I set up my forum with serious intent. I wanted my forum to put together evidence about what really happened to Madeleine. Over the years, together, we have done just that.
When Operation Grange was set up in May 2011, many of us had high hopes for it. I think it’s fair to say that most of us now feel that those hopes have been dashed.
I’d like to thank first of all those who helped me compile this letter, and all of you who in recent weeks have made suggestions about the content, even those who noticed a minor typo or a failure to close some inverted commas. I hope I’ve done justice to all your suggestions. I’m especially pleased to be able to say that my letter has been examined by some of those who have put the most work into unravelling this mystery and they have pronounced it accurate in its details and very much to the point. And that point is that Operation Grange does not seem to have been a genuine search for the truth.
I also want to pay tribute to many others whose work has contributed to this letter. By that I mean people like Nigel Moore and ‘pamalam’ who have for nearly 10 years run the mccannfiles and mccannpjfiles sites. I also mean Joana Morais and the many Portuguese helpers who voluntarily translated the Portuguese police files on the case, and many other documents. And I also mean every single individual anywhere who has helped to get us nearer to the truth.
What to do now?
I’ve done my bit. Now can you all help me please?
Can you please contact your local M.P., enclosing a copy of my letter, and add something like: “Dear MP, Please have a look at the enclosed letter and Appendix. It suggests that the Metropolitan Police have not been conducting a genuine enquiry into what happened to Madeleine McCann. Please forward this letter to the Prime Minister, Home Secretary and Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe and ask them for a detailed response to the serious allegations in the letter. Thank you. Yours sincerely…”
There is information and advice about how to contact your M.P. on the ‘Write To Them’ site: https://www.writetothem.com/
Please use social media to promote this letter. If using Twitter, please use hashtags. I suggest something like:
#CMOMM letter to #PrimeMinister suggesting #MetPolice enquiry into Maddie #McCann mystery is not genuine
Add a link to this thread, of course!
I’ll be arranging to send copies of this to various people over the next few weeks. Please share what you’ve done, or post further suggestions, on this thread.
And thank you all again
Jill
----------------------
From: Ms Jill Havern and members of ‘The Complete Mystery of Madeleine McCann’
Rt. Hon. Mrs Theresa May
Prime Minister
10 Downing Street
LONDON
W1A 1AA
Commissioner Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe
Metropolitan Police
8-10 Broadway,
LONDON
SW1H 0BG
Monday, 26 September 2016
Dear Prime Minister and Commissioner Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe
The conduct of the Operation Grange investigation into the reported disappearance of Madeleine McCann
First of all, Prime Minister, we congratulate you on your appointment as Prime Minister and wish you every success in your new position. The serious matters raised in this letter will of course be very familiar to you, as you had meetings with the McCanns and their advisers when you were Home Secretary, and asked Sir Paul Stephenson to set up Operation Grange.
You may also be aware of three petitions that were placed on the Prime Minister’s website by members of my forum, in 2010, 2014 and one in 2015, which addressed issues about the investigations into Madeleine McCann’s reported disappearance. The first two called for a public enquiry into the investigations. The most recent called on the Home Office to publish a full report on the work of Operation Grange.
According to statements made in the press on 3 April this year, you – as the then Home Secretary – sanctioned further expenditure on Operation Grange of £95,000, which was said to be for a further six months to ‘conclude’ this review and investigation. That meant that Operation Grange was scheduled to be completed on 3 October, in a week’s time. Since then we have learnt that the funding is to be extended by a further six months, with the team being granted a further £100,000.
The forum: ‘Complete Mystery of Madeleine McCann’
I write in my capacity as the owner of the internet forum, ‘The Complete Mystery of Madeleine McCann’, set up in November 2009. The letter is sent on behalf of my admin team, our members and our regular guests and visitors, who number tens of thousands every day. We currently have over 6,350 members, many of whom read us every day for updates, and hundreds of whom contribute by way of research, comment, and analysis every month.
Long-term forum members include many with professional backgrounds, including the police, the law and the medical professions, and others with technical skills in such fields as forensics, photography and statement analysis.
The forum is far and away the best-read Madeleine McCann discussion forum on the internet, and has been referred to regularly in the press and in books such as ‘Looking for Madeleine’, by Anthony Summers and Robbyn Swan.
It is with this background that we urge you to consider most carefully the following issues relating to Operation Grange.
The remit of Operation Grange
The very first consideration must be the remit allocated to Operation Grange from the outset. The relevant parts of it read as follows:
“The activity, in the first instance, will be that of an ‘investigative review’. This will entail a review of the whole of the investigation(s) which have been conducted in to the circumstances of Madeleine McCann’s disappearance. The focus of the review will be of the material held by three main stakeholders (and in the following order of primacy);
The Portuguese Law Enforcement agencies.
UK Law Enforcement agencies,
Other private investigative agencies/staff and organisations.
“The investigative review is intended to collate, record and analyse what has gone before. It is to examine the case and seek to determine, (as if the abduction occurred in the UK) what additional, new investigative approaches we would take and which can assist the Portuguese authorities in progressing the matter…
“The ‘investigative review’ will be conducted with transparency, openness and thoroughness…” .
It was clear from the outset that the initial investigative review had a strictly limited remit. That is highly unusual for any review which purports to be a genuine, comprehensive review. Most ‘cold case’ reviews start with a ‘clean sheet’, so to speak.
Crucially, however, the review insisted that it would only investigate ‘the abduction’. That meant that, from the very first, Operation Grange had ruled out any consideration of whether or not the McCanns could have been directly involved in the disappearance of Madeleine.
The purpose of this letter is not to make any accusation against the McCanns. It is simply to point out that, despite a number of indications that they may have been involved, the Operation Grange team were told from the start not to investigate them.
During his investigative review, the Investigating Officer, Detective Chief Inspector Andy Redwood stated that “Primarily, what we sought to do from the beginning, is trying to draw everything back to, to zero, if you like ..”. Plainly this was not the case, as any potential involvement of the McCanns was ruled out from the beginning.
In addition, on the day that your predecessor David Cameron signalled that he had ordered the Home Office to set up a review, his spokesman declared that the purpose of the review was to ‘help the family’. It was plain, then, that the officers leading the Operation Grange team were simply not allowed to consider any involvement of the McCanns in Madeleine’s disappearance.
The interim report of the Portuguese Police, 10 September 2007
I will not in this letter set out the many indications that the McCanns may have been directly involved in the disappearance of their daughter. That is something that any genuine re-investigation, with a remit not limited to declaring in advance that Madeleine had been abducted, should examine. I will however refer to the interim report of the Portuguese Police, dated 10 September 2007, a document made public in July 2008. It was compiled by Chief Inspector Tavares de Almeida. In a lengthy document, the contents of which have never been convincingly refuted, he set out the following indications that the McCanns may have been involved. These are all direct quotations from a translation of his report:
1 No abduction “As time went by, the abduction scenario was not confirmed. The abduction hypothesis did not stand up”.
2 The McCanns worked on their version of events “The information that was initially collected from family and friends was uncertain. In addition, the McCanns and their friends worked on their account of events in order to strengthen and defend their version of what had happened Madeleine”
3 ‘Distorted’ information “The information from the immediate family and their group of friends which is fundamental in investigating this type of crime was always distorted…The group’s initial informal statements given during the initial stages of the investigation immediately introduced the abduction hypothesis. But even simple things were the subject of misinformation:
was the window open or closed?
was the shutter up or down?
was the balcony door open or closed?
was the front door merely shut or locked with a key?
