The purpose of
this site is for information and a record of Gerry McCann's Blog
Archives. As most people will appreciate GM deleted all past blogs
from the official website. Hopefully this Archive will be helpful to
anyone who is interested in Justice for Madeleine Beth McCann. Many
Thanks, Pamalam
Note: This site does not belong to the McCanns. It belongs to Pamalam. If
you wish to contact the McCanns directly, please use
the contact/email details
campaign@findmadeleine.com
DR
GONCALO AMARAL
DOCUMENTARY THE TRUTH OF THE LIE SCREENSHOTS PLUS
ASTROS
ENGLISH TRANSLATION 13-04-09
«The following programme is
a documentary that is based on the book by Gonçalo Amaral,
the former PJ inspector who investigated the disappearance
of Madeleine McCann, in the Algarve. His version of the
events is repudiated by Maddie’s parents, who continue to
defend that this is an abduction case. The criminal process
that was conducted by the Portuguese authorities ended with
the archiving of the inquiry, a decision that was contested
by Gonçalo Amaral.
More than pointing out culprits, a task that belongs to
justice, the broadcast of this documentary is destined to
contribute for light to be shed on a case that remains an
unsolved mystery, for almost two years, and that elements
are given to help the public opinion to understand it.»
Gonçalo Amaral Former
Polícia Judiciária coordinator
00.33 - My name is Gonçalo Amaral. I’ve been an investigator
with the Polícia Judiciária for 27 years. I coordinated the
investigation into the disappearance of Madeleine McCann, on
the 3rd of May 2007.
00.48 - During the following 50 minutes, I will prove that
the child was not abducted, and that she died in the holiday
apartment in Praia da Luz.
00.58 - Discover the whole truth about what happened that
day – a death that many people want to cover up.
VC
Filmes presents
MaddieThe
Truth of the Lie
02.17 - On the 3rd of May 2007, a child that was sleeping
with her siblings was abducted. This is the version of the
crime that we got used to accepting as the only possible
one. But is it the true one? Or does this version hide a
crime that many want to conceal?
02.39 - There is a kind of need to stifle the case, to
silence the case. I remember that several people were
affected, English policemen are forbidden from speaking out,
other witnesses like Martin Smith are somewhat afraid, and
several persons… This is a case where some people are still
afraid or they are even prevented from speaking.
03.01 – The Reconstitution
03.04 – What we are preparing has never been done before. We
took the former PJ coordinator, Gonçalo Amaral, to the crime
scene, to show what happened to Madeleine McCann. This
reconstitution is going to allow us to understand who told
the truth, and who didn’t. We are going to find out what
happened on the night that Maddie disappeared forever.
Strangely, the judicial investigation was never able to
carry out the reconstitution of what happened.
03.33 – The reconstitution wasn’t carried out because there
were some who defended that would be equal to considering
the family to be suspects, as well as the risk of flight.
Since the beginning, the Polícia Judiciária was pressured
not to investigate this case like any other case. There was
media exposure, a political and diplomatic climate that made
the investigation much more difficult.
03.52 – Madeleine McCann was only days away from her 4th
birthday when she disappeared. The last time that she was
seen in public was at 5.30 p.m. on the 3rd of May 2007. Her
mother, Kate McCann, picked her up at the crèche. The exit
record shows the time.
04.14 – At the same time, the father, Gerald McCann, played
tennis only a few hundreds of metres away. The tenniscourt
timesheet and his statement to the police confirm that
Gerald only left at 7 p.m. On the same afternoon, the
family’s friends had tea at the Paraíso restaurant. The cctv
camera images prove that the men left the restaurant at 6.13
p.m., and the women left 15 minutes later. One of them,
David Payne, met up with Gerald McCann at the tennis court.
According to Payne’s statement to the Polícia Judiciária, he
asked him where Kate was, and then headed for the apartment
that had been rented by the McCann family, where he arrived
at around 6.30 p.m.
05.00 – In later questionings, the testimonies diverge.
Gerald McCann says that David Payne stayed at the McCanns’
apartment for 30 minutes. His wife, Kate, guarantees it was
only 30 seconds. At that time, Kate was bathing the twins
and Madeleine.
05.21 - It was shortly after 8.40 p.m. that the English nine
friends went for dinner at the Tapas bar. The restaurant is
approximately 50 metres away, as the crow flies, from the
apartments where 8 children remained alone. In apartment 5A,
Madeleine McCann and the twins, Amelie and Sean, were
sleeping.
