What was supposed to be a procedural day of the trial – big question was if facts were to be read in court or not – and with the expected discussions about them as they became known, turned out to be quite an intense and interesting day because some just came to conclusions in a hasty manner.

Wednesday’s activity was so frantic on both sides of the fence that it was like watching a crowd doing a standing ovation to an orchestra that was just tuning its instruments before a concert.

The concert was far from starting and the various critics were already acclaiming or criticising the orchestra’s performance.

Fascinating how some people failed to understand the expression “more to follow” and came to definite conclusions even before that “more” arrived.

And even more fascinating was how on the sound of the first notes played – we repeat in tuning instruments only – some just hailed the magnificence of the entire evening.

To be clear, very clear, Wednesday, in terms of the actual McCann v Amaral trial no one has won and no one has lost.

However one cannot but note, as we will explain, that the sounds made by some instruments during the tuning do make things look good for Mr Amaral but it’s never enough to stress again and again that only when the sentence is read can a definite conclusion be made about this trial.

The date of the concert is yet to be set. And it won’t be for the next 40 days at least, it seems. Up to 30 for the WoC issue, to hand, we suppose by Correia Afonso, over the London Court's authorisation to have Madeleine McCann represented by her parents in this trial and the following 10 for the “allegations of law” from all parties.

The Portuguese justice system has made us be very wary, so until then we will refrain from making conclusions about it.

As we explained in our post “Losing v Winning”, Mr Amaral cannot win this process. He can only not lose it.

But the fact that people are already stating that Mr Amaral will win, is very symptomatic.

That is done because there is indeed a sense of victory in case he doesn’t lose and because there’s a sense that if the McCanns don’t win they will have suffered a heavy defeat.

But both sensations only exist due to the fragile situation in which the McCanns have been since 2011. In fact as of 2010 as we’ll explain.

If all this took place in 2010, when Jim Gamble ran the show as we think he did, it’s our opinion that if the McCanns didn’t win we would simply get a repeat of what happened with the unnoticed overturning of the book’s banning by the Appeal Court.

Only now, years later and with this trial, are people realising that the book hasn’t been banned for years.

The Portuguese justice system would have been slandered, Portugal called an insensitive, cruel and fascist country and the McCanns would continue to be beatified in the UK.

But Jim Gamble was convinced to “relieve” himself of duties since 2010.

With their man removed from any official structure, the Swinging BH lost hold of the case and that control was then taken by the Government BH.

And it’s in the interest of the Government BH that the McCanns fall and fall hard in this trial as we’ll also explain.

For the Swinging BH, the McCanns matter only as much as they serve their interests. If there’s the possibility of having them prosecuted without implicating anyone else besides their group of friends, then it’s fine the McCanns and friends are taken away and locked up somewhere. That not being possible then the only other option acceptable is the whitewashing and that means that’s in their interest the McCanns remain above the waterline.

For the Swinging BH closure it can only be one of these two options: T9 only or whitewashing. Any other isn’t acceptable to them, and they will put up a fight.

Wednesday had the virtue to bring victories to both Government BH and GA. Both have won decisive victories. Independent of sentence.

All because the McCann ship as of Wednesday is beyond repair. It took a fatal blow to its hull. If the McCanns have always counted for little up to now, now they count for even less.

The Swinging BH side are now only worried about their own skin.

Let’s rewind a bit and contextualise things.

In 2010, Government BH decided to get closure on this issue. Convinced by the Media, as in News International and more specifically NOTW, that prosecuting the McCanns would be a piece of cake, decided to reopen the case as soon as Kate wrote her self-damning book.

Along the way they retook control by making sure Jim Gamble no longer ran the show as we’ve said.

Not having anyone in the structure of command –  Government had meanwhile changed from Labour to Conservative – is not to be in the loop and not to be in the loop is always fatal.

The reopening caught the swinging BH by surprise and prompted them to react.

And they quickly reminded the Government BH that UK was up to its neck in the mess and arresting McCanns implicating others would only pop open very inconvenient Pandora’s Boxes.

Government BH quickly realised that they couldn’t hasten things up and that the only solution to closure, as there simply is no scenario possible to incriminate only the McCanns and the T7 without involving external help, it would have to be with the Swinging BH on board.

To have them on board meant closure would have to be whitewashing. The only other one that served them.

But reality doesn’t play games, and as we have explained, whitewashing was impossible from the start.

The closest they could get to such a solution would be the bungled burglary.

On the drawing board it looked good but as anyone could see from a mile away, the casting was completely impossible.

For a long time the case remained stalemate as we know. Until up to a certain point in time when Government BH decided to proceed for closure via the only viable solution: the partial truth.

Knowing this was unacceptable for the Swinging BH all had to be done without haste. And keeping the Swinging BH on board the longest time possible.

As whitewashing looked good on the drawing board, Government BH pursued it publicly and so appeased the Swinging BH, while discreetly, without haste, eroding without remedy the hoax their “allies” had created back in 2007 with the collaboration of the UK Government in power then.

Few noticed how the noose was slowly, slowly tightening around the Swinging BH necks. We kept telling people but many thought we were just seeing things.

One of the first things that needed to be done, was to stop all “business” the McCanns had in Portugal.

Team McCann was ordered to not win.

But not just not win – for that all they had to do was find a “humane” excuse to spare Mr Amaral of further distress and drop the case – but to not win in a vexatious manner.

This was in January 2013. When they offered Mr Amaral to settle out of court.

One could try and say “when prosecution offers defense a settlement outside court it’s because they are certain they will not win” but one simply cannot do that because it’s something completely unseen before the McCanns did it.

This was the first move to humiliate the McCanns.

It was obvious that Mr Amaral would not accept the offer. If anything, it gave him positive signs that things were going to go his way.

The trial was rigged from then on.

No, not even suggesting anything about the Portuguese courts or about the judge. The trial was rigged by the prosecution. When one of the contenders is determined in not winning then the whole thing is rigged.

From September 2013 up to now, we have been forced to watch this pathetic show with one side going through the motions with no conviction whatsoever.

In September 2014, may we remind you, the Swinging BH launched their major last offensive, the Hater Campaign, which was stopped by the disgraceful reporting done by Martin Brunt for Sky News, which led, in our opinion, to Brenda Leyland’s death.

This Black Hat September episode showed how Jim Gamble remained an influential element for the Swinging BH.

But, notwithstanding Brenda’s death, the fact that SY stood its ground by standing behind their Crèche Dad against Bundleman during this crucial period showed that the Swinging BH were much less influential than they thought.

Plus, if the Black-Hat September was turbulent, it would have been much more if all had gone as planned: the SY questionings were supposed to have taken place during that month, which means it would have been in that period that the Robert Murat card – or the death of the whitewashing – would have been played by the Met.

Also it was supposed to have been during that month the final allegations of the McCann v Amaral were to have happened. When prosecution would bring such valid arguments as off-season rabbit hunting and Sunday Carnival.

With the software problem that afflicted it's justice system then, Portugal unwittingly “boycotted” 2/3 of the Government BH's moves for that month. Swinging BH had their path practically unhampered.

Thank goodness for the collective incompetence of the Gamble – Summers & Swan – Brunt trilogy who were able to implode themselves without any help.

The significant and humiliating defeat of this campaign allowed the Government BH to take advantage of the upper hand and anticipate a move: the forensics. Asking publicly for it before even sending the required rogatory letter-

The Swinging BH on a steep slope on their way down while the Government BH marched on.

SY questionings brought all groups into the spotlight: Swinging organising structure, Ocean Club, guests and ex-pats.

Final allegations was an absolute shame for the McCanns, as desired by Government BH.

So the expectation for Wednesday was great. Would, although all the efforts to the contrary, the Portuguese find proven facts that could provide the McCanns a victory?

The first report to come out, as far as we know, was this one from Lusa and published by Diário de Noticias Online:

This report was quickly translated by Joana Morais on twitter:


As it said “Court accepts as proven damages caused by Gonçalo Amaral’s book to Kate and Gerry McCann” it disheartened many reading this.

Some despaired. Some, very unjustly, simply shot the messenger, Joana Morais. She simply translated a piece of news. Yes, it was bad news to our side of the cause but it was but a translation.

Why no UK reporters in situ?

What we found interesting was what happened next based solely on this little piece of information.

The UK Media, starting with Sky News and Martin Brunt, started to spin this without waiting any further confirmation.


The McCanns had won, it was announced.

There hadn’t been any sort of sentence but the McCanns had won, that simple. That straighforward.

Based on a false assumption that the trial was under judicial secrecy the UK started to sell the story of victory. Swinging BH were boasting before confirming facts. They have so little to hold on to that anything will do.

Supposedly, they thought, the judicial secrecy would stop details of Proven/Not Proven facts to be publicly known much like we still don’t know who was and who wasn’t arguido in the SY Questionings.

The problem is that the SY Questionings are under judicial secrecy while the trial isn’t.

Once those papers that were handed out by the judge were in the hands of the defense lawyers it was inevitable that the proven and unproven facts would quickly appear on the internet.

And when they appeared they completely contradicted what had just been spun.


Martin Brunt, having learned his lesson from the Brenda Leyland episode, did a 180º turn and started to tweet the truth. He has proven us wrong on one thing. We thought he was allergic to the truth but as far as we know, his fingers haven’t fallen off his hands after he tweeted it.

So let’s look at the facts as listed here:

These were the clearly NOT PROVED facts:

#03. Defendant Gonçalo Amaral has earned from the sale of the book “Maddie, A Verdade da Mentira” an amount that is not less than € 621.000,00? and #04. Defendant Gonçalo Amaral has earned from the sale of editions in foreign languages of the book an amount that is not less than € 498.750,00? [not proven as the estimated by prosecution (1,119,750€) is more than 3 times reality (342,112€)].

#05. The book was sold in Brazil by defendant “Guerra e Paz, Editores, S.A.”

#07. Defendant Gonçalo Amaral has earned from the sale of the DVD an amount that is not less than € 112.500,00  [not proven as the estimated by prosecution (112,500€) is 2.8 times reality (40,000€)].

#09. Defendant “V.C. – Valentim de Carvalho – Filmes, Audiovisuais, S.A.” has already made the DVD, in an English version, available for immediate delivery via internet order.

#11. Because of the statements made by defendant Gonçalo Amaral in the book, in the documentary and in the interview to Correio da Manhã, the Polícia Judiciária stopped collecting information and investigating the disappearance of Madeleine  McCann.

#12. Because of the statements made by defendant Gonçalo Amaral in the book, in the documentary and in the interview to Correio da Manhã, authors Kate  McCann and Gerald  McCann are completely destroyed, from a moral, social, ethical, sentimental, family point of view, much beyond the pain that their daughter’s absence causes them.

#16. Namely because of defendant Gonçalo Amaral’s statements in the book, in the documentary and in the interview to Correio da Manhã, author Kate  McCann is immerged in a deep and serious depression, which has already made her state publicly “I wish I was in a coma, to relieve the pain”

#21. The criminal inquiry was reopened due to the appearance of new evidence [we consider this “not proved” as a statement by the court claiming ignorance as to the reasons case was reopened rather than stating that the case was reopened just on “old” evidence”].

#22. The attention of the media and of people in general diminished when defendant Gonçalo Amaral’s book was published.

#35b. The distribution for sale of book took place in conjunction with the distribution for sale of the newspaper Correio da Manhã’s edition of April 24, 2009.

So, completely clear that it was NOT PROVED to the couurt that Mr Amaral caused moral, social or ethical damages on the McCanns.

Completely NOT PROVED that Mr Amaral didn’t stop PJ from collecting information and investigating the disappearance of Madeleine  McCann

These were the clearly PROVED facts::

#01. Gonçalo Amaral made the statements that are attributed to him under item Z - item Z is the Correio da Manhã interview

#02. The cover price of the book “Maddie, A Verdade da Mentira” in Portugal is € 13.80, including VAT [we consider irrelevant a 0.47€ difference (real price 13.33€)].

#06. The DVD has a cover price of € 6,00 [we consider irrelevant the difference of 0.95€ - real price 6.95€)].

#08. The DVD that is mentioned under AN) has been edited and the edited copies have been sold by defendant “V.C. – Valentim de Carvalho – Filmes, Audiovisuais, S.A.”

#10. At least two million and two hundred thousand people have watched the programme that was broadcast on 13.4.2009

#15. Authors Kate  McCann and Gerald  McCann live under enormous daily pressure due to the need to keep their younger children away from the knowledge of defendant Gonçalo Amaral’s opinions about their moral integrity

#18. 63.369 copies of the DVD were not sold, having been destroyed afterwards

#19. Defendant Gonçalo Amaral has gone into retirement from the Polícia Judiciária on 1.6.2008 [we consider irrelevant the difference of one month (1,7,2008), as either dates are before archiving of process and book's publication].

#20. On 22.6.2008, the Attorney General’s Office published a note for the media, announcing the archiving of the inquiry, awaiting better evidence [we will disregard that as on June 22, 2008, there was no decision about the conditions in which case would be reopened, but consider a note with that content was issued on July 21, 2008. Besides this the note also prompted relevant diligences].

#23. The sale of the books was made on consignment, being subject to devolution for various reasons, like handling, manufacturing defects or their non-transaction [we consider irrelevant "partly sold on consignment, and partly firmly sold with a right to return for various motives"].

#24. The so-called “Maddie Case” has been profoundly treated within the Portuguese and foreign society, whether by the media, or through books, like those authored by Paulo Pereira Cristóvão, Manuel Catarino and Hernâni Carvalho.

#25. The so-called “Maddie Case” was commented upon by Dr. Francisco Moita Flores, former inspector, writer, criminalist and commentator, in various media.

#29. The social capital of defendant “V.C. – Valentim de Carvalho – Filmes, Audiovisuais, S.A.” is held, in 60%, by the firm “Estúdios Valentim de Carvalho, Gravações e Audiovisuais, S.A.” and, in 40%, by the Fundo de Investimento para o Cinema e o Audiovisual.

#30. Has defendant “V.C. – Valentim de Carvalho – Filmes, Audiovisuais, S.A.” ceded the rights to sell, distribute, exhibit and broadcast all of the cinematographic and audiovisual work that it creates, develops and produces to the firm “Valentim de Carvalho Multimédia, S.A.” [we consider irrelevant the fact that these rights were only sold for a period of 5 years].

#31. Until today, has the documentary been reproduced only once to be edited, published and sold in Portugal under video format, in this case a DVD.

#32. The reproduction and edition of the documentary in video format have been authorised by “Valentim de Carvalho Multimédia, S.A.” to firm “Presslivre, Imprensa Livre, S.A.”, the owner of the Correio da Manhã newspaper, according to a contract between both.

#33. Under which [contract], the DVD, its covers and packages would be, as they were, manufactured on behalf of, under order of and under the responsibility of Presslivre, in order to be distributed and sold together with newspaper Correio da Manhã.

#34. And the entire process of registering and classifying the video edition (DVD) of the documentary with ICAG would be, as it was, developed by Valentim de Carvalho Multimédia, a process whose cost would be carried by Presslivre, as it did.

#35a. The distribution for sale of documentary took place in conjunction with the distribution for sale of the newspaper Correio da Manhã’s edition of April 24, 2009.

#36. The documentary was reproduced, and even subtitled in the English language, by third parties that published it on the internet, without permission and against the will of the defendant “V.C. – Valentim de Carvalho – Filmes, Audiovisuais, S.A.”

#37. That illicit diffusion damages not only the rights that are held by defendant “V.C. – Valentim de Carvalho – Filmes, Audiovisuais, S.A.” over the documentary, but also its commercial exploration, because any citizen can watch the documentary, also only one “click” away.

Clearly PROVEN that there were many more than the defendants that spoke publicly about the case in terms not favourable to the McCanns

These were the facts that are of UNCLEAR proof:

#17. Sean and Amelie McCann will soon become aware of the conclusions that are mentioned in J), because they will go to school. It was affirmed that it was proved that Sean and Amelie started school in August of 2010 and have not learned about Mr Amaral's thesis yet, but that doesn’t clarify when does the court think the twins will be aware of conclusions of book.

#26. Authors Kate  McCann and Gerald  McCann have hired communication firms and spokespeople through the Madeleine Fund – for unknown reasons, the judge does not mention this item at all.

This leaves us with the following facts:

“13. Because of the statements made by defendant Gonçalo Amaral in the book, in the documentary and in the interview to Correio da Manhã, authors Kate  McCann and Gerald McCann suffer permanent anguish, insomnia, lack of appetite, anxiety and irritability, preoccupation and indefinable fear?

Proved. The judge adds that this psychological state is pre-existent to the book, the documentary and the interview and was not caused by the book. Nonetheless, it cannot be reasonable to believe that the book, the documentary and the interview had no effect on the couple, i.e. It had an effect but that is perfectly normal.”

The PROVED fact that spawned all the haste. However, the court by stating on the same paragraph that the effect caused is “perfectly normal” it emptied out completely any possible claim for provoked distress.

“14. Authors Kate McCann and Gerald McCann feel a deep shame and an indescribable ill-being because they are considered, by most people who know the theories of defendant Gonçalo Amaral, as having responsibility in the death of their daughter, being so cowardly that they have hidden her cadaver, simulating abduction, all of this to avoid criminal accusations?

Proved that the couple felt badly about being considered responsible over the hiding of their daughter's body and simulating her abduction by those who believe in Mr Amaral's thesis.

The judge states that it is not possible to determine what most people who have read or seen Mr Amaral's thesis actually think.

She adds that the plaintiffs failed to prove shame, even with Kate stating it was not shame that she felt.

The judge once more believes it is expected that the plaintiffs would feel badly about being considered responsible for hiding the body and staging an abduction - not, the judge stresses, about being responsible for their daughter's death, as is commonly, and mistakenly, believed.”

Not only the plaintiffs weren’t able to prove shame as the court finds obvious, or proved, that it was expected for them to feel bad in case they were considered responsible for hiding the body and staging an abduction.

The court is not considering them responsible for either. And uses very wisely the expression “as is commonly, and mistakenly, believed”.

To believe they are responsible for hiding the body and staging an abduction is as wrong, legally, as to believe they aren’t. The process has been archived and reopened. No one has been accused or declared innocent to this day by the ongoing investigations.

The judge says only it was expected they felt bad because they were accused of doing something they denied, in present case, hiding the body and staging an abduction.

Last but not least, for us the most the fundamental facts listed:

“27. Are the facts that are reported by defendant Gonçalo Amaral in the book and in the aforementioned interviews, like he himself writes and said, facts that were established during the inquiry?

28. Does the documentary only contain facts that are also in the inquiry files?

(Both articles) It is proved that the facts in the book and in the documentary, concerning the investigation, are mostly facts that took place in the investigation and are documented as such.

The judge does note that some of the facts in the book are not complete, and some facts that are in the book are not in the case files, including Jane Tanner's "informal" recognition of Robert Murat.”

The judge took the book and PJ Files as consolidated pieces of evidence and read them herself. For that reason didn’t allow any discussion about them in the court-room.

The court has now officially considered “proved that the facts in the book and in the documentary, concerning the investigation, are mostly facts that took place in the investigation and are documented as such.

It’s in writing in an official document produced by the legitimate Portuguese Court.

For Mr Amaral it’s a victory, independent of sentence the court has considered proven that what  Mr Amaral says, or better, concludes in the book is based on facts documented in the investigation.

If he happens to lose, which we see as highly unlikely but will repeat that the Portuguese system has surprised us more times than we would care for, then he has a very powerful argument to use in the appeal.

If he happens to not lose, then he has the exact same argument to use when and how he decides to act against the McCanns in the future.

Ironically, the only fact listed as not being in the files, the “Jane Tanner’s "informal" recognition of Robert Murat” is pretty much well detailed in Kate’s book, so, certainly, NOT something they can say Mr Amaral has lied about.

We think Mr Amaral has every reason to feel satisfied at this point in time.

To those questioning why we say the Government BH has linked the pouncing on the McCanns with the Lisbon trial, here is the answer.

They needed an official ruling connecting the McCanns to whatever happened to Maddie and her body.

As we have said, the trial was rigged for the McCanns to lose. Rigged by the Government BH by ordering the McCanns to take the fall.

The court, caught in all this would have to justify why the McCanns didn’t win. It would have to declare why Mr Amaral didn’t have to pay a single cent to the McCanns.

And the only reason for that could only be because Mr Amaral didn’t cause any damage to the McCanns with what he wrote in his book.

They got more than they bargained for. What Amaral wrote IS NOW A PROVED FACT that it is documented in the investigation.