4 Changes of story “The media attention that has been given to the case and the search for information by the said media has led to an evolution in Madeleine’s parents’ statements. All the information that has been made public has contributed to the McCanns rebuilding and adapting their story to fit the eventual police questions”.
5 Excuses for corpse scent and blood “When the media first informed the public that blood had been detected ‘in the car and in the apartment’, Dr Kate McCann and members of her family made statements to the public with the simple excuse that it had been someone who had access to the apartment that had deliberately placed this evidence there. Now they even say that it was the criminal investigation team that placed this ‘false’ evidence (i.e. blood and cadaver odour in the apartment and in the car). In an attempt to justify the finding of [Madeleine’s] blood in the apartment, Dr Kate McCann went even further, stating on that occasion that Madeleine sometimes suffered nosebleeds”.
6 Altering the crime scene “There is strong evidence that the crime scene was altered, and some furniture was moved around: an intentional alteration of things in that apartment took place, in order to create a false scenario that doesn’t match reality, in an attempt to develop opportunities to create a bogus abduction scenario. Those changes are indications that the abduction was a stage-managed simulation.
7 Findings of a top sniffer dog handler In addition, Tavares de Almeida listed the findings of top British dog handler, Martin Grime, who now works for the F.B.I. in the U.S. In early August 2007, he took with him to Portugal two springer spaniels, Eddie, a ‘cadaver dog’ who was trained to alert to the past presence of a corpse, and Keela, a ‘blood dog’ trained to detect blood. According to Mr Grime, the two dogs between them alerted on 17 occasions either to the scent of the past presence of a corpse or to blood in locations connected to the McCanns: their apartment, their clothes and in their hired car. They alerted to no other items or locations in Praia da Luz.
8 The unreliable evidence of Jane Tanner “Continuing with our analysis of information offered to us, one of the group’s members, Jane Tanner…became an important witness…She said she saw someone crossing the street at dinner time from the location of the McCanns’ apartment towards Robert Murat’s house…This information directed and occupied our work for a long time. This may be an example of how information that is not correct may not only delay the investigation but could even have led to losing the little girl. Jane Tanner insisted on the truthfulness of her account. This led to certain scenarios being developed. But these scenarios were not sustained in reality..”
9 “The precise moment when Jane Tanner chose to make her statement about what she had ‘seen’ and the explanation for choosing that moment, is unreal. That is to say: it is not easy to accept that any witness (from the group), on seeing someone with a child in their arms walking away from the McCanns’ apartment, didn’t act and speak immediately. Then there is her description of the abductor being altered, or ‘perfected’. These reasons mean there is little credibility in what she says”
10 “There was a discrepancy [about the moment Jane Tanner allegedly saw an abductor] between the statements of Dr Gerald McCann and Jane Tanner. They claimed to have passed each other at only two or three metres’ distance [7 to 10 feet], yet failed to see each other. How could they position themselves as both being together in quite a confined space, yet both fail to see each other walking by; or, more correctly, one sees the other but the other doesn’t see her? Even the exact location where they supposedly crossed each other’s paths is not very well defined by both”.
The following are direct quotations from Tavares de Almeida’s report, on the subject of the alerts by Martin Grime’s cadaver dogs:
“Apartment 5A, Ocean Club resort, the McCanns’ apartment from where the child disappeared: The cadaver dog alerted to the scent of a corpse in the master bedroom, in a corner, by the wardrobe; in living room, behind the sofa, and by the side window, while the bloodhound alerted to blood in the living room behind the sofa, and by the side window (in exactly the same spot that had been signalled by the cadaver dog)”.
“Front garden of Apartment 5A: The cadaver dog alerted to the scent of a corpse on one of the flower beds (the dog handler however commented on the ‘lightness’ of the odour in this location)”.
“The McCann family’s clothes and belongings: The cadaver dog alerted to the scent of a corpse on two pieces of clothing belonging to Dr Kate McCann, one piece of clothing belonging to Madeleine (a red T-shirt) and on Madeleine’s soft toy [Cuddle Cat]. The cadaver odour was detected when the toy was still inside the McCanns’ residence in July 2007; the scent was later confirmed outside the house as well”.
“The vehicle that was used by the McCann family: The cadaver dog alerted to the scent of a corpse on the car key and on the inside of the car boot, while the bloodhound also marked the car key and the inside of the car boot”.
“In a total of 10 cars examined [in an underground car park) the cadaver dog and the blood dog marked only the car of the McCann family, first rented on 27 May”.
Tavares de Almeida concluded his report as follows:
“From everything that was established, the facts point in the direction of the death of Madeleine McCann occurring on the night of 3 May 2007, inside apartment 5A, at the Ocean Club resort in Praia da Luz, which was occupied by the McCann couple and by their three children. There is a coincidence between the markings of cadaver odour and blood [by the two dogs], according to the (partial) Laboratory Report that has been annexed to the files.
“The said marking occurred behind the living room sofa (cadaver odour/blood/DNA), which unarguably proves that said piece of furniture was pushed back by someone, after the death of Madeleine McCann was confirmed. Because of the few traces that were recovered on location and subject to examination, it has to be admitted as a strong hypothesis that it [the room] was subject to a clean-up operation at some time following the occurrence of death”.
“From everything that we have discovered, our files result in the following conclusions:
A the minor Madeleine McCann died in Apartment 5A at the Ocean Club resort in Praia da Luz, on the night of 3 May 2007
B a simulation - a staged hoax - of an abduction took place
C in order to render the child’s death impossible before 10.00pm, a situation of checking of the McCann couple’s children while they slept was concocted
D Dr Gerald McCann and Dr Kate McCann are involved in the concealment of the corpse of their daughter, Madeleine McCann
E at this moment, there seems to be no strong indications that the child’s death was other than the result of a tragic accident…
F from what has been established up to now, everything indicates that the McCann couple, in self-defence, did not want to deliver up Madeleine’s corpse immediately and voluntarily, and there is a strong possibility therefore that it was moved from the initial place where she died. This situation may raise questions concerning the circumstances in which the death of the child took place.
I should at this point add the explanations that the McCanns have given for the alerts of the two dogs.
Dr Gerry McCann is on record as stating, to a Portuguese interviewer: “I can tell you that we have also looked at evidence about cadaver dogs and they are incredibly unreliable”. This statement contradicts the evidence from many disciplines, not only searching for corpse scent and blood, but also explosives, drugs (even being able to distinguish between different types of explosive material and different drugs) and even medical conditions. Sniffer dogs are used increasingly and to strikingly good effect in many fields in countries all over the world.
By contrast, the settled view of Dr Kate McCann, as set out on pages 249-50 of her book ‘madeleine’, is that the dogs made ‘false’ alerts because of “the conscious or unconscious signals of the handler”. This amounts to an attack on the professional integrity and judgment of Mr Grime and implies that the dogs were ‘mistaken’ in all of their 17 alerts to corpse scent and blood.
In addition, In the days immediately following leaks about the dogs’ findings, the McCanns and members of their family came up with a series of bizarre and increasingly desperate explanations for them. These included that any blood was from Madeleine having nosebleeds, or having scratched herself when climbing the steps to the aircraft, or from mosquitoes flying into the walls, or that any cadaver odour was due to carrying dirty nappies or rotting meat in their hired car, or to Kate McCann’s clothes and the soft toy, Cuddle cat, having been contaminated by her having visited six people who had died in the fortnight before they left for their holiday.