05.44 - At around 10 p.m., Kate McCann, Maddie’s mother,
raised the alarm. Maddie was not in the room. At around
10.40 p.m., the GNR in Lagos received a phone call, saying
that a little girl had disappeared from the Ocean Club, in
Praia da Luz.
06.04 – According to the testimony of the Ocean Club’s
manager, when the GNR patrol arrived on location, the
child’s father threw himself at the officers’ feet, like a
praying Arab, completely out of control over his daughter’s
disappearance. The same scene was repeated, according to the
officers, in the couple’s bedroom.
06.23 – It was past midnight when the GNR warned the Polícia
Judiciária. I was immediately informed and took the
appropriate measures. Searches were carried out in the
region, the Spanish authorities were warned, and the borders
were controlled. The largest search operation ever to be
carried out in Portugal was organised.
06.40 - During several days, hundreds of officers from the
GNR, firemen, volunteers, and members of the Polícia
Judiciária thoroughly search(ed) over 200 square kilometres.
A gigantic search operation. No search in Portugal had ever
included such means and so many people. Everything is
checked, and checked again. The borders are watched, all
sorts of vehicles are searched. The effort does not succeed.
The child doesn’t appear.
Guilhermino Encarnação
Joint PJ Director
07.08 – Until we have evidence that in fact the worst may
have happened to her, we continue to think that she may be –
that she may be alive. As you know, under the Portuguese
juridical order, it is not only abduction that gives a
ransom. If someone takes a person for a sexual act, that is
also an abduction. It is on that basis that we are hopeful.
07.30 – The child’s parents, Gerald McCann, aged 39, Kate
Healy, 39; the couple David Payne, 41, Fiona Payne, 35, and
her mother, Dianne Webster, 63; the couple Matthew Oldfield,
38, Rachel Mampilly, 37; and the couple Russell O’Brien, 37,
Jane Tanner, 36, are questioned for the first time by the
Polícia Judiciária.
07.57 – During the first week, we interviewed hundreds of
persons. The family, the friends, the resort’s employees,
and all the persons who had contact with the child. From
this first batch of testimonies, we obtained an outline of
what happened that night.
08.12 – It was on the back of one of Madeleine’s books that,
on the night of the crime, family and friends wrote down the
collective versions of that same night; the draft was used
to match the depositions from the nine British friends about
what happened. According to that version, which will later
be confirmed during questioning, at 8.45 p.m. the McCanns
enter the restaurant, and then the other couples arrive.
Dinner evolves normally. Given the fact that the children
are alone in the apartments, the families take turns in
checking the children.
08.45 – At around 9.05 p.m., Matt checks the windows of the
various apartments, and finds everything quiet and the
windows closed. Between 9.05 and 9.10 p.m., Gerald McCann
goes to the apartment, asserts that he entered through the
front door, and enters the children’s bedroom. Everything
seems well to him. At a later point in time, Gerald will say
that he sensed that a stranger was inside the room.
09.10 – When he leaves, he meets English tv producer
Jeremiah, who walks his child to fall asleep. He remains
talking to him under the apartment’s living room window. At
around 9.10 p.m., Jane Tanner goes to check her children,
and to check the other apartments. On her way to 5D, she
passes Gerald and Jeremiah. Jane will later tell the
authorities that she saw a stranger carrying a child in his
arms, on Agostinho da Silva Street.
09.39 - At 9.30, Russell and Matt check all the apartments.
Matt looks through the door of the McCann children’s
bedroom. From that standpoint, he can only see the twins.
Russell remains to take care of his sick daughter. At 9.50
p.m., Russell returns to the Tapas.
09.58 - On the same night, on the other side of Aldeia da
Luz, the Smith family – four adults and five children – have
just paid for their dinner at the Dolphins restaurant. The
credit card receipt was clocked at 9.27 p.m. on the 3rd of
May 2007. The Smiths go out for a drink at Kelly’s bar. They
don’t take long.
10.18 – It’s
around 9.50 p.m. when they start walking towards the Estrela
da Luz resort. When they cross 25 de Abril Street, arriving
at Escola Primária Street, they have just walked 30 metres
and they cross paths with a man who carries a child in his
arms.
