Madeleine McCann: German prisoner identified as suspect - #20

[Loobyloo]

Indoors. A painted wall. And that's just decorative wainscoting - ie. very common wooden panelling used to divide/give walls interest.

It just looks like they're in a pub or club.

Perhaps the casino where CB was a member?

ETA: this post from @MENDEL refers:
Madeleine McCann: German prisoner identified as suspect - #18

 

[Victoria Chambers]

I read something ages ago saying Tiago Da Silva "lost" a bunch of keys - Block 5 bunch? With various (but not all) apartment keys on it. The story was from an employee but it isn't mentioned by anybody in the witness statements! I'm starting to wonder wether I invented this story tbh. And that's not good considering how many "stories" have been invented in this case over time. Its driving me insane! X

 

[Loobyloo]

I read something ages ago saying Tiago Da Silva "lost" a bunch of keys - Block 5 bunch? With various (but not all) apartment keys on it. The story was from an employee but it isn't mentioned by anybody in the witness statements! I'm starting to wonder wether I invented this story tbh. And that's not good considering how many "stories" have been invented in this case over time. Its driving me insane! X

You've not invented it - it was an 'exclusive' in the Daily Express (though no names are mentioned):
Apartment key theft cover-up by resort staff in Madeleine McCann case

 

[redplanet]

DBM

 

[Victoria Chambers]

Can somebody please verify this for me.. HB reached out to SY, and he used a phone that was registered to a female in Bulgaria?? And this was 2017 ?? The same year SY revealed that they may now have identified purple blouse lady (Todorov) but could not find her and so were planning to go to Bulgaria in hope? So did HB revelation about CB divert this line of enquiries ??

 

[Sharkbite]

Perhaps the casino where CB was a member?

Although NM did travel to Portugal with CB, I think that this image was more likely taken in Braunschweig/Germany around 2013/2014 at the beginning of their relationship. Unsurprisingly NM didn't look happy at all after spending time with CB.

 

[Newthoughts]

That's a fair point. HCW commented they were looking at all similar crimes to see if CB might be a suspect for them.

Also fair points on the whole. Like I said, I'm still not convinced one way or the other, just putting forward some reason why the unplanned scenario makes some sense to me.

Just picking up on some of those points though.

You mentioned people spotted lurking, but these were all in the daytime. If he was monitoring their evening movements, it's a lot harder to go unnoticed. I'm not sure where you could safely observe the apartment/tapas group without standing out.

You asked if she was killed in the apartment, wouldn't it be just as likely be a failed abduction as a failed theft? Well, to my mind no. If he was planning an abduction I would have expected more care to be taken, plus he had a predefined goal to get her out of there alive. That's not to say it couldn't have happened though, so still quite plausible.

Similary, I wouldn't say re-registering on the 4th is just as likely in either scenario. If it was for the purpose of an alibi anyway, knowing he was going to need thay alibi it would have made more sense to do it beforehand.

Regarding MM's bedding, it looked remarkably neat. Perhaps too neat, as if put that way. And I'm not suggesting any scenario where she bled. If he had to kill her in a spontaneous way, it would likely been via strangulation or suffocation. Would be almost impossible to detect that had happened in the bedroom without a body. Even with a half-decent investigation team doing the forensics.

Regarding material evidence and knowledge of the crime, my suspicion is that they are not taking about the same thing but could be wrong. The material evidence apparently relates to knowing MM died. Knowledge of the crime implies CB told someone something. If they were able to tie CB to knowing of MM's death then surely they would have enough to charge. To me, it reads more like they can prove MM is dead but not quite tie CB to that material evidence. They then also have seperate evidence that CB has told some unknown detail of the crime to someone.

I think it's good to debate though. Thank you for some constructive arguments. A number of people think simply saying "it doesnt make sense" is a valid counter-argument.

Thanks. I would like to add in support of my counter arguments the things we now know about CB because he has been fairly convicted of them. They include a cruel and brutal planned rape, child abuse and possession of images of child abuse. The rape clearly involved some planning.

Likewise the abuse of a girlfriends small daughter involved getting to know her which is planning. I'll add it's a common ploy for paedophiles - befriending parents long before abusing. It's a plan

Based on that my opinion is he went in with the sole intention of taking MM.

I'd like to add that if it were a carefully planned abduction and if he had been watching the group and taking note of their movements, he would have known that the patio door would have been open each night.
Surely he would have taken that route in - it would have been the quickest route, then out by the front door. Less than a minute to scoop MM from her bed.
Instead he chose to go in through a window, his usual M.O when he burgled and much more inefficient.
Would a planned abduction take into consideration that the window just happened to be unlocked too?!