There is no evidence that Operation Grange has addressed these issues, though it has been supplied to them with full references.
New research: A photograph, evidence of collusion, and other matters
During the nine years since Madeleine was reported missing, members of my forum, and many others elsewhere, have added to the concerns about the possible involvement of the McCanns in Madeleine’s disappearance. It would be impossible in a short letter to even list all these concerns. They are all available for the police to see on my forum and on many other places on the internet.
I will however mention just two significant matters.
The photographic evidence of Madeleine’s presence in Praia da Luz on the McCanns’ holiday is confined to just five photographs. Three of those five are genuine photographs taken on the first day of their holiday, Saturday 28 April. A fourth, allegedly showing Madeleine holding tennis balls on a tennis court in Praia da Luz, has been claimed to have been taken by two different people and on two different days. There are other aspects of that photograph that also cast doubt as to its true provenance.
A fifth photograph, of Gerry McCann sitting by a pool with his daughters Madeleine and Amelie, is claimed by the McCanns to have been taken at 2.29pm on the day Madeleine was reported missing. They have called it ‘The Last Photo’. However, evidence discussed on my forum suggests that this key photograph may have been taken earlier in the week, probably on the Sunday. There is no indication that Operation Grange has addressed this evidence.
Second, there is the strange and striking correlation of two reports, made respectively by Jane Tanner and Martin Smith, alleging they had seen a man carrying a young child on the night of 3 May 2007, with a third report by a Spanish ex-pat living in Germany Nuno Lourenco, in which he alleged that a Portuguese holidaymaker, Wojchiech Krokowski, had tried to kidnap his own daughter on Sunday 29 April. Nuno Lourenco’s statement can be shown to be demonstrably false, yet his description of Krokowski is matched in almost every detail by the descriptions of Jane Tanner and Martin Smith. In particular, each of the three uses this meaningless phrase to describe the man: “He didn’t look like a tourist”. These facts, prima facie, suggest collusion to promote Krokowski as the likely abductor. This alleged collusion is clearly a matter which should have been addressed by Operation Grange, but there is no evidence that it has been.
These issues have been further complicated by the former Investigation Officer of Operation Grange, Detective Chief Inspector Andy Redwood, having claimed to a 7 million audience on BBC Crimewatch on 14 October 2013 that the person seen by Jane Tanner had ‘come forward’, six years later. We were told that he had been carrying his young child home from the night creche, with no mention made of where the child’s mother was. He was said to have been carrying his child in exactly the same way as described by Jane Tanner, with no buggy, no blanket and only dressed in pyjamas. It was dark and cold (13 deg C) at the time. The identity of this person who had suddenly emerged after six years was not disclosed. In addition, if he had been taking the route from the creche described by DCI Redwood, he could not have been taking the shortest route to his apartment. For these reasons and others, many people have real cause to doubt whether DCI Redwood was being truthful.
Members of my forum and others have on many occasions submitted detailed evidence to Operation Grange on these and other issues, but there is no evidence that these lines of enquiry have been followed up.
The appointment of Detective Chief Superintendent Hamish Campbell as the Senior Investigating Officer for Operation Grange
There is one other issue about the remit that has caused widespread concern, and that is why former Detective Chief Superintendent Hamish Campbell was chosen to head Operation Grange and allowed to set the remit. The action for which Hamish Campbell is best known is having been the Investigating Officer into the as-yet-unsolved murder of Jill Dando. His work on the case resulted in an innocent man, Barry George/Bulsara, being wrongly jailed for eight years.
There were credible suggestions, though never proved, that the conviction of Barry George was secured by a member of the Metropolitan Police placing an amount of firearms residue, matching the known weapon used to kill Jill Dando, in his coat pocket. Hamish Campbell’s role in that utterly botched police investigation surely made him an unsuitable choice to head up one of the most controversial and expensive reviews and investigations undertaken by the Metropolitan Police.
The employment by the McCanns of wholly inappropriate private detection agencies and individuals
I turn now to this aspect of Operation Grange’s remit:
“The focus of the review will be of the material held by three main stakeholders (and in the following order of primacy);
The Portuguese Law Enforcement agencies.
UK Law Enforcement agencies,
Other private investigative agencies/staff and organisations”.
I and my fellow members seriously question the designation of ‘other private investigation agencies/staff’ as ‘stakeholders’. Clearly, what is mainly being referred to here is the McCanns’ own private investigations. DCI Redwood made it clear on a number of occasions that he regarded the McCanns’ own investigations as being of real merit and interest. Pictures were seen in the British press of his men collecting boxes of documentary material from the offices, in Barcelona, of Metodo 3, one of the detective agencies used by the McCanns. Two e-fits of a man carrying a child said to have been seen by Mr Martin Smith and his family were drawn up by Henri Exton, one of the investigators employed by the McCanns, in the spring of 2008. These e-fits lay gathering dust until suddenly, on 14 October 2013, DCI Redwood produced them, saying that they were now “the centre of Operation Grange’s focus”. These two examples demonstrate without question that Operation Grange have relied to a considerable extent on the material supplied by the various ‘other private investigation agencies/staff’.
However, we would seriously question whether they were right to do so, based on all that is now known about the agencies and people involved in the McCanns’ private investigations, for which, as we know, they received very generous donations, amounting to millions of pounds, from a generous British public.
In an Appendix, I have provided a list of the main agencies and individuals that the McCanns have employed as part of their private investigations, and what is known about each. In summary, the two main private investigation agencies employed by the McCanns during the first year, namely Metodo 3 and Oakley International, were run by crooks.
A third private investigation team employed by the McCanns was hailed in the press as ‘Alpha Investigations Group’ and portrayed as a long-established private detective agency. It was also promoted as consisting of a team of ‘top detectives’. But as set out in my Appendix, the ‘team’ turned out to be two retired, low-ranking detectives. It was a deliberate deception, and a bogus company. ‘ALPHAIG Ltd’, was even formed to try to hide the deception.
None of the individuals or agencies used seem to have had any experience whatsoever of finding missing children or adults.
All have very dubious backgrounds and histories. I suggest that the Metropolitan Police must have known this from the beginning, since at least some of the facts I set out in the Appendix have been published in Britain’s mainstream media, and in places on the internet (including my own). How, therefore, in the light of the extraordinary conduct of these agencies and individuals, could the Metropolitan Police possibly claim that such material could assist in their investigations?
Given the appalling track record of these agencies and individuals, may I respectfully suggest that much more light will be shed on what really happened to Madeleine McCann if you begin with a fresh police force and a fresh remit. Any new police force should then interview under caution any U.K. individuals who have worked for the McCanns (see the Appendix for a list of names).
It would also be useful for any new police force to interview former Metodo 3 employee, Julian Peribanez, who worked on the Madeleine McCann case. Two years ago, he published a book which contained a damning indictment of the corruption and criminality within Metodo 3.
His claims amount to an accusation that Metodo 3 was, in effect, never employed to search for Madeleine at all. This matches an account written by Christie Twomey for The Times in early 2008, in which she also made strong criticisms of Metodo 3 and two of its staff.
