An interesting timeline from Goncalo Amarals site: 2007 May 3, 9.50pm to 10.00pm - The first reports from the McCanns that Madeleine is missing. May 3, around 10.30pm - John Hill, Manager of the Ocean Club, contacts the local police [the GNR] to report a missing child. May 3, around 10.50pm - three officers of the GNR arrive at the Ocean Club and minutes later enter the McCanns’ apartment and talk to the McCanns and most of the rest of the ‘Tapas 9’ May 3, between 11.30pm and 12.00midnight - Policia Judiciara [Portuguese National Police Force = PJ] arrive. May 4 - Clarence Mitchell, the then Head of the 40-strong Central Office of Information Media Monitoring Unit, at the heart of the government’s ‘spin machine’, is appointed by the government to control publicity on the McCann case. He flies out to Praia da Luz later in May. Before doing so, he boasts in a TV interview that it was he who spoke to Archbishop Cormac Murphy O’Connor and got him to arrange an audience for the McCanns with the Pope in Rome. May 4, 4am - PJ ask McCanns to vacate Apartment 5A. Mark Warners move them to a different location in the Ocean Club. The crime scene in Apartment 5A is sealed and examined later that morning. May 4 - Sniffer dogs are brought in, the Spanish and border police and airports are notified. Volunteer teams comb the village, resort and beach for clues. Already, the McCanns begin to accuse the Portuguese police of ‘not doing enough’ to find Madeleine. In the evening, the McCanns make an emotional plea, speaking of their ‘anguish and despair’. May 4 - Alex Woolfall, Head of Crisis Management at Bell Pottinger, one of the nations top media and public relations firms, flies out to Praia da Luz, and spends much time advising the McCanns May 5 - David Hopkins, Managing Director of Mark Warners, flies out to help, together with the Director (Alan Pike) and another member (Martin Alderton) of the Skipton-based Centre for Crisis Psychology (CCP), both appointed by Mark Warners and presumably paid by them. The Skipton Herald reports that “Mr Alderton has counselled those affected by major disasters across the country”, while a spokesman for Mark Warner said: ‘The Centre for Crisis Psychology (CCP) came highly recommended by industry partners and have been known to us for some time. Their experience in dealing with a variety of incidents is second to none’. May 5 - At least three police officers from Leicestershire Police fly out to praia da Luz, including Detective Superintendent Bob Small, who spoke to Jane Tanner on 13 May shortly before she adamantly identified Robert Murat as the abductor shed seen 10 days earlier (see below) Between May 5 and 12 - Two top people from Control Risks Group (CRG) are dispatched to Praia da Luz, Kenneth Farrow and Michael Keenan. Mr Farrow is the ex-head of the Economic Crime Unit in the City of London Police and Mr Keenan an ex-Superintendent from the Metropolitan Police with specialist fraud and investigative experience. No-one knows how they can help find a missing child, but Jane Tanner admits to speaking to them before she identified Robert Murat as the man with a child she claimed to have seen on 3 May. It is uncertain who promised to pay for them to come out; it could have been the government, or Brian Kennedy. Jane Tanner referred to them as ‘the people Kate and Gerry brought in’. Also during this time Foreign and Commonwealth Office staff were sent out to Praia da Luz, including Sheree Dodd, who soon returned to London amid reports that she did not accept the McCanns’ claims that Madeleine had been abducted. May 5 - Madeleines aunt Philomena McCann joins in the McCann family criticism of the Portuguese police, claiming they are ‘uncommunicative’. They refer to having ‘a sketch of a suspect’ [Jane Tanner’s], but do not release it. A Portuguese lawyer who was later to play a key role in prosecuting Gonçalo Amaral, Marcos Aragao Correia, has claimed that on this day, he attended his first-ever Spiritualist Church meeting on the island of Madeira, after which he had a ‘vision’ of a large evil-looking man strangling a fair-haired young girl looking like Madeleine. Earlier, he had falsely claimed that ‘underworld sources’ had told him that Madeleine had been abducted, raped, killed, and her body thrown in a lake. Under pressure, he was forced to admit that he had lied about that. Marcos Correia subsequently admitted to being paid by the McCanns for his services (see below). May 7 - Portuguese police hold a press conference. May 8 - Reports claim that Portuguese police are investigating British paedophiles with links to Portugal and the Algarve coast in particular. May 