163 Questions that the McCanns should answer in their forthcoming 'very truthful' book
The Madeleine Foundation
02 February 2011
On 12 May 2011, on what would have been Madeleine
McCann's 8th birthday, Transworld will publish the McCanns' account of the disappearance of their daughter. At the
same time, the Rupert Murdoch-owned Sun will serialise their book for a reported £200,000.The McCanns'
chief public relations officer, Clarence Mitchell (who when he stopped working full-time for the McCanns went to work for
Rupert Murdoch's son-in-law), admitted in March 2010 that Madeleine's disappearance was, quote, 'a complete mystery'.On
6 January this year, in an interview on Radio Humberside to promote the McCanns’ book, Mitchell went further. He conceded
that Madeleine's abduction could not be regarded as a 'fact', but was merely an 'assumption' or 'hypothesis'.
For over 3 years, The Madeleine Foundation has been saying the same thing. As our strap-line makes clear, we have been 'asking
the questions about what really happened to Madeleine McCann'.
The McCanns' decision to publish a book
about Madeleine's disappearance gives them an ideal opportunity to answer the many questions that have surrounded the
whole case. Questions about what happened that week in Praia da Luz. Questions about the McCanns' private investigators
and about their Fund, to which the public both in Britain and abroad have given so generously.
Well over 3 months
ahead of the publication date, we have earlier this week written to the McCanns' publishers, Transworld, suggesting 163
questions about the case that the McCanns should now answer.
Below are two letters we have sent.
LETTER
1 is to Transworld.
Below that, LETTER 2 is to the editor of The Sun, asking him to ensure that his serialisation
of the McCanns book answers the questions about Madeleine's disappearance which his readers - and the general public -
have been asking.
The Madeleine Foundation, 2 February 2011
-----------------------------
LETTER 1: to Transworld
The Madeleine Foundation
Asking the questions about what really happened to
Madeleine McCann
66 Chippingfield
HARLOW
Essex,
CM17 0DJ
Website: http://www.madeleinefoundation.org.uk
Mr Bill Scott-Kerr
Transworld
61-63 Uxbridge Road,
LONDON,
W5 5SA
and at
Mr Bill Scott-Kerr
Transworld
c/o The Random House Group Limited (Random House),
20 Vauxhall Bridge
Road,
LONDON,
SW1V 2SA.
And by e-mail to info@transworld-publishers.co.uk
Dear Mr Scott-Kerr
re: Your forthcoming publication by Dr Gerald and Dr Kate McCann: 'Madeleine'
We understand that on 12 May 2011 you will publish the McCanns' account of matters relating to Madeleine's
disappearance. Dr Kate McCann has stated that this book will be, and we quote, 'very truthful'.
As you
know, many people have many questions about the events which occurred in Praia da Luz whilst the McCanns were on holiday there
from 28 April to 3 May 2007 - and also about various matters which have occurred since Madeleine's disappearance. As you
are aware, the original senior detective in the case, Goncalo Amaral, wrote a book, 'The Truth About A Lie', after
he was removed from the investigation on 2 October 2007, in which he suggested that Madeleine had died in the apartment the
McCanns rented in Praia da Luz.
As you may or may not be aware, the chief public relations officer for the McCanns,
Mr Clarence Mitchell, was interviewed on Radio Humberside on 6 January this year and told its listeners that the McCanns'
claim that Madeleine was abducted was, and we quote: 'only an assumption' or 'a working hypothesis' - and
not, therefore, a fact.
In view of the many questions in the public's mind about what really happened to Madeleine,
we have made a list of some of the most commonly-asked questions relating to Madeleine's disappearance, thus giving the
McCanns, and yourselves as publishers, an opportunity to set the record straight, for example in respect of the many contradictions
that have arisen amongst the statements made by the McCanns and their friends. Should their book provide convincing answers
to these questions, this will put an end to the debate about what happened to Madeleine.
The McCanns have frequently
claimed that this debate about what happened to Madeleine is 'hindering the search for Madeleine'. One of the main
reasons for this ongoing debate is that there are still so many unanswered questions about the case. It would therefore be
in the McCanns' own interests and of course Madeleine's interest (if she is still alive) if the McCanns could clear
up as many of these questions as possible.
As you know, the whole world has been asked to donate towards the search
for Madeleine and to look for Madeleine. Many people feel that the McCanns owe it to the public, whom they have so frequently
asked for help, to give them reasonable answers to their questions.
Your forthcoming book is an ideal opportunity
for the McCanns to answer as fully and openly as possible the questions we have listed. We have sent this to you well over
three months before the proposed publication date so that there is time for you and the McCanns to consider whether they can
provide full answers to these reasonable questions. Of course, it may well be that they have already planned to answer most
of them anyway in what they have written already.
We intend in due course to publish this list of questions ourselves
on our wesbite, as matter of public record.
Below are the main questions which we trust your forthcoming book will
fully address. We have divided our questions between those which relate to events which took place before Madeleine was reported
missing, and those which occurred afterwards.
Yours sincerely
Tony Bennett
Secretary
|
QUESTIONS TO YOU AND THE MCCANNS ABOUT THEIR NEW BOOK
Questions relating
to events before Madeleine was reported missing
1.The McCanns originally claimed in 'phone calls to
relatives and friends (on the night of 3-4 May) that they found the shutters and window of the children's bedroom room
open. They told them that an abductor had 'broken in' and taken Madeleine after 'jemmying open the shutters'.
But they then changed their story, after police and the managers of the Ocean Club declared that there was no sign of forced
entry. What made the McCanns so sure that entry through the shutters and window had been forced by an abductor?
2.
Dr Kate McCann has stated that she 'wasn't going to bother to look in the bedroom to do a visual check' of the
children', when she says she went to check on them at 10.00pm on 3 May 2007? Why not?
3. Did the McCanns in
fact leave the patio door unlocked that night, as they later suggested? - because - in the McCanns'
original police statements, they both said that they had entered their apartment by the locked front door using
their keys.
4. If so, did the McCanns leave the patio doors unlocked on other evenings of the
week, or was it just that night? In one statement, Dr Kate McCann has said that they changed from locking the doors
to leaving them unlocked at some stage during that week, giving as a stated reason that: "The noise from the front door
might wake their children".
5. Had the 'noise from the front door' actually woken the children earlier
that week?
6. In the Channel 4 documentary screened in May 2009, Dr Gerald McCann is seen to enter the apartment
to do his claimed check on the children at 9.05pm, using the front locked door, in line with his first statement to the police.
Yet at other times, Dr McCann has said that he entered by the unlocked patio door? What is the truth?
7. It has
been widely reported that the only fingerprint found on the window frame was that of Dr Kate McCann, and that the window had
been cleaned the day before Madeleine disappeared. How do the McCanns account for that?
8. The McCanns have both
insisted that they knew 'instantly' on entering Apartment 5A that Madeleine had been abducted. Dr Kate McCann was
asked by a TV interviewer to explain why she thought that, and answered by saying that she could not say anything because
of 'judicial secrecy' which prevented her from revealing anything about the ongoing investigation. The McCanns have
not explained this to anyone since judicial secrecy was lifted in July 2008, when their status as 'arguido' was also
lifted. Also, the McCanns' chief public relations officer Clarence Mitchell has admitted very recently that Madeleine
being abducted is 'only an assumption', or a 'working hypothesis'. Neither is there any forensic or other
evidence of abduction revealed in any of the files, including in the McCanns' own statements, apart from the claims of
their friend Jane Tanner. Could the McCanns now explain, supplying us with actual evidence, and not mere supposition, why
they were both so certain that Madeleine had been abducted, rather than, for example, that she had wandered off?