It couldn’t get any clearer. Or more damning for the McCanns.

The McCann ship is beyond repair. Impossible to recover. Impossible to whitewash.

Everyone is happy.

Oh, except some people, of course.

1. The doomed dooming vessel

As we said in our post last week “To haste or not to haste”, the Government BH and Gonçalo Amaral were pleasantly surprised and both got more than they could expect, at least at this stage.

“As of Wednesday, the McCann ship is beyond repair”, as published by the Portugal Resident who were so kind to quote us.

And it is. It completely is.

It is just sitting there crippled and waiting for that merciful blow that will blow it out of the water. But it has to wait to be put out of its misery and it is an agonising wait indeed.

It has to wait because, as we have repeatedly said, the McCann ship was not, nor even by a longshot the Admiral ship of the other’s side’s fleet. It has only been its frontrunner. Taking the blows for others. Allowing them to remain hidden in the fog behind.

As we said in our “Maddie’s Pandora’s Box” post, blowing the McCann ship to smithereens is but the beginning of a new phase of the case. A phase everyone is realising is coming and are preparing for it the best possible way they can.

We have tried in the blog to always be realistic. To keep our feet on the ground. We have only been optimistic when realism showed us we could be. And such is the case now.

Reading, and re-reading the document issued by the court last Wednesday, the proven/not proven facts have given the judge very little margin to work with in terms of matter of law. It’s her job to apply it to the matter of fact and we simply cannot see how she can do it in a way that grants the McCanns any sort of victory.

We will wait for the sentence and correct ourselves if that is the case but it’s our conviction that the McCann ship is doomed. And we’re convinced that the other side shares that conviction as well.

The document listing the proven/not proven facts issued by the Portuguese Court was a total game changer. It was expected only to come at sentencing but it came earlier and no one expected to be so clear and decisive.

It was a game changer for 2 reasons. Both benefit Gonçalo Amaral and one works for and the other against Government BH.

The first reason, is that if Murat’s card played in November/December 2014 was indeed the death of whitewashing, the proven/not proven document has put a definite full-stop to it.

Or, in other words, if by bringing Murat centre front was killing the white washing, the court document has caused it to die. If in the first instance there could still be the desperate temptation of rushing the whitewashing into an emergency room of a very expensive hospital and try to shock some life back into its heart, the second has pronounced it officially dead.

What story can now be invented of a burglar killing Maddie in panic without sounding ridiculous after a legitimate court has ruled that “It is proved that the facts in the book and in the documentary, concerning the investigation, are mostly facts that took place in the investigation and are documented as such” and the only criticism it gives to the book is that the facts that aren’t complete are the ones Kate describes in her book?

A book that clearly accuses the McCanns, and not anyone else, of obstruction of justice and body concealment. Hard to explain why the McCanns helped a panicky burglar get rid of Maddie’s body and then embark on the abduction hoax.

From now on, every single time the word “burglar” is pronounced in relation to the Maddie case it will be met with heavy scepticism to say the least, if not laughed at.

The official death of whitewashing benefits both Government BH and Gonçalo Amaral as it gives either more leeway for upcoming combats-

Those questioning the reasons why Government BH linked the trial to moving on the McCanns you have here your answer. Only an official document/sentence produced by the Portuguese justice system legitimises the ridiculousness of the whitewashing. Which is the option sought by the Swinging BH. Now, no more.

That’s why this has been dragging on for so long. The Government BH have been waiting for what effectively empties out any other possible version proposed by the Swinging BH.

And it has been quite exasperating for the Government BH. They were betrayed in their planned timelines by both the fascinating way the Portuguese justice system works and by Gonçalo Amaral.

If thing had gone “normally”, or as announced by the Portuguese justice system, the sentence would have taken place in the first weeks of October 2013. 16 months later we’re not there yet.

All the Government BH planning was “betrayed” by Gonçalo Amaral.

If he hadn’t thrown in the WoC spanner into the engine, the final allegations would have been in January 2014, the proven/unproven facts in the following February if not sooner (no Christmas and New Year celebrations in between) and the sentencing would probably even take place that same month, or at the latest in March 2014 (no 30 days to present WoC document).

The predictions we made in our “Rats” post, would have been correct and this whole affair would be over and done with by Maddie’s 2014 anniversary, or the latest by the Summer of last year.

Instead, besides having the WoC question raised, we also had Gonçalo Amaral firing his lawyer in June and had the whole Autumn with the glitch in the software supporting the Portuguese justice system.

But, fortunately for all, we’re getting there. Not seeing any more unpleasant surprises as only sentencing is left to happen.

The second game changing effect that the document produced is that the McCann ship was hit too hard. Way too hard.

It’s useless, it’s scrap. And the problem is that it's an enormous and embarrassing piece of scrap. It’s very, very visible.

This works against the Government BH because it means the re-archiving option has gone out the window together with the whitewashing water and in Gonçalo Amaral’s favour as it facilitates significantly any future battles he wishes to undertake against the couple, and it seems he really is rolling up his sleeves.

One just has to add the £10Million to having to look at the horrendous spectacle of a visibly crippled ship, to easily understand that the Government BH have no other choice but go for truth.

It does have various degrees of truth to choose from. The degree up to where they want truth revealed. However, they mustn’t forget that whatever degree they choose it must answer all the 6 questions we have put in our “Maddie’s Pandora’s Box” post.

But whatever choice is made, the Swinging BH will fight it with all their strength the lifting of any of that fog, as that will reveal ships they don’t want revealed.

We must note that these ships cloaked themselves with a fog they, the Swinging BH, created but back then were helped significantly by those now pursuing them, the Government BH in creating it, thus the “BH” acronym after Government

Because the damage is so great and everyone can see it, the protecting fog will have to be lifted, to some degree or another. No question about that anymore.

Other ships will have to be revealed. It’s not an option anymore, to re-archive the case will be unacceptably shameful for the UK and to go for the whitewashing, ridiculous just isn’t enough to describe it.

The other side is stunned. It will certainly react but now is much more worried and busy with their in-fighting to decide on who will “be given to die” [a contraband term – smugglers make a choice between the various boats about which one will be caught on purpose by authorities so that the others can get the goods to the beach while “victim” distracts them].

They’re running around clucking like chickens, calling on loyalties, blackmailing, now top priority is each ones skin and as the joke says, one doesn’t have to outrun the bear, one just has to run faster than a poor soul who will become the bear’s supper.

Some thought that Gonçalo Amaral’s interview was a little premature. A little too early. We disagree. He’s on the attack, he’s pressuring, not allowing the enemy to breathe. His sights are not on the sentence, but further ahead.

He’s not pressuring the judge but those who have wronged him. It’s his life mission and he will fulfil it.

Now is the time to pressure, the time to convince the Government BH that only a 80/90% of the truth is the wisest choice. That only that amount that puts a lid on the issue and let UK restore its dignity especially when dealing with international partners. This case has been an embarrassement to the nation for far too long.

We here, who, modesty aside, consider ourselves relevant players of this game will follow Gonçalo Amaral's suit and we will step on the gas pedal.

You see, like the Government BH, we have also been waiting for this moment. For the right time to exert pressure so that it maximises effects. Pressure those who we feel it's timely to pressure. Expose truth to shorten the adversary’s space to manoeuvre with each burst, with each post.


2. Dirty laundry

Last week in our post “To haste or not to haste”, we said that Mário Marreiros, Ocean Club’s laundryman, said in his PJ statement of May 8, 2014 that “He does not know of anything suspicious that could be related to the events.”

However, 6 years later he does say on May 29, 2013 00:00, according to the Mirror, that he did see something:

“Mario Fernando, 47, told Portuguese cops about the “weird” stranger lurking at the Ocean Club resort in Praia da Luz but has never been quizzed by British police or spoken publicly.”

(…)

“Mario recalls a “nervous” man wearing big sunglasses hiding in a stairwell seconds away from the holiday apartment where parents Gerry and Kate were staying with their three children. The laundryman is convinced the lurker was involved in the kidnap.”

(…)

“He said: “I was at my last collection point near the girl’s flat. I was always rushing. I’d park the van any-where.

“It was 7.30pm to 8pm. When cleaners cleared sheets they dropped them down the hole in the stairs to be collected by me at the bottom.

“When I walked down and turned into the hole to get the laundry, I saw the weird guy and we nearly bumped into each other. He was embarrassed. He looked nervous.

“He was walking out from the hole under the stairs and must have been much further inside but had taken several steps after hearing me coming. We were, like, dodging each other.

“He had a really fat face and had two-tone sunglasses on, they got lighter at the bottom and were big. I will never forget those glasses.

“There was no reason for him to be there and no reason to wear the glasses as it was dark under the stairs.”

“He did not walk away but watched what I did. I collected the sheets and took them to the van outside. He stayed there watching me.

“I had never seen him before. I knew everyone who was living at the complex and he was not one of them.

“It is still recorded in my head like it was at the time. It was not usual for people to be there, in the shadows.

“My theory is that guy must have been involved, either in the kidnapping or studying what to do — their movements.

"He was there for something, for sure!”

Summing it up, Marreiros, an Ocean Club employee working in the laundry and doing his rounds, in the early evening of May 3, 2007, was in block 5 (where apartment 5A is) to collect laundry from the beneath the stairs. He sees a man with a really fat face and wearing two-tone sunglasses walking out from under the hole of referred stairs, generally acting strangely, like they were dodging each other.

We then said this could easily just be tabloid talk and we showed readers why it wasn’t: our certainty came from what Berry was asked by PJ, via rogatory letter, and to which he answered on Apr 23, 2008.

It clearly showed that Marreiros could only been referring to Neil Berry.


3. The laundry hole

Marreiros speaks of a “hole in the stairs” in block 5, the building where apartment 5A is, from which the man seemed to come out of.

Because of this case, Luz has been photographed almost to the inch by media and many who have gone there with the specific purpose of documenting visually all that may minimally be related with the case.

Ironically, out of all the details chosen to be preserved visually for history, not ONE, we repeat not a single ONE, both of media and of people dedicated to the case, photographed the Big Round Table (BRT) at  the Tapas.

We have dozens of photos of windows, lampposts, shutters and key locks (both of 5A and similar) but not ONE of the BRT. We have hundreds of pictures of the various streets, pathways and alleyways but it didn’t occur to any of these people to photograph that particular table.

And apparently it also hasn’t occurred to the thousands of tourists who have passed through that Tapas esplanade on hols to take a photograph of that table, even if only in the background.

We even have, curiously, pictures taken supposedly from where the table was, and one in particular, from Gettyimages by a Jacques Lange, who apparently works for Paris-Match with a delicious peculiarity:

(photo from here)

“Cette photo a été prise par un appareil photo pose sur une table oú les Anglais ont passé la soirée” which translates to “This photo was taken by a camera on a table where the English spent that evening”.

Gettyimages states very clearly that the camera is set on the BRT but of the table itself we have but a glimpse of the edge. And he was ever so cautious to remove all chairs around it so they wouldn’t obstruct the view.

Or as it was shown to the world:

(photo from here)

As a sidenote, this photo, allegedly taken with the camera set on the BRT, shows a small round table for 4 between it and the apartment. That would mean that every single night a group would block the view to the apartment and we have always thought the group had a clear and unhindered one.

This relevant fact is never mentioned anywhere but here. Is Lange confused?

But the interesting thing that this particular magazine has also done is in their rather big piece on the case, when it came to illustrate the Tapas esplanade, what did it decide to show?

(photo from here)

The opposite side from where the McCanns were! Why not go to the other side, where the T9 allegedly were seated and photograph that side? Isn’t that just a coincidence?

The only person we know who states clearly that she has pictures of the BRT (with the added bonus of the T9 sitting around it) is Dianne Webster. We challenged her to publish them in our “Will Kate’s book definitely prove Textusa wrong?” post but, unsurprisingly, the challenge went unmet.

But unlike what happened with the BRT we fortunately have a very good photographic future memory of “hole in the stairs” that Marreiros speaks of when he says it was there he saw Berry.

And we say “happened” because PJ considers it a FACT in one of the questions to Berry; “considering the fact that you were seen by a witness, clarify what you were doing at that time next to the stairs leading to the upper floor, which are located next to the lift of Block 5 at the Ocean Club, i.e. not far from the apartment from where Madeleine McCann went missing?”

These are the stairs mentioned by Marreiros:


The location of these stairs in relation to Apartment 5A is the following:


To be clear, the “hole in the stairs” is on the opposite side of Building 5’s elevator shaft when one is coming from Apartment 5A.

In terms of where the “hole in the stairs” is in block 5:


So, taking into account that ““He was walking out from the hole under the stairs and must have been much further inside but had taken several steps after hearing me coming” this is where Marreiros saw Berry:

A very strange place to be, indeed. And unfortunately for Berry that was EXACTLY where Marreiros, Ocean Club’s laundryman, was going to pick up the laundry of that day dropped there by the cleaning ladies.


4. Berry dixit

Let’s now look at what PJ requested Neil Berry to be asked:

“VIII - Interview to NEIL BERRY, 42, MeXXXXXXXX ROXX, Surrey, SMX 7XX. He should be subject to a buccal swab and hair sample collection and asked the following questions:

* Do you confirm your previous statements to the British Police?

* Could you provide a thorough description regarding everything you did on 3rd May, 2007? Indicate time and place.

* Where did you have your meals and with whom?

*Where were you on this day between 8.30 p.m. and 10.00 p.m.?

* At about 6.00 p.m., in particular, where were you? Who were you with?

* Considering the fact that you were seen by a witness, clarify what you were doing at that time next to the stairs leading to the upper floor, which are located next to the lift of Block 5 at the Ocean Club, i.e. not far from the apartment from where Madeleine McCann went missing?

* On that occasion, did you actually pass by an Ocean Club employee that went there to pick up laundry?

* If yes, what was the reaction like and why?

* Do you know a man identified as RAJINDER BALU? Who is he? From where do you know him? Did you travel together to Portugal? Did RAJINDER BALU travel together with his family?

* Explain clearly all your actions on that day between 6.00 p.m. and 11.00 p.m., namely with whom did you go to the TAPAS RESTAURANT to get food, and the kind of food you ordered, as well as the direction you took to go to the place where you ate.”

As already said, the content of these questions show clearly that it was Mr Neil Berry that Marreiros saw.

To these questions, after being asked whether he wanted to read his original statement in order to refresh his memory and having been granted that authorisation [why authorisation if he was the one being asked?] Mr Berry answered the following:

That he arrived on Saturday 28th April 2007.

That he didn’t leave the resort during his stay.

That on Thursday 3rd May 2007, daughter doesn’t return to the Mark Warner Children’s Club after lunch and the Berrys, a party of 4, spent that afternoon together as a family at the Tapas pool [we suppose the other child didn’t return to whatever kid’s club it went although this is not mentioned].

That at 16.00 Berry had a few drinks with Raj Balu, Jayne Jensen and Anne Wiltshire.

That at 17.00 his family returned to their apartment while he remained at Tapas with these 3 people for at least another half an hour.

That after that he returns to his apartment but although he doesn’t remember if Raj left with him or not he does remember that Jensen and Wiltshire remained at the bar [we must note the selective memory Berry has to only remember those he leaves behind and not who accompanies him, or not, all the way from Tapas to apartments].

That he tried to reserve a table at the Tapas Bar for that night but it was fully booked.

That he spoke to Raj Balu about this and they decided to order a meal from the restaurant and so that their 2 families could have dinner together in Berry’s apartment.

That he’s not certain where he was at 18.00. That at that time he could have already been in his apartment or be returning from the bar.

That to go from Tapas to his apartment he would walk along the side of the pool, crossing the stairs of block 4.

That, as he said, doesn’t remember if he was alone or not but if he was with someone, this person would have been Raj Balu.

That he doesn’t remember having seen a lift in any of the apartment blocks.

That he was NOT in block 5, but HAD to pass by it in order to arrive at his apartment.

That it is possible that he was on the other side of the street opposite block 5.

That he thinks that his apartment was 4G.

That he doesn’t remember having seen Ocean Club staff collecting dirty laundry at this hour.

That the Berry children went to bed at 19.00 and that Raj arrived at his apartment with his family, carrying a cot for his son.

That they [Neil Berry, Emma Berry, Raj Balu and Nicole Cox, 4 adults who were all parents] did not manage to set the cot up and so he [do note the singular] went to find a member of staff and he found a Mark Warner employee, whose name he cannot remember but remembers that she was the girlfriend of a maintenance employee called Rob [again please note Berry’s quite selective memory. The kind of memory that makes one not remember if it was a tree but that makes us certain there were high branches].

That the girlfriend of a maintenance employee called Rob accompanied them [do note the plural] back to the apartment and managed to set up the cot.

That they put Raj's child to bed [we suppose in the infamous travel cot] and sat down to relax and have a drink, once the children were asleep.

That at about 20.00 he and Raj went to the Tapas restaurant to place their order, probably had a drink while they waited and when they left with the meal.

That he doesn’t remember exactly what they ordered but he thinks included red cabbage [again that selective memory, cannot remember if it was meat, poultry, fish, seafood or pasta but does remember the red cabbage].

That they took the same walk back [well according to what he had said before, there was only one route back to the apartment which HAD to pass by block 5].

That he remembers that at dinner that the McCanns were not at the restaurant at the time that they left and we did not see them while he and Raj and were there [amazing memory Berry appears to have as it seems all that happens at Tapas – him leaving Jensen and Wiltshire behind there and noting the T9 were not there at around 20.00 – is etched in clearly in his memory while whatever he did outside the Tapas is almost like a blurred memory, namely if he, at 17.30/18.00, left the bar alone or not, if he left the apartment alone when he had to leave it to solve the travel cot assembling problem, the name of the girl who helped them, and even, amazingly, as we’ll show later, where his apartment is located. And why is he certain he doesn’t remember seeing the McCanns there? He doesn’t say “they could be there, I didn’t see them” but instead remembers they were not. Why remember the McCanns were not there when other people had already started to eat so the place was not empty? In fact, according to the Tapas reservation sheet that day, at 08.00, we had the Edmonds, the Manns, the Carpenters the Bullens and the Patells already there. A total of 17 people (with the T9 arriving that would make 26 people with only 20 covers available according to Ocean Club. With the Irwins and the Sperreys arriving that would raise the number of reserved covers to 30 out of a possible 20). So why notice that the T9 were not present? Could it be because they would have been a large group sitting around a large table that would be noted and he noticed that the large table was empty? No, that can't be it because we know that table doesn't exist].

That once back at the apartment both families had dinner and remained there.

From 22.00 onwards all the events that took place were already described in his previous statement of 7th May 2007.

And that’s all he had to say on this occasion. And he did say a lot. Maybe more than he wished he had as we hope to show.


5. To pass or not to pass through

Let’s start by clarifying where the various locations, blocks 4, 5 and 6 were in relation to Tapas, in the plant of the Ocean Club:


Using Google Maps:



It is quite clear that to go from Tapas to block 4, to go to apartment 4G where Berry thinks he stayed, one has to pass in the vicinity of block 5.

Apartment 4G would have to be G4G. The denomination is quite clear. All apartments in the blocks belongings to the “group” Waterside Gardens have their numbering starting with a “G”, which we suppose means Gardens. This is followed by the block number and ends with the identification of the respective apartment.

For examples the McCanns stayed at G5A, the Oldfields at G5B, the O’Briens at G5D and the Paynes at G5H

For block 4, the rooming sheets indicate the following apartments occupied:

G41 –  Bowness, Sandra

G46 – Heselton, Antony John

G4B – Carruthers, Beverley Ann

G4J – Jensen/Wiltshire

G4L – Weinberger, Jeni

G4M – Totman, Julian Edward Bartman

G4N – Naylor

G4-O – O'Donnel, Bridget Mary

No mention of the Berrys.

But, let’s suppose that he and his family indeed stayed in block 4 as he seems to affirm, not imply.

It is true that for to go from Tapas to block 4 one has to pass in the vicinity of block 5 but never through it. From various angles:


Apparently there are 3 possible routes from Tapas to block 4. None of them pass through block 5. None of them put anyone be at any point in the “hole in the stairs” inside that building.

The closest one to come to that is route 2 which passes through parking lot of block 5. To walk through the parking lot doesn’t in any way mean having to pass through the inside the building.

But, apparently, route 2 is blocked. The parking lot belongs only to block 5 and is independent from block 4’s:


The shortest route from Tapas to Block 4 is route 1. Through a pathway, which seems to serve only block 4 behind block 5. It makes sense as block 5 has a rear entrance for every apartment in that pathway.

