"Who would leave children that young alone?"

[fabgod]

As a child I was petrified of going anywhere in the dark.

This fear has remained with me, to this day I have NEVER walked anywhere alone in the dark.

I grew up in a very "safe" city, with an extremely low crime rate...but for some reason I have always been scared.

I actually thought all women felt this way until posting on this site.

Perhaps it was the way I was brought up...? But it seems more than that.

A natural, inbred caution. Perhaps I was attacked in a past life.

Its the Vampires Sapphire, check the marks on your neck lol

 

[Gem2626]

I know he persued her to Wellington New Zealand, which is where they hooked up.

Wellington has NEVER been a comfortable city to walk around at night.

Ahhhh ok. Now you've got me thinking about all the places i've travelled to and the risks i've taken in them countries particularly Thailand. I honestly believe it was growing up in a village that gave me no sense of fear. All the fears I do have are pretty irrational.

 

[Gem2626]

No, they were not.

I biked and bussed all over town in the daytime and got up to all sorts of mischief. I was the original "latch key kid" as they both worked long hours.

It almost seems like an instinctive fear...to this day I would never DREAM of doing it...I absolutely assumed every other woman felt this way too.

It was so odd to me to find they didnt.

Maybe you heard something/saw something on tv when you were younger that gave you that fear and it's lost in your subconscious. Guardian angels? Who knows. It's good you have that though.

 

[brit1981]

According to another poster on here, the nanny listening service wasn't even offered at the Ocean club due to the layout of the place, so not only is it moot, its totally not applicable.

Similarly, the quote as fact that the EVRD dog alerted to body fluids as well as blood?
Martin Grimes states "The dog EVRD also alerts to blood from a live human being or only from a cadaver'
The dog EVRD is trained using whole and disintegrated material, blood, bone tissue, teeth, etc. and decomposed cross-contaminants. The dog will recognize all or parts of a human cadaver. He is not trained for 'live' human odours; no trained dog will recognize the smell of 'fresh blood'. They find, however, and give the alert for dried blood from a live human being."

The body fluids are taken as being from a decomposed or decomposing body not live bodily fluids.

The same points seem to be being recycled endlessly, without being fact as far as I can see

You have misunderstood about the bodily fluids, he does not say the recovery dog only alerts to fluids from a decomposing body, he says he does not alert to fresh blood. So he would alert to dried blood from a living person - "They find, however, and give the alert for dried blood from a live human being." is what grimes stated. The material would degrade reardless of whether the donor had been living or not. it is misrepresentative to claim that he only alerts to material from a corpse. Hence it is believed that the recovery dog alerted in jersey to the large amount of bodily fluids that had come from living people, but had obviously began to degrade. In the same way the recovery dog alerted to the mccanns key fob which contained the bodily fluid of Gerry McCann.

The McCanns have lived in cities and villages. Liverpool, Glasgow and Dundee which both have nice and rough areas like anywhere else. When they got older they moved to a village. I spend a lot of my time (most at the moment) in London and I have no problem walking around in the dark on my own, it really does not bother me. I think it just depends on the person.

As for ward of the court, my friend is a social worker and she says in missing children's cases where the child is missing for more thna a few days it is common in her experience for them to be made wards of the court so that the courts can exercise more power on the child's behalf.

The reason the MW resort did not offer a listening service was not because of safety. It was because unlike most MW resorts it was spread out throughout the village so a nanny could not do a circuit in half an hour (I had a friend who was a nanny for MW and this was the standard practice according to her). I can see why they would think it was a good idea to make their own listening servie when their friends were saying how well they worked, and had used them before.

 

[Gem2626]

Baby listening services recommended as a safe option. Interesting.....

http://www.holidaywithbaby.com/pages/needtoknow/childSafety.php

 

[Gem2626]

You have misunderstood about the bodily fluids, he does not say the recovery dog only alerts to fluids from a decomposing body, he says he does not alert to fresh blood. So he would alert to dried blood from a living person - "They find, however, and give the alert for dried blood from a live human being." is what grimes stated. The material would degrade reardless of whether the donor had been living or not. it is misrepresentative to claim that he only alerts to material from a corpse. Hence it is believed that the recovery dog alerted in jersey to the large amount of bodily fluids that had come from living people, but had obviously began to degrade. In the same way the recovery dog alerted to the mccanns key fob which contained the bodily fluid of Gerry McCann.