The major involvement of the government and the security services in supporting the McCanns
As Prime Minister and the nation’s Home Secretary from May 2010 to July 2016, you will know better than almost anyone else about the extensive involvement of the government and the security services ever since Madeleine McCann was reported missing. This has seemed to a great many people to have been wholly disproportionate. Moreover, it has not led to Madeleine being found nor to the arrest of anyone responsible for her disappearance. I can only summarise here some of this high-level government support:
1 Appointing, within days of Madeleine’s reported disappearance, the Head of the government’s Media Monitoring Unit, Clarence Mitchell, to be the McCanns’ public relations spokesman, a post he held for nine years
2 The reported, successful efforts of former Prime Minister, Gordon Brown to persuade the Portuguese police to release the description of a possible abductor, based on the claims of the McCanns’ friend Jane Tanner
3 The direct involvement of MI5, as disclosed by Portuguese investigation co-ordinator Goncalo Amaral, in his book ‘The Truth of the Lie’
4 The role of the British Ambassador in Portugal, interfering with the Portuguese police who were trying to seize items for forensic testing from the McCanns in the early days
5 Delays by the then Home Secretary in 2007 and 2008 in processing requests by the Portuguese authorities for rogatory interviews
6 The reported involvement of Special Branch officers, who met with the McCanns at East Midlands Airport and drove them to their home the day they returned from Portugal
7 Setting up a top secret national co-ordinating committee on the Madeleine McCann case on 8 May 2007, under the chairmanship of the Head of Leicestershire Constabulary, Matt Baggott
8 The active involvement of the government-backed Control Risks Group in the case from the very first days after Madeleine was reported missing
9 Leicestershire Police officers deliberately delaying sending relevant evidence to the Portuguese Police, advising Jane Tanner ahead of an identity parade in which she purported to identify Robert Murat as the person she had seen carrying a child the night Madeleine was reported missing (leading to his arrest)
10 British criminal profilers identifying Robert Murat as fitting the likely profile of the abductor to the extent of 90% of likely characteristics
11 The former Prime Minister acceding to a request made by his friend Rebekah Brooks, CEO of Rupert Murdoch’s News International empire, to set up Operation Grange, reportedly after threatening him with ‘a week of bad headlines about Theresa May’.
These are only examples of the government’s heavy involvement in this case.
The McCanns’ public appeal for funds
There are several issues regarding the McCanns’ fund-raising efforts which do not appear to have been addressed by Operation Grange at all. Some of these are set out in lengthy papers written by qualified accountant, Enid O’Dowd, and can be read on the internet.
One issue is that the McCanns’ ‘Find Madeleine Fund’ is a private trust and company and not a charity. Moreover, it is quite clearly controlled by the McCanns and close members of their family and friends, although to the public it appears to be a charity.
Several contradictory statements have been made by the McCanns and those backing them about the use to which the funds have been put. Statements were made that funds would ‘only be used for the search’. However, contrary statements have been made suggesting that significant monies from the fund have been used to pay the McCanns’ legal fees and costs.
A further concern was a reference in a recent book to a statement made by Lord Bell of public relations firm Bell Pottinger - the company brought in to the case by Mark Warner, the holiday firm through whom the McCanns booked their holiday in Praia da Luz. He told a friend: “The McCanns paid me £500,000 in fees to keep them on the front page of every single newspaper for a year, which we did”. This raises the question of whether part or all of this huge sum of money came from the donations from members of the British public, who expected to see the money spent on a search for Madeleine, not a public relations exercise.
Apart from that, why has the public’s money apparently been squandered on the ill-chosen agencies and individuals employed by the McCanns, a responsibility also shared of course with each one of the Directors of the Fund? How could it be, for example, that the McCanns paid Kevin Halligen, said in newspaper articles to be a serial fraudster, £500,000 plus expenses for four months’ work, during which he was for most of the time living a 5-star life of luxury in hotels in Britain and the U.S, with his girlfriend, Shirin Trachiotis? Does the public not need Operation Grange, or others, to provide answers to these questions?
Several analyses of the accounts of the ‘Find Madeleine Fund’ have been carried out by qualified Irish accountant Enid O’Dowd. Her analyses are available at several places on the internet. These analyses have uncovered many anomalies. On page 128 of her book, ‘madeleine’, Kate McCann wrote of the Find Madeleine Fund: “It was set up with great care and due diligence by experts in the field. From the outset everyone agreed that, despite the costs involved, it must be run to the highest standards of transparency”. However, the accounts, every year, convey only the bare minimum to comply with the Companies Acts. The public cannot gain from them anything like a clear picture of where all their money has gone.
More recently, on 2 September 2015, the McCanns’ spokesman, Clarence Mitchell, said:: “They [the McCanns] realise that [Operation Grange] cannot go on forever. A newspaper report informed the public that Mitchell had explained “how former GP Kate and heart doctor Gerry, both 37, of Rothley, Leics., had moved money from the publicly-backed Find-Madeleine-Fund into a special account in anticipation of having to finance the hunt for their daughter themselves". The public, when they gave money to the Find Madeleine Fund, would not expect the Directors to then create a separate fund, which was reported as being controlled just by the McCanns.
An analysis of the case by 'PeterMac', a retired Police Superintendent, and other evidence submitted by members of my forum
'PeterMac', a retired Police Superintendent, has studied the Madeleine McCann case for nine years, and conducted original research on key evidential issues in the case. I am aware that he has submitted a great deal of evidence to the respective Senior Investigating Officers, always obtaining a receipt for the information he has sent them. His analysis, which by implication is highly critical of Operation Grange, has been presented in a free e-book which can now be read at this link:
http://whatreallyhappenedtomadeleinemccann.blogspot.co.uk/
It has also been reproduced on my websites, here:
https://jillhavern.forumotion.net/t13115-petermac-free-e-book-what-really-happened-to-madeleine-mccann
…and here:
http://gerrymccan-abuseofpower-humanrights.blogspot.co.uk/2016/08/retired-police-superintendent-peter.html
Other members of my forum have also submitted evidence and have been assured verbally and in writing that all the evidence they have submitted is being kept on computer and has been taken into consideration. It will therefore be available for any fresh police force, not bound by a restricted remit, to investigate.
What should happen now
I have set out the case that Operation Grange has not succeeded in its search for the truth because of its inappropriately limited remit. I have also referred to justified criticisms about the operation of the Find Madeleine Fund.
Despite impressive statistics released from time to time of the numbers of documents studied, lines of enquiry pursued, rogatory requests submitted, numbers of suspects or persons of interest questioned, etc., it seems plain that after well over six years, Operation Grange is nowhere nearer to solving this case. Despite promises of ‘openness’ and ‘transparency’, there is no evidence made available to the public which demonstrates that any of the above issues I have listed has been fully investigated (if at all) and what (if any) the findings were.
You will be aware that thousands of people, among them professionals such as police officers, criminal profilers, criminologists, doctors, psychiatrists and statement analysts, have questioned the McCanns’ account of events.
You may recall that at the recent Police Federation Conference, you addressed the issue of widespread corruption in British police forces and the need to tackle it. It cannot simply be assumed that Operation Grange is free from corrupt influences.
At the same time, we have seen in the press over recent years many accounts of senior-level police corruption in the Metropolitan Police force.