9 - Crimestoppers creates an international ’phone number for people who think they have information about Madeleine. May 11 (Friday) to May 13 (Sunday) - Robert Murat is placed under observation by the PJ. He is observed to hire a car for the weekend and drives long distances over local roads. May 12 - This would have been Madeleine’s 4th birthday. Dr Gerald and Dr Kate McCann come out of a ‘birthday mass’ and church service looking radiant and happy. Dr Gerald McCann says the couple are ‘convinced’ Madeleine is alive. The total reward being offered by business figures, celebrities and a national newspaper for information leading to Madeleines safe return reaches £2.5 million. Chancellor Gordon Brown expresses sympathy for Madeleines parents. May 12 - Members of the International Family Law Group fly to Portugal to assist the McCanns. May 13, late afternoon/early evening - Jane Tanner meets with members of covert investigation agency Control Risk Group and Bob Small of Leicestershire Police. Later that evening she claims to recognise, from the back of a police van with two-way glass, Robert Murat as the man carrying a child she claims to have seen at around 9.15pm on Thursday, 3 May, the date that Madeleine disappeared. Dr Gerald and Dr Kate McCann come out of church. May 14 - Dr Gerald McCann states: “Until there is concrete evidence to the contrary, we believe Madeleine is safe and is being looked after. Police take Robert Murat in for questioning and search his home. Murat gives the police a statement about his movement between 1 and 4 May which included 17 significant errors (see 10 July, below). May 15 - Police officially class Robert Murat as an ‘arguido’, or suspect. May 16 - Three members of the ‘Tapas 9’ (Rachel Oldfield/Mampilly, Fiona Payne and Dr Matthew Oldfield) now visit police and say they saw Robert Murat hanging around the Ocean Club on the night Madeleine vanished. Police reported to be investigating ’phone calls between Sergei Malinka and Robert Murat the night Madeleine was abducted. May 16 - McCanns’ fund-raising website set up: Find Madeleine Fund: Leave No Stone Unturned’ The following day Dr Gerald McCann on his new blog expresses delight that their new website has received 25 million hits and that donations to the Fund are pouring in. Posters protesting Robert Murats innocence appear around the Norfolk village where he used to live. May 16 - Detectives swoop on the Praia da Luz home of Murat’s close friend, Romanian computer expert Sergei Malinka, who designed a website for Mr Murat. The police discover he has wiped his computer hard drive. Madeleines aunt Philomena McCann travels to Westminster to lobby for support, and Gordon Brown [then Chancellor of the Exchequer] pledges to help ‘in any way I can’. May 20 (Sunday) - Dr Gerald McCann flies back to the U.K. for meetings with lawyers, with Leicestershire police, and to discuss the development of the Find Madeleine Fund. May 21 - Dr Gerald McCann meets with people from Rothley, where he sees hundreds of tributes from villagers. He is also given a guided tour of the ‘incident room’ at Leicestershire Police HQ, Enderby, Leics, where he professes himself impressed with the latest ‘state-of-the-art’ technology. He then meets with various lawyers, referring to them already as his ‘team of lawyers’. He plans strategies for developing the website, promoting the Fund, and appointing a Campaign Manager in addition to the support provided by the head of the government ‘spin machine’ Clarence Mitchell. Only after this visit to England does Dr McCann release the well-known ‘last photo’ of him and Madeleine. During this day, Dr McCann produces a pillow-case said to have Madeleine’s DNA on it. The police could find no trace of any of Madeleine’s DNA from any of her clothes, bedding, hairbrush, toothbrush, or other personal items in the McCanns’ apartment in Praia da Luz, a fact that remains unexplained to this day. May 22 - Dr Gerald McCann flies back to Portugal, along with Clarence Mitchell. May 24 - The McCanns releases the so-called ‘last photograph’ of her before she disappeared. The McCanns assert that it was taken at 2.29pm on the date she disappeared although the camera reading showed ‘1.29pm’. The McCanns Find Madeleine Fund reaches almost £300,000. The number of hits on the findmadeleine website reaches 125 million. May 25 - Dr Gerald McCann reads a prepared statement to the world’s media about a description of a person said to have abducted Madeleine. The description is based on the account of the McCanns’ friend Jane Tanner, who has already identified Robert Murat as the person she claims to have seen. The