The McCanns have lived in cities and villages. Liverpool, Glasgow and Dundee which both have nice and rough areas like anywhere else. When they got older they moved to a village. I spend a lot of my time (most at the moment) in London and I have no problem walking around in the dark on my own, it really does not bother me. I think it just depends on the person.

As for ward of the court, my friend is a social worker and she says in missing children's cases where the child is missing for more thna a few days it is common in her experience for them to be made wards of the court so that the courts can exercise more power on the child's behalf.

The reason the MW resort did not offer a listening service was not because of safety. It was because unlike most MW resorts it was spread out throughout the village so a nanny could not do a circuit in half an hour (I had a friend who was a nanny for MW and this was the standard practice according to her). I can see why they would think it was a good idea to make their own listening servie when their friends were saying how well they worked, and had used them before.

Yeah I can see under that 'false sense of security' I keep banging on about how it could be justified that their system was ok

 

[Gem2626]

An explanation of why the Mccanns sought wardship

http://shadplay.blogspot.co.uk/2010/11/maddie-ward-of-court.html

 

[BritsKate]

Baby listening services recommended as a safe option. Interesting.....

http://www.holidaywithbaby.com/pages/needtoknow/childSafety.php

I'd imagine they would have to be considering the lawsuits if something went wrong. From what I am reading it is now termed 'baby listening service' and instead of a nanny walking around listening at doors there is a mounted monitor within the room and a dedicated receptionist monitoring. If a child awakens the parents are paged to their room.

That is so not what happened here. And I stand by what I've already implied - many parents just do not feel comfortable leaving their infants and toddlers out of visual and auditory range in the care of strangers. Not the ones I've spoken to (both British and American) and many others posting on Mum forums. Some do of course otherwise the service wouldn't exist.

Somehow I very much doubt we'd even be discussing neglect now had the hotel offered such a service and the McCann's utilised it. They didn't though. MOO

 

[Gem2626]

I'd imagine they would have to be considering the lawsuits if something went wrong. From what I am reading it is now termed 'baby listening service' and instead of a nanny walking around listening at doors there is a mounted monitor within the room and a dedicated receptionist monitoring. If a child awakens the parents are paged to their room.

That is so not what happened here. And I stand by what I've already implied - many parents just do not feel comfortable leaving their infants and toddlers out of visual and auditory range in the care of strangers. Not the ones I've spoken to (both British and American) and many others posting on Mum forums. Some do of course otherwise the service wouldn't exist.

Somehow I very much doubt we'd even be discussing neglect now had the hotel offered such a service and the McCann's utilised it. They didn't though. MOO

I wasn't aware that there were other types of listening systems in place. I wonder how many hotels still offer the one that Mark Warner used to offer at their other hotels. The site I linked to does not state what type of listening system it suggests is safe.

So at the time this type of baby listening system was in place at Mark Warner where someone went and listened at the door every 30 mins. Yes there was no listening service at this complex, further up it was said this was only because of the lay out of the complex and the time it would take to walk around it would take longer than 30 mins. Not a problem for the Mccann's.

If the Mccann's were checking every 15 mins as they have stated then could this not be seen as actually better than there system? Obviously you have to take into account where staff are based/their own view of the apartments when they carry out these checks in other hotels. I wouldn't know where to get the answers to this.

What makes you think the outcome would be different had the hotels listening service been used. Although less likely Madeleine could have been abducted if the Mccanns had actually been in the apartment all night.

 

[SapphireSteel]

The resort offered night time babysitting in lieu of the listening service.

