EXCLUSIVE to mccannfiles By Dr Martin Roberts 25 May 2014 TAKING A GAMBLE Nowadays, for the McCanns and their public champions, appearances before the camera or on radio are fraught with more risks than ever before. Former head of CEOP, Jim Gamble, illustrates the point only too clearly. Interviewed recently for the Belfast Telegraph (19 May) he concludes with: I think Gerry and Kate McCann will get closure in my lifetime. My heart goes out to them. I never cease to be appalled by some of the things people say. A woman on the radio earlier was more fixated that Kate and Gerry left the kids and went for a meal. You know what? Lots of people make mistakes. Few people pay this price. Sometimes people should just think before they speak. It must surely be a comfort to know that closure for the McCanns will come within a lifetime. Can we afford to sustain Operation Grange for quite that long? But youre right Jim. People really should think before they speak. The world would be a happier place if we all did so, including your good self if I may make so bold. That woman on the radio earlier was followed by none other than our Jim, interviewed on the same programme no less (The JVS Show phone-in on BBC Three Counties Radio, 15 May). But before we take a closer look at the thoughts of career copper Capn Jim, lets just adjust the starting blocks with another of his explanations to the Belfast Telegraph: Q. You invested a lot in CEOP, you built it up but then you walk away in 2010. Do you regret it? A. I came to the point it was a matter of principle. For me it was the right thing. My fear was that it would be subsumed into a larger organisation. The Home Secretary said it would retain its identity, its profile and they would build on the success it had. Well, arrests have dropped in the last three years, the sign outside CEOP no longer says CEOP. It says National Crime Agency. Its profile has dropped. In NCA the C stands for crime. In CEOP the C always stood for children. Never mind the beguiling Home Secretary and Gambles paternal concern for children, the answer to the question is writ large in sentences 1 – 3. Subsumed into a larger organization would mean, inevitably, that he would no longer be top banana, and since wherever egos Jim goes, Jim went. The sheer arrogance of Jim Gamble is reflected in his conspicuous lack of professionalism toward fellow police officers and sardonic ungraciousness toward others. He and Gerry McCann no doubt got on very well together. After listening to what that woman on the radio said earlier, Gamble expresses his considered opinion with respect to the proposed excavation of Praia da Luz requested by the Metropolitan Police: Why now? thats a question perhaps for the Portuguese police. These issues are being addressed because they werent done at the time. The... the British authorities and the Metropolitan Police, who have brought a real professional focus to bear on this... Implying, of course, that the Portuguese police brought something other than a real professional focus to bear. Gambles insinuation is not only tactless, it is unwarranted, disrespectful and quite disgraceful. But no more so than his comment upon that womans (Sarahs) earlier point of view: I think its misplaced and shes given us a lot of her opinions, so let me just give you my opinion of her call. I think its spiteful, I think its small-minded, I think shes a condescending individual that needs to reflect on the hurt that parents feel - not the issues in the margins. He later adds: So, I think she needs... she really needs to look in the mirror, and if I was her this morning, after listening to my interview be broadcast, I wouldnt want to look in the mirror, and, quite frankly, I wouldnt want to meet ordinary mums and dads in the street after what she just said, whether its in Praia da Luz or where she lives. Well, Jim, we are each of us entitled to hold an opinion about things, but is a concentrated character-assassination really worthy of a former Police supremo with residual ambitions? I think not. The true worth of Jim Gambles advocacy of the McCanns soon emerges, as he continues: but the fact that a child was, you know, has... was... did go missing... is still missing, and that those parents are tortured... Lets get one thing out of the way shall we? The parents have been tortured, as Gamble puts it, for seven years. Their daughter Madeleine is dead for eternity. Now, what was it he twice had to duck out of saying? has been abducted, was abducted perhaps? What makes him so uncertain? Lets allow big Jim to tell us himself: These are the parents of a child who is suspected to have been abducted. (The boots on back-to-front here isnt it? She was the child of parents who were suspected of hiding her body). The initial inquiry had led, you know, to... to no... no one being arrested, no one being held to account for this. (Standing a bit too near the edge again here are we? The initial inquiry had led, you know, to... to the McCanns. That’s in the evidence the professionals engaged in Operation Grange will have reviewed) I mean, this is about searching for a child who may well have been abducted and who may well have suffered, you know, harm including murder. And I really dont like to speculate about what may, or may not have happened, but had the investigation covered all these bases in the beginning we wouldnt be here now. Ah Jim... Jim... No sooner do you attempt to feed the world bullshit than you give yourself the impossible task of polishing a turd. I mean, this is about searching for a child who may well have been abducted The child may have been abducted. On the other hand she may not. Small wonder then that Gamble declines to speculate about what may or may not have happened. You see, as Jim Gamble so eloquently explains, this is all about a child who may have been abducted OR... Our Jim, for glaringly obvious reasons, refrains from articulating the alternative. The same alternative that was expressly shut out from the (published) remit for Operation Grange. But since he has introduced the element of doubt, there can be nothing illegitimate about our clarifying the situation on his behalf. Madeleine McCann may have been abducted, or something else must have happened to cause her disappearance. Now what could that be? Theres no way she could have left the familys apartment on her own (weve been told that often enough) and yet she has not been seen in her parents company, or anyone elses for that matter, for seven years. Someone must have taken her from 5A. But thats abduction isnt it? And she may not have been abducted (the admissible alternative to Jim Gambles may well have been). Notwithstanding his understandable reluctance to speculate, Jim Gamble nevertheless gives us, in the same breath: ...but had the investigation covered all these bases in the beginning we wouldnt be here now. All what bases? The ones pertaining to the search for a child who may have been abducted. Which makes the question of abduction itself a base to be covered, then as now. So youre thinking of pruning a tree in your garden which happens to overhang the fence with your neighbour (who is entitled to engage in deforestation on his own account), and considering which side of the fence to work on yourself. No contest. Especially when you weigh up the number of branches involved. No one makes unnecessary work for themselves do they? No. So the first base either the Portuguese or the Met Police should have covered, Jim, is whether Madeleine McCann was abducted or not – not who might have abducted her in the event that she may have been. Well the seemingly less professional Portuguese acted sensibly. The Met, on the other hand, are lumbered with pruning all those extra branches. Which means, Jim, that you, the McCanns, and the rest of us, will probably have to wait a lifetime after all for the closure to which you refer, unless or until someone in authority decides to lift the taboo on the blindingly obvious, and permit examination of the forbidden alternative, the existence of which you yourself have admitted. Care to take a gamble on how long that might take, Jim? It would make a change from taking the Michael for the past seven years.
Posted on: Sun, 25 May 2014 21:51:47 +0000
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