10.38 – It is just after 22 p.m. when Kate goes to her
children’s bedroom using the shorter route, entering the
apartment through the sliding window, and sees Madeleine is
missing. She asserts that the bedroom’s window and shutters
had been opened. She drops everything, leaves the twins, who
continue sleeping, in a room with an open window, and heads
for the Tapas bar, to raise the alarm.
11.04 – This is where part of Kate McCann’s behaviour on
that night becomes incomprehensible. Instead of stopping
right here, and shouting out to the people who were at the
restaurant, where her husband was, what she does is climb
down these stairs, and walk a distance that is certainly
twice as much as the distance from here to the restaurant,
which is located approximately 50 metres from here, as the
crow flies.
11.33 – When she arrived there, she cried out “We let her
down”, which is a medical term that is often used in
medicine, “she’s gone”, and then everyone came running and
everyone used the entrance on this side of the apartment
again.
11.48 – There were many contradictions. The most evident one
was that someone was inside that room, when Gerald went in.
11.57 – If he didn’t enter, he just peeked through the door,
that also has to be taken into account with what the
abductor may have thought, if there was an abductor at all.
An abductor cannot be certain that a father wouldn’t enter
the room, because he would be discovered. Therefore,
standing behind the door was practically impossible,
physically that is not possible.
12.15 – He didn’t fit behind the door, and the wardrobes
were blocked by the cots.
12.20 – But given the drama that the family was living, and
the climate of commotion, we preferred not to make them
suspects.
12.25 – First Contradiction:
The Distance
12.28 – The first contradiction is related to the distance.
Everyone involved, except for Kate, stated that when they
went to check on the children, they used the apartments’
front doors. That meant walking over 100 metres more than
they would walk if they entered through the sliding windows.
Only the McCanns confirmed that they hadn’t locked that
window, justifying that they could see the window from the
Tapas.
12.59 – It is incomprehensible that they would walk over 100
metres more to check on the children, when there was a
shorter route. Maddie’s father said that, when he went to
check on his children, he was in a hurry to use the toilet.
Still, he took the longer route.
13. 14 – Let’s check the map. The yellow line is the route
that is walked until the sliding window. The red line is the
route that all of the parents state they took –
approximately twice as long.
13.29 – This preoccupation from the nine English people only
shows that they were afraid of being accused for leaving
their children in a dangerous situation.
13.38 – In fact, these contradictions could be justified
merely with the need of the English families to demonstrate
that the children were fully safe. According to a Portuguese
lawyer, who is experienced in working with several English
clients, the behaviour may be justified by the fear of being
accused of abandoning the children to danger, a crime that
is severely punished by UK laws.
Artur
Rego Laywer
14.01 – Having been left by their parents, exposed to
situations of risk and danger that they, in their young age,
wouldn’t be able to protect themselves from, and to confront
and to resolve on their own, is considered to be a serious
risk and serious and neglectful behaviour from the parents.
14.19 – Second
Contradiction: The Sightings
14.29 – The second relevant contradiction is given by Jane
Tanner’s deposition, who states she saw the abductor. One
cannot understand how Jane Tanner passes Gerald and
Jeremiah, and sees a man carrying a child, with both of them
failing to see her and the abductor.
14.48 – The only possible explanation for them not seeing
her is given by her husband’s deposition, who says that she
saw the abductor when she was returning from the apartment,
and not when she was going there. It was possible for her to
see Jeremiah and Gerald without any of them seeing her, but
only if she was coming from the back of the apartment, using
the sliding window. In any case, the detailed identification
that she gives of a possible abductor is impossible. See
with your own eyes.
15.17 – Jane Tanner asserts that she clearly saw, at this
distance and with this lack of light, five aspects:
First: she saw a dark-haired man, aged 35 to 40, slender,
with dark hair falling down his neck.
Second: that man wore linen trousers colored between beige
and golden.
Third: he wore a duffy jacket, but not as thick.
Fourth: he wore black classical shoes.
Fifth: the man walked in a hurry, with a child laying on his
outstretched arms, a position that is more likely for a
statue than for a person who walks carrying a child.
15.52 – Jane’s statements were the basis for the abduction
theory. But for us, and later on, for the English police,
they had doubtful value. How was it possible to see so much
as such a distance, and under that light? How was it
possible for Gerald and Jeremiah not to see Jane, or the
abductor?