9. What was the precise state of the apartment as Dr Kate McCann entered it at around 10.00pm on 3 May 2007: What was the
state of Madeleine’s bed and bedding? Where exactly was 'Cuddle Cat? How far was the bedroom door open when the
McCanns entered it? Were the windows and shutters open or closed? Were the doors to the apartment left open or locked?
10. Can the McCanns explain why, after they said they were immediately 'sure' that Madeleine was abducted,
they then allowed their friends and several staff from the Ocean Club, about 20 in all, to traipse all round their apartment,
thus contaminating a crime scene where vital forensic evidence could have been found.
11. Dr Gerald McCann was
overheard around 10.00pm on 3 May speaking on a 'phone and telling someone in a loud voice that 'Madeleine has been
abducted by a paedophile'. The McCanns repeatedly claimed in the early weeks after Madeleine went missing that a paedophile
or a paedophile gang had taken Madeleine. What made Dr McCann mention paedophiles in the first place, even before the McCanns
first contacted the police about Madeleine going missing?
12. Why did the McCanns and their friends focus their
attention on contacting the media in Britain rather than on searching for Madeleine in the early hours of 4 May 2007?
13. According to the accounts the McCanns gave to the Portuguese Police, Dr Kate McCann ran down to the Tapas restaurant
to inform the rest of their friends that Madeleine was missing. Why did she choose to leave the twins alone to raise the alarm,
when she could have remained with them and used her mobile, or shouted for help?
14. The McCanns and the children’s
nanny have given a number of different accounts of whether you were both with Madeleine at high tea-time on the day Madeleine
was reported missing. What is the truth?
15. The McCanns have said that at this tea-time, they asked Madeleine
if she was upset at not having been asked to the beach with all of the other families in their group that day? Why did they
ask Madeleine this when, in fact, as they and their friends have said elsewhere, the others did
ask the McCanns to join them and the McCanns declined?
16. There are three different
versions of who read the children bedtime stories the night Madeleine was reported missing: (a) Dr Kate McCann (b) Dr Gerald
McCann or (c) they both did. What is the truth?
17. Kate McCann said that her friend Dr David Payne knocked on
the front door of the McCanns’ apartment at about 6.30pm on 3 May, but was immediately sent away without ever entering.
Dr Payne, however, said he came in, saw all three children dressed, all in white nightwear, ready for bed, and stayed for
at least several minutes. What is the truth? Dr Kate McCann said she was dressed only in a towel; Dr Payne implied she was
fully dressed. Again, what is the truth about this matter?
18.The McCanns have said that the children were in
their pyjamas by 6.30pm the night Madeleine disappeared, were bathed at 7.00pm and
asleep by 7.30pm. But just a few weeks later, in Dr Gerald McCann's blog, he wrote: "The
twins must like their new cots as they were asleep by 7.30pm which was most unusual”. What
is the truth about when the twins normally went to bed?
19. On the night that Madeleine was reported missing, Dr
Matthew Oldfield claimed that he and his wife arrived at the Tapas restaurant at 8.55pm, but then went back to the Paynes'
apartment to chase them up, as they were late. Dr Russell O'Brien confirmed that: "Matt, around 9pm, got up and said
'I'll go and drag them out'." The Paynes flatly contradicted this. What is the truth about this?
20. Dr Matthew Oldfield changed his story about events that night several times. He said he did one 'check' on the
children, and then said he'd done two. He changed his story about the 2nd check, first saying that he walked
by the McCanns' apartment, later saying he'd entered it. What is the truth?
21. Dr Kate McCann claimed that Dr Oldfield said, at 9.30pm: "I'll check on Maddie for
you". Why didn't he say: "I'll check on the children?" Why, when all three
children were sleeping in the same room, as the McCanns have stated, did he only refer to checking on Madeleine?
22. Dr Kate McCann claimed that during dinner on 3 May 2007, she told her friends at the dinner table that Madeleine
had been crying the night before, and told them that she had left the door open for Madeleine in case she needed help during
the evening, implying that she could wander in the night and find them. Is that the truth?
23. How can that statement
be reconciled with another statement made by Dr Kate McCann, namely that 'Madeleine would never leave her twin brother
and sister on their own, therefore she would not have left the apartment'?
24. In the crime scene photographs
of the McCanns' apartment, a pink blanket can clearly be seen. Detectives investigating Madeleine's disappearance
said they could not find it. Do the McCanns know what happened to it?
25. Dr Gerald McCann on 4 May (the day after
Madeleine was reported missing) said: "Yesterday, Madeleine and the twins were put to bed in their respective beds
at 7.30pm". Yet when the police arrived at about 11.00pm, they found a bed where Madeleine was supposed to have slept
and two cots. Moreover, in a magazine interview (Vanity Fair) in January 2008, Dr Gerald
McCann said: "On one bed the twins lay sleeping". What is the truth about where the twins
were sleeping that evening?
26. Dr Gerald McCann claimed that Madeleine was lying on top of the bedclothes on the
evening of 3 May, but Dr Kate McCann claimed that she was underneath the bedclothes. Which is the truth?
27. The
McCanns' friend Jane Tanner insisted she'd seen someone carrying a child close to the McCanns' apartment at 9.15pm
the evening she was reported missing. She gave a description of the man she said she saw several times, though her description
of what she saw changed during her police interviews. During 2009, your chief private investigator, former Detective Inspector
Dave Edgar said, at a press conference about a Victoria Beckham look-alike in Barcelona, that Jane Tanner might have seen
a woman that night, not a man. Do the McCanns agree with him? - or do they specifically repudiate what he has said?
28. On the evening of 3 May 2007, Jane Tanner claimed that when she saw a man carrying a child, she walked past right past
Dr Gerald McCann and the McCanns' friend, Jez Wilkins. But both of them said that Jane Tanner had not walked past them.
There was a contradiction about which side of the lane Dr Gerald McCann was on, when talking to Jez Wilkins. What is the truth
about that occasion? Which person or persons gave the correct version of events?
29. Why did one of the McCanns'
detectives, Arthur Cowley, on a Channel 4 documentary, say that the above contradiction was 'irrelevant'?
30. The McCanns have stated that during that week at Praia da Luz, each set of parents had checked on their own children,
not on the children of other parents in the group. Why were things so different on the night of 3 May 2007?
31.
Will Dr Kate McCann tell us why when no one within that group of parents checked on each other's children throughout that
week, that this one night (3 May) they allowed the one person in the group [Dr Matthew Oldfield], who stated he did not know
the children, to do so?
32. In the McCanns' account of the events of 3 May 2007, they have clearly placed the
time at which Madeleine was taken just after Dr Gerald McCann was said to have checked on the children between 9.05pm and
9.10pm. They have clearly stated that the shutters and window were opened, either by the abductor entering or leaving by that
route. Can they explain therefore why neither Jane Tanner nor Dr Matthew Oldfield noticed the open window and shutters when
they did their claimed check at around 9.15pm and 9.30pm respectively that evening?
33. The McCanns have stated
on their own website, in an attempt to explain why the window in the children's room was found open, that the abductor
might have done that as a 'red herring'. What would be the point of that? Is that something the McCanns seriously
believe to be a possibility?
34. Why did Dr Kate McCann herself not notice, as she walked by the window of the
children's room, exactly what she claimed to have seen on entering the apartment: the shutter almost fully up and the
window open as far as was possible?
35. It has been reported that two friends of the McCanns tore off the cover
of Madeleine's Activity Sticker Book, in order to write down what they all claimed was a record of the night's events.