That’s the most reasonable one to go from Tapas to block 4 and doesn’t make one go anywhere near the front of block 5.

What one can’t see is any reason for Berry to say “it is possible that I was on the other side of the street opposite block five” when going from Tapas to block 4. What street? Rua Agostinho da Silva or Rua Dr Francisco Gentil Martins?

Does he mean the pathway between blocks 4 and 5? That hardly qualifies as a street, does it?

But we think there’s a reason for him to say that. His brain has played a little trick on him and this was a slip of the tongue.

You see, Berry never stayed in block 4. He stayed in apartment G606.



Apartment G606, as in block 6. Not even a 4 in it to confuse.

And block 6 is indeed the one on the opposite side of the street (Rua Dr Francisco Gentil Martins) of block 5.


Berry has ALL the reasons to be at that time “on the other side of the street opposite block 5” but has absolutely NONE to pass, much less be inside block 5, where he was seen by Marreiros.

So what was he doing there literally holed up in the hole below the stairs of Block 5 early evening of May 3rd?

At around the time, 18.30, we think Maddie died? Or shortly before or after?

We hope readers now understand the importance of Marreiros, the laundryman, having been questioned in December 2014 by request of SY.

It’s PJ asking the questions only for reasons of jurisdiction but SY are the ones wanting the answers.


6. To take away a reservation

But the mystery around Berry’s behaviour that day doesn’t stop here.

To understand it lets describe what appears to be normalcy. Only, as the reader will see, it isn’t. Far from it.

Berry says he tries to book a table at Tapas but is unsuccessful [it’s not clear when this attempt was made but it seems Ocean Club forgot to tell some of its clients that they needed to queue in the morning of the day to get a reservation. Berry was a victim of this lack of notice].

But, supposing he had been successful and got a booking, then it means when he went there to try he had to have planned what to do with his children, one 4 yr old and another just over 1 yr.

We suppose that the Berrys, if successful, would have planned to use the night crèche for their children.

To argue they wanted the children to eat with them falls to the ground because by his own words Berry sends his own kids to bed early [apparently before the Balus arrive at the apartment with their 1 yr and half old infant and a travel cot].

So, it’s quite safe to assume that the Berrys, if they could have made a reservation that night would resort to the night crèche, like so many other guest-parents did.

But he has no success. After all, there were only 20 covers to reserve [if you go by Kate’s word, only 15].

But at around 17.00, he finds out from Balu that the latter has a table reserved. It is indeed reserved for 2, in the name of Nicole Cox, Raj’s partner:


What is peculiar is Cox and Bullen were “authorised by Steve”. A special favour. We haven’t been told the reasons for this small act of nepotism but it’s a fact that it’s mirrored on the Tapas reservation sheet.

The reservation for Cox is only for 2, which means they had plans as to what to do with their kid.

Yes, one could say that Balu/Cox probably wouldn’t book a place at a restaurant for such a young child but take it along and sit it in a high chair and feed it bits from their plates. But they would have to do so in advance to make sure a high chair was available and that request would be shown/confirmed on booking form.

Just like with the Berry’s we’re supposing that they arranged to use the night crèche for that evening.

So the first obvious question to ask and that really stands out is why didn’t Raj Balu invite the Berrys over to their table?

Was it a Tapas mandatory rule that reservations could only be used by those who had reserved? And because of that, as the table had been reserved for Cox/Balu for only 2 covers no one else could dine with them?

If not, it seems that the logical and immediate thing to do would be to propose to Berry “hey, I got a table, why don’t you sit with us? Just put your kids at night crèche like we’re doing [remember that Berry had already foreseen that possibility] and we meet here at 07.30?”

We see no table allocated to Cox, and that makes us think said allocation was done upon arrival of guests.

But looking through the sheet, we can see that tables 203 (4 covers), 207 (4 covers), 209 (4 covers) and 212 (2 covers) weren’t allocated or planned to be used that night [plus the mysterious table 208 that is never shown to be used in the Tapas reservation sheets], so a lot of available tables to sit 4.

All that was needed was to find whoever was responsible and inform [not ask] him/her to add the Berrys to whatever table was going to be allocated to Cox and then put a bracket joining them like it was done with the T9.

Or, if that someone couldn’t be found at that particular moment, then simply arrive together for dinner and proceed as described above.

The only difference for Tapas would be to serve 2 more meals and charge 1 more room.

That’s it. Simple. With kids tended to by night crèche, all would have the enjoyable meal in the Tapas esplanade they all so much desired for that night.

But no. Balu and Berry decide not to follow this logical, basic and simple reasoning and instead decide to give-up on Cox’s reservation.

We can only imagine that Steve was not happy. Seeing people turn down a favour one does is never pleasant.

This decision will later imply, as the reader will see, the temporary acquisition of a cumbersome travel cot, and.

But what fascinates us is the fact that the Cox reservation is checked:


It was checked for what? They didn’t eat there.

Was it to check the take-away? Then why no mention of Berry?

Did Balu decide on the spur of the moment to offer the meal to Berry as it would be his apartment being used?  If so, where is the “2+2” in front of Cox?

It’s not said by either Balu or Berry as to who pays for the meals so we’re supposing they each paid for their own.

So, very bizarrely, these 2 families decide to give up on a dinner, which both families had sought, at the Tapas esplanade and prefer to have a take away at Berry’s apartment.

One can always prefer to have a take-away at a friend's apartment rather than eat on an esplanade. Each to his own. But of that was the case then no need to whine about not getting a reservation and of having let go of it.


7. The hands that handled the craddle

And if you thought all of the above was sufficiently bizarre, now is the cue to enter the stage from the left the most bizarre object ever reported on the Maddie case: the Balu travel cot.



The Balus stayed in apartment G603. In block 6, 3 apartments away from the Berrys at G606.

Doesn’t this little piece of information make it really strange that Berry doesn’t remember if he came out of Tapas towards apartment accompanied or not by Balu?

They could have been in different ends of Luz and so as soon as each left the pool area each would go separate ways. But no, to go from Tapas to their respective apartments they have to go to the exact same building.

For Berry to not remember if he walked alone or if he engaged in conversation along the way with a friend with whom he was going to dine with that night is strange, very strange to say the least.

Let’s now look at what Balu has to say about what he did that late afternoon, early evening.

Balu says that from 15:30 onwards, the Tapas bar was full, as normally happened, with the majority of people there. Neil and Emma were having a drink with him and his wife.

That they had a table reserved in the restaurant for that night, but as the Berrys were not able to arrange a table and for this reason [so why not invite him over to yours?] they decided to leave their table and ate together in Berrys’ apartment using takeaway service.

That his partner left the bar with his son to gp back to the apartment and that Berry's wife, also took her children to their apartment.

That he and Berry stayed at the bar drinking and talking with Jayne Jensen and Anne Wiltshire.

That he and Berry eventually left the bar after 19:00 [not at 18.00 as stated by Berry but then again Neil could have left earlier alone, we don’t know].

That he doesn’t remember if they left together or not [and we have already seen how really, really strange that is].

That he returned to his apartment and got ready to go out for dinner.

That around 19:00 [a little before he left the Tapas bar, which he did after 19.00], together with his my wife and son, they headed to the Berry apartment.

That when they arrived there, Neil was having problems in assembling a cot [Who? What? Where? We’ll come back to this later] which was placed there for his son.

That they had to head to the Mark Warner service desk [maybe meaning Ocean Club service desk or reception] and they sent [meaning a person left the reception to go with them] someone to help us [we remind readers, to assemble a travel cot and we’re supposing the referred person returned to reception after explaining how to assemble the thing].

That sometime between 19:45 and 20:00, he and Berry left the apartment and went to the Tapas restaurant. They ordered their food and had a drink whilst waiting for the food to arrive.

That they returned around 20:15-20:30 to the Berry apartment and all of them ate on the veranda.

That it was a takeaway order. That he remembers that he had a plate of grilled chicken, beef and salad [we’re supposing a red cabbage salad].

They also had chips and four bottles of red wine.

That he did not travel with Berry nor did they know each other prior to the holidays but got to know each other on the first day and got along well.

That Berry was there with his wife and two daughters and that they discovered later that their spouses had worked separately but for the same firm.

That they did not pass the day together but socialised occasionally at night.

That he and Berry spent two times together watching football games in the local bar.

Let’s forget the many, many discrepancies between what Balu and Berry have said about a night spent together with each other’s family and concentrate solely on the travel cot.

First question, what is the need for one? Couldn’t the infant be laid to sleep on one of the couches or on the parent’s bedroom bed? The other two children were asleep, one younger than the one in question, so why have a travel cot in an apartment with 4 adults present?

But where does the travel cot appear from? Berry says that it’s Balu who brings it but Balu says that when he arrives at apartment Berry is having a difficulty assembling it.



This is very strange because one does not forget that one has carried a thing with such significant volume. Whoever carried thing would have remembered. But neither do. Or better each one says it was the other.

But a question must be asked, as we have the McCann twins serving as an example: where did the Balu baby sleep all nights before in their apartment? We suppose that it was in a travel cot. Same question should be asked about Berry’s youngest.

So it’s really, really hard to believe that Balu doesn’t disassemble the cot in his apartment and take it with him to Berrys. And it’s even harder to believe that neither Berry nor Balu don’t know how to assemble a travel cot.

But let’s get back to the Berry & Balu storyline and we see a travel cot owned by neither [otherwise someone would have known how to assemble the thing] in the middle of that apartment

So one or the other had to have it requested it from front desk.

We won’t be picky to the point of who brought it from the front desk to the apartment but we would like to know who requested it and how. If the person who did it, Balu or Berry, walked all the way to the reception and asked for one or simply called front desk and asked for it to be delivered to the apartment. Or, as it would be more likely, called the reception to ask if there were travel cots available and one being there, was told s/he could pass by and pick it up.

We just want to know this because the path between Berry’s apartment and the reception is one that will be used and we just wanted to know if we had to add another round trip there by any of the participants in this epic saga.

Neither Berry nor Balu speak of this. So we’re completely left in the dark about how this particular travel cot was requested and who brought it there.

Now, a word has to be said in favour of Berry. He does say that “they”, as in all four, can’t assemble the cot. Balu on the other hand is not kind to his friend and points the finger at Berry (and implicitly Emma).

Nor does Balu try to help. It is for his child but apparently he prefers to look the other way.

The only conclusion that one can come to is that a travel cot MUST be something very complex to assemble. Frighteningly difficult. Something that only the brave should attempt.

In the following video of 31 seconds, it’s shown how one is assembled and disassembled:




31 seconds. A thing that is designed to be assembled with one hand while holding a baby with the other. A thing that if you turn your back on it and it will practically assemble itself.

Almost as simple as being shown a circumference and be asked to point where the circle is. Only simpler.

And if you really find it hard to assemble, the simple act of looking for instructions in it (even if they don’t exist) will be sufficient to open up and assemble itself.

We affirm it impossible for any adult or teenager not to be able to assemble a travel cot. But miracles do happen and we’re encountering one of unbelievable ignorance: 4 adults cannot assemble something that practically assembles itself.

Yet, Neil and Emma Berry and Raj Balu and Nicole Cox aren’t able to assemble a travel cot.

Assembling one is a straightforward process while in disassembling, as can be seen in video, there’s the trick of first pulling up a handle the middle of the base first. But the Berrys and Balus were struggling with the assembling.

To solve this problem they found a solution that many wouldn’t think of, and that was to send the men out to get external help without, for example, thinking of calling the reception first.

If they did, they would probably hear “Sir, all you have to do is spread the cot and you will see all will snap into place. For disassembling however, we would like to call your attention to the fact that you have first to pull the middle of the base…”

But no, why make something simple when you can complicate it? So they decide to walk all the way to the reception. Berry is even vague about on where to head when he says “I went to find a member of staff”.

He says he finds, without specifying where, a Mark Warner employee, whose name he cannot remember but she was the girlfriend of a maintenance employee called Rob and that she accompanied them back to the apartment [how did Berry know the name of MW employee's boyfriend and his job? Yet he didn't remember her name?].

Balu says they went to Mark Warner’s service desk, which we deduce to be the Ocean Club reception. That seems more reasonable within the absurdity of it all.

But, there and then, the receptionist, instead of explaining verbally, or even using another travel cot that may have been there, decides to abandon her working post and walk all the way to the apartment of these guests to assemble a travel cot.



If another problem meanwhile arose while she was gone, it would have to wait. Assembling self-assembling travel cots is top priority in any hotel business as everyone knows

Odd thing is that no Ocean Club receptionist speaks of going to any apartment to help set up a cot. Neither does the only Mark Warner customer support manager, Emma Knight.


8. Just in case you happen to see us around

Based solely on the statements form Berry and Balu, one has to wonder if such a take away dinner ever took place.

After the analysis done in the blog about the Tapas Reservation sheets and about the Big Round Table, we’re certain it didn’t.

Berry and Balu need alibis to be seen walking around in Luz from 18.00 to 20.30. And they have created 3 occasions:

- walking from Tapas to apartments between 18.00 and 19.00, using to confirm alibi if needed, Jayne Jensen and Annie Wiltshire, we spoke of in our post “60 of us”, the two women who find very suspicious the simple fact that 2 men are standing on the balcony of an apartment of a building different from the one they were staying in [pure bad luck on Berry’s part to be seen in the “hole in the stairs” by Marreiros and having no excuse to be there, proving that faked alibis do go wrong].

- walking from Berry’s apartment to Ocean Club reception and back again to apartment with some female Mark Warner employee, from 19.00 to 20.00 [do note how Ocean Club is perfectly ignored in these statements and only speak Mark Warner – it was if Ocean Club was owned by the tour operator, that only had leisure (tennis and watersports) personnel and nannies present]

- walking to and from Tapas to fetch their take away dinner, from 20.00 to 20.30 [after turning down a reservation obtained by a favour to the restaurant both wanted to go].

These two have it well covered in case they were seen by a truly independent witness or witnesses (Marreiros being an example) as we explained in our “The importance of the inexistent witness” post.

Please note that all discrepancies (with the exception of not seeing the McCanns when they went to pick up dinner) involving Berry and Balu have nothing to do with the T9.
They are defending themselves and no one else. What were they trying to hide?

Pity neither Berry nor Balu see a tall bald man with glasses walking in the Tapas area straight to the tennis courts and after losing little time there, walking out at around 18.00/18.30 that day when both say they are at Tapas.

1. Simple and straightforward

When one speaks of Jeremy Michael Wilkins, or Jez Wilkins, in relation to the Maddie case one thinks that he’s one of the first people to be brought into the case because of the conversation he had with Gerry McCann, around 21.15, when they stopped for a chat after having crossed with each other somewhere in the Rua Dr Francisco Gentil Martins.

What few people realise is that’s not exactly the reason why Jez is one of the first witnesses in the case. In fact, he is registered as the first “independent witness” of this case and for no reason to do with his conversation with Gerry.

As he was a relevant player on the night of May 3, 2007, one would expect his name, or at least the mention of his presence, to appear in the timelines given to the PJ that same night.


However both his name and presence appear in neither.

He could have been brought in by the T9 in their statements May 4, 2007. More specifically by the two who interacted with him, Gerry and Tanner. The latter only by sight.

And both refer to him. But in very vague terms. Gerry, in his first statement speaks of a short conversation and doesn’t mention his name:

"He then went to the WC" where he remained for a few moments, left, and bumped into a person he had played tennis with and who had a child's push chair, he was also British, he had a short conversation with him, "returning after that to the restaurant."

Tanner does mention his name but only as “Jez”:

“She remembers that at about 21.10 Gerald left the restaurant (3) to go to the apartment to check on the children. Five minutes later, the witness left, to go to her apartment to see whether her daughters were OK. At this moment she saw Gerry talking to an Englishman called Jez whom they had got to know during the holidays. They played tennis with him.”

But it is by own doing that Jeremy Wilkins enters the scene on May 4, 2007, also known as day 1:

“Following various informal conversations related to the area of research, we were contacted by a British citizen named Jeremy Michael Wilkins…”

This is what Jez had to say to PJ on that day:

“1 that yesterday, between 20:30 and 21 pm, when he was at the bar "TAPAS" he noticed that an individual with about 1.70, long blond hair, apparently "rasta type", wearing green clothing of military type, entered it.

2 that this individual was there for a short time and had a behavior a little strange, as he seemed to be a little nervous.

3 he was alone, did not speak to anyone and left soon after.”

Because he saw Rastaman on the night before, he’s the first witness outside the T9 who is mentioned in the process.

It is because of Rastaman and not by the hand of any T9 that Jez Wilkins comes into the process.

We are sure that later, the PJ would decipher who Gerry and Tanner meant when they were speaking about him in their statement, but on that Friday, according to the files, it is Jez who puts forward his name to the PJ.

This means that what he has said above is still very fresh in his mind. No one is pressuring him to speak and is very important because the information is fresh in his mind and no one but himself and his conscience is pressuring him to provide it.

Let’s highlight right away what is relevant in Jez’s words when recollecting something less than 24 hours afterwards:

- Jez walks in Tapas area;

- Rastaman walks in alone in the Tapas area stays there a short time and his behaviour is a little strange [something we fail to understand from his words is how he got this impression];

- Rastaman walks out Tapas area without speaking with anyone;

- Jez walks out Tapas area.

A very simple and straightforward sequence. Rastaman walks in and out while Jez is at the Tapas bar. To be able to say he didn’t speak to anyone means that Jez watched him the whole short time this suspicious man was inside the Tapas complex.

Jez makes no mention of using the toilet and no mention of his son in a pushchair.


2. Toilet makes debut

3 days later, May 7, 2007, PJ requested, via fax, that the following question, among others, be answered by Wilkins:

“- On the day of the disappearance, was JEREMY out with his children in the evening?”

Jez answered in own hand-writing:

“We decided to spend the evening in, watching television. Our son was awake and unable to sleep. I decided to take him for a walk in his pram. I left about 8:15 to 8:30 pm. I was pushing the pram around the complex and went to the toilet near the bar. I could not see inside the restaurant. As I got the baby to sleep, I was on my way back to the apartment.”

He doesn’t speak of Rastaman.

Quite strange for someone to overlook mentioning the incident that only 3 days before he had thought sufficiently important to speak about it to the PJ.

The question doesn’t ask anything about going or not to the toilet but that detail he mentions. Rastaman is simply overlooked.

From the Wilkins’ answer to the question we can conclude:

-  That he gives a reason as to why he leaves the apartment that night and it was to take his son out on a pram/pushchair to get him to sleep;

-  Leaves apartment about 20:15/20.30 [no longer 20.30/21.00 stated 3 days before]

- That he walks around the complex and then goes to Tapas bar toilet [his May 4 2007 statement starts and finishes with him at the Tapas bar and no mention of toilet].

- After that, realising the baby is asleep he heads from Tapas bar towards his apartment.

Summing up, leaves apartment, walks around, goes to toilet and heads for apartment.

A note with some significance: “I could not see inside the restaurant” is completely false. When entering the Tapas complex one is forced to look inside the esplanade as it’s open on both ends.


To have used the toilet and not be able to see inside of restaurant is not very credible either. Why does he avoid being asked about who he saw, or didn't see, there?


3. Let’s go walk again?

Jez is heard again on October 31st, 2007, this time together with his wife Bridget O’Donnel:

“They decided to spend the evening in the apartment. Their son was unable to sleep so about 2015hrs, Jeremy took him, in the pushchair for a walk. He walked around the main area of the resort and eventually ended up in the Tapas bar where he used the toilet facility. He was unable to state what time this was. His son was still awake so he walked in the area of the ocean club gardens and walked along the alleyways in that general area. He eventually made his way along Rua Dr Francisco toward the direction of Rua Dr Agostinho. At this time he was walking on the right side of the road passing the Tapas bar area to his left. He noticed the bad street lighting and although it was not completely dark there was enough light to see clearly. As he approached the corner of the McCanns apartment, he saw Gerry appear from the area of the gate. He crossed the road and engaged in general conversation with Gerry.”

Again, no Rastaman. Why speak of the toilet episode if he’s not going to mention man he found suspicious on the 3rd?