16.10 - This sighting has another problem: Jane saw the
alleged abductor crossing Agostinho da Silva Street, and
less than 30 minutes later, the Smith family also sees a man
carrying a child, on Escola Primária Street, on the other
side of the village, and walking into the opposite direction
of the man that Jane had seen.
16.36 – We have two sightings of potential abductors. The
problem is that the Smiths’ sighting doesn’t confirm Jane
Tanner’s vision, in its time and its direction. The man that
is seen by the Smiths is on the other side of the village.
He is heading for the beach area, carrying the child against
his chest and not on outstretched arms. But given his
physical look, they could be referring to the same person.
In a while, we’ll see to whom, and who is lying.
17.00 – Third Contradiction
– The Window
17.04 – The third contradiction in the testimonies is
revealed to us by the window. If at 9.20 p.m. Jane sees the
abductor with the child, and Kate, upon noticing that
Madeleine has disappeared, notices that the window to the
children’s bedroom had been fully opened, why did Russell
and Matt, who checked the apartments after 9.20, fail to see
the open window? This is completely impossible.
17.29 - The window is proof of the truthfulness of the
testimonies. If the little girl was abducted by the man that
Jane says she saw at 9.20 p.m., then the window was open
from that moment on.
17.44 – Matthew says that he was inside the apartment and
didn’t see the open window. This leads us to conclude that
the window was only opened after the pseudo-abduction.
17.53 - The Leads and Murat
18.10 – Over 350 leads were followed.
18.18 – The Polícia Judiciária says that the next few hours
may bring new developments.
18.24 – Robert Murat is made an arguido after a long
interrogation at the Polícia Judiciária in Portimão.
Olegário
de Sousa
Chief PJ Inspector
18.31 – A male individual, aged 33 and a resident in the
area of the events has been made an arguido. He was
questioned as such, and no evidence has been collected that
could justify his detention and further judicial
questioning.
19.11 – The journalist suspected him, but we didn’t follow
what the journalist said. We followed the analysis of the
facts. The facts were analysed, what actually had happened,
and we followed a testimony, a testimony that had to be
weakened in order to advance the abduction theory. Jane
Tanner’s testimony. Because otherwise, the abduction theory
died right there. The major foundation for the abduction was
what that witness had seen: a man carrying a child, walking
into the direction of Robert Murat’s house.
19.45 – Maybe
people don’t know, but the search at Robert Murat’s house
takes place on a Monday morning, and on Sunday evening,
we’re in a meeting with the Public Ministry, with the
prosecutor, with the judge, me and Dr Luís Neves, we’re at
the court house while diligences are being carried out in
Praia da Luz. Diligences to confirm the suspicion against
Robert Murat. And Mrs Jane Tanner is placed inside a police
surveillance vehicle, several people walk by, policemen,
people that Mrs Jane Tanner had never seen before, and Mr
Robert Murat among them, and she says that from the way he
walks, he is the person that was carrying the child.
20.27 – In fact, Jane Tanner’s memory progressively improves
as time goes by. The first e-fit that she helps to draw is a
vague sketch. She later makes a positive identification of
Robert Murat as the man that she saw that night. Several
months later, she participates in a new e-fit, now
miraculously remembering every facial trace of a man that is
very different from the Murat that she recognised earlier
on.
20.55 - Another document that weighed in at incriminating
Robert Murat was a psychological profile by English experts,
which in very general traces stated that his voluntary
attitude during the days that followed the crime, helping
the investigators and the family, could be the mask of a
criminal.
Eduardo
Moss
Psychologist
21.12 – These are either theoretical pre-suppositions, or
banalities. It’s obvious that they start with statistical
analyses, we could call them epidemiological, out of a
population, numerous types of behaviours which could prompt
the suspicion, a greater or smaller suspicion, on an
individual. And nothing more.
21.38 - The Global Media
Phenomenon
Cristiano Ronaldo Football
Player
21.42 – We’re all very sad about what happened to Madeleine
McCann. Please, if someone has any kind of information, let
us know.
Luís
Filipe Scolari
Trainer
21.51 – Pray a special prayer, pray at least one Hail Mary
all over the country, for Our Lady of Fátima to enlighten
our authorities so they can find that little girl.
22.45 – Time went by. The abduction leads led into a blind
alley. The family itself started considering the possibility
that Maddie was dead.