On behalf of the members of my forum, therefore, I call on you to:
1 Appoint independent assessors of proven integrity and independence to evaluate the work of Operation Grange, and make its findings public. In this respect, may I remind you of this part of the review’s remit, as determined by DCS Hamish Campbell: “The ‘investigative review’ will be conducted with transparency, openness and thoroughness…” Any such report must include a full investigation into the huge involvement in this case of MI5, Special Branch and other government or government-backed security agencies;
2 Appoint, via the new Home Secretary, a different police force, which has the highest possible reputation for integrity and independence, to investigate the reported disappearance of Madeleine McCann;
3 Ensure that any new police investigation has an unlimited remit and can therefore go to wherever the evidence leads them;
4 Order the relevant government department to investigate all aspects of the operation of the Find Madeleine Fund, including:
- investigating the actions of all of its Directors,
- the funding of the private investigations,
- whether or not funds have been used to pay the McCanns’ legal fees and expenses,
- why it was necessary for a separate account to be set up last year, to be controlled by the McCanns and not the Directors, and
- accounting for all monies paid into and from the Find Madeleine Fund since it was set up in May 2007.
I shall send the same letter to Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe but I urge you to seek an urgent meeting with him to discuss the contents of my letter. Please give this matter your most careful consideration and I shall look forward to your response in the near future.
Yours sincerely
_______________________
Jill Havern
For and on behalf of the members of ‘The Complete Mystery of Madeleine McCann’
Rt. Hon. Mrs Theresa May
Prime Minister
10 Downing Street
LONDON
W1A 1AA
Commissioner Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe
Metropolitan Police
8-10 Broadway,
LONDON
SW1H 0BG
Monday, 26 September 2016
Dear Prime Minister and Commissioner Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe
The conduct of the Operation Grange investigation into the reported disappearance of Madeleine McCann
First of all, Prime Minister, we congratulate you on your appointment as Prime Minister and wish you every success in your new position. The serious matters raised in this letter will of course be very familiar to you, as you had meetings with the McCanns and their advisers when you were Home Secretary, and asked Sir Paul Stephenson to set up Operation Grange.
You may also be aware of three petitions that were placed on the Prime Minister’s website by members of my forum, in 2010, 2014 and one in 2015, which addressed issues about the investigations into Madeleine McCann’s reported disappearance. The first two called for a public enquiry into the investigations. The most recent called on the Home Office to publish a full report on the work of Operation Grange.
According to statements made in the press on 3 April this year, you – as the then Home Secretary – sanctioned further expenditure on Operation Grange of £95,000, which was said to be for a further six months to ‘conclude’ this review and investigation. That meant that Operation Grange was scheduled to be completed on 3 October, in a week’s time. Since then we have learnt that the funding is to be extended by a further six months, with the team being granted a further £100,000.
The forum: ‘Complete Mystery of Madeleine McCann’
I write in my capacity as the owner of the internet forum, ‘The Complete Mystery of Madeleine McCann’, set up in November 2009. The letter is sent on behalf of my admin team, our members and our regular guests and visitors, who number tens of thousands every day. We currently have over 6,350 members, many of whom read us every day for updates, and hundreds of whom contribute by way of research, comment, and analysis every month.
Long-term forum members include many with professional backgrounds, including the police, the law and the medical professions, and others with technical skills in such fields as forensics, photography and statement analysis.
The forum is far and away the best-read Madeleine McCann discussion forum on the internet, and has been referred to regularly in the press and in books such as ‘Looking for Madeleine’, by Anthony Summers and Robbyn Swan.
It is with this background that we urge you to consider most carefully the following issues relating to Operation Grange.
The remit of Operation Grange
The very first consideration must be the remit allocated to Operation Grange from the outset. The relevant parts of it read as follows:
“The activity, in the first instance, will be that of an ‘investigative review’. This will entail a review of the whole of the investigation(s) which have been conducted in to the circumstances of Madeleine McCann’s disappearance. The focus of the review will be of the material held by three main stakeholders (and in the following order of primacy);
The Portuguese Law Enforcement agencies.
UK Law Enforcement agencies,
Other private investigative agencies/staff and organisations.
“The investigative review is intended to collate, record and analyse what has gone before. It is to examine the case and seek to determine, (as if the abduction occurred in the UK) what additional, new investigative approaches we would take and which can assist the Portuguese authorities in progressing the matter…
“The ‘investigative review’ will be conducted with transparency, openness and thoroughness…” .
It was clear from the outset that the initial investigative review had a strictly limited remit. That is highly unusual for any review which purports to be a genuine, comprehensive review. Most ‘cold case’ reviews start with a ‘clean sheet’, so to speak.
Crucially, however, the review insisted that it would only investigate ‘the abduction’. That meant that, from the very first, Operation Grange had ruled out any consideration of whether or not the McCanns could have been directly involved in the disappearance of Madeleine.
The purpose of this letter is not to make any accusation against the McCanns. It is simply to point out that, despite a number of indications that they may have been involved, the Operation Grange team were told from the start not to investigate them.
During his investigative review, the Investigating Officer, Detective Chief Inspector Andy Redwood stated that “Primarily, what we sought to do from the beginning, is trying to draw everything back to, to zero, if you like ..”. Plainly this was not the case, as any potential involvement of the McCanns was ruled out from the beginning.
In addition, on the day that your predecessor David Cameron signalled that he had ordered the Home Office to set up a review, his spokesman declared that the purpose of the review was to ‘help the family’. It was plain, then, that the officers leading the Operation Grange team were simply not allowed to consider any involvement of the McCanns in Madeleine’s disappearance.
The interim report of the Portuguese Police, 10 September 2007
I will not in this letter set out the many indications that the McCanns may have been directly involved in the disappearance of their daughter. That is something that any genuine re-investigation, with a remit not limited to declaring in advance that Madeleine had been abducted, should examine. I will however refer to the interim report of the Portuguese Police, dated 10 September 2007, a document made public in July 2008. It was compiled by Chief Inspector Tavares de Almeida. In a lengthy document, the contents of which have never been convincingly refuted, he set out the following indications that the McCanns may have been involved. These are all direct quotations from a translation of his report:
1 No abduction “As time went by, the abduction scenario was not confirmed. The abduction hypothesis did not stand up”.
2 The McCanns worked on their version of events “The information that was initially collected from family and friends was uncertain. In addition, the McCanns and their friends worked on their account of events in order to strengthen and defend their version of what had happened Madeleine”
3 ‘Distorted’ information “The information from the immediate family and their group of friends which is fundamental in investigating this type of crime was always distorted…The group’s initial informal statements given during the initial stages of the investigation immediately introduced the abduction hypothesis. But even simple things were the subject of misinformation:
was the window open or closed?
was the shutter up or down?
was the balcony door open or closed?
was the front door merely shut or locked with a key?
4 Changes of story “The media attention that has been given to the case and the search for information by the said media has led to an evolution in Madeleine’s parents’ statements. All the information that has been made public has contributed to the McCanns rebuilding and adapting their story to fit the eventual police questions”.
5 Excuses for corpse scent and blood “When the media first informed the public that blood had been detected ‘in the car and in the apartment’, Dr Kate McCann and members of her family made statements to the public with the simple excuse that it had been someone who had access to the apartment that had deliberately placed this evidence there. Now they even say that it was the criminal investigation team that placed this ‘false’ evidence (i.e. blood and cadaver odour in the apartment and in the car). In an attempt to justify the finding of [Madeleine’s] blood in the apartment, Dr Kate McCann went even further, stating on that occasion that Madeleine sometimes suffered nosebleeds”.
6 Altering the crime scene “There is strong evidence that the crime scene was altered, and some furniture was moved around: an intentional alteration of things in that apartment took place, in order to create a false scenario that doesn’t match reality, in an attempt to develop opportunities to create a bogus abduction scenario. Those changes are indications that the abduction was a stage-managed simulation.