Firstly we don't actually know how he entered or left. All we know is that the window was opened.

We do know that the patio doors faced the pool and restaurants and would be more public of you looked a bit shifty than either the bedroom window or front door. If other holidaymakers were in they would be more likely to be sitting in the lounge looking out thru the patio doors than looking out of bedroom windows

We do know he was a pretty successful burglar so would the window have been that much harder?

So based on that the options could range from in thru patio, check coast is clear thru window, out thru front door. In thru window out thru front door and so on.

Lastly planned doesn't necessarily have to mean 'carefully' planned. Nobody had said carefully planned.

Similarly Seeing an opportunity doesn't mean you don't plan the best way to seize it. And it worked

 

[Chiatos]

I read something ages ago saying Tiago Da Silva "lost" a bunch of keys - Block 5 bunch? With various (but not all) apartment keys on it. The story was from an employee but it isn't mentioned by anybody in the witness statements! I'm starting to wonder wether I invented this story tbh. And that's not good considering how many "stories" have been invented in this case over time. Its driving me insane! X

You've not invented it - it was an 'exclusive' in the Daily Express (though no names are mentioned):
Apartment key theft cover-up by resort staff in Madeleine McCann case

Tiago used to live in Burgau.
Something starting with an "S":
https://www.mccannpjfiles.co.uk/P2/02_VOLUME_IIa_Page_401.jpg

 

[enjy15]

'Madeleine is Dead' - They've Taken Her - Omny.fm

A podcast with HCW about MM

 

[enjy15]

'Madeleine is Dead' - They've Taken Her - Omny.fm

A podcast with HCW about MM

“Our evidence is so strong that we can say there was a murder of Madeleine McCann”

Cannot confirm if PJ and SY have the same info and evidence the BKA have.


“There is evidence that the phone number did belong to CB”

“I don’t know the range of the OC mast”? He just presumes the mast puts CB in the OC, he is not sure how accurate it is and what area it covers. (Doesn’t sound promising)

“From our evidence we have to say shes dead and murdered by our suspect, we don’t know why British police are investigating missing persons case”

“in the past 2 years we have collected many evidence and info about the case, and in the past weeks it has been so strong that we are sure she is dead and that he is the murderer”

“there’s more evidence not only the phone call, concrete yes but not forensic. Evidence so strong but not to charge him, the evidence is more than only a hint and more than only a witness.”

“Only possible to charge someone in Germany when you are sure they will be sentenced, evidence is not so strong that we are sure he will be sentenced.”

“We cannot say what the missing link is. Perhaps we need more witnesses, we need photos or videos” doesn’t sound like they have a photos or videos personally IMO, I think maybe there is rumour of images/videos that CB has likely hidden or destroyed.

“We are hopeful we will find the missing evidence but I’m not able to say if we will be successful but we are hopeful”

“When we charge him we can speak about the details and the evidence we have”

 

[Dlk79]

“We cannot say what the missing link is. Perhaps we need more witnesses, we need photos or videos” doesn’t sound like they have a photos or videos personally IMO, I think maybe there is rumour of images/videos that CB has likely hidden or destroyed.

That doesn't necessarily mean they don't have another photo or video of MM's death. He talks about witnesses, photos or videos. That's in keeping with the initial appeal where he asked British holiday makers staying in PDL at the time for any photos or videos they had. In other words, it sounds to me like they are hoping for one of these to have captured CB in the area.

 

[mrjitty]

Thanks. I would like to add in support of my counter arguments the things we now know about CB because he has been fairly convicted of them. They include a cruel and brutal planned rape, child abuse and possession of images of child abuse. The rape clearly involved some planning.

Likewise the abuse of a girlfriends small daughter involved getting to know her which is planning. I'll add it's a common ploy for paedophiles - befriending parents long before abusing. It's a plan

Based on that my opinion is he went in with the sole intention of taking MM.

RSBM

This is an example of propensity reasoning which would not be allowed at trial. Just because he is the kind of abuser who has targeted kids (in a fairly typical way) does not tend to prove in one way or another that he is likely to have planned an abduction.

Profiling works in these cases because we know historically that sex offenders will tend to act up to their big crime, so you will find clues in their past consisting of lesser offences. So then by looking for more evidence, you can link them to the crime.

But the prior offending of itself doesn't tell us anything about whether he is the kind of offender who would do an abduction.