22.52 - Stalemate in the
Investigation
22.54 – The first signs of death come from the family.
Exterior signs. We had already considered it but it’s the
family that hires a former officer from the South African
military, who uses a miraculous machine to find the child’s
body on location.
23.16 – South African Daniel Krugel points at a location
where Madeleine McCann’s body is supposed to lie. A vast
area where nothing was found.
23.12 - The Turnaround in
the Investigation
23.29 – The investigation uses two very special dogs that
are used by the English and North American police, that have
successfully solved over 200 cases. These include the murder
of Attracta Harron, an Irishwoman who went missing. The
police and the forensic scientists were unsuccessful in
finding out what happened to her. The investigators then
brought in Eddie, one of the two dogs that were in Portugal,
that identified a carbonised piece in the suspect’s car.
That piece contained DNA from the missing woman. The dogs
that were brought in to help the investigation are great
investigators. Eddie is a dog that specialises in finding
dead victims and marking locations where dead people have
been. Keela is able to detect human blood in such tiny
amounts that they elude the investigators.
24.26 – In these police images, we can see Eddie and Keela
inspecting the houses where the nine British tourists
stayed, and Robert Murat’s house. The dogs only reacted
(alerted) in the apartment where the McCanns stayed. Eddie
marked (alerted to) cadaver odour in the wardrobe of the
McCanns’ bedroom.
24.50 – That was how it was. The dog that marks (alerts to)
human cadaver odour marked cadaver odour in this corner, the
doors were open when the test was made, and after walking
around the parents’ bedroom, he placed his nose in here and
marked this area. So according to the expert, a cadaver was
here, either on the shelf or on the floor.
25.20 – Eddie also detected the odour of death behind the
sofa in the apartment’s living room. Keela is brought in,
and she points out a small amount of blood behind that same
sofa.
25.49 – At the time when the area behind the sofa was
cleaned, there is a body being transported to this location,
or it was kept here for a while. That is the indication that
exists, there was no blood here, contrary to what was found
behind the sofa, and there is the marking that a cadaver was
here [indicating the wardrobe shelves].
Martin
Grime
Dog Handler
26.34 – The dogs’ investigation continues. They inspect
several vehicles, and they only alert to the car that was
hired by the McCanns 23 days after Madeleine’s
disappearance. Eddie alerts that the car key and the boot
had been in contact with a dead body.
27.01 – Keela discovers organic traces for analysis in the
boot.
27.23 – The dogs’ reaction is revealing. These dogs have
never failed in over 200 cases. The dogs marked two spots in
the house: The wardrobe in the parents’ bedroom, and behind
the living room sofa.
27.40 – They also signalled the car, that had been rented by
the McCanns 23 days after the facts, as well as Kate’s
clothes and Madeleine’s soft toy.
27.58 – How was it possible to find a soft toy with cadaver
smell in a bed that was not marked by the dogs, and with no
indications of Madeleine having slept in it? The dogs’ work
could hardly be more revealing.
28.31 – Two weeks ago, there was a radical change in the
investigation, tiny traces of blood were found in the
apartment. When you heard that the police had found blood in
the apartment, how did you react?
29.23 – This is the turnaround in the investigation. The
abduction theory becomes less likely than the child’s death.
The parents, friends and relatives become suspects.
29.33 – The hypothesis that little Madeleine is dead has
somehow gained some consistency.
29.40 – The collected samples are sent to an expert lab in
the UK, the Forensic Science Service, in Birmingham. The
analyses’ results start being targeted by speculation. The
Times is the first newspaper to announce that some of the
preliminary results of the analyses on some of the collected
material didn’t match Maddie’s DNA, prompting a denial from
the lab.
30.20 –
Journalist Duarte Levy was one of the authors of this
article. He asserts that there were other preliminary
reports that identified Madeleine’s blood in the samples,
and that were put aside.
Duarte
Levy
Journalist
30.32 – For the ‘Times’, we – I say ‘we’ because I worked
with Paulo Reis and David Brown – the first article that we
wrote was about the blood traces that had been found on the
apartment’s wall, and we published that the blood was not
Madeleine’s. It was an article that raised some problems, in
terms of the FSS’s organisation, but that didn’t prevent us
from accessing other preliminary and final reports. At a
given time, we had access to a report that was signed by
more than ten FSS professionals, which stated the existence
of a correspondence of 17 out of 19 alleles in the case of
Madeleine McCann. To us, there was more than enough data to
state that this was Madeleine’s blood.