I find it very disturbing that this "family holiday" consisted of the children being in the creche for every second it was available (apart from evenings), while their parents relaxed, every single day of the holiday. The other Tapas members all spent time with their children, but not the McCanns.

I wonder why they bothered with the creche at all? They should have just left them alone in the room all day every day, as it was so "safe".

 

[fabgod]

An explanation of why the Mccanns sought wardship

http://shadplay.blogspot.co.uk/2010/11/maddie-ward-of-court.html

Thanks Gem2626
From that link, it gives me 2 thoughts, one is why bother going down this road, if it was simply part of a smokescreen as pointed out by the writer of that article?
My meaning is, much as I personally question the McCann thought process in many of their actions, they never publicised the Ward of Court move, so why would they do that as part of a smokescreen (unless maybe it was on a higher level)
Second thought is that it sends me back to thinking that the McCanns may have known of something regarding Madeleine being taken that has not been brought to our attention.

Going over old ground now, but just for a moment lets say that Madeleine was taken from the apartment and most, possibly all of the group had no prior knowledge of the abduction.
There is no doubt that Kate McCann in those early hours, portrayed a Mother who was in absolute hell, now that could be e genuine in that she had had her child taken, or it could be genuine in the fact that she was devasted by what had happened but for different, more selfish reasons.

If we take the thought that she/they believed it was a genuine abduction for a moment, then factor in the miraculous change exhibited by the Parents just days later, when I think they were visiting the church in PdL follow that with Gerry McCanns "wider agenda" and his "revelation" again in Church.

Suddenly, to me at least, the argument could be made that, they had been made aware of certain circumstances that changed their thinking and outlook.

Within this short period (2 weeks to apply to Court for a Wardship, from the date of MAdeleine going missing) we also had Gerry McCann stating that they would be looking for a big event, not in a year but on some anniversary or something, they were suddenly talking long term, why?

Possibly because they had knowledge that Madeleine was indeed safe, but not being returned for some unknown (to us) reason.
Again, all hypothetical bu, what if the UK police and peolple like BK were in the know as to this, it would suddenly make sense for the backing, rather than supporting a couple of Doctors who had covered up an accidental death or suchlike, that the support would be for a more supportive reason?

 

[fabgod]

I wasn't aware that there were other types of listening systems in place. I wonder how many hotels still offer the one that Mark Warner used to offer at their other hotels. The site I linked to does not state what type of listening system it suggests is safe.

So at the time this type of baby listening system was in place at Mark Warner where someone went and listened at the door every 30 mins. Yes there was no listening service at this complex, further up it was said this was only because of the lay out of the complex and the time it would take to walk around it would take longer than 30 mins. Not a problem for the Mccann's.

If the Mccann's were checking every 15 mins as they have stated then could this not be seen as actually better than there system? Obviously you have to take into account where staff are based/their own view of the apartments when they carry out these checks in other hotels. I wouldn't know where to get the answers to this.

What makes you think the outcome would be different had the hotels listening service been used. Although less likely Madeleine could have been abducted if the Mccanns had actually been in the apartment all night.

The MCCanns were never checking every 15 minutes, they stated that it was every 30 minutes.
If Mark Warner didnt offer the baby listening service at Ocean club, why would the McCanns think that they could copy a non existent service?

Madeleine could have been abducted if the McCanns had been in the apartment, but that is a pretty pointless argument to be honest, there are a million and one "what ifs" that could be brought up.
It is massively less likely that some "abductor" would walk in to the apartment and take Madeleine one very significant reason being, they locked the doors when they were all in the apartment, it was only left unlocked when it was just the kids in bed, from the PJ statements I read

 

[Donjeta]

I just wanna know if the nanny listening service, wherever available, leaves the doors unlocked.

 

[Donjeta]

The MCCanns were never checking every 15 minutes, they stated that it was every 30 minutes.
If Mark Warner didnt offer the baby listening service at Ocean club, why would the McCanns think that they could copy a non existent service?