It has been reported that they then wrote out a second timeline of what the McCanns and their friends said had happened that
evening. These hand-written 'timelines' have now been published by the Portuguese police for us all to see. In both
versions of the 'timeline', it is clearly stated that Jane Tanner had seen an abductor around 9.15pm that
evening. But in her interviews with the police she has said that she did not tell the McCanns what
she had seen for 24 hours, because she was 'embarrassed' to do so. What is the truth? - clearly the
McCanns all had knowledge of Jane Tanner's 'sighting' in order for Dr Russell O'Brien to write down these
two timelines.
36. The McCanns have frequently said that their sitting having dinner in the 'Tapas restaurant'
was 'just like being in your back garden', and that they were no more than 50 yards away, as the crow flies. But are
not the following all true: (1) the children's room was on the far side of the apartment, so the McCanns couldn't
see the children's room from where they were, (2) their room was 120 yards away on foot, up the lane, from where they
were, and (3) it was about 1½ minutes' walk from the Tapas bar to the children's room?
37. Will
the McCanns in your book make it crystal clear to all parents reading it that they should never, ever, leave young children
on their own, just as all child welfare agencies advise?
38. The McCanns have stated that both Madeleine and Sean
had said they were crying, while left on their own, the night before she was reported missing. For what reason did the McCanns
take precisely the same risks involved in leaving their children on their own the very same night that Madeleine reported
this to them? - apparently (so we are now told) with the apartment doors unlocked?
39. The McCanns have already
admitted that on the morning of 3 May 2007 Madeleine told them that she and Sean had been crying the previous night whilst
they were on their own, Madeleine apparently asking: "Why didn’t you come when me and Sean were crying."
Given that admission, why did Dr Kate McCann say, in a TV interview: "Was it maybe when we were bathing them
that they had cried?"
40. Dr Gerald McCann has claimed that a senior Social Services official told him: "Your
child care was well within the bounds of responsible parenting". This implies that a senior Social Services official
fully approved of three children under four being left in the dark well away from where their parents could hear them, and
exposing them to all manner of risks, quite apart from being abducted, e.g. (i) fire breaking out,
(ii) one
of the children becoming sick, perhaps choking on their vomit,
(iii) waking up frightened or distressed,
(iv) falling
over and hurting themselves in the dark,
(v) mistaking pills for sweets, or e.g. detergent or other harmful liquids for
fruit juice,
(vi) cutting themselves on a sharp object,
(vii) danger form electrical appliances,
(viii) any
other accident, such as falling over, hurting their heads and bleeding
(ix) wandering off, and so on. Given
that child welfare organisations like the N.S.P.C.C. and Social Services Departments say: 'Never leave young children
on their own, even for a few minutes', it is important to know who made such a controversial statement. Who was it?
41. How would the McCanns' children have coped if there was any kind of emergency while they were absent and out
of earshot?
42. The McCanns were asked a simple question as to whether they had ever given the children Calpol
or other sedatives the night Madeleine was reported missing. They denied on TV ever giving their
children Calpol or other sedatives. But Kate McCann's father confirmed that they did give the
children Calpol. What is the truth about this?
43. The McCanns have said: "Madeleine does not like to be called
Maddie and does not answer to Maddie". But Dr Gerald McCann called her 'Maddie' on Friends Reunited, the twins
called her 'Maddie', and many of their relatives and friends called her 'Maddie'. Dr Matthew Oldfield referred
to her as 'Maddie' when he was going for his 9.30pm 'check', according to Dr Kate McCann's statement.
A long list of examples of Madeleine being called 'Maddie' can be found at www.mccannfiles.com So what is the truth?
Was she often called 'Maddie', or not? And why was this apparently insignificant fact such an important issue for
the McCanns?
44. On the night Madeleine was reported missing, two sets of police arrived, the local GNR, and then
the national force, the PJ. On the first occasion, it is reported that the McCanns both spread out their arms above their
heads and lay down flat on the double bed in the apartment, as the two GNR officers walked in, around 11.00pm. On the second
occasion, reports say that Dr Gerald McCann repeated that same strange gesture, falling down on his knees, spreading out his
arms on the ground, rather like a Muslim at prayer. What is the explanation for this most unusual gesture?
45.
In the days following Madeleine being reported missing, the McCanns and their friends gave different accounts of how often
they were supposedly checking the children - hourly, half-hourly and 'every 15 minutes'. What is the truth?
46. What is the reason that the McCanns refused to pay for the evening baby-sitting service that was available for Mark
Warners holiday guests?
47. Why did the McCanns delete a significant number of their mobile 'phone voice mail
and SMS text messages before the police obtained their mobile 'phone records? Who were these messages from?
48.
According to an article by David James Smith of The Times on 16 December 2007, Dr Gerald McCann had an Achilles'
tendon injury so serious that at 4.00pm on the afternoon of 3 May he was unable to play tennis. How come he was able to play
tennis later on that day and go jogging long distances just a few days later?
49. Different things have been said
about the pink soft toy, 'Cuddle Cat': (1) that it was Madeleine's favourite toy and (2) that it was to be given
to her as a 4th birthday present. Which is the truth?
50. It was reported that after Madeleine was reported missing,
Dr Kate McCann put her fingers under the twins' nostrils and kept on checking that they were still breathing. Why was
that?
51. Dr Kate McCann is a trained anaesthetist. The McCanns’ latest chief private investigator, Dave
Edgar, believes that the twins ‘might have been sedated by an abductor with chloroform’. In view of these considerations,
and believing as she did that an abductor had taken Madeleine, why did Dr Kate McCann not immediately try to rouse the twins,
get them out of their cots and make them move around and breathe deeply to disperse any chloroform (or other sedative) the
abductor might have used? And if chloroform had been used, why did Dr Kate McCann not immediately identify chloroform, since
as a trained anaesthetist she must be aware of its distinctive and lingering smell, and its liability to cause burn marks
to the face if administered by an untrained person? Do the McCanns now specifically repudiate what Edgar said about this?
52. Why did the McCanns not wake Sean and Amelie at all on the night Madeleine disappeared, to ascertain whether the
abductor might also have harmed or disturbed or woken them in any way, and to gently question them as to whether they had
heard anything?
53. Why didn't the McCanns insist that the twins be taken to a hospital that night to check
that the supposed abductor hadn’t drugged them ?
54. Given the complete uncertainty the McCanns must have
faced at not knowing who might have abducted Madeleine and whether or not the abductor might have had inside help, why did
the McCanns promptly place Sean and Amelie back in the same Mark Warner crèche shortly after Madeleine went missing,
and despite the McCanns’ claims that they felt they might have been watched for some time?
55. What explanation
can the McCanns give for the police being unable to find any sample of Madeleine’s DNA in their apartment or elsewhere
in Praia da Luz, necessitating your returning to England to obtain a sample?
56. Why did it take three weeks to
release an up-to-date photograph of Madeleine, and only after Dr Gerald McCann returned to England to produce it?
57. Was that the only photograph the McCanns took of Madeleine on that holiday? (They haven’t published any others
of her taken by them during the holiday).
58. Dr Kate McCann has said that she had a premonition that ‘something
bad would happen’ on the holiday. She has also said that the McCanns left the patio doors unlocked ‘in case fire
broke out’. Did the McCanns truly consider it ‘safe’ to leave three children under four alone in a dark
room 1½ minutes’ walk away from them, especially in the light of those two comments?
59. How
do the McCanns account for the person who lived above their apartment, Mrs Pamela Fenn, stating that she heard Madeleine continuously
crying: ‘Daddy, Daddy’ for 75 minutes between 10.30pm and 11.45pm on Tuesday 1 May?