31.23 – In order to understand the analyses that were made,
we went to the Forensics Institute in Coimbra, where
presently similar analyses are carried out, using the Low
Copy Number method. When the samples were collected at the
Ocean Club apartment, and from the car that had been rented
by the McCanns, they were sent to the lab, where the samples
were then prepared. Later on, the DNA quantity that existed
in the collected material was evaluated. Because the
quantity was very small, the Low Copy Number method was
used.
31.55 – The samples were increased, and then the DNA markers
were signalled. This method has the advantage of working
with very small amounts of DNA, but the results don’t always
allow for a clear comparison between the victim’s DNA and
the collected one. By artificially increasing the DNA
quantity for analysis, we also amplify a set of data that
can be confused with the markers.
32.24 – The final report that the FSS delivers to the
investigation is not conclusive. It establishes that the
collected samples may be from Madeleine McCann, but there is
no certainty. The most significant is the material that was
collected from the car that had been rented 23 days after
the child’s disappearance. The preliminary reports mention a
correspondence of 15 alleles out of 19, but the problem is
that the analyses demonstrate that the material didn’t come
from one sole donor, but from at least three.
32.58 – Professor Corte-Real, who met with the FSS experts,
and saw the British scientists’ reports and work notes,
explains this issue.
Dr
Francisco Corte-Real
Vice President, National Forensics Institute
33.09 – When those 15 alleles are included in a mix, where
beyond those 15 we can have another 30 or 40 alleles, that
means that it includes biological material from several
persons. And there it can be much more difficult, much more
inconclusive, because we may have a mixture from several
persons, including hypothetically, if that happens, we may
have several persons from the same family, and that may even
give us the idea, in a way, that a certain missing person
may be included, and that is not conclusive.
33.46 – Despite the conclusions of the FSS reports, the
investigative team’s conviction is not based exclusively on
scientific evidence. A normal procedure within criminal
investigations, which is explained to us by a reputed
forensics medicine expert.
Dr João
Pinto da Costa
Forensics Medicine Expert
34.02 – Criminal investigation is not only one aspect. The
whole way of being, in terms of the suspect’s attitudes and
behaviour, are fundamental, as fundamental as the biological
analysis of blood, urine or any other situation. There are
other elements that allow for corroboration.
34.29 – The McCanns are summoned for deposition at the
Polícia Judiciária in Portimão. During that interrogation,
they are made arguidos. Kate McCann refuses to answer all of
the questions, and Gerald McCann repeatedly denies the
investigators’ conclusions, defending his innocence, and his
wife’s.
Carlos
Pinto de Abreu
McCanns’ Laywer
34.47 – Today, Kate and Gerry McCann were made arguidos.
34.52 – Their behaviour was a distant behaviour. For
example, when they, especially Gerald McCann, when they are
shown the dogs’ movie, he didn’t even want to look at the
television, saying that it had no value, and that it didn’t
show proof of his daughter’s death, and that to him, his
daughter was alive.
35.12 – When the McCanns leave the Polícia Judiciária, the
Portuguese public opinion starts to turn against them. The
Portuguese and British investigators are now convinced that
the little girl was the victim of an accident. She died in
the apartment and someone made the body disappear.
35.30 – That was assumed by the entire investigation team,
which consisted of Portuguese and English people. In
September 2007, that is the major conclusion drawn from the
investigation. I remind you, concerning that issue of
inconclusive tests, that there is an ongoing case in the
USA, involving a mother and a missing three-year-old, where
there is also cadaver odour in the car boot, and an
incomplete DNA profile of the child, and the mother has been
arrested for trial, or has already been tried.
36.24 – The investigation’s change of direction prompts the
McCanns’ return to the UK. The family, that had always
refused to abandon Portugal without clarifying their
daughter’s disappearance, decides to return home. The images
of the McCann family’s return go around the world. When he
sees this image of Gerald McCann carrying one of the twins,
Irishman Martin Smith says he recognises in the stance and
the manner of holding the child, the man whom he crossed on
the night that Madeleine disappeared. He goes to the local
police, and gives a statement.
36.59 – It was exactly the same manner and appearance of the
man that he saw on the night that Maddie disappeared.