7 Findings of a top sniffer dog handler In addition, Tavares de Almeida listed the findings of top British dog handler, Martin Grime, who now works for the F.B.I. in the U.S. In early August 2007, he took with him to Portugal two springer spaniels, Eddie, a ‘cadaver dog’ who was trained to alert to the past presence of a corpse, and Keela, a ‘blood dog’ trained to detect blood. According to Mr Grime, the two dogs between them alerted on 17 occasions either to the scent of the past presence of a corpse or to blood in locations connected to the McCanns: their apartment, their clothes and in their hired car. They alerted to no other items or locations in Praia da Luz.
8 The unreliable evidence of Jane Tanner “Continuing with our analysis of information offered to us, one of the group’s members, Jane Tanner…became an important witness…She said she saw someone crossing the street at dinner time from the location of the McCanns’ apartment towards Robert Murat’s house…This information directed and occupied our work for a long time. This may be an example of how information that is not correct may not only delay the investigation but could even have led to losing the little girl. Jane Tanner insisted on the truthfulness of her account. This led to certain scenarios being developed. But these scenarios were not sustained in reality..”
9 “The precise moment when Jane Tanner chose to make her statement about what she had ‘seen’ and the explanation for choosing that moment, is unreal. That is to say: it is not easy to accept that any witness (from the group), on seeing someone with a child in their arms walking away from the McCanns’ apartment, didn’t act and speak immediately. Then there is her description of the abductor being altered, or ‘perfected’. These reasons mean there is little credibility in what she says”
10 “There was a discrepancy [about the moment Jane Tanner allegedly saw an abductor] between the statements of Dr Gerald McCann and Jane Tanner. They claimed to have passed each other at only two or three metres’ distance [7 to 10 feet], yet failed to see each other. How could they position themselves as both being together in quite a confined space, yet both fail to see each other walking by; or, more correctly, one sees the other but the other doesn’t see her? Even the exact location where they supposedly crossed each other’s paths is not very well defined by both”.
The following are direct quotations from Tavares de Almeida’s report, on the subject of the alerts by Martin Grime’s cadaver dogs:
“Apartment 5A, Ocean Club resort, the McCanns’ apartment from where the child disappeared: The cadaver dog alerted to the scent of a corpse in the master bedroom, in a corner, by the wardrobe; in living room, behind the sofa, and by the side window, while the bloodhound alerted to blood in the living room behind the sofa, and by the side window (in exactly the same spot that had been signalled by the cadaver dog)”.
“Front garden of Apartment 5A: The cadaver dog alerted to the scent of a corpse on one of the flower beds (the dog handler however commented on the ‘lightness’ of the odour in this location)”.
“The McCann family’s clothes and belongings: The cadaver dog alerted to the scent of a corpse on two pieces of clothing belonging to Dr Kate McCann, one piece of clothing belonging to Madeleine (a red T-shirt) and on Madeleine’s soft toy [Cuddle Cat]. The cadaver odour was detected when the toy was still inside the McCanns’ residence in July 2007; the scent was later confirmed outside the house as well”.
“The vehicle that was used by the McCann family: The cadaver dog alerted to the scent of a corpse on the car key and on the inside of the car boot, while the bloodhound also marked the car key and the inside of the car boot”.
“In a total of 10 cars examined [in an underground car park) the cadaver dog and the blood dog marked only the car of the McCann family, first rented on 27 May”.
Tavares de Almeida concluded his report as follows:
“From everything that was established, the facts point in the direction of the death of Madeleine McCann occurring on the night of 3 May 2007, inside apartment 5A, at the Ocean Club resort in Praia da Luz, which was occupied by the McCann couple and by their three children. There is a coincidence between the markings of cadaver odour and blood [by the two dogs], according to the (partial) Laboratory Report that has been annexed to the files.
“The said marking occurred behind the living room sofa (cadaver odour/blood/DNA), which unarguably proves that said piece of furniture was pushed back by someone, after the death of Madeleine McCann was confirmed. Because of the few traces that were recovered on location and subject to examination, it has to be admitted as a strong hypothesis that it [the room] was subject to a clean-up operation at some time following the occurrence of death”.
“From everything that we have discovered, our files result in the following conclusions:
A the minor Madeleine McCann died in Apartment 5A at the Ocean Club resort in Praia da Luz, on the night of 3 May 2007
B a simulation - a staged hoax - of an abduction took place
C in order to render the child’s death impossible before 10.00pm, a situation of checking of the McCann couple’s children while they slept was concocted
D Dr Gerald McCann and Dr Kate McCann are involved in the concealment of the corpse of their daughter, Madeleine McCann
E at this moment, there seems to be no strong indications that the child’s death was other than the result of a tragic accident…
F from what has been established up to now, everything indicates that the McCann couple, in self-defence, did not want to deliver up Madeleine’s corpse immediately and voluntarily, and there is a strong possibility therefore that it was moved from the initial place where she died. This situation may raise questions concerning the circumstances in which the death of the child took place.
I should at this point add the explanations that the McCanns have given for the alerts of the two dogs.
Dr Gerry McCann is on record as stating, to a Portuguese interviewer: “I can tell you that we have also looked at evidence about cadaver dogs and they are incredibly unreliable”. This statement contradicts the evidence from many disciplines, not only searching for corpse scent and blood, but also explosives, drugs (even being able to distinguish between different types of explosive material and different drugs) and even medical conditions. Sniffer dogs are used increasingly and to strikingly good effect in many fields in countries all over the world.
By contrast, the settled view of Dr Kate McCann, as set out on pages 249-50 of her book ‘madeleine’, is that the dogs made ‘false’ alerts because of “the conscious or unconscious signals of the handler”. This amounts to an attack on the professional integrity and judgment of Mr Grime and implies that the dogs were ‘mistaken’ in all of their 17 alerts to corpse scent and blood.
In addition, In the days immediately following leaks about the dogs’ findings, the McCanns and members of their family came up with a series of bizarre and increasingly desperate explanations for them. These included that any blood was from Madeleine having nosebleeds, or having scratched herself when climbing the steps to the aircraft, or from mosquitoes flying into the walls, or that any cadaver odour was due to carrying dirty nappies or rotting meat in their hired car, or to Kate McCann’s clothes and the soft toy, Cuddle cat, having been contaminated by her having visited six people who had died in the fortnight before they left for their holiday.
There is no evidence that Operation Grange has addressed these issues, though it has been supplied to them with full references.
New research: A photograph, evidence of collusion, and other matters
During the nine years since Madeleine was reported missing, members of my forum, and many others elsewhere, have added to the concerns about the possible involvement of the McCanns in Madeleine’s disappearance. It would be impossible in a short letter to even list all these concerns. They are all available for the police to see on my forum and on many other places on the internet.
I will however mention just two significant matters.
The photographic evidence of Madeleine’s presence in Praia da Luz on the McCanns’ holiday is confined to just five photographs. Three of those five are genuine photographs taken on the first day of their holiday, Saturday 28 April. A fourth, allegedly showing Madeleine holding tennis balls on a tennis court in Praia da Luz, has been claimed to have been taken by two different people and on two different days. There are other aspects of that photograph that also cast doubt as to its true provenance.
A fifth photograph, of Gerry McCann sitting by a pool with his daughters Madeleine and Amelie, is claimed by the McCanns to have been taken at 2.29pm on the day Madeleine was reported missing. They have called it ‘The Last Photo’. However, evidence discussed on my forum suggests that this key photograph may have been taken earlier in the week, probably on the Sunday. There is no indication that Operation Grange has addressed this evidence.