60. In the journey
out to Praia da Luz, Dr Gerald McCann was filmed on the airport ’bus sitting moodily in a corner. When Dr David Payne
spoke to him and said: “Cheer up Gerry, you’re on holiday”, Dr McCann can be clearly heard on the video
to reply: “I’m not here to enjoy myself”. What did he mean by that answer?
Questions
relating to events after Madeleine went missing
61. How did the McCanns manage to be so calm, well focussed
and organised, play tennis and go jogging etc., in the aftermath of the sheer devastation they must have felt at losing their
precious first child, Madeleine?
62. One of the many people who came out to Praia da Luz to advise the McCanns
and Mark Warners was Alex Woolfall, Head of Reputation Management at Bell Pottinger. He made a statement that during the first
few weeks he and the McCanns were working on the theory that Madeleine had wandered off. Will your book explain the
discrepancy between the McCanns’ certainty that Madeleine had been abducted and Alex Woolfall’s claim that the
main hypothesis of him and the McCanns was that she had wandered off?
63. On 4 May, the day after Madeleine went
missing, the McCanns were reported as returning to Praia da Luz. The police say they seized CCTV film at a petrol station,
showing a girl similar to Madeleine with two adults. The police asked the McCanns to return to Portimão, but it was
reported that Dr Kate McCann became ‘irritated’ at being asked to visit the police station again and ‘showed
no hope’ that Madeleine could be found. Why was Dr Kate McCann so irritated by being given the chance to identify her
missing daughter on CCTV?
64. On the same occasion, Dr Gerald McCann was reported as sucking on a lollipop, discussing
the football results and laughing and joking with the police. How can Dr McCann explain such a reaction so soon after Madeleine
had gone missing?
65. How did the McCanns know within a very few days of their daughter's disappearance that
they would need a 'fighting fund' for an upcoming legal battle, and that fighting extradition
back to Portugal may be a factor?
66. The Portuguese police were told by British police: “The McCanns have
no credit or ATM cards”. But the police found out that the McCanns’ flights to Portugal and hire of a Renault
Scenic in Portugal were paid with credit cards. Dr Gerald McCann later admitted having credit cards, saying they went missing
after his wallet was stolen. Did the McCanns have credit cards?
67. In a BBC TV interview, Dr Kate McCann admitted
that she had never spent any time at all physically looking for Madeleine. Why was that?
68. In August 2007, Dr
Gerald McCann was photographed writing on a flipchart about ‘The Wider Agenda’. What is the nature of this ‘wider
agenda’ of which Dr McCann wrote?
69. Why did Dr Gerald McCann’s brother John McCann, days after Madeleine
was reproted missing, leave his job indefinitely, knowing that Madeleine could be found any day?
70. On Friday
1 June, Dr Kate McCann wrote in her diary: “FRIDAY, JUNE 1: Quite fed up...I can't stop thinking about Madeleine,
about her fear of pain. How can I go on knowing that her life could have ended like this?”
What experiences had led Madeleine to have a ‘fear of pain’?
71. After Dr Kate McCann was taken in
for questioning on 7 September, she was asked 48 questions by the Portuguese police. She refused to answer any of them. Why
was that? Surely any parent with nothing to hide would answer every question the police asked?
72. Clarence Mitchell
was appointed in September 2007 to be the McCanns’ chief public relations officer. What is the total amount he has been
paid for this role since then? How much of that was paid by the Find Madeleine Fund, and how much from other sources?
73. The McCanns said publicly in August 2007: “We will take a lie detector test at any time”. Then a newspaper
offered to pay for one. The McCanns then changed their minds and said they wouldn’t take a lie detector test.
Why did they change their minds?
74. Months after the McCanns returned to England, in early 2008, they and their
friends were asked by Portuguese police to take part in a reconstruction of the events of 3 May 2007. Why did they refuse
to take part?
75. Why did the McCanns not let the Portuguese police check Madeleine’s medical records?
76. When asked by a Portuguese journalist from Sol to give some details about Madeleine’s abduction,
the McCanns’ friend Dr David Payne said: “This is our matter only. We have a pact of silence. All comments must
go through Gerry McCann”. Why couldn’t the McCanns’ friends speak freely to the media about the events that
led up to Madeleine being reported missing?
77. Why did the McCanns ignore police advice not to publicise Madeleine’s
distinctive mark in her right eye, a ‘coloboma’? The police had told them that if she was with an abductor, it
could place her life in danger. Did they take advice from others before deciding to proceed with making Madeleine’s
‘coloboma’ a marketing strategy? If so from whom?
78. On 15 July 2007, Dr Gerald McCann said: “We
thought it was possible that publicising her coloboma could harm Madeleine. Her abductor might do something to her eye. But
in marketing terms it was a good ploy”. Was the use of Madeleine’s coloboma particularly helpful to the McCanns’
marketing campaign?
79. Dr Kate McCann, in 2007, said: “I know that what happened is not due to the fact
of us leaving the children asleep. I know it happened under other circumstances”. What did she mean by those ‘other
circumstances’?
80. On 3 June 2007, Dr Gerald McCann said: “We want a big event to raise awareness
she is still missing…It won’t be a one-year anniversary, it will be sooner than that”. On 28 June, he said:
“I have no doubt we will be able to sustain a high profile for Madeleine’s disappearance in the long-term”.
Why did the McCanns make these statements if, as they told the world they truly believed, Madeleine
could have been found at any time?
81. Soon after Robert Murat was arrested, Dr Gerald McCann was asked if he already
knew him. He replied, irritated: “I am not going to comment on that”. Can he now comment on that and say whether
or not he knew Robert Murat before his holiday in Praia da Luz?
82. Did the McCanns play any part in Robert Murat’s
sudden decision at midnight on 30 April/1 May to fly to Praia da Luz?
83. Did the McCanns know Clarence Mitchell
before Tony Blair’s government appointed him as their chief public relations officer in May 2007?
84. Why
were the McCanns for so long convinced that Madeleine had been abducted by paedophiles?
85. On 24 August 2007,
Dr Gerald McCann, in a Scottish TV interview, said: “In fact, one of the slight positives in all of this is that there
is so much rumour about what did and didn't happen, it's actually very difficult, if you're reading the newspapers,
watching TV, to know what is true and what's not”. Many people have commented that they cannot understand how such
confusion can possibly help in the search for Madeleine. Can the McCanns now explain how people ‘finding it difficult
to know what’s true and what is not true’ helped in the search for Madeleine?
86. In 2007, Dr Gerald
McCann was asked to comment on his reaction at learning that Madeleine had been abducted, and replied: “It was like
being told you were overdrawn on your student loan”. In what ways is the abduction of your child comparable with finding
yourself overdrawn on a student loan?
87. Father Pacheco in Portugal was very supportive of the McCanns in the
early days, but then had a crisis of conscience and explained that he could not reveal all that the McCanns had said to him.
He also was quoted as saying ‘The McCanns have destroyed me’. Are the McCanns still in touch with him?
88. On 22 October 2007, Dr Gerald McCann e-mailed Bob Small of Leicestershire Police about the abductor Jane Tanner claimed
to have seen, as follows: “Sketch 1 was the rough outline…she (Tanner) was not really happy with the face and
therefore Melissa decided to leave it blank”. Why did Dr McCann send this email to Small, with the comment 'Tanner
was not really happy with his face', when in her own statements to the police, when Tanner has been asked about the person's
face, Tanner has said: 'His face was turned away from me’?
89. What did the McCanns and your
‘Tapas 9’ friends discuss when they all met up with their advisers at Rothley Court Manor Hotel on 16 November
2007?
90. Have the McCanns ever been in contact with Tony Blair in a professional capacity?
91. Had
the McCanns spoken to Tony Blair or Gordon Brown before 3 May 2007?