Madeleine could have been abducted if the McCanns had been in the apartment, but that is a pretty pointless argument to be honest, there are a million and one "what ifs" that could be brought up.
It is massively less likely that some "abductor" would walk in to the apartment and take Madeleine one very significant reason being, they locked the doors when they were all in the apartment, it was only left unlocked when it was just the kids in bed, from the PJ statements I read

Cuz you wouldn't want anybody to come in and get the adults.

 

[BritsKate]

I wasn't aware that there were other types of listening systems in place. I wonder how many hotels still offer the one that Mark Warner used to offer at their other hotels. The site I linked to does not state what type of listening system it suggests is safe.

So at the time this type of baby listening system was in place at Mark Warner where someone went and listened at the door every 30 mins. Yes there was no listening service at this complex, further up it was said this was only because of the lay out of the complex and the time it would take to walk around it would take longer than 30 mins. Not a problem for the Mccann's.

If the Mccann's were checking every 15 mins as they have stated then could this not be seen as actually better than there system? Obviously you have to take into account where staff are based/their own view of the apartments when they carry out these checks in other hotels. I wouldn't know where to get the answers to this.

What makes you think the outcome would be different had the hotels listening service been used. Although less likely Madeleine could have been abducted if the Mccanns had actually been in the apartment all night.

Well if you believe Pamela Fenn's statement it calls into question whether or not they did in fact check on the children every half hour as she believes Maddie was crying for an hour and 15 minutes on a previous evening.

If you believe Yvonne Martin (the social worker) then someone would go see the children "every hour".

From Kate's own statement dated 4/5/07:

Around 9.30pm was the time the interviewee should have gone to see her children, but her friend Matt (a member of the group) had just done a check in his apartment then gone to the interviewee's. He had entered the apartment by a glass sliding side door, that was always unlocked and once inside had not gone into the children's bedroom. He only looked through the door, and did not hear any noise. He went back to the restaurant and said that everything was fine.

At around 10pm, the interviewee went to check on the children. She went into the apartment by the side door, which was closed but not locked, as she said before. She noticed that the door to her children's bedroom was completely open, the window was also open, the shutters raised and the curtains open, while she was certain of having closed them all as she always did.

Gerry was the last one to actually see Maddie at approximately 9:05pm if you choose to believe him.

As for what I bolded there is contradictory information available. Some say 50 metres while others closer to 75. All I know is when I look at where their apartment was from the tapas restaurant I certainly don't consider it a direct line of sight (but I do have astigmatism ) and there is that awfully big pool in the way. It's my personal opinion that these children were in no way left a safe (or even reasonable) distance from their parents. Not at their ages and not even at 15 minutes (though we know by all accounts it was longer).

 

[Gem2626]

The MCCanns were never checking every 15 minutes, they stated that it was every 30 minutes.
If Mark Warner didnt offer the baby listening service at Ocean club, why would the McCanns think that they could copy a non existent service?

Madeleine could have been abducted if the McCanns had been in the apartment, but that is a pretty pointless argument to be honest, there are a million and one "what ifs" that could be brought up.
It is massively less likely that some "abductor" would walk in to the apartment and take Madeleine one very significant reason being, they locked the doors when they were all in the apartment, it was only left unlocked when it was just the kids in bed, from the PJ statements I read

Ok what I read there were checks with the shortest being 15 min and the longest time they were left being 30 min.

The reason for the non-existent baby sitting service is because staff could not get around the whole resort and carry out the service within 30 min. As far as I know no other reason has been given in terms of it not being safe for children to be left in the apartment. It could have been reasonable that as they didn't have the issue of having to walk around the whole complex and there were no issues of safety then it would be ok to do there own listening service.

This is all extremely relevant in why charges haven't been brought against them, as is the fact that no one can say whether she would have been abducted had the parents of been there. If she was abducted he could of had a gun, planning to use that and lucked in when he realised the parents weren't there.

I'm thinking from a social worker point of view not a personal one and these things are all very relevant. Charges for neglect were not brought against them and there is a good enough reason for this which I am trying to work out.

Where did the thing about the locking of the door come from?