But now we have an extra walk between using toilet and heading for apartment:

- Leaves apartment at 20.15 [no longer 20.15/20.30 or the initial 20.30/21.15];

- Walks around main area of resort;

-  Eventually ends up in the Tapas bar [we fail to see how one is able to “end up” inside an enclosed area with a clearly identified entrance – to be inside it one has to have the clear intention of entering it, not ending up in it] and uses toilet;

- Walks in the area of Ocean Club gardens and walks along alleyways there [why forget to mention this on May 7, 2007? Then, we remind readers, he went from Tapas to apartment – but to do that would mean that he would be on the left side of the street, wouldn’t it?];

- Eventually [we’re supposing his son has fallen asleep at this time] makes way along Rua Dr. Francisco Gentil Martins heading North towards Rua Agostinho da Silva

- He walks on the right side of road with Tapas bar area on the left and as he approaches corner of the McCann apartment he crosses the road to the other side:


Jez, on this occasion, says he crosses the entrance of the Tapas area twice.

The first time, when he enters the complex by accident [we don’t know from which direction he approaches the Tapas entrance] ending up there and using the toilet and on the second when he passes it heading from North on the other side of the street.

One other note of significance, at 20:15, the time Jez says he leaves the apartment it’s already dark [sunset on May 3 in Lagos is at 19:24] and not as he says about the visibility around 21:00 that “although it was not completely dark there was enough light to see clearly”.


4. The health problem

But it’s on April 8 2008 that Jez Wilkins provides the most detailed narrative of the whole Rastaman episode:

“As stated in my original deposition, I think that I left the apartment around 20h30. I calculate that I met Gerry on the road somewhere between 20h45 and 21h15. I am aware of the importance of this timeline and am also aware it was disclosed openly by the media that the encounter happened at 21h05. It even may be correct although I have no idea from where this information came from. I was on holidays, unhurried and relaxed and I can’t be more exact in terms of timeline. I can’t find any possibility to give a more exact timeline.

(…)

I left my apartment pushing my son's pram so that he could fall asleep. I did not have any particular direction set nor how long he was going to take. I left the apartment and turned right. Walking down the street, I looked at the block next door where the McCann apartment was and saw a woman dressed in purple. Later I will refer to this woman in relation to questions made about Jane Tanner. At the next crossing, I turned right and went down the hill. As I was walking down the hill I saw a man coming from the street and heading for the reception. I think that he was accompanied by a woman but I cannot be precise about any detail about her. He was a tall man, with blonde hair in a “rasta”. I think in his thirties, used long khaki coloured shorts. The “rasta” was caught up in a bun [translation of: apanhada em “xuxu”] instead of long and straight. When I arrived, I headed to the WC through the pool area. He was also was in the WC and appeared to be making time. I do not remember if he still remained there when I left. I did not see the woman in that area. I had never seen him and I didn’t see him again after that.

After I left the WC I continued to walk downhill, around the back of the tennis courts and returned by the route opposite the pool and Tapas complex. While I was walking through the streets, I would be exploring waiting that my son fell asleep. Some of the routes didn’t have a way out, so, because of it, the walk was practically in circles. While I was walking through the dead end routes I found a tourist named Curtis and his girlfriend, whose name I don’t know. He also knew Gerry from the tennis games. I remember passing them  but assumed they were going out to dinner. Eventually I got out of a street on the other side of the road to the pool complex, between the McCanns’ apartment and the Tapas bar.

To help locate this street, I think it was the street used later by the press and media satellite communication vehicles as shown by the car parked during the covering of the incident.

When I left the street, I remember seeing Gerry on the other side.”

He says he leaves apartment at 20.30.

Walks out of the building and turns right and heads for the crossing between Rua Dr. Agostinho da Silva and Rua Dr Francisco Gentil Martins.

On the way he glances towards block 5 and notices a woman (who we will find out could be Jane Tanner) dressed in purple clothing.

Turns right at Rua Dr Francisco Gentil Martins and walks down hill.

At this point in time he sees a blond man, in his thirties, with a “rasta” caught up on a bun hairstyle and wearing long khaki shorts [no longer green clothing of military type].

He doesn’t remember if the man was or not accompanied by a woman [how is it possible to describe a hairstyle and type of clothing a person is wearing and not to be able to see at the same time if there’s another person there?] which is quite strange as just few minutes before he remembered seeing another woman, and the colour clothing she was wearing, with a mere glance.

We remind readers that Jez was adamant, on May 4, 2007 (the previous and only other time he mentions the suspicious man) that Rastaman was alone.

This time [as against him, Jez, being in the restaurant when Rastaman comes in, as per what stated on May 4, 2007] he follows him after seeing the man enter the Tapas area and follows him inside

He then goes into the WC and Rastaman is already there making time [fiddling his thumbs? whistling a melody? looking blankly at the wall?].

We imagine that the size of the toilet facilities of Tapas are similar to those of other restaurants/esplanades of the same size: small. Usually with space for only one person, two at the most, if they are comfortable with each other. But now we have 2 adults and a pushchair [unless he decided to leave son outside alone while he relieved himself] inside one.

One man, Jez, doing what he had to do, and the other is… making time. The baby in the pushchair just watching.

And can anyone explain how a man notices another making time inside the WC he’s in but then cannot remember if that same man remains in the WC or has already left when he leaves? Well, that is what Jez says he can’t remember.

Another thing he can’t remember is seeing the woman there [we suppose this is after he left toilet not knowing if Rastaman remained there or not]. Do note that he says “the woman” and not “a woman”. So, apparently there was a woman with Rastaman but Jez is unable to see her, only notice her absence!

But, has the reader now noticed his ailment? Jez must have a bladder problem. According to him, he walks directly from his apartment to the Tapas WC!



Couldn’t he have relieved himself at home before he left? Finds out a minute after leaving that he needs to go and doesn’t turn back? Was the toilet of his apartment clogged? If so, did his wife also use the Tapas toilets as backup?

One thing is certain, the man leaves his apartment and heads straight for a toilet [as opposed to walking around and then finding himself at the Tapas bar and only then using the toilet like he stated on May 7, 2007].


5. Let’s ad-lib a bit?

He then leaves the Tapas area, turns right and says that he goes around the back of the tennis courts and returns on the opposite side of complex, up Rua Primeiro de Maio.

By saying this, Jez shows his first sign of ignorance of the terrain of where he's on holiday. In this instance about the surroundings of the Tapas complex. There is no “back of tennis courts” to go back around. Behind the courts are houses:


To go around behind the tennis courts, coming out from the Tapas one has to go by the Baptista Supermarket parking lot and only then access Rua Primeiro de Maio:


From there he says he decides to do some street exploring. Says that he then finds “some of the routes didn’t have a way out, so, because of it, the walk was practically in circles.”


We challenge readers to find all these routes that don’t have a way out and, most important would make him walk in circles. The ignorance shown about the layout of Luz is evident.

Jez is familiar with a pathway that has a dead-end. It’s the one that that passes at the back of the buiding he’s staying at, block 4:


The pathway that passes behind blocks 5 and 4 (and joins up with pathway between the buildings) is, as far as we could tell the only one that doesn’t have an exit on the other side. It seems that Jez has taken what he knows about one specific pathway in Luz and assumes there are many others like it. Only there aren't.

But let's go back to to where we left Jez pushing his son's pushchair up Rua Primeiro de Maio, on the opposite side of the Tapas complex (A). Here he decides to do some exploring. Where we don’t know. He doesn’t say he passes again in front of his apartment.



He then says he makes his way back to his apartment to Rua Dr Francisco Gentil Martins via a road on the other side of the complex that’s between Tapas and the McCann apartment. We suppose that he came from point (B).

How he went from (A) to (B) we don’t know except that it was to walk in circles.

Note that when he enters Rua Dr. Francisco Martins coming from point B, he isn’t exactly walking up that street with the Tapas complex on his left as he says he was in his statement of October 31, 2007.


6. The sighting of Tanner

When he makes that right turn, the crossing with Gerry happens.

We will not discuss where the encounter happened and only mention that the topics mentioned have been talked about by Gerry and Jez, don’t merit a man stopping, knowing that his meal, which he interrupted, is getting cold very quickly on an outdoor table on a chilly night.

Instead of a simple nod of the head or wave of the hand in acknowledgment of each other’s presence, these two, one certainly very tired of walking around in circles and anxious to return to the coziness of his apartment and the other with a hot meal waiting for him and going cold, decide to engage in small, pointless talk. Nothing important or even interesting.

Yet both say they crossed the street to the other side to engage in this particular conversation with the other.

During the conversation Jez does one odd thing. He turns the pushchair in a downhill direction. Why? If he’s heading up the street shouldn’t the pushchair be facing that direction?

One could say that he was preparing to use the pathway to his apartment, the one that goes behind block 5. But no, when the conversation ends, he turns pushchair around and continues to walk up the street to head for apartment.

We won’t discuss the fact that he doesn’t see Tanner passing by him and Gerry. But what he has to say about Tanner is quite interesting.

When he leaves his apartment, he says he looks over at block 5 and sees a woman dressed in purple. He doesn’t say it’s Tanner only that he thinks it is her.

At 20.30 in early May, is not dusk. It’s night. It’s dark. The Sun has set that day at 19.24. Little over an hour before.


The view of blocks 4 and 5 is blocked, to anyone walking along the street, by small trees all the way to the crossing.

The only exception is at the entrance to block 5’s parking lot.

Jez says that he sees her in the “street” in front of the apartments. We’re supposing he’s referring to the pathway in front of apartments that happen to be below ground and have a wall which further blocks the view to anyone on the street:


As the only two apartments, out of the 4 where the T9 were staying, are visible from entrance of parking lot, 5A (McCanns) and 5B (Oldfields), Jez is placing Jane at an odd location at an odd time.

(image from here)

Especially taking into account that only a minute later, he’s unable to remember (much less recollect what she may have been wearing) if he saw, or not, a woman in a wide open road (Rastaman’s possible female companion).


7. The elimination of Rastaman

A mistake many make is to think that Rastaman has been officially eliminated as suspect because PJ determined he was a guest Michael Sperrey, who had a reservation for 2 that night at the Tapas bar for 21:00.

This idea is based on these words from the PJ File written by PJ inspector Duarte Ferro:

“In the Ocean Club’s main reception (open 24h), the undersigned was able to observe an individual, with curly long hair, blonde colour, with camouflage shorts and a green sweat-shirt, who fits in the description of the “Rasta” suspect, being asked about the man, the receptionist immediately said that the individual and his wife are guests in that hotel unit and have been tireless, as of yesterday, in the searches for the disappeared. Copies of their passports as well as the registry of the of the hotel unit are annexed”

The passports of Michael James and Clare Sperrey were annexed, making it clear that inspector Ferro is indeed speaking about him.

Does this confirm Michael Sperrey is Rastaman?

No, it doesn’t.


The picture in the passport was 3,5 yrs old. It shows a man without dreadlocks. However the time in between seems to us would be enough for the man to grow a rastafarian hairstyle if he so wished to do so.


But the rastafarian hairstyle has such a visual impact that it cannot be mistaken with any other.


Dreadlocks cannot be confused with long curly long hair.


And a “rasta” tied up in a bun, makes one big bun indeed.

If inspector Ferro had seen a man with “rastas” he would have used the term rastas. Or possibly “tranças” (braids) but never long curly hair as he does.

But let’s suppose for a minute that Sperrey had a “rastafarian hairstyle and inpsector Ferro was unfortunate in the choice of words.

Since when is a man confirmed to be a person described by another simply by fitting the description? Is Sperrey the only one who would fit that description, or are there many others who would too? Of course there would.

But the thing that makes it a reality that Rastaman hasn’t been ruled to be Sperrey is because the person who says he sees Rastaman, Jez Wilkins, is not ever confronted with the man, personally or by picture to confirm or deny that he was or was not the man he claims he saw.

Only Jez Wilkins could do that. Only Jez Wilkins can prove or disprove Sperrey to be the Rastaman he saw. No one else but him. And he doesn’t.

And the excuse that Jez could have already returned home falls to the ground as the inspector is clear in saying that Sperrey had been “tireless since yesterday”, meaning that this external diligence took place either on the 4th or 5th, when Wilkins was still in Luz.

To say that Michael Sperrey didn’t have dinner at Tapas because Jez Wilkins says that Rastaman has walked in and out of Tapas is incorrect.

Michael Sperry didn’t have dinner at Tapas because there were no Tapas dinners. No other reason.


8. Murat and Rastaman

It is very curious the way Jez Wilkins gets to know that his suspect has been [not] ruled out by the authorities. He’s informed by a surprising source: Robert Murat!

“On Friday, May 4, or Saturday May 5 2007 [as is becoming usual in this case, again that famous “selective memory” afflicting so many, in this case he doesn't remember if it was on the day he talked to the police or if it was the day after, the day he left Luz] , in one of the police cordons, I saw Robert Murat again. He told me that they had investigated the man with a “rasta” lead but it was a local man and all was okay.”

We believe that anyone outsourced to help a criminal investigation has to sign some sort of confidentiality agreement.

But even if it’s not true, there’s the secrecy of justice.

Robert Murat clearly commits a crime when he informs Jez Wilkins that the “rasta” lead has been eliminated. That's information belonging to the inside of the investigation and not to be shared with witnesses.

Committing a crime and giving the wrong information to boot: Rastaman is a local man, according to Murat and Michael Sperrey is hardly a local man, is he?

Rastaman was eliminated by PJ simply because it didn’t give this suspect any importance.

Rastaman doesn’t even make an appearance in the Final Report.

In our opinion, PJ literally discards Rastaman because more suspicious suspects started to appear. We’re referring to Tanner’s Bundleman [who doesn’t have “rastas” or green military clothes] and Robert Murat when he’s thrown to the lions by the T9.

With these “probable suspects” (later the list is augmented with another suspect, Smithman) and as none of the Tapas staff speak of a blond man with “rastas” alone at Tapas that night (who would look terribly suspicious), we suppose PJ took Jez’s Rastaman as a confused statement by someone that was only too willing to help.

However, after reading his statements of April 8, 2008, it simply isn’t possible for a man to confuse seeing another man, with “rastas” in the same WC when he is with his son in a pushchair.

So, according to Jez that is, Rastaman exists.

And , like Pimpleman he's out there.


Could Joaquim Marques have been pointed out by Kelsie Harris simply because he has dreadlocks? He’s not blond though. So he can't be Jez's Rastaman.

But what we would like to highlight to readers is how Jez Wilkins and Robert Murat meet:

“Bridget and I returned to the apartment and minutes later a police officer in uniform appeared, accompanied by an English man who was performing the translating duties. Later I came to know that this man was Robert Murat. I don’t remember that he gave me information about himself [translation of “seus dados”] but recently when I cleaning a bag I found a card with his name and phone number. I believe that he gave us the card so that we could contact him, in case we had we had some adjacent information.”

First, let's highlight the fact that police were knocking on doors an asking questions. Knocking on doors with a translator beside. This to say that most probably they also knocked on Mrs Fenn's door and for some unknown reason she didn't say then what she would later, in August 2007.

In this passage Jez says that Murat gives him one of his business card [of course, unsurprisingly, Jez doesn’t remember when that happened]. To be contacted in case Jez remembered anything else.

Murat is a translator working alongside a PJ Inspector and supposedly if a witness remembered anything further instead of contacting authorities he was to contact the translator.

Fascinating to say the least. And did inspector Ferro endorse this? Or was the card given behind his back?

Murat was apparently walking around with business cards, distributing them to witnesses.

However, with the exception of Jez, we haven’t heard of any other witness who got one.

But what should be noticed is where said card was retrieved by Jez, when he, much later, was cleaning a bag.

Funny place for a card to be as one has the tendency to put these things in a wallet, purse or in one’s pockets and is left there forgotten.

The fact that it was in the bag and only found much later means that Jez decided the card was to be one of the first, if not the first thing to pack on his way back home.

Why, we don’t know and it proved not to have been a good idea. If he didn’t clean that bag he wouldn’t have found it and that would be a waste of card wouldn’t it?

Another possibility is for that card to have been given to him prior events. Maybe even prior coming to Luz. You know, a card of someone to be contacted in case things there were problems to solve during the stay.


9. Honey, have you seen the baby’s leash?

All we have written above takes some reading of the files.

People conclude that the fact that Tanner is not seen by either Gerry or Jez means that Tanner is lying.

Also, when Gerry says the conversation took place on the side of the street opposite apartment they conclude Gerry is lying.

Why? Because Jez is a guest and guests don’t lie. Not in Maddie’s case.

However, we have already proven last week that Neil Berry and Raj Balu are not exactly truth-friendly.

Now we have Jez Wilkins. Red flags should have fired up because of something he says he does right off the bat: he says he takes a walk outside to see if he get his son to sleep.

That alone is, in our opinion, an evident lie.

You see, Jez’s son was only 8 months old and the temperature outside was 11º/12º C (52º/54º F). Pretty, pretty chilly. Chilly enough for Tanner to have borrowed a fleece.

So who would take an 8 month old baby outside on a chilly night on a pushchair instead of walking back and forth inside the apartment? No one.

We have heard of people driving around to get their young ones to sleep.

One does not walk a baby at night. One walks a dog.

He says that he leaves the house at 20.30. Says meeting with Gerry could have taken place between 20.45 and 21.15.

If at 20.45, it means that Jez and his son walked to Tapas, daddy used the toilet, got out, walked all the way to the Baptista supermarket parking lot and then up Rua Primeiro de Maio, from there exploring dead-ends and walking in circles until meeting Gerry, all under 15 minutes. Impressive is all one can say if that was the case.

If at 21.15, it means that an 8 month old baby was subject to chilly temperatures for around 45 minutes.

To be clear about who we think lied during this episode:

- Tanner lies when she says she passes by Jez and Gerry. And when she says she sees the pushchair. We think she’s truthful when she says she sees them together because we believe she watched this encounter from inside apartment 5A like we showed in our post “"Tanner's Abductor", A Tale Told by a Special Friend” (Oct 30, 2010) and Bundleman is no more than Gerry carrying Maddie's body after Jez has left the scene like we showed in our post “The Way I See What Tanner Saw” (Nov 01, 2010);

- Gerry lies when he opens his mouth (and that includes saying he sees the pushchair) with the exception of when he says he meets Jez that night around 21-15.

- Jez, lies about the Rastaman episode but, more importantly, lies about pushing a pushchair.

Neil Berry and Raj Balu came up with a take-away and an epic assembling of a travel cot to have alibis in case they were seen walking around.

Jez Wilkins invents a pushchair and a sleepless 8 month old baby.

Neil Berry is seen by Marreiros, the laundryman. Jez Wilkins is seen by Gerry alone walking up Rua Dr. Francisco Martins. He has to have a reason for being there at that hour alone.

Some of the detractors of the swinging theory ask the question: why would people lie for a group of people they didn't know from anywhere?

Now they have another question they now must ask: why would 2 members of a group of people lie for a person, Jez Wilkins, who one of them, Gerry, had only met that week?




Post Scriptum (Feb 07, 2015 13:30) 


a. Mission unaccomplished

We have said in the post that Jez does a very strange thing while talking to Gerry: he turns pushchair downhill when he’s headed uphill.

“I don’t know if we were face to face or side by side when this conversation happened. As I had the pushchair with me and was rocking it for my son to sleep, it makes sense that I was positioned downhill, but it’s possible that I may have turned around.”

He’s rocking the pushchair.

That can only be for one of 2 reasons, either the baby was asleep and he was afraid that he would wake up or the baby hadn’t yet fallen asleep.

In the first instance, being afraid of waking up baby, why then engage in conversation? If the baby was such a light sleeper then the natural reaction would be to shush anyone disturbing and certainly not cross the street to find said disturbance.

As any mother knows, once an 8 month old baby falls asleep there’s only one thing that wakes him up, hunger. Otherwise he could be on the stage of an AC/DC concert and will continue sleeping.

No, the baby hadn’t fallen asleep yet.

After all that walking in the cold, into toilets and dead-ends and around in circles, Jez at a certain point in time just gives up and decides to return home with a woken-up son.

Such an effort for nothing.

That makes us curious, what did Jez and his wife do to get their son to finally fall asleep? 


b. Withholding witnesses

We have wonderful readers. That’s a fact. The feedback we receive tells us that many re-visit us because of the comments we receive.

We cannot thank everyone personally. As we’re writing these words, we have published approximately 17,000 (16,891 to be more exact) comments.

Impossible to thank all but we feel the utmost gratitude for all the kind, insightful and critical comments we have received.

Some comments have the virtue of triggering analysis of facts that we overlooked or that otherwise we wouldn’t have seen.

On this post we have received 2 such comments:

“Anonymous 6 Feb 2015, 15:38:00

"After having gone to sleep on the 3rd of May, we were woken around 01H30 by the manager of the resort, John Hill and by a friend of Gerry's. It was them who told me what had happened. I did not see or hear anything else than what has been stated in this statement. I did not take part in any searches. I offered my help but it was not necessary."