That is what worries me most about the media discussion - it tends to assume guilt because CB did other bad crimes

 

[mrjitty]

“Our evidence is so strong that we can say there was a murder of Madeleine McCann”

Cannot confirm if PJ and SY have the same info and evidence the BKA have.


“There is evidence that the phone number did belong to CB”

“I don’t know the range of the OC mast”? He just presumes the mast puts CB in the OC, he is not sure how accurate it is and what area it covers. (Doesn’t sound promising)

“From our evidence we have to say shes dead and murdered by our suspect, we don’t know why British police are investigating missing persons case”

“in the past 2 years we have collected many evidence and info about the case, and in the past weeks it has been so strong that we are sure she is dead and that he is the murderer”

“there’s more evidence not only the phone call, concrete yes but not forensic. Evidence so strong but not to charge him, the evidence is more than only a hint and more than only a witness.”

“Only possible to charge someone in Germany when you are sure they will be sentenced, evidence is not so strong that we are sure he will be sentenced.”

“We cannot say what the missing link is. Perhaps we need more witnesses, we need photos or videos” doesn’t sound like they have a photos or videos personally IMO, I think maybe there is rumour of images/videos that CB has likely hidden or destroyed.

“We are hopeful we will find the missing evidence but I’m not able to say if we will be successful but we are hopeful”

“When we charge him we can speak about the details and the evidence we have”

Interesting

I think @SuperdadV8 might be correct that the evidence is more in the direction of internet chats and witnesses than photos/videos

My highly overvalued opinion is that they believe such evidence exists or existed, but they don't have it.

 

[Chiatos]

'Madeleine is Dead' - They've Taken Her - Omny.fm

A podcast with HCW about MM

The way that I have understood HCW's comments is that LE has proof that that phone was CB's and that the concrete evidence has been provided by means of that same phone. And with that I don't mean the notorious phone call.

Probably CB has used his phone in some chats or whatever. Or he has provided images through that phone.
Something like that.

 

[mrjitty]

You say his history is torture, abuse and filming but that's not necessarily the case when it comes to children. There's no record of him torturing a child or even filming one as far as we know (he did take photos though of his ex's daughter but he manipulated that opportunity through trust). All his perversions against children fit a profile of opportunist voyeurism which is what I'm suggesting may have happened to MM before things got very ugly.

I think this is an important point. What we know of him doesn't point in the direction of planned abduction/murder. More opportunistic.

 

[mrjitty]

Very true. I think they haven't, since BKA had said this sharing could potentially hamper the investigation.

I find this state of affairs very odd

Are BKA concerned Scotland Yard would leak the details?

To the parents? The media?

It also tends to indicate that BKA place see no value in any assistance from the UK - meaning the multi-year Met investigation is a complete waste of time?

 

[Okapi]

That doesn't necessarily mean they don't have another photo or video of MM's death. He talks about witnesses, photos or videos. That's in keeping with the initial appeal where he asked British holiday makers staying in PDL at the time for any photos or videos they had. In other words, it sounds to me like they are hoping for one of these to have captured CB in the area.

Hypothetically then, they may have a time stamped image of a disguised perp and they need proof CB was in radius of the date and location to add weight to to the case it is him? Or is that too simplistic?

 

[Dlk79]

Thanks. I would like to add in support of my counter arguments the things we now know about CB because he has been fairly convicted of them. They include a cruel and brutal planned rape, child abuse and possession of images of child abuse. The rape clearly involved some planning.

Likewise the abuse of a girlfriends small daughter involved getting to know her which is planning. I'll add it's a common ploy for paedophiles - befriending parents long before abusing. It's a plan

Based on that my opinion is he went in with the sole intention of taking MM

It's interesting you say "based on that", your opinion is that he went in there with the sole intention of taking MM. Yet both the examples you quote didn't involve any sort of abduction. They were both abuse in situ, which is what I'm effectively proposing might have happened.

The only common theme is that they involved some planning. And just to be clear, I'm not saying CB did not plan anything. Even a burglary usually requires SOME element of planning. My main distinction between the 2 theories is whether CB's intent was always to abduct MM that night (which would have required a specific plan to do so) or was it something else and that his plans changed.

So even assuming he did plan 'something' ahead of time, why is it necessarily that his plan was to take MM? Is it not equally as likely that his plan was just to carry out some sort of abuse while MM was asleep in the apartment? That would have been more in keeping with his MO from what we know about him.