man is described as “White, approximately 35 to 40 years old, of medium build and 5ft 10ins tall. He was wearing a dark jacket, light beige trousers and dark shoes”. Later, the PJ, who do not believe Jane tanner, quietly issue a similar description. These developments only occur after sustained pressure from the McCanns, their legal team and public relations advisers, and the British Government. It is later admitted that Gordon Brown spoke to Dr Gerald McCann several times on the ’phone and spoke to the Portuguese authorities, pressing them to release a description. At the time, Gordon Brown was Chancellor of the Exchequer, not the Foreign Secretary. May 29 - Dr Gerald and Dr Kate McCann fly to Rome to meet the Pope May 30 - The McCanns meet the Pope at St. Peter’s Square in The Vatican. The event is beamed across the world’s media along with photos of Madeleine McCann. May 31 - The Portuguese Police say they’ve been inundated with messages from ‘clairvoyants’ and ‘psychics’ and have a 4”-thick file of letters from them. June 3 - Just one month after Madeleine had disappeared Dr Gerry McCann was already planning a ‘big event’ to mark Madeleine’s abduction. He told the press: “We want a big event to raise awareness that she is still missing…It wouldn’t be a one-year anniversary, it will be sooner than that.” He had talked specifically of approaching celebrities like Elton John to ‘front’ a major fund-raising concert. Less than a month later, on 28th June 2007, Dr Gerry McCann said: “I have no doubt we will be able to sustain a high profile for Madeleine’s disappearance in the long-term”. How on earth, we might ask, could any father talk about organising concerts to generate publicity, and plan to sustain a ‘long-term high profile’ for Madeleine’s disappearance, months into the future, when there was still the possibility that the police might, any day, bring them news that June 6 - The McCanns are in Berlin. They are interviewed on TV. A German journalist raises for the first time the suspicion voiced by some that the McCanns know what really happened to Madeleine. Dr Kate McCann brushes this aside nervously by claiming this view is only shared by a tiny minority. June 7 - A mystery ’phone call, later traced to Argentina, is received from a man claiming to know Madeleines whereabouts. The McCanns temporarily put their European search for their daughter on hold in case they need to change their plans. June 13 - An anonymous letter sent to Dutch newspaper De Telegraph claims Madeleines body is buried in deserted scrubland only nine miles from where she was abducted. June 17 - Portuguese Police issue a statement saying that the McCanns, their friends and other staff of the Ocean Club may have destroyed vital evidence in the first few hours after her abduction by trampling all round the apartment from where the abductors had supposedly taken Madeleine n, during their search for her. Chief Inspector Olegario Sousa says that their actions ‘could prove fatal for the investigation’. June 21 - The first of flurry of dozens of false ‘sightings’ of Madeleine in Malta. June 22 - Hundreds of balloons bearing Madeleines photo are released across the world on the 50th day since she was reported missing. June 28 - Spanish police arrest an Italian man and a Portuguese woman suspected of trying to cash in on Madeleine’s disappearance by claiming they were collecting cash for Madeleine’s Fund. Dr Gerald McCann makes the following statement: “I have no doubt we will be able to sustain a high profile for Madeleine’s disappearance in the long-term”. July 2 - The McCanns move out of the apartment in the Ocean Club resort where they have been staying since the abduction to a private villa nearby. The rent is said to be being paid by an unnamed benefactor. July 6 - Dutch police reveal they have arrested a man in Eindhoven suspected of attempting to defraud Gerry and Kate McCann demanding two million euro (£1.35 million) for information on her whereabouts. July 10 - Robert Murat taken in for more questioning. Now that he knows the police have mobile phone triangulation records which pinpoint where he was during those four days, he changes his original story in at least 17 different respects. July 11 - More questioning of Robert Murat and also the police carry out a ‘confrontation’ between three members of the ‘Tapas 9’ [Rachel Oldfield/Mampilly, Fiona Payne and Dr Russell O’Brien] and Robert Murat. The three of the ‘Tapas’ group say: ‘We saw you hanging around the Ocean Club on the night Madeleine disappeared’. Murat says: ‘Oh no you didn’t, I wasn’t there, I was chatting with my Mum at her home’. Each side