92. The McCanns were reported as having had
nine separate telephone converations with Gordon Brown in May 2007, culminating in Gordon Brown reportedly using his influence,
as Chancellor of the Exchequer, to persuade the Portuguese authorities to allow Sr McCann to release a desciption of the abductor,
based entirely on Jane Tanner’s recollections. What were the McCanns asking Gordon Brown to do for them?
93.
How did a child’s hair and DNA get into the tyre well of the car?
94. The McCanns have repeatedly said that
‘there is no evidence that Madeleine has come to any harm’. Do the McCanns accept that a girl of nearly four is
simply bound to have come to harm - and indeed to a lot of harm - simply by being parted abruptly
from the only family she has ever known?
95. The McCanns repeatedly said that they would stay in Portugal until
Madeleine was found. Why, when their continuing presence could have helped the ongoing investigation, did they leave hurriedly
for England three days after being made ‘arguidos’?
96. As parents, the McCanns had the legal right
in 2008, when the investigation was closed, to insist that the investigation remain open. Why did they not ask for it to remain
open?
97. Asked about having access to secret Portuguese reports, Dr McCann said recently in a TV interview: “I
don’t see any reason why the contents of that report should not be made available to us. We’ve been very clear
all along the way that we’ll only divulge information if and when its valuable to the search and the government
know that we have kept lots of information, erm, quiet.” How does the British government know that the
McCanns have kept lots of things quiet, and what sort of things have the McCanns ‘been keeping quiet’?
The alerts to human corpse scent and blood - by the two British cadaver dogs
98. Does Dr Gerald McCann
still stand by his claim that the evidence of the cadaver dogs is ‘notoriously unreliable’?
99. Dr
Gerald McCann told the media that the cadaver dogs, in the case of the murder of Eugene Zapata’s wife, had been described
by the judge, Patrick Fielder, as ‘unreliable’. Dr McCann on another occasion described the dogs’ alerts
to cadaver odour as ‘incredibly unreliable’. Do the McCanns still stand by that statement, now that they know
that Eugene Zapata eventually pleaded guilty to her murder, after discoveries wholly consistent with the dogs’ alerts
(and admissions by Zapata) proved that the dogs’ alerts had been 100% correct in that case?
100. As you may
be aware, on British police advice, the Portuguese Police asked top dog handler Martin Grime to bring his springer spaniels,
Eddie and Keela, to Praia da Luz. Eddie is trained to detect the scent of human corpses; Keela is trained to detect the presence
of human blood. Eddie had never given a false alert in around 200 previous outings. He alerted to the odour of a human corpse
in these locations: four different places in the McCanns’ apartment, two of Dr Kate McCann’s clothes, one of their
children’s T-shirts, on the pink soft toy, ‘Cuddle Cat’, and in two places in the Renault Scenic that the
McCanns hired. Eddie did not alert to a corpse scent anywhere else in Praia da Luz. Keela detected blood at some of these
places. How do the McCanns best explain the ‘alerts’ of these two highly trained springer spaniels? (In 2008,
Portuguese TV interviewer Sandra Felgueira asked Dr Gerald McCann: “How can you explain the scent of cadaver found by
the British dogs?” Dr McCann answered, and we quote verbatim: “Ask the dogs, Sandra”).
101. When
the dogs’ alerts became public, one of the McCanns’ very close relatives said that the McCanns said that the ‘smell
of death’ may have been found on Dr Kate McCann’s clothes because she was said to have been ‘close to six
corpses’ in her last two weeks at work. Can the McCanns substantiate that claim?
102. It was also suggested
that the ‘smell of death’ may have been found on Madeleine’s soft toy ‘Cuddle Cat’ because she
‘sometimes took Cuddle Cat to work’. Can the McCanns substantiate that, and, if so, can they explain how the smell
of death could be deposited on a soft toy?
103. At one time, the McCanns suggested that if Madeleine’s DNA
were to be found in blood found at the flat, this might have come about from Madeleine ‘grazing her leg’ or suffering
a nosebleed. Can this explain why a quantity of blood [or bodily fluid] was found where the wall joins the floor underneath
the window in the apartment living-room?
104. If there was in fact none of Madeleine’s DNA in either the
McCanns’ apartment or in the tyre-well of the hired car, why did the McCanns publicly state that they feared that
either the police, or the abductor, had planted DNA evidence in these places?
105. And from where could the Portuguese
police get samples of Madeleine’s DNA to plant, if they couldn’t find any of Madeleine’s DNA in the McCanns’
apartment?
106. When the McCanns moved from their Ocean Club apartment to a villa in Praia da Luz, a neighbour
saw their Renault Scenic car boot left open all night long for weeks. A relative of the McCanns, Michael Wright, admitted
to police that this was because of a ‘horrible smell’ in the car. Did the McCanns ever locate the source of that
smell, and why did it take so long to dissipate?
107. What was the reason that Dr Kate McCann washed the pink soft
toy, ‘Cuddle Cat’, before the sniffer dogs arrived in Portugal?
108. In August and September 2007,
the McCanns and members of their family gave a number of reasons for why the springer spaniels might have detected cadaver
odour and blood in the McCanns’ apartment and on some of their clothes. These included: transporting rotting meat or
dirty nappies in the boot, and even mosquitoes flying into the wall and killing themselves, to explain the presence of blood
on the walls - besides the other explanations we’ve just referred to. Did the McCanns at that time therefore effectively
concede that the dogs were correct in having detected the ‘smell of death’ of a human being?
109. Did
the McCanns ever ask the Portuguese police if anyone else had died in Apartment G5A?
The private investigators
the McCanns have used
110. Why have the McCanns appointed a series of private investigators who
have no experience or track record in locating missing children?
111. Why did many of the ‘private investigation’
agencies the McCanns have used have expertise in such areas as money-laundering, fraud, state security and intelligence, rather
than in finding missing children?
112. Do the McCanns still stand by the description of the alleged abductor that
they gave out to the world’s media on 22 May 2007?
113. If yes, why have we seen a total of 16 different
faces of people who are either ‘suspects’ in the disappearance of Madeleine, or people the McCanns refer to as
‘persons’ of interest’, or ‘people we wish to eliminate from our enquiries’?
114.
How many of those 16 are the general public still supposed to be looking for?
115. These events took place:
On Sunday 13 January 2008, Brian Kennedy visited Albert Schuurmans of the Roscoe Foundation in Portugal.
On 16 January 2008, three days after Brian Kennedy’s interview with Albert Schuurmans of the Roscoe Foundation, Dr
Gerald McCann emailed Superintendent Stuart Prior of Leicestershire Police with a PowerPoint presentation (folio 3966), with
the briefest of covering notes saying: ‘As discussed’.
Just one hour later Superintendent Prior forwarded
the package to Ricardo Paiva of the Portuguese Police, asking for instructions and stating, among other things: “The
PowerPoint attached (Folio 3968) was completed by the McCanns, but the statements were all taken by the U.K. police. Miss
Tanner’s description was taken from the press and from the summary of her statement. There is some urgency around this
as we need to decide prior to the Gail Cooper artist’s impression appearing in the U.K. press. How are you going to
deal with the possible press issues? What are you planning around Mr Kennedy and the private investigation firm?"
He concludes: “I will need to get back to the McCanns as he has asked to be updated. How would Paulo [Mr Rebelo]
want this conducted and what information I am to provide to them? They are very excited about this potential lead”.
