Madeleine McCann found?

[orora]

Has it ever been determined whether the patio door was left unlocked or not or is this too still being debated?

 

[SapphireSteel]

saphire,
cat has never said she left the toy on a high shelf, there was no shelf so it woudl be an easily torn apart lie. The press claimed she had said this. Not one direct quote attributes this claim to kate herself. It has been talked about on the forum as an example of the bad press reporting.

Rashamon.
Can you just say where you got that translation, because that is nto what I have seen in the original portuguese ones, or the translations. And jeremey wilkins stated he saw gerry come from the path that led from the patio doors. But again it doe snot really matter what door he entered by, Jeremey saw him come from the path there so he had to have left by the patio door, and the patio doors could not be unlocked from the outside, and matt Oldfield said he used the patio doors as did kate.

Madeleine's favourite 'Cuddle Cat' toy was 'placed out of her reach'
Last updated at 15:54pm on 12th August 2007

Madeleine's favourite toy, her pink 'Cuddle Cat, was taken from her arms and placed beyond her reach by her kidnapper, according to new reports.

This important evidence could point to the fact that Madeleine was actually taken alive.

According to a report in the Sunday Mirror, Kate McCann knew instantly that Madeleine had been abducted when she saw that the toy had been moved from her sleeping daughter's arms and placed on a ledge way beyond the four-year-old's reach.

The paper quotes a police source as saying: "When Kate tucked Madeleine up in bed earlier in the evening she had the toy tightly in her arms as she did every night.

"So Kate was terrified when she spotted it had been left in a place too high for her to reach.


http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-474844/Madeleines-favourite-Cuddle-Cat-toy-placed-reach.html

By the way the correct spelling of my name is Sapphire not Saphire.

 

[rashomon]

Has it ever been determined whether the patio door was left unlocked or not or is this too still being debated?

The McCanns themselves stated that they had left the patio door unlocked.

 

[Sabot]

Trying to discredit Amaral does not alter the fact that crucial info is availabe to the public in the police files, where one can read the different versions of events the McCanns have offered to LE, like for example Gerry's first version being that he entered the apartment through the front door.

There was a lot of confusion about the back and the front of the appartment in the beginning because of the two aspects. And most of the discrepancies are due to The Press and Forum Myths, and due to Mistranslations in The Files appearing on Forums.

 

[Sabot]

Madeleine's favourite 'Cuddle Cat' toy was 'placed out of her reach'
Last updated at 15:54pm on 12th August 2007

Madeleine's favourite toy, her pink 'Cuddle Cat, was taken from her arms and placed beyond her reach by her kidnapper, according to new reports.

This important evidence could point to the fact that Madeleine was actually taken alive.

According to a report in the Sunday Mirror, Kate McCann knew instantly that Madeleine had been abducted when she saw that the toy had been moved from her sleeping daughter's arms and placed on a ledge way beyond the four-year-old's reach.

The paper quotes a police source as saying: "When Kate tucked Madeleine up in bed earlier in the evening she had the toy tightly in her arms as she did every night.

"So Kate was terrified when she spotted it had been left in a place too high for her to reach.


http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-474844/Madeleines-favourite-Cuddle-Cat-toy-placed-reach.html

By the way the correct spelling of my name is Sapphire not Saphire.

NEWS REPORTS. Some of those News Reports cost The Tabloids a lot of money.
Enough said, I think.

 

[Donjeta]

So why did the abductor bother to remove the toy and put it on a shelf? Why not just leave it on the bed or the floor or wherever it was at the time? Is he a neat freak?

How did she immediately know that the abductor had put the toy there and not one of the people who had been to the apartment before her?

Why does the toy being on the shelf point to Madeleine being taken alive? I'd have thought that people can put a toy away just as easily if they're handling a dead child, perhaps even more so because the child is beyond caring for her toy.

 

[brit1981]

Donjeta,
You have misunderstood the point. There was no shelf. Kate never said it was put on a shelf, as there was no shelf for it to be put on. It is just an example of the confusion that appeared in the media. But some people are of the mind that if it is in the media it must be one hundred percent true, regardless of the fact the media in the UK have admitted to printing fake stories. They had to pay Robert Murat, kate and Gerry, and the rest of the Tapas nine a lot of money for printing fake stories about them (and they are just some of the recent cases). Look up the leveson inquiry if you want to see how badly our media have behaved.

Sabot,
Yes I remember that. the flat always seems back to front to me, because we always see it pictured from the pool side, and this was the entrance they normally used. The front door was actually at the back of the flat and faced the car park. the door which seems to be at the front was the patio door, but in actual fact these are the back doors.

 

[Donjeta]

Ok, I get it. If anything that the McCanns or the police sources, as in this case, are quoted as saying is confusing or weird it's a media mistake.

If, however, it is in the media and it's favorable to the McCanns it must be true.

 

[Cappuccino]

The media do make mistakes Donjeta. Especially the British tabloids, they do not have a good record for accuracy or responsible reporting, and should in no way be taken as Gospel.

 

[brit1981]

Ok, I get it. If anything that the McCanns or the police sources, as in this case, are quoted as saying is confusing or weird it's a media mistake.

No, but the media have admitted printing fake and misleading stories (not just about this case either). Look at the Joanna Yeates case.
But there was a huge amount of confusion in the media about this intitally as they all rushed to get their stories out and spoke to people who did not really know what was going on. The cuddle cat on the shelf story is an example of this. Kate is hardly going to have told the police that there was a shelf in the room, when the police were in the room and could see for themselves there was no shelf. There is no mention of a shelf in the PJ files either. Look at the actual files (be careful there are some rubbish translations), rather than the early media reports.