37.04 – The McCann family’s representative, a former
spokesman for English prime minister Gordon Brown, pushes
all suspicions aside.
Clarence
Mitchell
McCann family’s Spokesman
37.42 – Kate McCann’s diary, which was accessed by the
investigation, is clear about the importance of such
political support. Gordon Brown phones the couple several
times, as the diary shows on the 23rd of May.
37.57 - The Disarmed
Investigation
38.01 – The McCann case has always worried both countries’
political authorities, even leading Prime Minister Gordon
Brown to speak about it with his counterpart, José Sócrates,
during the Lisbon summit.
38.15 – The British press repeatedly attacked the Portuguese
investigation. Following a reply from Gonçalo Amaral to a
former British detective, in an interview to Diário de
Notícias, the Polícia Judiciária’s national director
dismissed the investigation’s coordinator, with the Justice
Minister’s support.
Alípio
Ribeiro
PJ’s National Director
38.34 – I’m not going to comment on that matter.
38.36 – But you confirm that he was replaced in the case?
38.37 – Yes. Substituted as the leader.
38.39 – Why?
38.40 – I can’t comment on that now.
38.41 – Was it because of the statements that were published
today?
Alberto
Costa
Justice Minister
38.44 – It’s an act that belongs to the national director of
the Polícia Judiciária, that I approve.
38.48 – Did you influence this dismissal?
38.50 – I don’t want to say anything further about this
matter.
38.53 – Gonçalo Amaral is sent back to the headquarters in
Faro, and forced to abandon the McCann case investigation.
38.59 – Before I left, someone came to me, I’m not saying
who, with a speech about investigations that don’t end,
investigations that don’t end in the way that we desire,
that do not succeed, and that if this investigation was
archived, or if the investigation was dropped, nobody would
question it much, or raise any problems about it.
39.26 – Paulo Rebelo is nominated to direct the
investigation. He hurries to visit Aldeia da Luz, and to
observe the locations where Madeleine McCann disappeared
from, showing his intention to carry out the process until
its end. A set of rogatory letters are sent to the UK for
the interrogation of the witnesses in the process. There is
an attempt to schedule a reconstruction. Some witnesses are
never questioned again in Portugal, like the Smith family,
who said they saw Gerald McCann carrying a child in his
arms, towards the sea, at around 10 p.m. on the 3rd of May
2007.
40.04 – The
witness who lived near the McCanns’ second home, in Aldeia
da Luz, who says she witnessed an uncommon fact about the
McCanns’ hire car, where the dogs detected cadaver odour and
remains that may belong to Maddie, was not heard, either.
This neighbour has signed a document authorising the
broadcast of her deposition that identifies her, but fearing
threats and pressures, she doesn’t show her face.
40.30 – This is an interesting matter, when I left the
Criminal Investigation Department in Portimão, in October
2007, nothing was known about this vehicle, about this issue
of the open car boot. We knew that inside the vehicle
cadaver odour and bodily fluids had been found, where
Madeleine McCann’s DNA profile was extracted from, with 15
alleles. Months later, there is a jurist, who lives nearby,
who came to report that after the McCanns arrived at this
villa, they saw the car boot open from then on.
41.09 – I drive down this street every day to turn my car
around at that end, and every time that I passed the house,
and I looked at the car, and the car always had an open boot
door, day or night. I often passed at night, and always
verified it. It was a fact, I reported it, and that was it.
41.33 – It’s important to report the following: that lady,
that jurist, was never heard at the Polícia Judiciária
because her deposition was not considered to be relevant,
which is strange. While she was not heard, while a rogatory
letter was sent to England, relatives of Gerald and Kate
McCann came out to say that they had transported, inside
this car boot, food from the supermarket, namely a meat
package that leaked blood.
42.09 – The great question is how the family heard about the
witness, despite the fact that she was not heard by the PJ,
and tried to reply to the observed facts.
42.18 – Only a few months later, the investigation is
closed. Gonçalo Amaral resigns from the police, writes a
book about the case and accepts to return to 5A at the Ocean
Club, to demonstrate his conviction that Madeleine McCann
died inside this apartment on the 3rd of May 2007.
42.37 – The family’s spokesman accuses him of being an
opportunist, who is merely interested in making money.