By this time, there was an ultra-friendly relationship between Stuart Prior and Dr Gerald McCann. It was ‘Stu’
and ‘Gerry’. Despite being one of three ‘arguidos’ suspected of active involvement in the disappearance
of Madeleine McCann, Dr McCann is able to discuss his ‘Powerpoint’ presentation with Stuart Prior and get him
to forward it on to the Portuguese police within minutes. Prior was clearly aware that the McCann Team wanted to do a major
press blitz as soon as possible on this new sketch, and was anxious to help them. “I will need to get back to the McCanns”,
wrote Prior, in much the same way as he might have written: “I will need to get back to my Chief Constable”.
The McCanns and their formidable team were directing the entire course of the investigation at this point, aided by
Stuart Prior’s deferential relationship to the McCanns.
By this time, Leicestershire Police had already,
months previously, made the unprecedented decision to link their website to the McCanns’ fund-raising website, which
in turn directed any members of the public who might have information not to Leicestershire Police, nor to the Portuguese
Police, but to the McCanns’ own very dubious private investigators, Metodo 3, whose controversial boss, Francisco Marco,
had made the bold but false claim in December that he knew where Madeleine was, his men were closing in on her, and she would
be home before Christmas.
Dr McCann’s ‘Powerpoint’ slides attempted to highlight the alleged
similarity between Jane Tanner’s ‘bundleman’ and the ‘Monster Man/George Harrison man’ of Gail
Cooper.
Dr Gerald McCann wrote:
“Tanner spent a full day with Melissa Little, a qualified Police
Sketch Artist since 1986, to compile this likeness of the suspect. Melissa met Gail Cooper in a separate session. After spending
hours with both witnesses, Melissa Little states: “There are many similarities between Miss Tanner’s man and Gail’s.
Tanner believes that there is an 80% likelihood that this is the same man she saw carrying away the child, believed to be
Madeleine”.
Dr McCann was in effect telling the police: “Forget about Tanner saying it was Murat that
she’d seen. It wasn’t. Tanner now says the man looks something like these three sketches”.
On
17 January 2008 (the very next day), Detective Constable 4168 of the Leicestershire Police interviewed Gail Cooper and e-mailed
the Operational Task Force. He noted at the time that Mrs Cooper was trying to explain why the News of the World had
added to and embellished her police statements, by saying “It never crossed my mind” that they would do so. The
Officer also reported that she “mentioned a man called Brian Kennedy who was working for the McCanns and...had sent
an artist down to do a sketch of the man she saw at the villa” (Police files: Folio 4005).
On 18 January
2008, Superintendent Stuart Prior emailed Ricardo Paiva about the Gail Cooper statement:
“As discussed, I
have given Gerry a brief update just saying that the other descriptions are different to the artist’s impressions completed
by Gail and identified by Jane [Tanner].That the witnesses appeared genuine which indicates a number of charity collectors
in the area prior to Madeleine being taken.
“We have not spoken to Jane at all and will not share our files
with anybody, except yourselves, unless you request this from us. It appears there were at least three charity collectors
if not more in the area in the weeks before Madeleine being taken. I am told that the artist’s impression by Gail Cooper
is likely to hit the press over the weekend and I will update you on the effects of this next week, although we are not involved
in this in any way at all”.
Prior notes that the artist’s impression ‘is likely to hit the press
over the weekend’. He knew, we can be sure, exactly when Clarence Mitchell, the McCanns’ public relations chief,
would be calling the press for his now-famous presentation, ‘Crimewatch’-style, of ‘Monster Man’ to
the British press. This was a planned media event by the McCann Team to highlight Melissa Little’s sketches. Leicestershire
Police were acting like pawns on a chess board.
Later, Prior referred to an email from Michael Graham of the Leicestershire
Police who reported:“I [Mick Graham] have spoken to Charlotte Pennington this morning and she has no additional information
to give…She has been spoken to by a Private Investigator (Noel Hogan) working on behalf of Metodo 3. Charlotte assures
me that she has only relayed to him the same information that she has already given to the Portuguese Police and to me (as
per email dated 7 August 2007)”.
On Sunday 20 January 2008, the News of the World published a long
article on Mrs Cooper’s alleged sighting and printed the full facial and striding out sketches of ‘Monster Man’.
On 21 January 2008, Clarence Mitchell, the McCann’s spokesman, held a press conference releasing details of ‘Monster
Man’.
The News of the World concluded: “The sketch by qualified police artist Melissa Little
bears an uncanny resemblance to an earlier picture, based on Miss Tanner's story”. This is unsurprising given that
both sketches had been made - using considerable artistic licence - by the same artist, Melissa Little, who was paid for by
Brian Kennedy to assist the McCanns.
Given the obvious differences between Murat and either ‘Monster Man’
or ‘bundleman’, why, we must ask, did Tanner not at this stage immediately correct what, by now, must have been
quite obvious to her - namely that she had misidentified Murat from the police van, back on 14 May the previous year?
Our question: Given the above information, can the McCanns please tell us if this artist's sketch is of someone we should
now be looking out for, or has he been eliminated from the McCanns enquiries? The reason we ask is because the Daily Telegraph
last year published photos of 11 ‘suspects’ and ‘persons of interest' - and if the public is to look
for Madeleine and her abdcutor, we need the best possible description of the person we are supposed to be looking for. We
ask this also because this artist’s sketch of ‘monster man’ was in January this year referred to as the
sketch of a ‘suspect’ in an article in The Sun about an alleged sighting of Madeleine in Dubai.
This man has been identified by the Portuguese police and is not a suspect, is he?
116.
Did the McCanns know the Cheshire-based multi-millionaire double glazing magnate, Brian Kennedy - who has conducted their
private investigations from one of his properties in Knutsford since August 2007 - before 3 May 2007?
117. Did
the McCanns know Brian Kennedy’s his in-house lawyer at his Cheshire-based Latium group, Edward Smethurst, who became
their ‘co-ordinating lawyer’, before 3 May 2007?
118. Why did the McCanns and Brian Kennedy decide
to employ Metodo 3, a highly controversial Spanish detective agency, some of whose employees have been convicted of criminal
offences?
119. Just before Christmas 2007, Francisco Marco, the boss of the private detectives employed by the
McCanns, Metodo 3, boasted that his men were ‘closing in on Madeleine’s kidnappers’, promising that ‘Madeleine
will be home by Christmas’. These were obvious lies. What was the McCanns’ reaction to these clearly bogus claims?
120. The Portuguese lawyer, Marcos Aragao Corriea, searched the Arade Dam for Madeleine’s body and said he was
paid ‘expenses by the McCanns’ (i.e. by the Find Madeleine Fund) , via Metodo 3, to do so. Metodo 3 have
confirmed that they made payments to Marcos Correia at a time they were instructed by the McCanns and being paid by the Find
Madeleine Fund. Did the McCanns personally, or any of their backers, and/or the Find Madeleine Fund, pay Marcos Corriea, and
if so, how much?
121. Marcos Corriea then went on to conduct a prosecution against the Portuguese detective Goncalo
Amaral for allegedly filing a false report in the case of Leonor Cipriano, who was convicted of murdering her own daughter.
Did the McCanns in any way, directly or indirectly, finance him to do so?
122. Marcos Correia, as the McCanns know
very well, claimed that underworld sources had told him that Madeleine had been abducted, raped, killed and her body then
thrown into a lake. He then brazenly admitted that he had lied, and now said that he had had a vision of a big man strangling
Madeleine. He said he had had this vision immediately after attending his first-ever Spiritualist church meeting. How could
the McCanns use such a man in the ongoing search for Madeleine?
123. Brian Kennedy was and is the organiser of
the McCanns’ private investigations. On 13 November 2007 he and his lawyer Edward Smethurst met with suspect Robert
Murat and his lawyer Francisco Pagarete in Portugal. Brian Kennedy even brought along to a meeting he had with Portuguese
police on the same date some of the Metodo 3 personnel that the McCanns were employing. What was discussed and decided at
those two meetings?