Second, there is the strange and striking correlation of two reports, made respectively by Jane Tanner and Martin Smith, alleging they had seen a man carrying a young child on the night of 3 May 2007, with a third report by a Spanish ex-pat living in Germany Nuno Lourenco, in which he alleged that a Portuguese holidaymaker, Wojchiech Krokowski, had tried to kidnap his own daughter on Sunday 29 April. Nuno Lourenco’s statement can be shown to be demonstrably false, yet his description of Krokowski is matched in almost every detail by the descriptions of Jane Tanner and Martin Smith. In particular, each of the three uses this meaningless phrase to describe the man: “He didn’t look like a tourist”. These facts, prima facie, suggest collusion to promote Krokowski as the likely abductor. This alleged collusion is clearly a matter which should have been addressed by Operation Grange, but there is no evidence that it has been.
These issues have been further complicated by the former Investigation Officer of Operation Grange, Detective Chief Inspector Andy Redwood, having claimed to a 7 million audience on BBC Crimewatch on 14 October 2013 that the person seen by Jane Tanner had ‘come forward’, six years later. We were told that he had been carrying his young child home from the night creche, with no mention made of where the child’s mother was. He was said to have been carrying his child in exactly the same way as described by Jane Tanner, with no buggy, no blanket and only dressed in pyjamas. It was dark and cold (13 deg C) at the time. The identity of this person who had suddenly emerged after six years was not disclosed. In addition, if he had been taking the route from the creche described by DCI Redwood, he could not have been taking the shortest route to his apartment. For these reasons and others, many people have real cause to doubt whether DCI Redwood was being truthful.
Members of my forum and others have on many occasions submitted detailed evidence to Operation Grange on these and other issues, but there is no evidence that these lines of enquiry have been followed up.
The appointment of Detective Chief Superintendent Hamish Campbell as the Senior Investigating Officer for Operation Grange
There is one other issue about the remit that has caused widespread concern, and that is why former Detective Chief Superintendent Hamish Campbell was chosen to head Operation Grange and allowed to set the remit. The action for which Hamish Campbell is best known is having been the Investigating Officer into the as-yet-unsolved murder of Jill Dando. His work on the case resulted in an innocent man, Barry George/Bulsara, being wrongly jailed for eight years.
There were credible suggestions, though never proved, that the conviction of Barry George was secured by a member of the Metropolitan Police placing an amount of firearms residue, matching the known weapon used to kill Jill Dando, in his coat pocket. Hamish Campbell’s role in that utterly botched police investigation surely made him an unsuitable choice to head up one of the most controversial and expensive reviews and investigations undertaken by the Metropolitan Police.
The employment by the McCanns of wholly inappropriate private detection agencies and individuals
I turn now to this aspect of Operation Grange’s remit:
“The focus of the review will be of the material held by three main stakeholders (and in the following order of primacy);
The Portuguese Law Enforcement agencies.
UK Law Enforcement agencies,
Other private investigative agencies/staff and organisations”.
I and my fellow members seriously question the designation of ‘other private investigation agencies/staff’ as ‘stakeholders’. Clearly, what is mainly being referred to here is the McCanns’ own private investigations. DCI Redwood made it clear on a number of occasions that he regarded the McCanns’ own investigations as being of real merit and interest. Pictures were seen in the British press of his men collecting boxes of documentary material from the offices, in Barcelona, of Metodo 3, one of the detective agencies used by the McCanns. Two e-fits of a man carrying a child said to have been seen by Mr Martin Smith and his family were drawn up by Henri Exton, one of the investigators employed by the McCanns, in the spring of 2008. These e-fits lay gathering dust until suddenly, on 14 October 2013, DCI Redwood produced them, saying that they were now “the centre of Operation Grange’s focus”. These two examples demonstrate without question that Operation Grange have relied to a considerable extent on the material supplied by the various ‘other private investigation agencies/staff’.
However, we would seriously question whether they were right to do so, based on all that is now known about the agencies and people involved in the McCanns’ private investigations, for which, as we know, they received very generous donations, amounting to millions of pounds, from a generous British public.
In an Appendix, I have provided a list of the main agencies and individuals that the McCanns have employed as part of their private investigations, and what is known about each. In summary, the two main private investigation agencies employed by the McCanns during the first year, namely Metodo 3 and Oakley International, were run by crooks.
A third private investigation team employed by the McCanns was hailed in the press as ‘Alpha Investigations Group’ and portrayed as a long-established private detective agency. It was also promoted as consisting of a team of ‘top detectives’. But as set out in my Appendix, the ‘team’ turned out to be two retired, low-ranking detectives. It was a deliberate deception, and a bogus company. ‘ALPHAIG Ltd’, was even formed to try to hide the deception.
None of the individuals or agencies used seem to have had any experience whatsoever of finding missing children or adults.
All have very dubious backgrounds and histories. I suggest that the Metropolitan Police must have known this from the beginning, since at least some of the facts I set out in the Appendix have been published in Britain’s mainstream media, and in places on the internet (including my own). How, therefore, in the light of the extraordinary conduct of these agencies and individuals, could the Metropolitan Police possibly claim that such material could assist in their investigations?
Given the appalling track record of these agencies and individuals, may I respectfully suggest that much more light will be shed on what really happened to Madeleine McCann if you begin with a fresh police force and a fresh remit. Any new police force should then interview under caution any U.K. individuals who have worked for the McCanns (see the Appendix for a list of names).
It would also be useful for any new police force to interview former Metodo 3 employee, Julian Peribanez, who worked on the Madeleine McCann case. Two years ago, he published a book which contained a damning indictment of the corruption and criminality within Metodo 3.
His claims amount to an accusation that Metodo 3 was, in effect, never employed to search for Madeleine at all. This matches an account written by Christie Twomey for The Times in early 2008, in which she also made strong criticisms of Metodo 3 and two of its staff.
The major involvement of the government and the security services in supporting the McCanns
As Prime Minister and the nation’s Home Secretary from May 2010 to July 2016, you will know better than almost anyone else about the extensive involvement of the government and the security services ever since Madeleine McCann was reported missing. This has seemed to a great many people to have been wholly disproportionate. Moreover, it has not led to Madeleine being found nor to the arrest of anyone responsible for her disappearance. I can only summarise here some of this high-level government support:
1 Appointing, within days of Madeleine’s reported disappearance, the Head of the government’s Media Monitoring Unit, Clarence Mitchell, to be the McCanns’ public relations spokesman, a post he held for nine years
2 The reported, successful efforts of former Prime Minister, Gordon Brown to persuade the Portuguese police to release the description of a possible abductor, based on the claims of the McCanns’ friend Jane Tanner
3 The direct involvement of MI5, as disclosed by Portuguese investigation co-ordinator Goncalo Amaral, in his book ‘The Truth of the Lie’
4 The role of the British Ambassador in Portugal, interfering with the Portuguese police who were trying to seize items for forensic testing from the McCanns in the early days
5 Delays by the then Home Secretary in 2007 and 2008 in processing requests by the Portuguese authorities for rogatory interviews
6 The reported involvement of Special Branch officers, who met with the McCanns at East Midlands Airport and drove them to their home the day they returned from Portugal
7 Setting up a top secret national co-ordinating committee on the Madeleine McCann case on 8 May 2007, under the chairmanship of the Head of Leicestershire Constabulary, Matt Baggott
8 The active involvement of the government-backed Control Risks Group in the case from the very first days after Madeleine was reported missing
9 Leicestershire Police officers deliberately delaying sending relevant evidence to the Portuguese Police, advising Jane Tanner ahead of an identity parade in which she purported to identify Robert Murat as the person she had seen carrying a child the night Madeleine was reported missing (leading to his arrest)
10 British criminal profilers identifying Robert Murat as fitting the likely profile of the abductor to the extent of 90% of likely characteristics
11 The former Prime Minister acceding to a request made by his friend Rebekah Brooks, CEO of Rupert Murdoch’s News International empire, to set up Operation Grange, reportedly after threatening him with ‘a week of bad headlines about Theresa May’.