His help wasn't necessary? Was another searcher superfluous? John Hill say 60 people were searching and went on searching until the early hours. So why tell Jez his help wasn't needed?”

and

“Lesly Finn 6 Feb 2015, 23:07:00

“Great post, Textusa. Covered so much of what has puzzled me about Mr Wilkins accounts which, like Topsy, .... just growed.

I particularly find it hard to understand the reason why JH and MO would wake him up at 1.am ..... I mean, were they knocking on every apartment door in the complex waking people up (and likely to wake up any small children inside in the process)? How would they know that apartment occupants were not out searching already? And having woken Mr Wilkins up why tell him that there was nothing he could do to help when he offered, when half of PDL were out searching? I mean, Hello?

Perhaps MO was on a mission to 'warn' certain other people that they would be expected to rally round to save the ship.

With that in mind it is indeed very odd/interesting that JW does not appear on the 'book cover timelines'. But of course these were written prior to the 1 am visit to his apartment, weren't they?

There is certainly plenty to ponder about Mr JW's contributions to the case.!”

Lesly asks all the right questions.

It’s unexplainable for a “civilian” search party to go knocking on the door of an apartment in a building, block 4, at 0I.00 which wasn’t the one from where Maddie had disappeared, which was block 5.

Unless there’s a reason.

We agree with Lesly that the real reason was a rallying round for what would be a sleepless night scheming, allocating tasks needed to prepare staff as well as those required to keep police and public 100% committed to the searching.

To salvage the ship after Kate had disastrously sounded the alarm too early and get the basic storyline as coherent as possible.

But a reason is given by Jez, on May 7, 2007, which only adds to the pile of feet in his mouth:

“The doorbell woke us up at about 1 am. It was the resort manager who I learnt to be John and one of Jerry's friends. I think his name was Matt. He is white, slim, and tall with greying hair. From previous conversations I learnt him to be a diabetics specialist. We met him o the way to the destination. Matt said XXXXX to the effect that Jerry's daughter had been abducted, and that Jerry said that he had met me and wanted to know if I had seen anything. I said 'You're joking'. I offered help but they said there was nothing that could be done at that stage. We remained at the apartment but could see people around the pool and at the front with torches. I also saw the police arriving. We then went to bed."

We know from Tanner that she was reluctant to tell parents about seeing Bundleman but it is a fact that she spoke about it on the night of the 3rd. The Bundleman sighting appears in both timelines and could have only come from her:


But as noted, Jez’s name doesn’t appear in either. Jez’s name is only mentioned vaguely by Tanner to the PJ the next day.

However, according to Jez, Jez has been a topic of conversation on the night of the 3rd: “Jerry said that he had met me and wanted to know if I had seen anything”.

For Gerry to have him asked if he saw anything because they had met that night, means that Jez was indeed then an integral variable in the formula of Tanner’s sighting.

The question that has to be asked, is why wasn’t the police informed of this?

A little girl has just disappeared and in those crucial first hours there’s a potential witness on the block next door who might have seen Bundleman who could contribute significantly to a better description of the man and possible other circumstances that may have escaped Tanner.

And yet police are not informed about this potentially crucial witness. How do we know that? Because it would have been the police and not a “civilian” search party of 2 knocking on Jez’s door.

A “civilian” search party made up, certainly by coincidence, by the Ocean Club’s manager and one of the T9.

At this point in time no one knows if Jez has or hasn’t valuable crucial information but as he was supposedly present when Tanner sees man walking with little girl in arms, he would have to be found quickly, by the police, and questioned if he had seen anything.

Why was this information not passed by Gerry to the police that night? Didn’t he want his daughter to be found?

Even to all those who believe in the abduction theory, it’s clear that Gerry’s incomprehensible attitude of not informing that night the police about his conversation with Jez, seriously hindered the search for Maddie.

We think, because of this, that Kate, Maddie and the twins should sue the pants off Gerry for damages.

The 52yr (in 2007) Stephen Carpenter, or Steve as he prefers to be called, is a very fascinating man.

He’s the man who affirms he introduced Robert Murat to the case.

It was because of him, he says, that Murat was introduced as a translator to the case. How Murat must now regret ever having met, supposedly that is, Carpenter on that fateful morning of May 4, 2007 in that cul-de-sac.

Carpenter is the man who speaks of a mysterious man with grey hair who disappears mysteriously in the morning. Could it have been a vampire?

Carpenter is also the man who has a fascinating relationship with Ocean Club's laundry.

Before we get to what Carpenter had to say on April 21, 2008, just a note.

Carpenter was in 2007 a maintenance technician. Unless he did maintenance of sophisticated medical equipment, he doesn’t seem to fall under the medical profession.

As readers know, some think that the Pandora’s Box of the Maddie mystery was some sort of secret medical convention that supposedly took place in Praia da Luz that week. We cannot see where a maintenance technician fits into such a scenario but if there’s one thing this case has convinced us is that pigs do fly so we’ll maintain an open mind on the subject.

Carpenter’s rogatory, on April 21, 2008, is quite an interesting document to observe because it is, literally, 2 statements in 1.

Carpenter’s statement given to the British police on May 17, 2007, doesn’t appear in files. But DC Ferguson of Leicestershire Police, does us the favour of reading it out loud when questioning Carpenter on April 21 the following year.

The document available in the files, the rogatory interview of 2008 is basically the revision of what Carpenter said in 2007.

For example, when DC Ferguson says “Neil and Raj, two MW tourists that I saw in the Tapas Bar who were looking for Madeleine with me, doesn't make much sense, I think it was perhaps explaining who they are and where I met them” and“I will now describe the resort and to help me with this description I will base myself upon an aerial photograph from the Sun Newspaper dated the 16th May” is not the Leicestershire police officer speaking of Berry and Balu nor describing the resort but simply voicing Carpenter’s words said back in 2007.

From DC Ferguson’s voice we get to know what Carpenter said on May 17, 2007 and from what Carpenter himself said we get to know that he wants to further clarify what he said plus what he would like to add to what he then said.

This means, as DC Ferguson so rightfully says, that “Good. Right, this statement was taken by a UK police officer on the 17th May and so the facts should be quite fresh in your memory.”

This was just 3 days after Robert Murat was named arguido in the process.


2. The really-very-close-by neighbour

Stephen Carpenter is staying at apartment FP02. FP stands for Fiji Palms. We have seen it also called Fugi palms. Its the building just South Casa Liliana, the Murat's property:


Carpenter is very keen on telling us how near he is to Murat's property:

“…now knowing where Murat was in relation to us, because I don't know whether they showed you the proximity between us” and “here was the club where Gerry was, behind Murat's garden and here we were probably the people closest to Murat” and “...only thing is thinking about our proximity to Murat's property.”

He also tells us what path he used on the night of May 3 to go from the Tapas bar, where he says he had his dinner, to his apartment:


“Between approximately a quarter past nine and half past nine we left the Tapas bar to go home, we walked across the MW reception area, crossed the road and a semi circular path to return to the apartment, were we put the children to bed and a short while later did the same ourselves.”

Murat and Carpenter couldn't be closer neighbours.


3. Carpenter walks into the case

Knowing where exactly Carpenter and his family were lodged will allow us to better understand his movements on the morning after Maddie disappeared, May 4, 2007.

Please be reminded that DC Ferguson is reading from Carpenter’s statement on May 17, 2007.

This is how Carpenter becomes aware of what had happened to Maddie, the night before:

On hearing this news and assuming it was about the McCanns, Carpenter leaves the apartment:

Do note that the Tapas reception, has now become the MW reception. There’s no sign that refers it as such but that’s what Carpenter calls it:

From where did Carpenter get the idea that Gerry’s friends surfed? It seems clear from Carpenters words that only the McCanns were to be seen around the tennis courts. The others who appeared to join them at dinner, he assumes they were… surfing.

We wonder which of the 2 out of 3 friends of Gerry these 2 “surfing friends” were. Or better, which one wasn’t, David, Russ or Matt?

We bet that it was David who wasn’t. He’s required to be next to the McCanns when Yvonne Martin arrives so it cannot be him.


4. Let's get lost and stuck in a language barrier

Then the three, Carpenter, Russ and Matt “walked towards the supermarket and we ended up stopping at the reception opened 24 hours ”:

Why do they go towards the Supermarket? Carpenter doesn’t mention the reason why and we find that strange. Did they just decide to walk down the road? We think it would be perfectly natural to have said they were going there to get something to eat or drink. Why otherwise go down the street, if not to go to the supermarket?

But what doesn’t make any sense is saying “walked towards the supermarket and ended up stopping at the reception opened 24 hours”. It’s like saying “I was heading towards Big Ben and ended up in Liverpool.”

No one goes from the Tapas reception towards a supermarket 100m (109yds) down the road and ends up walking an extra 175m (290yds) without realising it and ends up in a completely different road altogether. The conversation must have been really interesting.

It's fascinating how easily people “get lost”, “walk in circles and “end up” in Praia da Luz. It must be have been very poorly conceived urbanly.

Why not just say, “we went to the main reception, passing by the Baptista supermarket”? Why the need to arrive at the 24h reception by surprise?

So they “ended up stopping” at the main reception.

What happens there? Did they go and ask someone for an update of the situation? If the reception knew anything new about Maddie?

No, one of them decides to make a phone call: “where one of the men tried to talk to one of the Portuguese employees in the attempt to make a phone call, but the communication became complicated because the employee didn’t speak English and the man didn’t speak Portuguese”.

This, on first glance, appears to be the most ridiculous sentence written in the PJ Files. Not one of the most ridiculous but the most ridiculous one.

In the  Ocean Club 24h Reception, in the Algarve, Portugal’s most tourist oriented region of the country, in a hotel facility with approximately 100% English-speaking clients, a receptionist doesn’t speak English?!!

Please note it was “one of the Portuguese employees” which means there were other around who were just as helpless linguistically!

We would be more likely to buy a story from someone claiming they were kite-surfing in the middle of the Pacific and were suddenly blinded by a sand storm before buying this one.

This one is just too ridiculous.

Only it isn’t.

Yes, it’s over-egging an already over-egged pudding but it’s not ridiculous.

First, who makes the phone call and to whom? Or why the need for the call?  Carpenter doesn't explain and neither Matt nor Russ speak of this trip, by accident, down to the main reception and then wanting to make a phone call and not being able to because of linguistic problems with the Portuguese employees of the resort.

That’s what Carpenter clearly states.

Carpenter’s intent, dear reader, is to plant the seed that no one around among the locals, spoke English. Not even the resort’s receptionists. They were no good to help. They didn't serve as translators as even they couldn't understand the simple request to make a phone call. To convey the idea that all was happening in a foreign land to a group of British people who found themselves among locals who only spoke their native language so it was up to the Brits to urgently fill that communication gap somehow. The Portuguese working at the resort simply didn't serve the purpose.

A story not that ridiculous as it first appears to be. Not ridiculous at all.


5. People, let's take our places on stage, please!

The group of three, Steve, Russ and Matt, who “had ended up stopping” in the Ocean Club’s main reception, and on failing to be able to make a phone call, decide to go back to the Tapas reception or as Carpenter calls it, the MW reception.

Maybe to make the phone call from there?

No, they just to return there, apparently: “we returned to the MW reception where I asked whether there was anything I could do to help so that they would let me know…”:

So where did the need to make the phone call go?

Carpenter doesn’t say which route they take to return but we’re supposing they’re intelligent enough to go the shortest route possible.

Why the reason for this Tapas reception – 24h reception – Tapas reception trip, we’re not told. We're only told that in the middle of it one of them remembered to make a phone call, can't and doesn't attempt to make it afterwards.

Were they going between receptions thinking the abductor, on seeing Maddie in broad daylight and feeling disappointed changed his mind about the “product” he had with him, would return the little girl to the main reception or drop her off at the Tapas reception?

What were Matt and Russ doing in the first place waiting at the entrance of the Tapas complex when Carpenter first arrives?

Wouldn’t it be better for them to be waiting sitting down inside the Tapas area for whatever, or whoever, they were waiting for?

Apparently, on the return trip both Russ and Matt agreed to let him know if there was anything he could do, so Carpenter “returned to my apartment by the same route as the previous night. Upon nearing my apartment…”:

So as can be seen, from the moment he heard the news on GMTV, Carpenter had one busy morning that day:

He does that morning what we call a “4-phase-walk”:

1. Alone, from apartment to Tapas reception;

2. With Russ and Matt (we suppose) from Tapas reception to 24h reception;

3. With Russ and Matt (we suppose) from 24h reception to Tapas reception;

4. Alone from Tapas reception to “nearing my apartment”

An absolutely pointless walk Tapas reception – 24h reception – Tapas reception trip. Started for no reason, didn't reach any objective and just ending where it started.

It does beg the question, if there was nothing to be done, why did Carpenter return to the Tapas reception when the group left the 24h Reception? Wouldn't make more sense for him to go from there to his apartment directly without making a long round trip?


Why? Because it gives a reason for Carpenter to approach his apartment by a route that passes nearby Murat's property. And, by sheer coincidence, just as he's doing that he hears a voice. “A male voice coming from the garden next to my apartment”

Not just any voice but that of a soon to be translator.


6. Conflicting stage props

Let’s see where exactly Carpenter says he is when he hears this voice:

 “…and returned to my apartment by the same route as the previous night. Upon nearing my apartment I heard a male voice coming from the garden next to my apartment. This would be the voice of Murat, correct?”

He is nearing his apartment when he’s walking in the semi-circular pathway nearing his apartment. Let's put him right at the nearest point he can be to Murat's property:

The orange star shows where Carpenter says he is when he says hears Murat’s voice.

Carpenter is in our opinion painting a picture.

He has up to now shown that he was staying so close to Robert Murat that if had then known he would have paid more attention to his neighbour and would now be able to make transcripts of every conversation the man had on the phone when in his the garden. That's how close Carpenter wants us to think he was to Murat without realising it.

He has shown that his commitment to the case from him having had a “buddy-morning” with 2 of the T9, Russ and Matt.

He has shown there’s a serious communication gap between the locals, which include the authorities and Ocean Club employees, and the many English speakers there, which includes not only the T9 but other guests who could prove to be crucial witnesses.

He has now placed himself to be able to accidentally meet Murat.

That moment in time when he’s nearing his apartment and hears “a male voice coming from the garden next to my apartment”

But Carpenter is not in his apartment. He's across a cul-de-sac and some trees and bushes from the South-West corner of Murat's property.

Shall we say IF Murat was perched up on the South-West corner of his property there would be about 15 metres (50 ft) between the two with no apparent line of sight between them due to the vegetation on both sides.

But what is the likelihood of Murat even being in that corner?

As we'll find out, the question Murat wants so desperately to ask is “what is happening, or what is going on?", so why not just open the front gate and try and find out himself?

Wasn't that exactly what Carpenter had done that morning? Didn't Carpenter simply exit his apartment and set about finding out what was going on instead of going to the balcony of his apartment and calling out?

So why would Murat go to a corner of the property filled with vegetation and wait there to see if he could see someone to call out and pop the question?

Note the further in Murat may be inside his property, the further away he will be from Carpenter so even the likely to have been able to be aware of Carpenter's presence when he passes on his way to his apartment.

Looking at the pictures taken from inside Murat's property, we don’t see Robert Murat being anywhere near the South-East corner of his property.

Carpenter seems to agree with us: “Yes. This garden is situated at the other side of the passage way from my apartment block and is enclosed by net fence of about 1.80 m in height, the garden is thick and it was not possible to see inside …”

Let's overlook that and see, when exactly Carpenter says he makes contact with Murat?

So now, he’s no longer nearing his apartment but is actually on the cul-de-sac making the best efforts to look inside Murat’s garden. He has gone and made a cross-country short-cut between the bushes and trees that are between the cul-de-sac and the pathway he was on.

But what is important to realise is that this clearly shows that Murat calls him not once but twice.

Once when Carpenter nears his apartment (otherwise he would have entered it and joined his family) and the second time when Carpenter is trying to look inside the garden.

So the scenario described by Carpenter is one that shows some despair on Murat’s part. Why would Robert be calling over a netted fence of 1,80m in height (6ft), thick with vegetation to a man he probably cannot see?

Only an urgent reason would make 2 complete strangers walk on each side of a high netted fence looking for a gap through which they could talk to each other. It sounds more like the story of someone inside a prison trying to communicate with a friend outside.

But so many strange things have happened and before we get hit by a stray pig from the sky let’s assume Robert Murat was really desperate and was jumping up and down at the South-West corner of his property shouting “what is happening, or what is going on?” to whoever could hear him.

Carpenter, the good Samaritan of this story, hears his cries 15yds away, with bushes and trees in between, not to speak of a building. He cross-countries through bushes and trees, to get to the cul-de-sac and desperately looks to find a gap in the fence through which he may communicate with the man inside on the other side, who he doesn't know, and when they're finally able to communicate he hears the question made in despair, “what is happening, or what is going on?".

The suspense certainly calls for a stunned silence on Carpenter’s part. But he quickly reels back and is able to reply “that a three year old girl had disappeared”.

And what does the distressed person reply? Wait for it… wait for it… “I am going to come round to talk to you"

What?!?

Why didn’t he do just that in the first place?

Why didn’t he open his front gate and simply looked down the road and see the strange activity that was going on about 100m from the front of his house?

And if there was nothing to be seen because all was quiet, then wouldn’t the Baptista supermarket be the natural place to head towards to try to find out what was going on?

It seems that Murat is not that much of a nosy character after all. He prefers, according to Carpenter, to hole himself up in his property and from there call out to whoever can hear him. It makes perfect sense. Not.

But as we don’t want to be bombarded with pigs coming down on us we’re really, really, really going bend over backwards and pretend whatever Carpenter has said did indeed happen: Murat for some reason was desperate and calls out into the cul-de-sac, Carpenter comes to his rescue, they're able to see each other on separate sides of a netted fence somewhere along the cul-de-sac, Murat asks, Carpenter replies and Murat gets a “I am going to come round to talk to you”.

Murat comes around and there you have it: a chance encounter between a guest and an ex-pat.

The problem with Carpenter’s tale is not exactly it's total lack of credibility.

That would be serious enough but Carpenter's biggest problem is that he's proven wrong. By whom? By no other than Robert Murat, the man he's supposed to have encountered by mere chance. Or better said, by what Murat has said on May 14, 2007:

“On Friday, 04/05, woke around 09:00, took a bath, went to the kitchen to his mother, the latter told him that something terrible had happened, because a child had disappeared in Praia da Luz, according to 'Sky News' that she had been watching. At once the respondent and his Mother went to look in the garden, walled with a fence of 1m in height [looking at the pictures we tend to go more with Carpenters 1,80 netted fence with vegetation], checking if the child had managed to enter, which in a way was almost impossible without aid [even he recognises at once how ridiculous it is to have searched garden, at least with that urgency]. In one corner of the garden is a greenhouse, which was searched, and then they saw an English passer-by on the outside, he does not know the identity. When asked about this, he was told that the child had disappeared.”

So it’s when Robert and Jenny Murat had just finished searching the greenhouse on the corner that Murat first makes contact with Carpenter.

First, let’s see where said greenhouse is:

The greenhouse is on the North-East corner of the property, the furthest away from where Carpenter says he was when he says he first hears someone call from that property [note Murat makes no reference to this calling].

This means that around 70m (230 ft) separate Carpenter from Murat when the former says he hears someone calling from that property. A house and lots of vegetation in-between.

A call Murat makes no mention of making.

Without this call, there’s absolutely no reason for Carpenter to be in that cul-de-sac as he was heading towards his apartment and would have no reason to not go inside.

Also note that Murat is very clear when he says “and then they saw an English passer-by on the outside”, the “they” being him and Jenny Murat.

Carpenter makes no reference to Robert’s mother whatsoever.

And Murat Robert doesn’t mention saying “I am going to come round to talk to you”

To add to Carpenter’s “crash-and-burn” on how he and Murat meet, Robert corrects himself about this particular episode in his statement of July 10, 2007:

So he no longer gets up at 09:00. Half an hour before, at 08:27 he makes a phone call. One that on May 14, 2007 he doesn’t remember making and even when correcting himself he only admits he may have made it because it is registered. So it's not exactly a passionate call made on waking up. He's already awake.

So around 08:27 Robert is most likely heading for breakfast when a little after his mother tells him about the tragic events. “At once the respondent and his Mother went to look in the garden” which wouldn’t take more than 10 minutes and when they are coming out of the greenhouse, they see Carpenter.