sticks to their story but the PJ tend to believe Murat and not the three friends of the McCanns. July 12 - Dr Gerald McCann flies back to the U.K for a meeting with the British Police in London. July 13 - Dr Gerald McCann meets with the police in London, while Dr Kate McCann flies back with relative Michael Wright of Skipton to attend a christening in Skipton of their two god-children. July 15 (Sunday) - The McCanns attend the christening of their god-children. July 16 - ‘Harry Potter’ author J K Rowling announces she will use the worldwide appeal of Harry Potter to help the search for Madeleine. Posters of Madeleine are made available to booksellers in more than 200 countries around the world ahead of the publication of the long-awaited final book in her best-selling series on July 21. Nothing more is said about J K Rowling’s support for the McCanns after this announcement. July 23 - On a four-day ‘fact-finding visit’ to the United States, Dr Gerald McCann meets U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to ‘discuss efforts to tackle child abduction’. July - Portuguese police call in Martin Grime, one of the world’s top sniffer dog handlers, and ask him to bring cadaver dog Eddie and bloodhound Keela to Portugal. August 1-8: Martin Grime, and springer spaniel dogs Eddie and Keela in Praia da Luz. The cadaver dog Eddie detects the scent of human cadaverine, in other words a corpse, in four places in the McCanns’ apartments, on four items of clothing and property belonging to Dr Kate McCann and the children, and in their hired Renault Scenic car and on its key. August 3 - Details emerge of a possible sighting of Madeleine in Belgium. A child therapist says she is ‘100% sure’ she saw the young girl at a restaurant in the Flemish town of Tongeren, not far from the Dutch border, on July 28. The witness said the girl was with a couple, a Dutch man and an English-speaking woman, who were acting strangely and not like ‘normal parents’. August 4 - Robert Murats house searched a second time. Dr Kate McCann discloses for the first time that, as she tucked Madeleine into bed the night Madeleine disappeared, she said: ‘Mummy, Ive had the best day ever. Im having lots and lots of fun’. August 5 (Sunday) - Major articles by-lined to Lori Campbell in the Sunday Mirror and the Independent on Sunday. In those articles. Dr Kate McCann admits that the pair of them left Madeleine and the children on their own six evenings in a row. The search of Murats home is completed; apparently nothing new is found. August 6 - A Portuguese newspaper reports that British sniffer dogs have found traces of blood on a wall in the apartment where Madeleine went missing. According to Jornal de Noticias, Portuguese detectives, in an off-the-record briefing, now believe it is more likely than not that Madeleine is dead, perhaps ‘having been killed accidentally’. August 8 - Rachael Oldfield/Mampilly complains about damaging and untrue leaks from the Portuguese police. August 9 - The McCanns take their two-year-old twins Sean and Amelie to the creche at the Ocean Club resort in Praia da Luz for the last time. It follows concerns about photographers taking pictures of their children and disturbing holidaymakers using the child-minding facility. Murats lawyer, Francisco Pagarete, publicly criticises the McCanns ‘strange’ behaviour in leaving Madeleine alone on the night she vanished, adding that ‘People in Praia da Luz want ‘these bloody McCanns’. The McCanns issue a statement sating: ‘We will not be bullied into leaving Portugal’ by the growing backlash against them. August 10 - The McCanns launch a new section of the internet video-sharing website YouTube, called ‘Dont You Forget About Me’. It will be devoted to helping to find missing youngsters such as Madeleine. August 11 - the 100th day since Madeleine disappeared. The McCanns attend a service for Madeleine at a church in Praia da Luz. The Portuguese police acknowledge officially, for the first time, that Madeleine could be dead. Chief Inspector Olegario Sousa tells the BBC that ‘New evidence had given intensity to the possibility that Madeleine was killed’. A ‘McCann family friend’ is quoted as saying: ‘It is ‘extraordinary’ that the police did not have the decency to tell the couple that they now believed Madeleine could be dead, before stating it in an on-the-record interview. August 12 (Sunday) - Dr Kate McCann tells Womans Own magazine that she would rather know her daughter was dead than live in limbo forever. She says: “Gerry and I have spoken about this and in our heart of hearts wed both rather know - even if knowing means we have to face the terrible