At approximately 10pm on 3 May 2007, at Praia da Luz on the Algarve in Portugal, Kate and Gerry McCann presented the world with a mystery, the disappearance of their 3 year old daughter Madeleine.
Today, Ned Tenko writing in the Observer and reviewing Gonçalo Amaral’s book Maddie: A Verdade da Mentira (The Truth About the Lies) states, after briefly putting Amaral’s main points, “This reviewer – as well as any objective person – would surely by now have ruled out any of these possibilities. The book does nothing to change one’s view that there is no plausible case against the McCanns”.
Whilst Ned Tenko’s review of Gonçalo Amaral’s book is quite good, his view that the McCanns are innocent of guilt in the disappearance of Madeleine is mistaken.
Kate and Gerry McCann claimed that between 8-8.30pm they had left their three children under 4 years of age unsupervised in their locked apartment, only to return at 10pm to discover Madeleine was missing. They claimed that an abductor must have broken into the apartment, whilst they were away, and kidnapped Madeleine.
Rather than state “that there is no plausible case against the McCanns”, the abductor theory is not plausible, which means that the last people to see Madeleine alive, after 6pm, were Kate and Gerry McCann. Ned Tenko describes the McCanns as “an ordinary, middle-class family”. However, this couldn’t be further from the truth. The McCanns in my book are best described as an odd couple. There is quite a bit about them which is strange to say the least.
According to Kate and Gerry McCann, there was no mystery surrounding the disappearance of Madeleine, because it was obvious to them that she had been abducted. They were certain of this. The McCanns have yet to explain why it is that they were so certain as to the fate that had befallen Madeleine. Whilst other holiday makers, locals, and the police and Mark Warner staff were out searching for Madeleine, the McCanns stayed in the apartment. This was odd. Because, if the McCanns were innocent, and returned from a night out to find their daughter missing, they would not have a clue what had happened to her. However, the McCanns claimed to know just what had happened to Madeleine. All they needed to do was to convince the rest of the world to accept their version of events.
Initially, the McCanns claimed that their apartment was locked and that an abductor had broken into the apartment and damaged the shutters when they were jemmied open. The McCanns had phoned their family and friends to give their version of events and told them to spread the word. Newspapers, radio and television picked up these reports and broadcast them as though they were factual reports. However, there were no visible signs of a break in according to John Hill, the Mark Warner complex manager. There was no evidence, according to the police and PJ, of any break in. Much later, even Clarence Mitchell, the McCanns media spokesman, confirmed that there was no evidence of a break in. However, the McCanns personally have not yet made any public statement why they lied about a break in. It has to be said, it is plausible that the McCanns lied to cover up their own involvement in the disappearance of Madeleine.
It is plausible that at 10pm, before she raised the alarm, Kate McCann opened the apartment window. It had been cleaned the day before. Kate McCann was asked whether she had touched the window, and she claimed that she had not. However, only Kate McCann’s fingerprints showed up on the window during the PJ fingerprint testing. Once again, the McCanns have yet to provide an explanation to refute this evidence against them. Not only is there no evidence of a break in, there is evidence against the McCanns that they have lied twice in relation to the break in and setting the scene to look like someone broke in. It must be plausible that the McCanns are involved in the disappearance of Madeleine, and their attempts to blame someone else must be suspicious to say the least.
One of the most disturbing things about this whole case is the way that the McCanns keep changing their story of events. When the break in version starts to crumble, the McCanns then claim that they left the apartment unlocked. So, instead of an abductor breaking into the apartment, he simply walked in through the unlocked patio doors and supposedly climbed out of the window. Surely, it would have made more sense to walk out the same way? But, there needs to be an explanation for the opened window. It is plausible that the McCanns were desparate to keep hold of the abductor theory and adapting it later to fit the police findings. In my view, once the break in story was rejected the abductor story should also have been rejected. Then this leaves the McCanns with no explanation for the disappearance of Madeleine.