124. Who made the decision to appoint Kevin Halligen, a fraudster and money launderer who has
various aliases, of Oakley International, to run the McCanns’ private investigation?
125. Were the McCanns
aware before Mark Hollingsworth’s article in the Evening Standard in August 2009 that Halligen had squandered
most of the money given to him by the Find Madeleine Fund on high living and hard drinking, achieving nothing?
126.
Why did the McCanns’ chief public relations officer, Clarence Mitchell, boast about handing over the investigation to
‘the big boys of private investigation’, namely Oakley International, when Oakley International hadn’t even
been formed by the time Madeleine went missing, and when it was essentially a one-man band run by fraudster and money-launderer
Kevin Halligen?
127. Why was the payment to Oakley International routed through Brian Kennedy’s company?
Why was it not paid to them direct?
128. According to iJet, the Virginia-based company taken on by the McCanns,
Brian Kennedy and Kevin Halligen in 2008 to field calls to the McCanns’ information line, no-one from the McCann Team
ever followed up on a single call made to that information line. Why was that?
129. On what dates did the McCanns,
Brian Kennedy and Clarence Mitchell meet personally with Kevin Halligen?
130. Did the McCanns or the Find
Madeleine Fund sign a contract with Kevin Halligen for him to provide services?
131. If so, what were the main
terms of that contract?
132. The McCanns’ chief public relations officer, Clarence Mitchell, has said that
Kevin Halligen ‘did a good job for the Find Madeleine Fund’. Do the McCanns agree with him? Of so, what precisley
did he achieve?
133. In September 2009, the McCanns’ lead investigator Dave Edgar said that he was ‘convinced’
that Madeleine was being held in a ‘secret prison lair’ within 10 miles of Praia da Luz? Is he - and are the McCanns
- still ‘convinced’ that this is where Madeleine is? Or do the McCanns specifically repudiate what Edgar said?
134. When Dave Edgar reported to the McCanns that he was ‘convinced’ that Madeleine was being held in
a secret prison lair within 10 miles of Praia da Luz, what action did the McCanns take to follow up his convincing beliefs
about where Madeleine was being held?
135. From all the investigations that have been made by the McCanns’
private investigators over the past four years, is there at least one definite fact that the McCanns
can give us about who took Madeleine and where she might have been taken? The
McCanns did recently publicly concede that as yet their investigation team had come up with ‘No leads at all’.
If the McCanns do have any useful information to tell us about the abductor, can they please tell us now, or in the book you
are publishing for them, what facts the McCanns have so far established about him/her?
136. On 11 December 2009,
Dr Gerald McCann said: “There is no evidence that we were involved in Madeleine’s death”. The previous year,
their chief public relations officer Clarence Mitchell said: “Can I suggest you actually quote me accurately. I said:
‘I believe Kate and Gerry are not responsible for Madeleine’s death’.” Do these statements indicate
that the McCanns and their chief public relations officer accept that Madeleine is probably dead, and was probably dead in
2008?
137. The McCanns met with former Home Secretary Alan Johnson and current Home Secretary Theresa May. What
did they ask the Home Secretaries to do for them?
138. It is reported that the McCanns asked both Home Secretaries
for a fresh British police force to carry out a ‘Review’ of the case, including obtaining all the files that the
Portuguese Police have so far not disclosed to the public, to enable the Review to be comprehensive. Is that correct?
139. Did the McCanns ask the Home Secretaries for a ‘Review’ of the case, or for a full ‘Re-investigation’?
140. Why in the recent ‘viral video’ about Madeleine, prodcued by Jon Corner, and backed by CEOP, did
the McCanns decide to use questionable photos of Madeleine, one in particular that caused even some of their supporters to
regard it as ‘poor judgment’ to have used them in their campaign to help find Madeleine? Did any of their advisers,
such as Jim Gamble, the then Director of CEOP, query their decision to put these photos into the public domain?
141.
The McCanns commented on stories in The Sun and other newspapers that convicted paedophile Raymond Hewlett knew what
had happened to Madeleine. The McCanns also commented on a story that he had told his long-estranged son Wayne in Telford,
in a death-bed letter, that Madeleine had been abducted by a gypsy gang in Portugal that had sold her on to a wealthy North
African family. He was said to have heard this story while both he and a gypsy gang leader were drinking together one
evening. The McCanns’ spokesman said at the time that this was a ‘strong lead’. Do the McCanns really believe
that to be a ‘strong lead’? If so, will the book you are publishing for them tell us what they have been doing
to follow up this ‘information’?
142. The McCanns sent their current chief private investigator, Dave
Edgar, over to Germany to try to interview Raymond Hewlett. Did the McCanns ever really believe that he had any connection
with Madeleine’s disappearance? If so, what was the nature of the evidence which led the McCanns to that belief?
143. Dr Kate McCann was recently asked if she had a message for Madeleine’s abductor. Her message was an appeal
to the abductor ‘to look after Madeleine’ and not ‘to return her to her rightful family immediately’.
Can the McCanns explain why her message was ‘look after her’ and not ‘return her now’?
Questions specifically about the Find Madeleine Fund
144. According to the annual accounts of the Find
Madeleine Fund, how much in total has been spent so far on lawyers’ fees (plus VAT) alone?
145. According
to the annual accounts of the Find Madeleine Fund, how much in total has been spent on the fees, salaries and expenses of
the private investigators in searching for Madeleine?
146. Why is the Find Madeleine Fund so secretive? Most of
it was public donated money. Why then do the McCanns and the fund Trustees not have a running total on the website any more,
and a page showing how the money has been spent?
147. Why did the McCanns remove the running total for the Fund
that they had on public dispay for the first few weeks?
148. How much of the Find Madeleine Fund has been spent
directly on the search for Madeleine?
149. What is the total amount the McCanns and/or the Find Madeleine Fund
have received in fees for e.g. appearing on TV shows like Oprah Winfrey and for helping to make documentaries and for other
TV appearances?
150. How much of those fees have been placed into the Find Madeleine Fund?
151. How
much did the Find Madeleine Fund or the McCanns or their backers pay Metodo 3 altogether? The McCanns have been secretive
and evasive about this, and different figures for how much the McCanns were paying them per month have been quoted. What is
the truth?
152. Different figures of £500,000 and £300,000 have been quoted as the amount the McCanns
paid to Oakley International/Kevin Halligen. What is the truth?
153. Why was such a large amount of money paid
upfront to Oakley International/Kevin Halligen? In the interests of the Find Madeleine Fund to which many of the general public
generously contributed, why did the McCanns/The Fund not at least spread the payments over the term of the contract?
154. Are the McCanns or the Fund intending to sue Kevin Halligen or otherwise trying to recover the money paid to him, given
the reckless way he spent the Fund’s money?
155. How much in total have the McCanns or the Find Madeleine
Fund paid to Melissa Little for the various occasions on which she was called on to create artists’ impressions of ‘suspects’
or ‘persons of interest’?
156. How much in total have the McCanns paid to Dave Edgar?
157.
The McCanns took legal action to ban Mr Amaral’s book on the case: ‘The Truth About A Lie’. The McCanns
succeeded in September 2009. But in October 2010 the Portuguese Appeal Court lifted that ban. The McCanns are carrying on
with their libel action against Mr Amaral, using their money or the Find Madeleine Fund to do so. What is the total amount
of money the McCanns and/or the Find Madeleine Fund have spent so far in fighting to ban Goncalo Amaral’s book in the
courts?