 

[Donjeta]

No doubt the media get a lot of things wrong but I think it's within the realm of possibility that some of the confusion may be because confusing things were said by the family to different people at the time.

 

[brit1981]

It could be, but we have no way of knowing. i think we can safely say that the shelf thing was at best chinese whispers. there is also the problem of churnalism, where one media outlet states soemthing and everyone else picks up on it and embellishes it. I remember at the time seeing reports syaing the window had been forced, and other reports syaing it could be opened from the outside. there were also reports saying Madeleine's dna had been found in the car which turned out not be be true etc.

 

[rashomon]

There was a lot of confusion about the back and the front of the appartment in the beginning because of the two aspects.

But keep in mind that the police files also mention the key used to open the locked door:

[FONT=Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif]Witness statement of Gerald Patrick McCann, on the 4th of May 2007, at 11.15 a.m.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif]Thus, at 9.05 pm, the deponent entered the club, using his key, the door being locked, and went to the children's bedroom and noted that the twins and Madeleine were in perfect condition.
http://www.mccannfiles.com/id192.html#sta4[/FONT]

Since the McCanns never disputed that the back (patio) door had been left unlocked by them, this leaves the front door as the only possible entrance point which Gerry could have meant.
Later he changes this part of the story.
It pays to go through the police files with a fine tooth comb. They are the primary official sources available to us.

The McCanns' earlier statements are of particular interest because at that stage, they had not yet the time to 'fine-tune' their story and weed out possible discrepancies.

Imo Gerry's statement about having had to open the locked door with a key served the purpose to convey to the police that the McCanns had taken every precaution to leave the children behind 'safe'.
The unlocked patio door blatantly contradicts this of course, but I think Gerry was in an emotionally stressful situation where the wish to convince the police that the children had been "safe" led him to present this version despite the discrepancy evidenced by the unlocked patio door.

 

[brit1981]

I think assuming it had been translated correctly, the bit about him using a key is just a mistake. Things like that do happen when making statements like that. It gets confused, espeiclaly if people can get confused about qhich is the front or back door. besides the front door bit does not indicate a cover-up, because gerry always said he left by the patio door, and jeremy supports this. so the police knew straight away he had left the place unlocked.
I do not know about Portuagl but in the UK statements are nto actually taken down word for word (I know this from experience). So it is easy for someone to ask how the front door is opened, and be told with a key, and then for them to be confused and think the front door was the patio door, when in fact people had been talking about different doors. I would never ever sign a statement in a language I did not know, it is bad enough in a language you do know.

 

[brit1981]

going back to the confusion in the media.
here are two reports concerning the death of Tia sharp in the UK that have been printed today. One report states that the post mortem was halted at the weekend and we be resumed this week. Another report states that the cause of death was smothering. So which is it, has the OM be finished and the cause of death confirmed as smothering, or is has the PM not been completed and the cause of death not yet confirmed.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...ded-custody-appears-court-charged-murder.html

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-19240104

 

[Donjeta]

going back to the confusion in the media.
here are two reports concerning the death of Tia sharp in the UK that have been printed today. One report states that the post mortem was halted at the weekend and we be resumed this week. Another report states that the cause of death was smothering. So which is it, has the OM be finished and the cause of death confirmed as smothering, or is has the PM not been completed and the cause of death not yet confirmed.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...ded-custody-appears-court-charged-murder.html

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-19240104

I don't see a discrepancy here.

One article actually gives both bits of information in the same sentence.

t is believed that the girl had been smothered, although a post-mortem examination is yet to be completed.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...pears-court-charged-murder.html#ixzz23Qw9MKvH

They can in many cases form a belief about the cause of death before the whole post mortem exam has been completed. It takes time to run all the tests. It's a working hypothesis until the final report has been submitted.

Also, I'm not familiar with the status of this case but the post mortem examination may not be the only source of information about the cause of death if the perp confessed or there are witnesses or circumstantial evidence as to what happened.

 

[brit1981]

But the dailymail had a big headline claiming she was smothered. It shows the irresponsible journalism (and in the original online report they made no mention of the pm being yet to be completed).
This is the same paper that reported amanda knox had been found guilty of murder at her appeal, and presented a story complete with quotes from her family about their devestation at the result!

 

[Donjeta]

I think maybe we should wait for confirmation that she was not smothered before we blast them for reporting it wrong.

The Sun also claims she was smothered.

TRAGIC Tia Sharp was "smothered" and her body was found wrapped in a black sheet and bin liner in the loft of her step-grandfather's home.
The details emerged as Stuart Hazell appeared in court via video - charged with the schoolgirl's murder

Read more: http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepag...dy-found-in-binbag-in-loft.html#ixzz23R3ZY3Zr

 

[brit1981]

It is about the fact they do nto bother to get proper confirmation in their desperation to get their story. They may be right, but it seems they just print their story and hope that they have got it right. The amanda knox case, was a cas ein point.
The media have admitted they printed false stories about the mccanns, and have done to the same to lots of people. That is why we have had the leveson inquiry.

 

[Donjeta]

JMO but supposing (as the article seems to imply) that the prosecutor told them outside court that they believe that Tia Sharp was smothered, that would be sufficient confirmation for reporting that this is what they believe.

If they completely made it up based on rumor that's terrible but if it came from a source who should know I don't see anything wrong with it. They did not report that the COD has been confirmed, they reported it as a preliminary theory.