We’re talking about 08:40/08:50.

This begs the question, at what time did Carpenter wake up?

Note that up to this point in time, Carpenter makes no reference about breakfast. Did he leave for the Tapas reception after he and his family had breakfast? If so, where? At home or at the Mill? Or are the Carpenters also one of those families who have breakfast in their apartment, paying for the food while they have it already included in the price at the resort’s restaurant?

Carpenter makes no mention of breakfast. Neither for him or his family. We simply don’t know if he left for the Tapas reception after he and his family had breakfast.

One could say that the Carpenters stuck to their usual routine, which would be the family going to the Mill for breakfast, returning and only then switch on GMTV and hear the news about Maddie.

For him to be in the cul-de-sac at 08:40/08:50 means he has to have woken up, washed and got dressed [taken or not his breakfast at the Mill, and if he did please allow time for that], watched GMTV and only then started his “4-phase-walk” - from apartment to the Tapas reception , wasting some time there engaging in some sort of conversation, walk leisurely towards the Baptista supermarket and end up stopping at the 24hour reception [which is only more than double the distance to the supermarket and on a completely different street], watch the frustrated attempt of one of the T9 men, Russ or Matt, failing to make a simple phone call, decide to return together to the Tapas reception and again waste some time engaging in small talk about where he could be found if they needed something from him and then walk back, with no need to hurry, to his apartment.

The story about the Ocean Club receptionist not being able to speak English is becoming more credible in comparison with the Carpenter-Murat chance get-together.

But the most important part of what has been said above, is that even with all the ridiculousness, it's that the statements from Murat and Carpenter match!

Their statements tally up on the essential.

First, Murat agrees with Carpenter that they met with the former inside the property and the latter in the cul-de-sac.

They both agree that it’s Murat who asks Carpenter something and in reply gets “told that the child had disappeared”.

They both agree that it is Carpenter who introduces Murat to Gerry to help out with the translation.

Carpenter says:

Murat says:

Both agree that if it wasn’t for Carpenter, Murat apparently would have not become a translator in the case. By the hand of Carpenter, and we would even say pressure, Murat is introduced to Gerry.

Carpenter is very adamant on this point.

According to Carpenter, Murat was not a volunteer but was convinced by him to go and be introduced to Gerry to help translating.

Do note the arrogance of Carpenter’s statement.

It’s as if the Portuguese authorities don’t exist. It’s Gerry who, according to Carpenter, runs the show. Gerry has, apparently the power to decide on who or not becomes a translator. This is quite telling about the spirit with which the British, namely the guests, looked at the problem before them.

One way was to look as if the Ocean Club practically didn’t exist, they were just local people. It was Mark Warner, a mere tourist operator, who ran the resort.

The other way was to look at it as an exclusively British problem to be solved only by the British. The local authorities? Their job was simply to do what they were told.

To those justifying Murat’s enthusiastic participation in the case to his over-eager nature to volunteer must recognise that he put his over-eagerness in his pocket when the moment came to… volunteer.

The statements made by both him and Carpenter make it clear that it is much more Carpenter pushing Murat into becoming a translator than him wanting to be one.

He comes across as a timid ex-pat, one who literally doesn't leave his property to try and find out what was happening, being introduced to Gerry by an eager guest, who at this point in time has seen NOTHING suspicious about the case [except a vague “Madeleine, Madeleine” which his wife may have heard when they left Tapas the night before and about which we’ll speak in a future post] and who barely knows Gerry McCann.

Mind you, as the reader will be able to see in future posts, Murat almost immediately loses any and all shyness and is invaded by the spirit of eagerness.

Only his entrance into the scene is discreet and by the hand of another.

We hope that readers can understand what Carpenter’s main mission was: for him to be the reason Murat is introduced into the process.

A guest freshly aware of a linguistic problem who happens to encounter an ex-pat who speaks Portuguese and convinces him to help.

This way a very important thing is achieved, Murat comes into the process “out-of-the-blue”, or by the unsuspected hand of a guest, to help people who he supposedly hasn’t met before.

It Murat had walked out of his house and gone to the apartment 5A area and after asking what was going on would offer his help someone could start wondering why his interest in the case. Coming by the hand of another, who he also hadn’t met before, would explain that he only came into the case by… sheer accident, the result of a chance encounter.

With Carpenter’s help he becomes the perfect mole inside the investigation. Well, not exactly perfect because his exaggerated curiosity in the proceedings fired up red flags within the PJ investigation. As Inspector Pedro Varanda says on May 11, 2007:

Here we have to go back to what Murat told a witness, Jez Wilkins, about the fact that Rastaman had been eliminated as a suspect because it was determined he was a local individual. A clear breach of his duties as a translator in an ongoing investigation.

As we said, all could be attributed to an over-eager personality. That of someone who wants to tackle out of the best of good-wills.

Unfortunately for Murat and Carpenter there isn’t enough good-will to explain why both their statements are so well synchronised in terms of getting Murat being a translator, starting with both saying [with all the discrepancies shown] they met in a cul-de-sac where one, Carpenter, had absolutely no reason to be.

But for the story to fulfill its objectives the encounter between them has to be by chance. That means Carpenter has to be in that cul-de-sac unexpectedly [only goes there because he hears a call on his way back to apartment] and Murat needs to be inside the property when he sees the guest [reason why he feels the urgent need to search the garden knowing full well, as he does recognise, that it would be impossible for the child to have entered his property – note – without help].   

Who was lying? Carpenter? Or was it Murat? It seems to us, both. We would love to see a reconstruction of their chance-encounter.

In our post “Bladderman” we said the following:

Today we add a third question to be asked: why would an ex-pat and a guest who supposedly have never met each other have synchronised statements describing something that evidently didn’t happen?

About Carpenter’s other missions, we will speak about them later.



Post Scriptum (Feb 16, 2015 10:30)

In this post we received the following comment from GP:

We went as far as congratulating GP, and “complaining” that what he had spotted would spoil a bit a follow-up post on Carpenter.

However, both we and GP were misled by a mistranslation of what is the files. It’s subtle but changes the meaning entirely.

In the files, we don’t have the original English version of the rogatory statement but its translation into Portuguese.

The translation above says “Voltamos de regresso pelo caminho que eu tinha percorrido até ao apartamento do Gerry e expliquei que o Robert falava fluentemente Português…”

This translates to “We returned by the path I had taken to Gerry’s apartment and I explained that Robert spoke Portuguese fluently”.

The difference is that Carpenter is saying that he retraced his steps from where he was, in the cul-de-sac, to go to apartment 5A and not saying he’s been to apartment 5A before.

Does this better understanding of what he said make this bit of his statement less compromising?

No. It’s as compromising. But it does aggravate Murat’s participation in this episode.

First thing as that it remains valid the question how does Carpenter know where Gerry’s apartment is? Not because he's been there, but to know where to go and find Gerry and introduce Murat to him.

Do guests in Luz know where each other are staying? For example, does Gerry know where Carpenter’s apartment is? Does Carpenter know where Gerry’s surfer friends’ apartments are? If all answers are affirmative, one must wonder why. As Carpenter says, in Luz, “here was different because we could find the same person two or three times a day, others we could pass three or four days without seeing them because one is on this side and the others on the other side...”

There's nothing in Carpenter's statement that indicates he meets the McCanns two or three times a day outside the tennis courts. So where does he know where Gerry would be for him to be able to take Murat there?

There’s nothing in his statement that says he does know.

According to him “all was very quiet and there was no one around”. Only Gerry surfing friends, as he calls them, were there and they only tell him that “Madeleine had been kidnapped on the night before”.

Nowhere Carpenter says that they identified the apartment. He just “thinks they were waiting for news from the Portuguese Police” and then the three of them walk down the road towards the supermarket.

So from where does Carpenter know where Gerry McCann lives?

But to make things even worse for Carpenter, as of that morning, Gerry is no longer in block 5 but in block 4, to where the McCanns moved.

Again, the question must be asked, how did Carpenter know where to go to introduce Murat to Gerry? We are supposing that “Gerry’s apartment” is where he 's now staying and not apartment 5A. After all he did introduce Murat to him, so the three did meet. According to Carpenter and Murat.

But let’s speculate in favour of Carpenter.

Let’s suppose that during the initial conversation with surfer friends, they pointed out apartment 5A to Carpenter and went as far as telling him that the McCanns were now staying in block 4. That's from where, speculating, Carpenter knows where to find Gerry.

The problem for Carpenter about this “let's-introduce-Murat-to-Gerry” trip is where it starts.

It starts exactly where happens the conversation between Carpenter and Murat where one tells the he would be useful as a translator and convinces him to offer his help.

It happens in the cul-de-sac. In front of Murat's property.

Remember, Carpenter leaves the pathway that he’s walking on his way back to his apartment that morning and enters the cul-de-sac (here we would like to point out there’s no passageway between the 2) only because he hears Murat calling.

He walks along the cul-de-sac, Northbound, trying to look inside Murat’s property to see through the high netted fence with thick vegetation who he has heard calling. At some point he’s able to see inside and Murat asks him the question to which he answers.

This causes Murat to say “I’ll come around to talk to you”.

We’re assuming when Murat came around he exited the property by the front gate. We’re also supposing Carpenter walked towards him to meet him.

So we would estimate that they were very near the gate when they talked and decided to go to offer Murat’s help to the McCanns. We would say this conversation took place at point A. Certainly between points B and C:

If the reader was at point A and wanted to go to block 4, which route would the reader choose? The BLUE route or the YELLOW one?

Carpenter chooses the YELLOW one. Carpenter says he retraces his steps.

That means he takes Murat back into the cul-de-sac, into the semi-circular pathway and from there walking the “Jez Wilkins” route up to block 4 where the McCanns were then staying.

It doesn’t take a genius when standing at point A to realise that the road before him goes directly in the direction he intends to go. But Carpenter must have walked that week around Luz like Hansel dropping breadcrumbs wherever he went so he wouldn't get lost.

But what really stands out in this, is Murat’s attitude. He follows Carpenter right into the cul-de-sac! Certainly in the conversation, the word Tapas must have popped up. If nothing else, to say “it happened to a family I met at the Tapas bar”.

The expected reaction on Murat’s part would be to lead the way (he’s the ex-pat, Carpenter the guest) down Rua Dr Agostinho da Silva to block 4, where, as we have presumed, Carpenter knows the McCanns are staying by reasons we have speculated.

So why does Murat follow Carpenter on this ridiculous journey?

(image from here)

Foreword: As this post is lengthy, it will be posted in 3 parts. Today, we are publishing the first third.


1. Introduction

The problem most (we would go as so far as saying all, including us) make when reading Stephen Carpenter’s rogatory statement of April 21, 2008 is… reading it.

Before doing that one should take one or two steps back, look at it from a distance. One must understand its background, its context, its objectives, its characters and its plots.

Only then should one start reading it.

But even then, one must also understand the incompetence of its main actor

You see, for the most important “play” of all this spectacle, they picked an actor used to playing Noddy in school plays and sent him off to play Othello at the Royal Shakespeare Company.

He forgets his lines, misses cues, confuses plots, says his lines before the time and skips whole pages of the script. It's like he's trying too hard. At times one feels he’s completely lost in the plot and doesn’t really know exactly where he is in the storyline.

Let’s then guide readers through the proposed exercise.


2. Background (updated Feb 25, 2015 09:00)

All chips had been placed by the Black Hats on the binomial Smith – Bundleman. The encounter with this Irish family had gone exactly as intended and when this family came forward they would make Bundleman real and so provide credibility to the abduction thesis.

Why it took Bundleman around 45 minutes to get to Rua da Escola Primária would be a detail easily overcome by myth creation and subsequent theories.

But as the reader knows, the Smiths didn’t come forward.

The Black Hats wasted no time waiting for them. They would arrive when they arrived, meanwhile it was important to feed the PJ with false suspects to keep them from investigating what really was there to be investigated.

The first suspect was Jez Wilkin's “Rastaman”. Right on the day after, May 4.

However the Black Hats quickly realised that this was a disastrous suspect because it drew attention to where it was least desired: the Tapas bar.

We wouldn’t be surprised if it wasn’t “someone” who pointed out to the PJ that Rastaman could probably be Sperrey in order to make this character disappear.

Among so many tourists, one just doesn’t look at a man with long curvy blond hair and conclude that he is a man with dreadlocks. But if one is told that the man with the curvy long blond hair had been at Tapas on the night in question and someone could have easily confused his hair with dreadlocks, then one might be convinced that it could be so.

It was urgent for the Black Hats to make Rastaman go away just as fast as he had arrived. So fast that they didn’t even bother to take him to Jez Wilkins for confirmation or denial.

(Michael Sperrey - phoyo from JH Forum)

Sperrey was Rastaman, end of Rastaman.

May 4 went by and no sign of the Smiths.

On May 5, Denise Beryl Ashton, speaks of 2 men on her front doorstep on May 3, at 17:00, who say are “authorised to collect donations on behalf of an orphanage” which she assumes, from a question put to her, to be in Espiche, which in turn “regarding the orphanage, she became aware through other people and residents who told her that there was no such [orphanage] in Espiche”

On that same day, May 5, Richard and Susan McCluskey in Alvor, at around 01:00 on May 5, see a man stopping a van, getting out with a child in his arms and disappear over a bunker.

A woman appears and talks to them in Portuguese. Later, on September 12, 2007 (by coincidence after Martin Smith recognises Gerry as Smithman) Richard would recognise this woman as Kate:

“Having viewed recent news footage of Mrs McCann I am now almost certain that she is the female I described as being in a distressed state. I say this because of her slight build, high cheekbones and her eyes and hairstyle.

I've agonised for days over whether or not to contact the police about this because it is a terrible thing to accuse somebody of. It had just not crossed my mind that the child’s parents could in some way be involved in her disappearance.”

With thousands of front page photos of Kate, only in September does Richard recognise her as the woman he spoke with, in Portuguese, that night. Strange, to say the least.

May 5 goes by and still no signs of the Smiths.

On May 6 (it could have been on May 5) Derek Flack says he sees Pimpleman staring at apartment 5A and a parked white van next to it on the street. We have dealt extensively with Flack and is sightings in the following posts:

Flack, Residence Discrepancy
Flack, Memory Lapse
Flack, Faulty Memory Day
Flack and Pimpleman
Flack, The White Van
Flack, Distances & Angles

It’s on May 14, 2007 that Carpenter decides to act.

His wife had supposedly heard “Madeleine, Madeleine” on May 3, the night Maddie went missing.

He on May 4, had supposedly seen with his own eyes a garage where someone allegedly lived and where children’s toys appeared completely out of context.

But only when he hears that Murat had been named arguido, does he decide to speak up. Fascinating.

And why? Because he thinks they have the wrong man.

He thinks that it’s more likely to be a 50 yr old man with grey hair, who he didn’t see, but supposedly knows of his existence from other two guests, Neil Berry and Raj Balu, rather than Robert Murat.

When in Luz, with the authorities there, he says nothing, but 10 days later, he decides to speak.

He contacts the UK Police, via Philomena McCann [we will get back to this later], on May 14, is contacted 2 days later and heard on May 17, 2007.

Carpenter is nothing but the first antidote of “Operation Bait”.

Remember that the bait, Murat, is meant only to make the shark circle. When the shark gets too close, it has to be pulled out of the water temporarily. And is kept out of the water until the shark gives up and starts to swim away. Then the bait goes back into the water so the shark picks up the scent again and resumes the circling.

Carpenter is the first yanking of Murat out of the water.

His mission, to make it very clear that he was the one responsible for Murat getting involved in the case. A guest stating in very clear terms that Murat had not been nosy.

There’s a justification for his involvement and that justification is him.

Last week, in our “Planting a spy” post we said that Murat was planted in the investigation to keep the “Dark Side” permanently updated about the investigation. Ironically, he’s replaced by the British Police in that role.

Murat very quickly becomes expendable. And they do a Murat on Murat.

What is a Murat? A Murat is a convenient and conscious change of one’s role, done by others on to him not in accordance to reason but due to changes in direction of winds of reality.

The winds of reality for Murat was the fact that the Smiths didn’t show up and so no chances could be taken.

What we didn’t say last week was that it was Carpenter who planted him.

We said both Murat and Carpenter say it was like that. But as we showed we don’t think the Carpenter – Murat encounter ever happened.

But from the effective synchronisation between their statements we can deduce that for the PJ, Murat comes by the hand of Gerry McCann (after being introduced to him by Carpenter).

It’s Gerry who approves Murat as a translator according to both Murat and Carpenter. So for the PJ it’s he, Gerry, who is the link to Murat and the investigation. And Murat has appeared by chance.

In our opinion, Murat is “brought” to Gerry, not by Carpenter but on orders from whoever was able to make decisions in Luz on May 4. For some reason Murat doesn’t even remember Carpenter’s name.

But Carpenter has further use.

The Black Hats have a problem on their hands. The laundryman, Mario Marreiros has seen Neil Berry at the “hole in the stairs” in block 5 when he has no reason to be there and looked very dodgy.


Neil Berry needs credibility and the laundryman has to be discredited as much as possible.

When Carpenter steps forward, on May 14, Both Raj Balu (May 6) and Neil Berry (May 7) have given their first statements.

These are not in the files, but on their respective rogatory statements of 2008 both ratify what they said.

We’re sure they both said they spent the night searching. But the alleged decision to have a take-away dinner with each other at Berry’s apartment makes them linked to each other. Their credibility is intertwined.

This means that on one side, if one is proved to be lying then other will have been lying too, and about the other, what one says about what the other has done has little or no value.

For example, Berry saying that he and Balu, or the other way around, helped in the searches means nothing because this doesn’t prove either went.

Before solving whatever problem they have with laundryman, they have their credibility problem to deal with.

They need an independent witness saying they were seen searching.

No one else, has said they were seen searching.

On May 17, for anyone to come forward and say they saw Balu and Berry helping search, outside any context, would make them look even more suspicious, as it would look like someone was coming to their rescue. These things have windows of opportunity and theirs had passed. It would draw further attention to them.

Now, the only way to “confirm” that Balu and Berry were out searching is to report something they say they saw.

Enter Greyhairman.

Carpenter by bringing on to the scene Greyhairman, is not bringing in a new suspect but giving credibility to Balu and Berry’s statements.

Greyhairman shows, or is supposed to show, that these 2 were indeed out searching that night.

Credibility gained, there’s still the problem of laundryman having seen Berry under the stairs.

Here the reader may fall into the temptation of asking, why, on May 17, would they be worried about what Marreiros may have seen, if on May 8, Marreiros has already stated to the PJ that “he does not know of anything suspicious that could be related to the events”.

Because they don’t know what he has told the PJ. Why? Because he’s Portuguese. He was heard in Portuguese by a Portuguese, so his statement was taken and put directly into the file. His “he does not know of anything suspicious that could be related to the events” is only of the knowledge of the detective who questioned him and of Marreiros himself.

But, say you, you have said that the Portuguese staff was told to lie, so why wasn’t Marreiros told to do the same? Or him having said he didn’t see anything suspicious” is already the result of such a request?

There’s this idea that the staff were aware of the swinging. Just because they worked in the resort. We will deal with this topic in detail in another post, but for now we propose that the reader does an exercise.

Please choose any hotel you know with some activity in the area you reside in.

Now imagine you can ask anything about any and all guests who stayed there last night of any of the hotel’s employees and you will get honest answers from anyone questioned.

All you will be able to find out is how many guests were in the hotel last night and their names. That’s about it.

How many of them did indeed stay and sleep in their rooms? We imagine the majority or even all, but is there a certainty? No. No one can answer that question with certainty.

How many of the guests staying there last night had sex? Again, no one knows (and, by the way, if anyone was to know the answer to this question that would mean the hotel had serious privacy issues).

Of those who had sex, how many had it with their spouse, and how many had with people they were not married to? No one knows.

Of those who had sex with people they were not married to, how many were cheating (meaning married or in a long-term relationship with another than the one they were with) and how many were simply having a one-night stand? No one knows.

Was there any wife-swapping last night? No one knows.

Was there swinging there last night? No one knows.

Why? Because it happens inside a room and what happens inside the room is only of the business of those inside it.

Yes, experienced eyes may be able to tell the difference of clients going into a room for fun or simply to rest, but even these eyes are unable to tell what kind of relationship exists between those who use it for fun.

Back to Tapas. The staff who were asked to lie, or better, were told to lie, about the T9 and all that was related with them.

Word was quickly spread that if asked, they were to say that that group had dinner at Tapas.