 

[fabgod]

Ok what I read there were checks with the shortest being 15 min and the longest time they were left being 30 min.

The reason for the non-existent baby sitting service is because staff could not get around the whole resort and carry out the service within 30 min. As far as I know no other reason has been given in terms of it not being safe for children to be left in the apartment. It could have been reasonable that as they didn't have the issue of having to walk around the whole complex and there were no issues of safety then it would be ok to do there own listening service.

This is all extremely relevant in why charges haven't been brought against them, as is the fact that no one can say whether she would have been abducted had the parents of been there. If she was abducted he could of had a gun, planning to use that and lucked in when he realised the parents weren't there.

I'm thinking from a social worker point of view not a personal one and these things are all very relevant. Charges for neglect were not brought against them and there is a good enough reason for this which I am trying to work out.

Where did the thing about the locking of the door come from?

If we are talking about the night of the 3rd may 2007
The McCann checks according to them were
8.30pm leave apartment
9.05 Gerry McCann check
9.30 Matt Oldfield
10pm Kate McCann
So nowhere near 15 minutes by their own statements.

Regarding baby listening etc, there was no service offered so it doesn't apply.
What is more pertinent is that they the McCanns felt it reasonable to leave their children in the apartment with an unlocked door, they did and that was their choice, they say they felt safe.
As far as we know, there is no law stating specific distances or times that are legal or illegal as far as leaving children so it is all subjective as far as neglect etc and as you rightly say, there were no charges brought for whatever reason.

The argument about the abductor breaking in with a gun etc is pretty much a non event, you cannot argue what ifs, the list would be endless.
The likelihood is, if the McCanns would have been in the apartment, that Madeleine would not have been abducted, the reason? there would have been no window of opportunity.

We have heard endlessly about the one maybe two abductors who may have watched the apartment and may have done this and may have done that, there is no evidence at all of any abductor, the PJ looked at all the information, followed the leads and found nothing to lead them in the direction of the abductor.
Thats not to say there isnt an abductor, there may well have been, but its also a valid theory that Madeleine was the result of a cover up of some sorts, the inference from the PJ files is that they strongly suspect that to be the case and from looking at the case and information available, that does to me at least seem to be the more likely scenario for that evening, why who or what I truly dont know



The locking door?
If you mean the patio doors being left open, that is admitted by Gerry McCann in his statements.
There is also a mention somewhere in the files that they locked the patio door when they were in, (meaning the parents)

 

[Gem2626]

If we are talking about the night of the 3rd may 2007
The McCann checks according to them were
8.30pm leave apartment
9.05 Gerry McCann check
9.30 Matt Oldfield
10pm Kate McCann
So nowhere near 15 minutes by their own statements.

Regarding baby listening etc, there was no service offered so it doesn't apply.
What is more pertinent is that they the McCanns felt it reasonable to leave their children in the apartment with an unlocked door, they did and that was their choice, they say they felt safe.
As far as we know, there is no law stating specific distances or times that are legal or illegal as far as leaving children so it is all subjective as far as neglect etc and as you rightly say, there were no charges brought for whatever reason.

The argument about the abductor breaking in with a gun etc is pretty much a non event, you cannot argue what ifs, the list would be endless.
The likelihood is, if the McCanns would have been in the apartment, that Madeleine would not have been abducted, the reason? there would have been no window of opportunity.

We have heard endlessly about the one maybe two abductors who may have watched the apartment and may have done this and may have done that, there is no evidence at all of any abductor, the PJ looked at all the information, followed the leads and found nothing to lead them in the direction of the abductor.
Thats not to say there isnt an abductor, there may well have been, but its also a valid theory that Madeleine was the result of a cover up of some sorts, the inference from the PJ files is that they strongly suspect that to be the case and from looking at the case and information available, that does to me at least seem to be the more likely scenario for that evening, why who or what I truly dont know



The locking door?
If you mean the patio doors being left open, that is admitted by Gerry McCann in his statements.
There is also a mention somewhere in the files that they locked the patio door when they were in, (meaning the parents)

As a social worker you have to be objective in your decision making. You can be subjective, I could be subjective if I choose to but the reason i'm being objective is because tomorrow I could be given a case just as complicated as this one and it's useful to me to look at this and understand why charges were not made.