These are only examples of the government’s heavy involvement in this case.
The McCanns’ public appeal for funds
There are several issues regarding the McCanns’ fund-raising efforts which do not appear to have been addressed by Operation Grange at all. Some of these are set out in lengthy papers written by qualified accountant, Enid O’Dowd, and can be read on the internet.
One issue is that the McCanns’ ‘Find Madeleine Fund’ is a private trust and company and not a charity. Moreover, it is quite clearly controlled by the McCanns and close members of their family and friends, although to the public it appears to be a charity.
Several contradictory statements have been made by the McCanns and those backing them about the use to which the funds have been put. Statements were made that funds would ‘only be used for the search’. However, contrary statements have been made suggesting that significant monies from the fund have been used to pay the McCanns’ legal fees and costs.
A further concern was a reference in a recent book to a statement made by Lord Bell of public relations firm Bell Pottinger - the company brought in to the case by Mark Warner, the holiday firm through whom the McCanns booked their holiday in Praia da Luz. He told a friend: “The McCanns paid me £500,000 in fees to keep them on the front page of every single newspaper for a year, which we did”. This raises the question of whether part or all of this huge sum of money came from the donations from members of the British public, who expected to see the money spent on a search for Madeleine, not a public relations exercise.
Apart from that, why has the public’s money apparently been squandered on the ill-chosen agencies and individuals employed by the McCanns, a responsibility also shared of course with each one of the Directors of the Fund? How could it be, for example, that the McCanns paid Kevin Halligen, said in newspaper articles to be a serial fraudster, £500,000 plus expenses for four months’ work, during which he was for most of the time living a 5-star life of luxury in hotels in Britain and the U.S, with his girlfriend, Shirin Trachiotis? Does the public not need Operation Grange, or others, to provide answers to these questions?
Several analyses of the accounts of the ‘Find Madeleine Fund’ have been carried out by qualified Irish accountant Enid O’Dowd. Her analyses are available at several places on the internet. These analyses have uncovered many anomalies. On page 128 of her book, ‘madeleine’, Kate McCann wrote of the Find Madeleine Fund: “It was set up with great care and due diligence by experts in the field. From the outset everyone agreed that, despite the costs involved, it must be run to the highest standards of transparency”. However, the accounts, every year, convey only the bare minimum to comply with the Companies Acts. The public cannot gain from them anything like a clear picture of where all their money has gone.
More recently, on 2 September 2015, the McCanns’ spokesman, Clarence Mitchell, said:: “They [the McCanns] realise that [Operation Grange] cannot go on forever. A newspaper report informed the public that Mitchell had explained “how former GP Kate and heart doctor Gerry, both 37, of Rothley, Leics., had moved money from the publicly-backed Find-Madeleine-Fund into a special account in anticipation of having to finance the hunt for their daughter themselves". The public, when they gave money to the Find Madeleine Fund, would not expect the Directors to then create a separate fund, which was reported as being controlled just by the McCanns.
An analysis of the case by 'PeterMac', a retired Police Superintendent, and other evidence submitted by members of my forum
'PeterMac', a retired Police Superintendent, has studied the Madeleine McCann case for nine years, and conducted original research on key evidential issues in the case. I am aware that he has submitted a great deal of evidence to the respective Senior Investigating Officers, always obtaining a receipt for the information he has sent them. His analysis, which by implication is highly critical of Operation Grange, has been presented in a free e-book which can now be read at this link:
http://whatreallyhappenedtomadeleinemccann.blogspot.co.uk/
It has also been reproduced on my websites, here:
https://jillhavern.forumotion.net/t13115-petermac-free-e-book-what-really-happened-to-madeleine-mccann
…and here:
http://gerrymccan-abuseofpower-humanrights.blogspot.co.uk/2016/08/retired-police-superintendent-peter.html
Other members of my forum have also submitted evidence and have been assured verbally and in writing that all the evidence they have submitted is being kept on computer and has been taken into consideration. It will therefore be available for any fresh police force, not bound by a restricted remit, to investigate.
What should happen now
I have set out the case that Operation Grange has not succeeded in its search for the truth because of its inappropriately limited remit. I have also referred to justified criticisms about the operation of the Find Madeleine Fund.
Despite impressive statistics released from time to time of the numbers of documents studied, lines of enquiry pursued, rogatory requests submitted, numbers of suspects or persons of interest questioned, etc., it seems plain that after well over six years, Operation Grange is nowhere nearer to solving this case. Despite promises of ‘openness’ and ‘transparency’, there is no evidence made available to the public which demonstrates that any of the above issues I have listed has been fully investigated (if at all) and what (if any) the findings were.
You will be aware that thousands of people, among them professionals such as police officers, criminal profilers, criminologists, doctors, psychiatrists and statement analysts, have questioned the McCanns’ account of events.
You may recall that at the recent Police Federation Conference, you addressed the issue of widespread corruption in British police forces and the need to tackle it. It cannot simply be assumed that Operation Grange is free from corrupt influences.
At the same time, we have seen in the press over recent years many accounts of senior-level police corruption in the Metropolitan Police force.
On behalf of the members of my forum, therefore, I call on you to:
1 Appoint independent assessors of proven integrity and independence to evaluate the work of Operation Grange, and make its findings public. In this respect, may I remind you of this part of the review’s remit, as determined by DCS Hamish Campbell: “The ‘investigative review’ will be conducted with transparency, openness and thoroughness…” Any such report must include a full investigation into the huge involvement in this case of MI5, Special Branch and other government or government-backed security agencies;
2 Appoint, via the new Home Secretary, a different police force, which has the highest possible reputation for integrity and independence, to investigate the reported disappearance of Madeleine McCann;
3 Ensure that any new police investigation has an unlimited remit and can therefore go to wherever the evidence leads them;
4 Order the relevant government department to investigate all aspects of the operation of the Find Madeleine Fund, including:
- investigating the actions of all of its Directors,
- the funding of the private investigations,
- whether or not funds have been used to pay the McCanns’ legal fees and expenses,
- why it was necessary for a separate account to be set up last year, to be controlled by the McCanns and not the Directors, and
- accounting for all monies paid into and from the Find Madeleine Fund since it was set up in May 2007.
I shall send the same letter to Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe but I urge you to seek an urgent meeting with him to discuss the contents of my letter. Please give this matter your most careful consideration and I shall look forward to your response in the near future.
Yours sincerely
_______________________
Jill Havern
For and on behalf of the members of ‘The Complete Mystery of Madeleine McCann’
Reply and Appendix on this thread: https://jillhavern.forumotion.net/t13163-letter-sent-today-to-the-prime-minister-and-sir-bernard-hogan-howe-suggesting-met-police-enquiry-into-maddie-mccann-mystery-is-not-genuine