158. Of this sum, how much has been spent on those legal expenses from the Find Madeleine Fund?
159. The McCanns said late last year that their Fund was ‘running low’ and that the Fund ‘might run out
of money soon’. Yet at the very same time, the McCanns were concluding negotiations for a multi-million pound book deal
with yourselves, having ‘already written 60,000 words’ for the book. A serialisation in The Sun
for a reputed £200,000 was also apparently being discussed. The McCanns have said that the proceeds of the sales of
your book would be used to fund the search for Madeleine. Why did the McCanns encourage the general public to give more money
to their Fund when they knew fine well at the time that their Fund would be boosted by millions of pounds as the result of
you publishing their story?
160. Have the Trustees of the Find Madeleine Fund keep a full list of all donors with
their contact details?
161. Clarence Mitchell, the McCanns’ chief public relations officer, once asked the
general public to send money ‘in envelopes to the McCanns, Rothley - it’ll get there’. How did the McCanns
and then the Trustees deal with donations received in this way?
162. Who counted and audited the receipts from
events where cash was raised and handed over directly?
163. Have anonymous donations been recorded as a separate
category by the Trustees?
Madeleine Foundation 31 January 2011
LETTER 2: to Dominc
Mohan, Editor, the Sun
|
The Madeleine Foundation
Asking the questions about what really happened to
Madeleine McCann
66 Chippingfield
HARLOW
Essex,
CM17 0DJ
Website: http://www.madeleinefoundation.org.uk
Mr Dominic Mohan
Editor
The Sun,
1 Virginia Street,
LONDON,
E1 9XR
1
February 2011
Dear Mr Mohan
re: The Sun's reported serialisation of the McCanns' forthcoming
book, 'Madeleine'
We write regarding your newspaper's reported serialisation of the McCanns'
forthcoming book, for a fee said to be £200,000.
As you are aware, we exist to ask questions about the McCanns'
claims that Madeleine was abducted.
On 7 November 2009, your newspaper ran a story on claims by our ex-Chairman
that there was fraud within the Madeleine Foundation, claims subsequently found by Essex Police to be utterly baseless. You
also reported within the same article as follows: "A source close to Gerry and Kate McCann said: 'This foundation
is now in meltdown. They can’t wait to see the end of it'."
Contrary to that statement, The
Madeleine Foundation continues to flourish and continues to question the McCanns' account of events, as can be clearly
seen on our website: www.madeleinefoundation.org.uk
We have also published a new book since then: 'The Madeleine
McCann Case Files: Volume 1', and we are currently supporting an active internet petition calling for a full public enquiry,
with the power to summon witnesses, into all aspects of the reported disappearance of Madeleine McCann.
Our stance
of questioning the McCanns' claims has been significantly strengthened since 6 January this year, when the McCanns'
chief public relations spokesman, Clarence Mitchell, admitted on Radio Humberside that the McCanns' claims that Madeleine
had been abducted were 'only an assumption'. He added, twice in the same broadcast, that the abduction of Madeleine
was just, quote, 'a working hypothesis'. Up until then, the McCanns and their spokesman had always insisted
that Madeleine's abduction was 'a fact'. In this interview, Mitchell said he was 'in daily contact' with
the McCanns by e-mail or 'phone, thus it is clear that his use of these words, three times within the same interview,
'assumption' and 'hypothesis', was no accident.
Dr Kate McCann in a recent statement said that
the McCanns' new book would be 'very truthful'. However, the McCanns' book - and your serialisation of it
- will both be worthless unless they address some of the many questions that have arisen from their statements, and those
of their friends and their advisers, and their actions. I attach for your consideration a letter sent to the McCanns'
publishers, which includes a list of 163 questions which we consider that the McCanns' book should answer. The McCanns
have repeatedly asked the general public in this country and abroad to give money to their fund. They have asked the whole
world to look for Madeleine. In return, it is, we suggest, entirely reasonable for them to answer, in their 'very truthful'
book, the many questions in the public's mind.
If Madeleine's abduction is 'only an assumption',
then that assumption may be challenged. If it is just a 'working hypothesis', then evidence can be brought for or
against that hypothesis, or to support another hypothesis, as for example the former detective in the case, Goncalo Amaral,
did, in his book: 'The Truth About A Lie'.
It is a fact that in the early morning after Madeleine was reported
missing, Dr Gerald McCann and others in their group of friends made a series of 'phone calls to relatives and the media,
claiming that an abductor had jemmied open the shutters to their apartment and forced open a window, in order to take Madeleine.
That claim was immediately shown to be false when police and Ocean Club staff examined both the window and the shutters and
saw absolutely no signs of forced entry. The McCanns then changed their story, for example claiming that they had left the
door to the apartment unlocked. They then claimed that the abductor had opened the shutters and windows as 'a red herring'.
These facts alone give rise to significant concerns about the McCanns' accounts.
Then, as has been documented,
there are numerous flat contradictions between the accounts of what happened on 3 May 2007 as between the statements McCanns
and their friends. We have set some of these out in Questions Nos 1 to 60. These contradictions cannot go unexplained for
ever. They are not minor inconsistencies which one invariably gets when several witnesses try to recall events. These are
simply outright contradictions.
Our list of questions includes many about the private investigators employed by
the McCanns and the head of their investigation team, Cheshire businessman Brian Kennedy - and about the Fund. One of the
key questions we have asked is Question 135: "From all the investigations that have been made by the McCanns' private
investigators over the past four years, is there at least one definite fact that they can give us about who took Madeleine
and where she might have been taken?", Despite the expenditure of millions of pounds, the answer to that must surely
be: 'No'.
Then there are specific questions about those who have been investigating Madeleine's disappearance.
Portuguese lawyer Marcos Correia claims to have been paid by the McCanns to seach the Arade Dam for Madeleine's remains.
The McCanns paid hundreds of thousands of pounds to a controversial Spanish detective agency, Metodo 3, who lied to
the world in December 2007 by claiming that they knew where Madeleine was and that she would, quote 'be home by Christmas'.
The McCanns then appointed high-living, hard-drinking fraudster and money launderer Kevin Halligen, now in Belmarsh
Prison and awaiting extradition to the U.S. on fraud charges, to head up their private investigation team for 6 months. At
the time, the Mccanns' spokesman Clarence Mitchell claimed in your newspaper and others that he and his company Oakley
International were a top, experienced set of international investigators.
The boss of a U.S.-based company, iJet,
employed to respond to telephone calls to the McCanns' investigation hotline, has made a statement on the record that
none of the calls made to his company were followed up by the McCanns.
The public who donated so generously to
the coffers of the Find Madeleine Fund deserves full answers to all the questions we raise about these and many other issues.
It might also be helpful if the McCanns in the serialisation of their book in your newspaper were to update us on,
for example, what action they took to follow up the strong belief of their top investigator, Mr Dave Edgar, that Madeleine
was 'being held in a prison lair within 10 miles of Praia da Luz', and also what action they have taken to trace the
Portuguese gypsy who allegedly spoke to notorious paedophile Raymond Hewlett one evening whilst they were both drinking together
and told him that his gang had abducted Madeleine and he knew where she was.
As you reported on 1 September last
year, Hewlett is alleged to have given details of this in a letter delivered by a 'mystery man' to his long-estranged
son, Wayne, in Telford, after his death, which Wayne promptly burnt on receipt. An update on what the McCanns have done about
what they described at the time as 'significant information' would be helpful.
We trust that you will agree
that the McCanns should answer as many as possible of these reasonable questions about statements they have made and actions
they have taken, given the level of public donations and other support they have been favoured with. The serialisation of
their book in your newspaper would be the perfect medium in which to do so.
Yours sincerely
Tony Bennett
Secretary
ENC. Letter sent to the publishers of the McCanns' book, Transworld
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