truth that Madeleine might be dead. We both need to know” August 15 - The Times reports that blood traces found in the bedroom where Madeleine was sleeping the night she disappeared were not hers. It says: ‘Forensic results show the blood came from a man’. August 16 - A senior police officer in Portugal says ‘It’s a strong theory that Madeleine is dead. August 17 - Alipio Ribeiro, National Director of the Portuguese judicial police, tells El Mundo that forensic test results from the U.K. on blood traces from the holiday apartment ‘are due imminently’. He adds that ‘The quality of the traces found was not very good and it was possible they would be inconclusive’. August 20 - News reports suggest the police inquiry has entered a ‘decisive phase’, with detectives poised to carry out a series of new searches. August 21 - Dr Russell OBrien and his partner Jane Tanner deny what they say are ‘smears’ about them in the Portuguese press. August 22 - The McCanns issue a statement saying that Madeleine ‘may be alive and in Spain’. At the same time, the McCanns give interviews to Spains three top-selling newspapers. August 23 - There are reports in the Spanish press that police in Spain are investigating a reported sighting of Madeleine. August 24 - The McCanns attack a series of police leaks which they save ‘have fuelled preposterous speculation about what happened to his daughter’. They say they are concerned that so much information has made its way into the public domain despite Portugals strict judicial secrecy laws. August 25 - Dr Gerald McCann says he will be returning to work soon. August 29 - Dr Gerald McCann issues an appeal to Madeleines abductor ‘end our 118-day nightmare, if only to assuage the torment in our souls’. August 30 - This should have been Madeleines first day back at school at Bishop Ellis Catholic Primary School, Thurmaston, Leicestershire. August 30 - The McCanns say they will launch a libel action against a Portuguese newspaper, Tal & Qual, based in Oporto, which said that police believe they killed their daughter. Detectives are about to name them as suspects in their daughters disappearance. September 5 - Pope permanently removes appeal to find missing Madeleine McCann from Vatican website September 6 - Dr Kate McCann taken in for questioning by the PJ: released, but made ‘arguido’ (suspect) September 7 - Dr Gerald McCann taken in for questioning by the PJ: released, but made ‘arguido’ (suspect) September 7 - A further report on the DNA results of fluids found in the McCanns’ apartment and hired car is e-mailed by John Low of the Forensic Science Service in Birmingham to the PJ in Portimao September 10 - Damning interim Report of Detective Inspector Tavares Almeida which gave strong evidence that Madeleine McCann had died in Apartment 5A and that the parents must have been involved in concealing the body September - Gonçalo Amaral speaks to media off the record blaming the British government for interfering with his investigation. October 2 - Gonçalo Amaral receives a fax removing him from the Madeleine McCann investigation, and ordering him to report to duties at Faro instead of Portimao. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is told two hours beforehand. October - Brian Kennedy, double glazing magnate, contacts Gail Cooper, who claims to have seen a strange man in Praia da Luz just before the time Madeleine was reported missing. He then arranges for Melissa Little, supposedly an F.B.I.-trained ’forensic artist’, to prepare a sketch of him. The sketch is dubbed ‘monster man’ or ‘George Harrison man’. The PJ later totally dismiss Gail Cooper’s evidence as it is inconsistent; her second statement contradicted her first. November 13 - Double glazing magnate Brian Kennedy travels to Portugal with his in-house lawyer from the Latium Group, and meets with suspect Robert Murat and his lawyer Francisco Pagarete. They meet at the house of Murat’s uncle and aunt, the Eveleighs. Murat’s mother is there. Kennedy wanted to keep the meeting top secret, but news about it leaked out. November 14 - Kennedy meets with the PJ and Metodo 3 at Portimao Police Station. He says his only interest is to help find Madeleine. December 31 - Daily Mail reports that ‘Two British sisters gave a dramatic account of a pair of strangers watching the Ocean Club pool and Tapas Bar hours before Madeleine McCann vanished’. The pair are Jayne Jensen and Annie Wiltshire, two divorcees from Maidstone, Kent. They were in Dr Gerald McCann’s tennis group but didn’t for some reason come forward any earlier.
Posted on: Sun, 15 Jun 2014 18:34:10 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015