Even discounting the theory of a death occurring in 5A. He might have gone in with the intention of doing something while she was asleep and then (for whatever reasons) ended up taking her.

An interesting potential link for me was mentioned in the Netflix documentary. It's in the 8th episode, about 24 minutes in. Andy Redwood of SY talks of a possible connection to a sexual predator operating in the area. This man had alledgedly sexually assaulted 5 young white british girls IN THEIR OWN BEDS. British police uncovered 28 similar cases in the area, in nearly all of them the victims were british tourists. When they discuss the man's description, they seem to match with CB's profile. They say he was speaking English but with a foreign accent (check), his skin was very tanned (check), he wore a face mask (similar concept to the DM case) and he smelt strange (like a mechanic maybe?). The one aspect that doesn't quite match is the hair, it is described as dark. I don't know how CB's hair would look in a darkened bedroom (it looks quite brown in certain photos) but there's also the obvious option he was wearing one of his wigs. Would make sense as a disguise combined with the face mask and also a way keep his real hair covered up to prevent shedding DNA evidence (again, similar to DM case).

IF this predator was indeed CB, it could be his intent with MM that night involved something similar prior to something going wrong (accidental death etc?) or him deciding he had an opportunity to take her with him.

 

[mrjitty]

I suspect I might be one of those 'it doesn't make sense' people that you see as 'unconstructive' in their counter arguments. And that's fine.

I absolutely agree that it's good and crucial to debate. But for me, the debate has to take *historic, documented events into account that have to be explained and made sense of before they can be dismissed by me so I can travel, unencumbered, down another plausible path.

And a lot of *them still don't make sense to me to this day. So that's where I am, for clarity. It's not about being unconstructive or dismissive of your theories, it's about understanding why past ambiguities can be just abandoned now that there's a named prime suspect in place who apparently and allegedly is responsible for and at the root of the mystery of MM's disappearance.

And that's where I'll stay until Herr Wolters reveals all.

BIB - especially because FF has revealed these will form the heart of the defence case.

I suspect a key reason not to charge is HCW knows he needs a piece of evidence so strong as to short circuit the entire convoluted history of the case.

By way of example, had they found some of her clothing at his garden, then everything else falls away. FF can't point to the various 5A suspect and theories, because whatever the truth of all that, at the end of the day, CB must be involved beyond any doubt.

So to my mind, building a case on a circumstantial web of suspicious points is not enough - you need that direct hammer blow.

 

[mrjitty]

It's interesting you say "based on that", your opinion is that he went in there with the sole intention of taking MM. Yet both the examples you quote didn't involve any sort of abduction. They were both abuse in situ, which is what I'm effectively proposing might have happened.

The only common theme is that they involved some planning. And just to be clear, I'm not saying CB did not plan anything. Even a burglary usually requires SOME element of planning. My main distinction between the 2 theories is whether CB's intent was always to abduct MM that night (which would have required a specific plan to do so) or was it something else and that his plans changed.

So even assuming he did plan 'something' ahead of time, why is it necessarily that his plan was to take MM? Is it not equally as likely that his plan was just to carry out some sort of abuse while MM was asleep in the apartment? That would have been more in keeping with his MO from what we know about him.

Even discounting the theory of a death occurring in 5A. He might have gone in with the intention of doing something while she was asleep and then (for whatever reasons) ended up taking her.

An interesting potential link for me was mentioned in the Netflix documentary. It's in the 8th episode, about 24 minutes in. Andy Redwood of SY talks of a possible connection to a sexual predator operating in the area. This man had alledgedly sexually assaulted 5 young white british girls IN THEIR OWN BEDS. British police uncovered 28 similar cases in the area, in nearly all of them the victims were british tourists. When they discuss the man's description, they seem to match with CB's profile. They say he was speaking English but with a foreign accent (check), his skin was very tanned (check), he wore a face mask (similar concept to the DM case) and he smelt strange (like a mechanic maybe?). The one aspect that doesn't quite match is the hair, it is described as dark. I don't know how CB's hair would look in a darkened bedroom (it looks quite brown in certain photos) but there's also the obvious option he was wearing one of his wigs. Would make sense as a disguise combined with the face mask and also a way keep his real hair covered up to prevent shedding DNA evidence (again, similar to DM case).

IF this predator was indeed CB, it could be his intent with MM that night involved something similar prior to something going wrong (accidental death etc?) or him deciding he had an opportunity to take her with him.

Great post

The other offences do seem to be a much more likely modus than complex abduction theories