The abduction happening even if the parents were there (having a gun) is not simply a 'what if' it is an important factor. As nobody can say for sure whether Madeleine would have been abducted anyway goes in favour of the decisions made against the parents. If Madeleine had hit her head and died in the apartment whilst they weren't there there would most definitely have been charges because by them being there at the time, although she may have still died, it was clearly an accident and they were there to deal with the situation as best as anyone could. If they were there that night and the perp had a gun they would have been pretty powerless.

I can honestly see from my objective point of view why no charges were made, other than the door being unlocked, that falls into my false sense of security but still it's pretty stupid to leave a door unlocked.

I wonder if that was seen as OK as in the event of a fire it would have been easier to rescue them. I'm guessing, and the reason is that one of the many reasons I sacked an old childminder of mine is that when I went to drop my daughter off one morning her kids were in the house and she was nowhere to be seen. She'd gone out the gate at the end of the garden and round the corner to where her garage was. When I spoke to my daughters new childminder about this she just asked if the door was locked as that would be imprisonment. As the door wasn't locked that conversation didn't continue but it's now got me thinking.....

 

[Gem2626]

Well if you believe Pamela Fenn's statement it calls into question whether or not they did in fact check on the children every half hour as she believes Maddie was crying for an hour and 15 minutes on a previous evening.

If you believe Yvonne Martin (the social worker) then someone would go see the children "every hour".

From Kate's own statement dated 4/5/07:
Gerry was the last one to actually see Maddie at approximately 9:05pm if you choose to believe him.

As for what I bolded there is contradictory information available. Some say 50 metres while others closer to 75. All I know is when I look at where their apartment was from the tapas restaurant I certainly don't consider it a direct line of sight (but I do have astigmatism ) and there is that awfully big pool in the way. It's my personal opinion that these children were in no way left a safe (or even reasonable) distance from their parents. Not at their ages and not even at 15 minutes (though we know by all accounts it was longer).

BBM- I'm assuming that she didn't know that children had been left alone at this point as if she had known then she wouldn't of ignored it. The Mccanns told the police that Madeleine had said they were crying though adding that they had checked

http://madeleinemythsexposed.pbworks.com/w/page/39077680/Rebuttal of "Fact" 11

It's a case of she said/they said.

What's interesting is that she says she saw a man looking into the Mccanns apartment (although says further down she didn't see any strange person or action before or after the event) and that someone had tried to burgle her.

http://www.mccannpjfiles.co.uk/PJ/PAMELA_FENN.htm

What Yvonne Martin said is hearsay and not admissible in court.

The apartment was 50 metres as the crow flies and near 77 metres in walking distance. Their view of the actual apartment was pretty much obstructed but they could see the building. They asked to be seated where they were because it was closest and due to the checks they'd be making.

http://madeleinemythsexposed.pbworks.com/w/page/39077600/Rebuttal of "Fact" 9

 

[fabgod]

Gem2626
You lost me when you started justifying the thought process of someone entering the apartment with a gun.
Its not important, but I am really interested in the Social Services way of thinking here,

So you are saying that you are taking into account the possibility that the above (man with Gun) could happen and that nobody can say for sure if Madeleine would have been abducted anyway.
Is that really the way that Social Services would approach a case?

Then you are saying that they may term the leaving a door unlocked as a kind of plus point because there may have been a fire?
Surely, it is not a plus point because it puts the 3 children at risk of an abductor walking in and taking one or as many of the children as he/she wants and on top of that, If the Parents had been at the apartment and a fire had broken out, they wouldnt have needed to leave a door unlocked in the first place?

Back to the man with gun, I dont see the sense in that at all, surely the issue should be to deal with the situation that you as Social Services are presented with, which would be difficult enough as it was, without adding ficticious scenarios to the mix?