43.11 – Contrary to what Mr Clarence Mitchell says, I used
my knowledge in the investigation, and thus can state with
all certainty that Madeleine was not abducted. Just verify
the location of the facts, like we are going to, right away.
43.25 - Final Evidence
43.28 – With the help from one of the major experts from the
Scientific Police, who worked for the Polícia Judiciária,
Alexandre Simas, Gonçalo Amaral intends to prove, first,
that it was impossible for the child to be abducted,
starting by demonstrating that the indications prove that
the apartment’s window and door were not forced.
43.47 - How does one open a door like this, without the key?
43.51 – This type of apartment door, normally there are only
three possibilities: to extract the lock’s cannon, which
didn’t happen, or it would have been reported; a false key,
a copy or one that was used without permission; or using a
malleable material, as long as it’s not locked, it’s
introduced, and it makes the lock go back inside. But when
it goes in, even if it did, it would hit this screw. If it
hits the screw, no matter how much I force it, it doesn’t
jump to open the lock for me.
44.33 – If the door wasn’t opened without a key, the window
doesn’t bear any traces of having been forced, either.
44.40 – These windows have a very good characteristic to
check if they were forced or not. Being made of lacquered
aluminium, any screwdriver, any instrument that is used to
make the lock jump, immediately leaves a mark. What we can
see here, there is no break-in, the mark that is there
belongs to the lock itself as it rotates, sometimes one does
this with the lock in place, and it hits there. So, to open
this window, all we have to do is this. To close it, it’s
impossible, because either one has a magnet on his fingers
to pull the window…
45.18 – Another important fact is revealed by the
fingerprints that are left on the bedroom window, which the
McCanns insist they left closed, and is supposedly found
open when the mother notices her daughter is missing. The
only fingerprints that are found belong to Kate McCann, and
reveal that they were made by opening the window.
45.42 – These three indications mean that there was no
abduction, and that is proved. No abductor entered apartment
5A, through the door or through the window.
45.54 – Finally, it was impossible for anyone to leave with
the child through the window on his own, without supporting
himself on the bed, and leaving traces of abrasion on the
window.
46.03 – If I carry a child in my arms, a package, in this
case, the window is already open, I have to walk through
here, and then I have to place my feet here, I can’t…
46.15 – We tried to prove this difficulty, taking a child
through the window, keeping everything the way it was found:
the beds, without a trace of being stepped on, and no signs
of abrasion on the window sill. It seems to be practically
impossible for one single abductor, like the one that Jane
Tanner saw, carrying the child on the street.
46.37 – Let’s review: First, the front door and the window
were not forced. Second, the window was opened by the
mother. Third, it’s impossible for a lone abductor to carry
out the child without leaving traces on the beds and on the
window.
46.53 – Adding this to the traces that were detected by the
dogs, and the sighting that was made by the Smiths, we have
a completely different probable scenario. Madeleine McCann
died in apartment 5A, and her body was concealed.
47.12 – What do these leads tell us? What means that which
the dogs detected, and what can be established about what
happened on the 3rd of May 2007?
47.24 – It is behind the sofa, in front of the middle
section of the window, that cadaver odour and human blood
with Madeleine McCann’s profile is traced. It’s the only
place inside the apartment where the findings coincide:
human cadaver odour and blood. So, within a policeman’s
logic, this is where death may have taken place.
47.49 – What happened to Maddie? There is an hypothesis that
can explain all known clues. The child woke up at night,
heard her father talking below the living room window,
climbed on the sofa, fell and hit her head. The fall, and
the possible use of Calpol on the children, by the parents,
to keep them asleep while they dined, may have provoked
Madeleine’s death.
48.40 – The habit of using Calpol on the children was
confirmed by Kate’s father. Later, a man, whom the Smiths
identified as Gerald McCann, carried the child towards the
beach.
48.55 – What I know tells me that Madeleine McCann died in
apartment 5A on the 3rd of May 2007. I am certain that this
truth will be established some day. The investigation was
brutally interrupted, and a political and hurried archiving
took place. There are some people who hide the truth, but
sooner or later the varnish will crack and the revelations
will appear. Only then will there be justice for Madeleine
McCann.
49.25 – The mystery persists. The former inspector believes
that some day, the truth will be known. For the time being,
all we know is that on the 3rd of May 2007, Madeleine McCann
disappeared in Praia da Luz. She was three years old, and
she was a happy child.
