead than
remain in limbo for the rest of her life.
Chief Insp Sousa is said to have not ruled out the possibility that friends of
the family, from Rothley, Leicestershire, could be connected to Madeleine's
disappearance.
A British family caught up in the investigation into the disappearance of
Madeleine have already been cleared of any involvement.
James and Charlotte Gorrod, from Essex, who were on holiday at the same time as
the McCanns, came under suspicion when they hired a car with a child seat. It
turned out to be for their two-year-old son. |