Some, in the know, were to say they participated in the searches that night. But if one is to look at all statements, only a small minority of the staff say they searched for Maddie.

The majority were either home or if in the resort doing something else but not exactly searching.

For Marreiros to be told to lie about Berry would be to ask a member of staff to lie about someone other than the McCanns and their friends.

Maybe they should have asked him. Maybe they didn't want to risk asking him. Maybe they overlooked asking him. Maybe when Berry told what had happened, it was too late to do anything about it.

When Marreiros lies, as he does, when he says he didn’t see anything suspicious, we think is because he's simply trying to keep himself away from the events.

Not to get involved in the problems with the “bifes” (a word commonly used in Portugal to define the British, meaning “steak” in reference to the sunburned pink skin they quickly get on arriving at the Algarve beaches) were having among themselves. It was their problem, he didn't want anything to do with it.

On May 9, 5 days after Maddie has disappeared, everyone in the area already knows that the story told by the parents wasn't exactly what the parents and their friends were telling.

The abduction didn’t make any sense and everyone was already certain that the little girl had died due to some accident and now the parents were “a fugir com o rabo da seringa” (which translates, running with their behinds away from the syringe).

Very quickly, because of the media circus put in place, the locals understood that the best attitude was to stay as far away from it as possible.

So Marreiros, although seeing a tourist in an odd place at an odd time, decides to “overlook” it and pretends he didn’t see anything.

However, Carpenter’s laundryman saga, proves one thing, in our opinion, that is that Marreiros is not under control.

The Black Hats don’t know what he has said to PJ but assume that Berry’s odd behaviour and odd location would be suspicious enough to have been referred.

They felt the need to discredit the man and they carried on with it.

To sum up the context of Carpenter’s statement:

First, to emphasise that Murat was introduced by him and not Murat volunteering his services as a translator (main plot);

Second, to give credibility to Balu and Berry’s statements as first phase to defend against any possible attacks from Marreiros (Greyhaired man plot);

Third, to withdraw credibility from Marreiros as a second phase of defence for Balu and Berry (Laundryman plot).

But when one gives a plumber a gardening job, one ends up with a garden with only weeds.

Carpenter is not only able to fail at these 3 tasks, as by losing himself in the script, he provides more information than he was supposed to.

Even to the point of proving our blog right, as you’ll see further on.

(to be continued)

Following chapters:

4. The Murat plot. 

5. The Greyhairedman plot 

6. The Laundryman plot 

7. Miscellaneous Feet-in-the-mouth 

(pic from here)

Foreword: As this post is lengthy, it will be posted in 3 parts. Today, we are publishing the second third.


4. The Murat plot.

We have shown in our “Planting a spy” post quite clearly that the Carpenter – Murat encounter of the morning on May 4, 2007, in the cul-de-sac in front of Murat’s Casa Liliana never happened, much less the way both say it happened.

Unfortunately for both, their statements tally up about the “chance” encounter that never happened between them: Murat inside property and Carpenter in the cul-de-sac, Murat asking a question and Carpenter answering it, Murat coming out of his property to talk to Carpenter, Murat following Carpenter to be introduced to Gerry and Carpenter introducing Murat to Gerry McCann as a translator.

Mainly their statements tally up on what matters: Murat being a translator in the case was because and only because he was taken by Carpenter to be introduced to Gerry.

As we have shown the idea behind Carpenter's statement is to alleviate the pressure on Murat. To yank him briefly from the water.

The plot was quite simple. A guest encountered by chance an ex-pat and convinced him to be a translator [regardless of not knowing if the PJ officers did, or didn’t, speak English] to help in the case.

The guest takes ex-pat to Gerry McCann who approves his services. Based on what authority, we don’t know.

As we said, based on Carpenter’s words, Murat comes across as timid man, “holed” up in his property, who and from what Carpenter describes, it wouldn’t have crossed his mind to offer his help.

But, again trusting Carpenter’s version, Murat’s shyness suddenly disappears the moment he’s introduced:

“DC Ferguson: and I explained that Robert spoke fluently Portuguese, he [Murat] told Gerry that it was important to have someone who spoke the language so that nothing would be lost in translation. And that was how Robert Murat was presented as translator”

Carpenter: Yes.

DC Ferguson: After he [Murat]  left, he explained that Gerry was frustrated with the way in which the process was running and they went to talk to John Hill.

Carpenter: Yes.

DC Ferguson: In Mark Warner and he [Murat] demanded that he [John Hill] open up all the Mark Warner rooms so that he [Murat] could check them and he [John Hill] called the cleaning ladies etc. to help and open all the empty apartments that were not necessarily in the Mark Warner complex, but for which they could have the key. At this time you also met an English man called Dave who lived in the area and helped the Ocean Club give you the authority to enter in all possible apartments, some of the apartments in Gerry's block belonged to local owners and Dave helped to get the key to these same apartments so that you could search them, and then and then began the search, searching all in general.

Carpenter: Mmm mmm.”

First, Gerry, confides in a total stranger that he isn’t happy with the way the process was going.

In the first hours of the first morning Gerry has already formulated a negative opinion about how PJ were doing things. He hasn’t given his first statement but is already critical and says this to a total stranger.

Then we are in the Wild West. Gerry McCann is the sheriff and he deputises Murat. Murat with the deputy’s star pinned on his chest, demands that the Ocean Club manager open up all doors so that he could check inside apartments. And, apparently, the Ocean Club manager complies.

Carpenter and Murat are even given authority by the Ocean Club to enter all apartments possible. We do wonder about the legality of this.

If we add "Dave“ and John Hill, we are taken back to Tombstone with the Earp Brothers and ‘Doc’ Holiday’, walking side by side to the gunfight at the O.K. Corral with Murat playing the role of Wyatt Earp!

Now, that is clearly doing translating. Not!

Then, for no reason other than tracking dogs having arrived, Murat and Carpenter stop this apartment searching and head towards the beach.

“DC Ferguson:’But Robert and I searched the terrains near the beach’.

(…)

Carpenter: They had a team of tracking dogs on site, from Lisbon according to what I was told, and afterwards we walked to the beach in the attempt to find the scent, whether she had strayed alone or had fallen into the sea, and it was just him and me and the dog handlers, so there was no big theme of conversation, simply walking the path and taking it to return”

Excuse me?

We have Portuguese dog handlers doing searches in Portuguese territory, what is a translator needed for?

In case the dogs found Maddie’s scent on a tourist? Because if they found it on an ex-pat, that ex-pat has the obligation to identify himself and make himself understood in the language of the country he is residing in to its authorities .

And shouldn’t Murat be doing some translating instead of following Maddie's scent?

On May 4, SIC made a report for the evening news and filmed the dogs and the dog handlers:

(images captured from video at gerrymccannsblogs)

They seem to be accompanied, correctly so, only by GNR officers. No civilians walking with them. No sign of Murat or of Carpenter.

The reader may say that Murat led the apartment searching because there wasn’t any sort of Portuguese police present [not true, as Murat does speaks of the presence of the GNR during the apartment searching] and decided to go with the tracking dogs because they were the first ones to arrive and so he accompanied them.

The problem with that reasoning is that Murat has been, in theory, accepted as a translator, so his job would be to stay put until the appropriate investigative authorities arrived and used his services.

And Carpenter proves us right, because when they return, the PJ is there and Murat had, according to Carpenter, been wandering about and wasn't where he was needed:

“Carpenter: …when we arrived we talked with different Portuguese police officers and after with the one who appeared to be leading the operation, an individual more of Forensic look, but as I now say it doesn’t appear very clear.

DC Ferguson: Yes.

Carpenter: Humm... where Robert presents himself as being capable of speaking both languages and they no; they tried to use him to withdraw the maximum information from the English side, so that the Portuguese could understand what the people were saying and up to what state they were, humm… in that involvement with the police and then we tried to enter all the apartments that had a view to where Gerry and Kate were lodged.

DC Ferguson: Yes..

Carpenter: And it was just talking about, you know...trying to access the possible and trying to open the maximum of doors in the surroundings, and I think that was all.

DC Ferguson: You go on describing with a little more detail the searches in the apartments neighbouring Gerry and Kate's…”

From Carpenter’s words, Murat’s translating abilities are not gleefully welcomed by the PJ. They prefer to get information from him than to use him to interview people.

And it seems that there was someone else also doing translations, one “Dave Shelton from Manchester, who now lives in the village, has been co-ordinating volunteer searchers.”

The Daily Express reports:

“Search co-ordinator Dave Shelton, 38, from Manchester, who has lived in the village for more than 16 years running an air conditioning company, said: “I came here first on Friday morning, I speak a little Portuguese and was helping police knock on the doors of all the apartments. Then people just started coming out of the woodwork saying, ‘We’ve heard, what can we do to help’.”

In spite of his involvement in searches there is no statement from Shelton.

And Carpenter confirms that Shelton did translate:

“Carpenter: Who had supposedly acquired a property, because of it I strongly suggested that we open the maximum possible number of doors, the... I can't remember the name of the individual, who I also met by chance, and who was doing a bit as a translator, what was his name again, who helped to open the doors.

DC Ferguson: Was it John HILL?

Carpenter: No, John Hill was a Mark Warner employee, I forgot his name, but he...humm also knew the local Estate Agent and different people who helped to get the keys of the owners or potential renters, some of whom were on holiday.”

Another fascinating memory phenomenon afflicting those involved in the Maddie case, as Carpenter has forgotten he has just said “at this time you also met an English man called Dave who lived in the area and helped the Ocean Club give you the authority to enter in all possible apartments”.

Carpenter as we will describe will continue to search apartments and garages with Dave Shelton [yes, the same man he has difficulty remembering his name].

From Carpenters words, we’re not sure if Murat accompanied him in the apartment searches involving the Greyhairman episode.

However, Carpenter makes it clear that some sort of relationship developed between the 2, that there was some proximity between both. He says he speaks to Murat about Greyhairman:

“Carpenter: Hummm.. then it would just a question of asking who he was, where he was and could be eliminated from the list of suspects, becoming one less person to raise concern.

DC Ferguson: And did you talk about this to Robert as well about the person [Greyhairman] well in the scenario [best translation possible for: lá bem dentro do cenário]?

Carpenter: Ah ah”

The proximity between them is confirmed by Carpenter when he says Murat has explained to him how unhappy the Portuguese Police was with the British Media, this already on Saturday:

“Carpenter: Yes.

DC Ferguson: And you go on to say that you spoke to Robert on that day [Saturday, May 5] about how the Portuguese Police were unhappy with the incomprehensible way in which the British press treated them.

Carpenter: That was what he said. What he explained to me.

DC Ferguson: Yes.

Carpenter: Yes.”

Good friends they seemed to be.

However this is Murat’s version of the same events:

“…and then they saw an English passer-by on the outside, he does not know the identity. When asked about this, he was told that the child had disappeared. Accompanied by that person, he went to the place of the disappearance, and was introduced to the parents of the child, as he spoke the two languages, Portuguese and English. Assumes that the passer-by would be staying at the Luz Ocean Club, in the block opposite the home of the respondent. This individual already knew the parents of MADELEINE, or met them at the time. He started a conversation with the family of the child, offering to help. Together with an officer of the GNR and an employee of the resort with several keys, entered several apartments, opened with the keys or by the tenants in order to locate the child. Some of the apartments were closed and there were no keys, these sites were flagged by the GNR man.

At that time he met John Hill, manager of MARK WARNER, who supplied them with more keys to other apartments.

Prior to this occasion, he did not know the interior of the "Ocean Club", only entering the resort after the disappearance.

In the meantime the tracker dogs arrived that undertook a more rigorous form of search.

Then, having told several of the present people, including officers of the GNR, that he spoke two languages, he was taken to some places to make verbal translations for people who wanted to testify, remaining in that role during the afternoon. On the evening of that day by 19:00-19:30 went to see Michaela, returning to Luz about 23:00-23:30.

On Saturday he continued the verbal translations next to the GNR mobile police station, making various contacts with the press, and that night went again to Lagos.

When asked he said the relationship with the press was somewhat troubled.”

Murat doesn’t know Carpenter’s name. He speaks of him as “that person” (credit to our reader Nuala for spotting this).

Murat does confirm he went apartment searching. He speaks of being accompanied by an officer of the GNR and an employee of the resort and then later meets John Hill who supplies more keys.

No talk of Carpenter being present.

We don’t know who the “employee of the resort” is. It’s not Dave Shelton [we do wonder from where Carpenter got the idea Dave had access to Ocean Club keys] as he's not on the Ocean Club employee list.

But whoever it was, had to speak Portuguese. So what was the need for Murat’s presence in this searching?

It makes sense that he participates in verbal translations with the PJ or with GNR. As an example of this, we have been told by Jez Wilkins that he was visited by Murat and a PJ Inspector and that makes perfect sense.

What doesn’t make any sense is for Murat to be going inside apartments with the GNR like a police investigator.

Note that he does this searching before telling “several of the present people, including officers of the GNR, that he spoke two languages”.

It’s not as a translator that he accompanies the GNR officer and whoever the Ocean Club employee is into apartments.

So why does he do it? Maybe because he’s on a mission, and that mission is not exactly to translate but to use his bilingual skills to be able to provide a permanently updated situational awareness upstream.

What matters is that what Carpenter has to say about Murat, harms him more than it helps.

He gets the message across that it was him who brings Murat into the case, and then spoils it all by saying a little too much.

If he had “left” Murat after introducing him to Gerry and gone back to his apartment as he was going to when he allegedly heard Murat's first call [that bit also had to be completely rewritten] then all would have sounded more credible.

Carpenter spoils it all by not recognising when he should have left the stage. He should have but doesn't.


5. The Greyhairman plot

This plot was to prove that Raj Balu and Neil Berry have credibility in their statements. To stock up on ammo for the fight for credibility they supposed they were going to have against Mário Marreiros, the Laundyman, because he saw Neil in the hole in the stais of block 5 early evening of May 3.

Berry and Balu are linked to each other about what they did on the night of May 3 so neither provide proof or an alibi for the other.

Note that when the discussion goes around Greyhairman it is deflected completely away from the one questioning if Balu and Berry did indeed take part in the searches on the night of May 3.

Other than themselves, we only have Carpenter, with the Greyhairman tale, saying that Berry and Balu participated in that searching. And he says that using the FOAF (Friend-of-a-friend) technique, which we saw being used by Murat's pseudo-friend Carlos Costa.

Carpenter, Balu and Berry only search together on May 5:

“DC Ferguson: Neil and Raj, two Mark Warner tourists who I saw in the in the Tapas bar who searched for Maddie with me”

Carpenter, apparently meets Berry and Balu at Tapas Bar, during his dinner:

“DC Ferguson: Another couple whose names I do not remember, sat at the table in front of us. The other man [singular] was sitting on the esplanade having a drink while they [plural] waited for the ‘takeaway’, I talked to them briefly, I hadn't realised that the Tapas bar had ‘takeaway’. At this time I didn't know their names yet.”

The Carpenters with a baby and a toddler certainly calling for attention are surrounded by people at Tapas (he says, as we’ll see later, his daughter is playing with Philip Edmonds' sons) and he takes notice of two men sitting at a table not near them (from what Carpenter describes, near them are Edmonds and his 3 sons, an unknown couple and the Tapas Big Round Table, empty because the T9 had not yet arrived) who are just having a drink.

Being Tapas bar fully booked, as queueing up for reservations indicates, we imagine that Balu and Berry were sitting having their drink at the table reserved for Balu and that he gave up that afternoon, because all others, we imagine, would be set up for dinner.

Shouldn't Carpenter be paying more attention to his family? After all, this would be the second night (the first was when they arrived on Saturday) the family was having dinner together. So shouldn't he be focused on them instead of other guests?

So why does he get up to talk, however briefly, to the two men who are just sitting and having a drink? Or, did he from his chair, shout out across the esplanade “hey, you guys, what are you doing there?” or “hey, you guys over there, enjoying your drinks?”

Even if he got up to see what his daughter was up to, what’s the reason to start a conversation with 2 men who are just sitting enjoying a drink?

If one was able to get a dinner reservation at Tapas, did that imply one had to talk to everyone? Did one have to sign some sort of document obliging oneself to talk to everyone that was there?

If I was sitting with Fred enjoying a drink and a total stranger came up to me and asked us “are you enjoying your drink?”, the natural reaction would be “sorry, what?” and if he insisted, I would politely respond, “yes, thank you”. And avoid any further conversation with the person. Conversations happen naturally, not just because one is sitting down enjoying a drink.

It's none of Carpenter’s business what Berry and Balu are doing. Why the need to tell a stranger about the take-away?

In our opinion, this “casual take-away banter” is to provide credibility to what Berry and Balu have stated about going to Tapas to get a take-away for their dinner in Berry’s apartment.

By chance Carpenter meets Murat and by chance he learns of the take-away from Balu and Berry. It wasn't enough for him to say he saw 2 men drinking and then they left, or even he saw them leave with some bags that would appear to be a take-away. No, he had to get across, so you wouldn't miss it, that they were there for the take-away. He heard this from them. The 2 total strangers he had never seen before in his life.

Then the Greyhairman episode begins.

It starts when Carpenter has apparently parted ways with Murat when he starts the second phase of apartment searching:

“DC Ferguson: You go on describing with a little more detail the searches in the apartments neighbouring Gerry and Kate's, and then you found Neil and Raj who started talking and told you that they had collaborated in the searches the night before.”

Carpenter: Yes. .

DC Ferguson: And they explained to you that they had seen a man with torches [a torch?] and they felt something suspicious about him, that they were not at all satisfied with him.

Carpenter: Yes, yes.

DC Ferguson: Then he introduced himself saying that he lived in Portugal and that he had just bought a block of apartments.

Carpenter: Yes.

DC Ferguson: These were in front of Gerry's block, which made them concentrate more in that area.

Carpenter: Yes, because Raj in particular said that he felt something unusual and that it wasn’t right, and the fact they [apartments of supposedly bought block of apartments] were where they were, the fact that the back of the apartment block was in front of Kate and Gerry's apartment, humm...and that they even discussed the purchase price and how much he paid, but the following morning there were not even signs, even knocking on all the doors of the apartments that were occupied and of those that were unoccupied, we didn’t find anyone, he said, and that is why we thought it was unusual for someone who was available and collaborated in the searches and who lived nearby, was not found the following morning, because as you know, we were not contactable.

DC Ferguson: Not even signs of him and you remember that you were worried about this man who was described as being in his fifties and with grey hair.

Carpenter: Ah ha.

DC Ferguson: And it seems strange, as you referred, that a person who helped so much on the previous night, disappeared the following morning.

Carpenter: Yes, I suppose there was something that even the Portuguese locals would be incapable of identifying (inaudible) or recognising by the description of a poster in particular.

DC Ferguson: Who he was.

Carpenter: Hummm.. then it would just a question of asking who he was, where he was and could be eliminated from the list of suspects, becoming one less person to raise concern.

DC Ferguson: And did you talk about this to Robert as well about the person well in the scenario [best translation of: lá bem dentro do cenário]?

Carpenter: Ah ha.”

So, apparently Berry and Balu had met a man the night before who had bought, recently, or very recently, a block of apartments.

The block referred to is the one opposite and above block 5 where apartment 5A is:

“Carpenter: Yes, yes, well what happened was that, Gerry's apartment was here because it was not a flat area, it was more or less like this and that is why the opposing apartments were higher up.

DC Ferguson: Correct.

Carpenter: Because of that it can obviously be seen, can be seen from above these apartments and all the others in the lower area and where we, hum... this is where the individual with the grey hair was.”

So Greyhairman has bought block 2 of the Ocean Club:



He must be a very rich man.

But is there any reason to find Greyhairman suspicious just because he's rich?

The fact that he doesn’t appear the next morning only confirms the suspicions but what started them, we don't know.

Balu finds a man suspicious because the stranger tells him he has bought a block of apartments and those apartments overlook block 5.

That’s the only reason we're told why this man has become a suspect.

As if a rich abductor, having bought a block of apartments to stakeout block 5 (we won’t go as far as having him buy the whole lot of apartments just to keep an eye on apartment 5A) and the first thing he does after abducting Maddie is to come back and confide that same fact to a pair of complete strangers.

To imply that the abductor has dumped Maddie somewhere (supposedly nearby) and returned to tell 2 men he knows from nowhere that his investment on a block of apartments has paid off is beyond ridiculous.

Them having him talking about the purchase price to create further suspicion backfires.

If the man had indeed bought block 2 and the three of them are searching around block 2 as Carpenter says they were, then it would be perfectly natural for Greyhairman to say something like “I just bought this block for X amount of euros and I really hope the little girl is found because it may hurt the investment I just made…”

Having him with a torch is a detail that serves only to confirm their “suspicion” that he lived nearby. Only a local would have a torch at that time.

Him not being found the next morning is suspicious? Why?

First, we would think highly unlikely for an investor to live in the building of apartments he has just bought as a block. He would have been a man of wealth and most likely live in a big villa nearby.

Then, who knows what this man had to do on that day? He could be in his office working. It was a Friday and people do work on Fridays. Or he could have gone on a business trip.

Do note the description of the man: he's fifty and he has grey hair. No mention of clothing. What kind of trousers was he wearing? T-shirt or a shirt? Was he fat, or was he thin? Did he have any particular facial characteristics that could help identify him? A beard? A moustache? Was he short or was he tall?

When one finds a person suspicious and one has time, as Balu and Berry had (as they did converse with him) to observe these things, then one does.

Instead, all we have is a man in his fifties with grey hair, holding a torch. How many 50 yr old men have grey hair? That many?

Fascinating though is that it’s Carpenter, not Berry or Balu, who becomes really obsessed with Greyhairman.

We don’t have access to the original statements of either, only to their rogatory statements of 2008. In neither of these does PJ ask any question about Greyhairman nor do they find it necessary to talk about the character.

We don't believe any diligences were made by PJ to find Greyhairman, which would be expected if either Berry or Balu had mentioned him, but are open to correction.

Carpenter really gets fixated with the man.

First, it’s because of Greyhairman that he strongly suggests to open as many apartments as possible:

“Carpenter: Who had supposedly acquired a property, because of it I strongly suggested that we open the maximum possible number of doors, the... I can't remember the name of the individual, who I also met by chance, and who was doing a little of translator, what was his name again, who helped to open the doors.”

Now, please take note of something here because it’s important for the next plot, the Laundryman: Balu and Berry disappear from the story from this moment on.

It’s like they planted the seed in Carpenter’s brain about this Greyhairman and trusted Carpenter to go and look for him, They threw him a bone, told him to go and fetch it and exit stage.

Why? Because from here, as you’ll see, the Greyhairman plot will link up with the Laundryman one, so Balu and Berry cannot be anywhere near the latter, for obvious reasons.

So Balu and Berry leave the stage and let Carpenter continue the search with the help of a man whose name he cannot remember, as we'll see.

The fixation on Greyhairman goes to the point that when he enters the “Laundryman garage” filled with children’s toys out of context, he doesn’t fully realise [strange, neither does Dave, the nameless man] what he’s looking at because his mind is totally focused on the Greyhairman:

“Carpenter: And while we entered there [the garage] I asked who lived there, he replied that his son lived there and then there were toys because I was concentrated on the fifty year old English man, this one is Portuguese, it was only afterwards when I later thought about what we were searching for”

Was Carpenter searching for Maddie or not? Apparently he was searching for a filthy rich fifty year old grey haired man with a torch who could possibly be living alone in a garage.

But he takes his fixation further. When he returns home, on the day he gives his statement, just before giving it (otherwise it wouldn’t be part of it), he sends an e-mail to Sky News about… Greyhairman:

“DC Ferguson: Certainly you followed the development of the events on TV.

Carpenter: Yes.

DC Ferguson: Humm... then you say that on the 17th May you sent an email to Sky News about the description of an individual with about fifty of age, humm.... on the May 14 you caught the end of a report on the news which mentioned that Robert Murat had been referenced as a suspect.

Carpenter: Yes (inaudible) I spoke to the Sky reporter, I think Ian Woods, humm...did I put that there?

DC Ferguson: It's here, yes.”

But the most fascinating thing that Carpenter has to say about Greyhairman is when he involves Gerry McCann:

“DC Ferguson: Yes, you found Gerry in the swimming pool area on Saturday afternoon, he told you that the fifty year old man had not been taken into consideration, that the Leicestershire Police were on their way and you gave him your phone number and returned to England that night.”

On Saturday, May 5, Gerry is unhappy that Greyhairman has not been taken into consideration.

One must really, really question Gerry’s unhappiness. We cannot see why he is unhappy. Or better said, we see no reason for him to be unhappy. Not about Greyhairman.

Because, at this point in time the PJ hasn’t been told about Greyhairman.

So how could they not take something into consideration that they don’t know anything about?

Gerry, if he already knew about Greyhairman, on Friday May 4, says nothing about him to the PJ.

Gerry is unhappy about Greyhairman not being taken into consideration on Saturday, May 5, but the only ones that had seen the man, Balu and Berry had not yet given their statements. Balu gives his statement only on Sunday, May 6, and Berry only on Monday, May 7.

What one cannot understand is why neither Berry nor Balu speak to GNR on May 4. They are both filmed near GNR officers and Balu is even filmed talking to them:

(images captured from video at gerrymccannsblogs)

But, apparently, they didn't.

Carpenter only speaks on May 17, so it can't be by him the PJ has disregarded Greyhairman by May 5.

Could it be Dave? No, there’s no statement from Dave.

Could it be Murat? No, Murat only speaks on May 14.

Fascinating stuff this Gerry unhappiness. Unhappy about something he couldn't possibly be unhappy about.

All Carpenter had to do was to say that he talked to Balu and Berry that morning, and they told him they had seen a suspicious person. That would be enough for an “independent” witness to have spoken about Balu and Berry being out and about searching for Maddie.

Carpenter has, in our opinion, ingrained the mission that he has to get Murat off the hook, so decides on his own to say that Greyhairman is more suspicious than Murat. It's Greyhairman they should be looking for, not Murat.

Once again, over-eggs the pudding, and spoils the dessert.

But, is there a Greyhairman? We think there is. A man in his fifties is filmed by SIC on May 4 2007 talking to Raj Balu. He's wearing a light green t-shirt and appears to be accompanied by a blonde woman:

(images captured from video at gerrymccannsblogs)

This man, in his fifties, hasn't been identified till this day.

Exactly a month before, on April 4, 2007 (by coincidence Carpenter's birthday), the Comet online, published an article called “Planning protest”. In it it says:

“But one BXXXXXXX LXXX resident, Stephen Carpenter, 51, says he feels that the development is "over densely populated" as he believes that...”

And then has this picture showing the Carpenter family:


Making a comparison, be the reader the judge:


Comet's Stephen Carpenter shares the same address as the Stephen Carpenter in the PJ Files.

It seems to us that when Carpenter says he spoke to Balu on May 4, he is indeed telling the truth.

However, he appears accompanied by his wife, who he doesn't mention being present in his searches, nor does he seem to be doing any searching in fact.

Could it be that Carpenter was describing himself when he speaks of Greyhairman?

Another thing, could it be Carpenter who was the 50 yr old man who lured Cecília Pires into trespassing a villa so that Jenny Murat could get her siren story out to an independent witness?

“In her walk she approached a scrubland which is located to the north and a few metres from the resort, when at this time a man approached, about 50 years old, who addressed the deponent in English, asking her if she was involved in the searches for the missing child.

The deponent told him no, although having affirmed that she was also looking, partly to appease her conscience.

In this context the man proposed to the deponent that he and she went to an villa, apparently uninhabited, but not abandoned, with the intention of looking for the child and so that it wouldn’t be only one person trespassing.

After they entered the parking area of the residence, where they called out to confirm if there was anyone there, they saw that, on the outside, a woman approached, appearing to be elderly, with about 70 years, about 1,5 or 1,6 metres tall, greying hair pinned back in a "banana" style, so the man mentioned before took the initiative to approach the lady inviting her to enter the residence together with him and the deponent with the intention of locating the missing child, to which the lady agreed.”

Unfortunately for Jenny Murat she said “being it then that she realised of the disappearance of a girl from the "Ocean Club"”instead of saying what she should have said: “but only this morning did she realise those sirens were about the disappearance of the girl from the "Ocean Club"”

Sometimes when actors don't remember their lines correctly.they change the plot completely.


Next chapters:



6. The Laundryman plot

7. Miscellaneous Feet-in-the-mouth

Foreword: As this post was lengthy it was posted in 3 parts. Today, we are publishing the third and final part.

However, this week we realised that what was left to be published was still too big for a single post.

Because of that we have decided to take a part of it out, although originating from some of Stephen Carpenter's words, it takes us to a totally different subject. If there aren't any surprises, this will be published next week as a post called “Luz's secret service”.


6. The Laundryman plot

Laundryman, Mário Marreiros, had to be discredited.

In the exact same way the Greyhairman plot was to make Raj Balu and Neil Berry win credits the Laundryman plot is to make Mário Marreiros, the laundryman, lose his.


The fact that he would have told the PJ that he saw a guest, Neil Berry, in an odd place at an odd hour, had to be countered. A shadow of suspicion had to be put to over him.

Then, whatever he had said, his words must be taken by PJ as those of someone trying to shrug the guilt off his shoulders and doing his best to point fingers at others, in this case Berry, to distract.

The laundryman makes his appearance on the stage, via a mysterious van. A van that appears completely out of context when Carpenter is describing where his apartment is located.

“DC Ferguson: That’s true, I see.

Carpenter: The bushes were all around here, we were on the ground floor, it was all open here, and that’s why I now think (inaudible) you know, that the idea that, humm... for which I mentioned in the interrogation that there was a van from the laundry that parked and other things.”

So he sees a van parked in the cul-de-sac. Is that mysterious?

The true mystery about the van, as will be seen, is why is the van has ever become mysterious.

We believe that some or most of Ocean Clubs administrative services, like maintenance, laundry and cleaning are based in the building in which Fiji Palms is part of. Fiji Palms is where Carpenter is staying in apartment FP02.

We know that the building has the indoor pool, the crèche and the 24 hour reception. So we find it perfectly natural for that cul-de-sac to be used by vehicles used by the Ocean Club for its client support services.

Why does Carpenter say it’s a van from the laundry? He speaks not of any logo on it or of any other mark that would identify it being used for laundry. Is it even from the Ocean Club? As we'll see later Carpenter doesn’t see anyone near it, drive it, load it or unload it. So why call it a laundry van?

We will come back to the van later.

Now let’s see what Carpenter has to say about Laundryman.

As we said in the previous week, Balu and Berry “sent” him looking for Greyhairman and then they exited the stage.

It’s in these searches for Greyhairman that Carpenter “finds” Laundryman.

“DC Ferguson: …It is likely that my papers are not in sequence because this page is more about the details of the search of the apartments near Gerry's apartment and speaks of the laundryman.

Carpenter: Yes, yes.

DC Ferguson: And of the reconnaissance done.

Carpenter: I remember that, yes.

DC Ferguson: You spoke with a man who later showed you a garage where there was a bed.”

Carpenter says he finds this garage together with Dave Shelton, whose name he doesn't remember although having spent quite a long time with him:

“Carpenter: … I can't remember the name of the individual, who I also met by chance, and who was doing a little of translator, what was his name again, who helped to open the doors.

DC Ferguson: Was it John HILL?

Carpenter: No, John Hill was a Mark Warner employee, I forgot his name, but he...humm also knew the local Estate Agent and different people who helped to get the keys of the owners or potential renters, some of whom were on holiday.

DC Ferguson: Yes.

Carpenter: And once the garage door was opened, it wasn’t a garage for single a car, it was like a "capsule", that went back about six or nine metres as it became larger where there was a bed in the corner, and all else, and it was when we were looking for this, searching this, the English man with greying hair who I didn’t know who he was, but who had explained to me.

DC Ferguson: Yes.

Carpenter: Humm... this garage belonged to a Portuguese man, the laundryman.

DC Ferguson: Yes.”

Dave knows the garage. Dave knows it belongs to a Portuguese. Dave knows it belongs to the Laundryman.

Now is the time to explain why we’re certain that Laundryman is Mário Marreiros. The reason is very simple, there are 3 people working in Ocean Club’s laundry and 2 of them are women: Vera Arez and Sílvia Cravinho.

The only laundryman Ocean Club has is Mário Marreiros.

Dave must know him and his son because he answers the question put to him by Carpenter about who lives in the garage:

“Carpenter: And while we entered there [the garage] I asked who lived there, he replied that his [the Laundryman's] son lived there and then there were toys because I was concentrated on the fifty year old English man [Greyhairman], this one is Portuguese [Laundryman], it was only afterwards when I later thought about what we were searching for, it didn't occur to me but I think it was because of this that I mentioned in my statement two weeks later, because I think there were some distortions.

DC Ferguson: Yes.

Carpenter: Of course with Murat, there is Murat and the Russian individual, you know....I thought that well, we might well be looking for the totally wrong person and the fact that a bed existed in the garage and some children's toys.

DC Ferguson: Yes.

Carpenter: I thought, ohhh...it’s worth mentioning this and that's the reason I mentioned this in my statement.”

A garage with a bed and children’s toys out of context lying around and this doesn’t raise red flags when looking for a possible abducted little girl?

No, because Carpenter was concentrating on Greyhairman, remember? Why Dave doesn't react to this as one would expect him to, we don't know.

Now, here Carpenter makes a big mistake. Garages in Portugal are commodities. Only in the last 25 years have buildings, all over Portugal, started to have communal parking spaces in their basements. Before that, there weren't that many cars and there were always enough parking spaces in the streets.

This lack of garages is aggravated in tourist regions like the Algarve. Buildings tend to exploit all their space, so are all made up of apartments which can be sold for seasonal use, or rented for holidays.

Garages are a luxury. Very, very rare. In the Algarve even more so. One may find communal garages but individual ones are very hard to find. Not that there aren't any, in fact we found 3:


We don't know if there any others but certainly anyone living in such a garage would be common knowledge in Luz.

The garage described seems to be quite big but is too small to be communal. And a bed, cupboards and toys in a communal garage is something completely unrealistic.

In the area Carpenter describes he searches, around block 5, there are no individual garages. Only a communal one at the end of Rua dr Agostinho da Silva, in a building that is not part of Ocean Club and it doesn't look like “Laundryman's garage”:


So we would really like to know exactly where this “Laundryman's garage” was located and who supplied the keys to open it.

Then Carpenter makes the link between Laundryman and the mystery van:

“DC Ferguson: Fine, now (inaudible) describe to me the Portuguese man, the laundryman, yes?

Carpenter: Yes.

DC Ferguson: I am certain that I read about this at the beginning, which (inaudible)?

Carpenter: I think that after, and coincides after with the fact that he was the laundryman and the van parked there, because as I have already explained, we were here in a small street above here which linked to the main road and to everything beside here on top, the rest was all pathways and I think that on two or three occasions I thought...this is a dead end road, there was this van was parked there, I never saw anyone and once more assumed that it would be the cleaning staff and only this thought coincided with the presence of the laundryman, that is if there was any answer to be given in relation to the connection between the van parked there and the laundryman.

DC Ferguson: Yes.

Carpenter: Murat here, I thought and the laundry thing here.

DC Ferguson: Yes

Carpenter: And because of it once more a reason why I mentioned the subject.”

A van that he never sees being used. It’s just a parked van:

“DC Ferguson: This is the part where you mention that there was a van, and as you said was parked at the back of Robert Murat’s garden, and you never saw anyone use the van, but you remember assuming that it had something to do with the cleaning staff.

Carpenter: Yes, to transport the bed linen and towels.

DC Ferguson: Yes. It says here that you never saw anyone drive it, you know only that you saw it parked, did you ever notice that it was missing or do you remember always seeing it there'

Carpenter: Humm, no...it was not always there, it was about two or three times that I saw it.”

What would be strange would be not to see any vehicle parked there. The cul-de-sac has parking spaces!


The Google Maps image shows cars parked there. And Google Maps' Street View shows vehicles on it.



One, a van. Could it be “Carpenter’s van”?

But then comes the surreal moment:

“DC Ferguson: Of what age did the laundry man appear to be?

Carpenter: Humm, I don’t remember clearly what I said, but obviously sometimes Europeans appear being older, because…

DC Ferguson:... (inaudible) the sun.

Carpenter: Yes with the sun, and a bit out of character, was what I stated in the statement (inaudible).

DC Ferguson: I’m trying to locate the front pages where you mentioned, but there is no description.

Carpenter: Forty five to fifty years old, I think.

DC Ferguson: I'm only thinking what age the man would have, the man that I met was difficult to say, but he would have been of an age to be able to have a small child living in the garage or it could be expected that the had a grown up child.

Carpenter: Oh, I think he would have been of an age able, you know.... of eighteen years, twenty or twenty two years old living in the back of the garage because it had large cupboards and other things, but to live in a garage it requires someone of eighteen years old or more, for a question of safety and even because it isn’t the best way to live.

DC Ferguson: No. Then as you say the children's toys seemed to you to be out of context'

Carpenter: Yes, yes.

DC Ferguson: Yes.

Carpenter: Yes, mainly because I’m thinking of someone aged eighteen or slightly older.”

Fascinating. Simply amazing. Carpenter describes a man he’s never seen but says “the man that I met” is 45 to 50 yrs old and skin darkened by the Sun.


He then tries to explain how he gets to the 45/50 number: because he estimates that whoever is living there is 18 to 22 yrs old so Laundryman must be around 45 to 50 yrs old.

Then why the talk about the Sun making people looking older than they really are? Was it or was it not a pure mathematical estimation?

He did say in 2007 “the man that I met was difficult to say”. To be very clear about this phrase this is what is in the PJ Files in Portuguese: “o homem que eu conheci era difícil de dizer”.

So where, when and under what circumstances did Carpenter meet Laundryman?

Didn’t we tell you that Carpenter was a fascinating man?

Maybe what he really meant to say was “the man that I was shown was difficult to say”. That would probably be more truthful.

But the irony of it all is that Marreiros, the laundryman, has said nothing to the PJ. The Black Hats cannot know because Marreiros was heard in Portuguese by a Portuguese. No need for anyone else to be present.

We are almost certain that Murat was trying to find out what Marreiros had said on May 8 when Gonçalo Amaral says the following in his book: “He [Robert Murat] has tried, in a furtive way, to look at the police files”.

Gonçalo Amaral must have based his words on what Inspector Pedro Varanda had to say on May 11, 2007: “It should be mentioned that this suspicion would be further consolidated, following the fact that I became aware that ROBERT MURAT tried furtively and insistently to look at the various procedural pieces that are part of the present inquiry, while the signatory looked at them, in order to carry out the inquiry of DIANNE WEBSTER.”

Dianne Webster was heard for the second time on that day, Friday May 11, and we now know that it was on the morning of that day that Murat was put on the PJ's radar. His every move was from then on being observed with the utmost attention. Thus the report from Inspector Pedro Varanda.

As we said, it's our opinion that when Marreiros says “he does not know of anything suspicious that could be related to the events” he's not saying what he saw simply because he just wanted to distance himself from the case.

But, after having heard Carpenter and all about the Laundryman's garage, son and out of context children's toys, the PJ just had to go back and speak to Marreiros again. This is what we think happened:

“Where’s the garage your son lives in?” they asked.

“Eh? What?!” he answered.

“You know the one with the bed, big cupboards and children’s toys..” they insisted.

“What???” he answered again. “Who has said that?!” he asked.

“A British guest says he saw children’s toys in a garage where your son lives” they answered.

“A British guest told you I had a garage? Is that so? And a son living there with children's toys? The 'Bifes' want to make me a patsy?! Well then, let me tell you about a 'Bife' guest who I saw the evening the girl disappeared, where exactly I saw him and I'll even tell you who he is because I saw him again the next day parading himself…”

If Carpenter hadn’t brought up Laundryman, we would never have known about Berry being in the stairs.

That’s what happens when you over-egg an over-egged pudding that wasn't a pudding in the first place and so didn't need any eggs.


7. Miscellaneous Feet-in-the-mouth

But what makes Carpenter fascinating doesn’t end in the 3 failed plots. During the course, or discourse of both his statements (one on May 17, 2007, the other on April 21, 2008 and both mixed up in the latter) the complexity of all the inner plots gets, in our opinion, the better of Carpenter.

In an attempt to connect the irreparably disconnected and patch up what is visibly shredded, Carpenter tries with this and that detail to bring some sort of what he thinks to be realism to a an absurd tale.

In doing so he fills his statement with things that it simply would have been better not said. The lapsus linguae.


7.1. The Carpenter family lapsus linguae

Has the reader noted that Carpenter leaves his apartment very early in the morning and doesn’t return to it? The closest he is to it is when he hears Murat’s voice but from then on he really seems to have had a busy day!

What did his family do all day? How did his family know what he was up to?

We don’t know.

The crèche records show no one from FP02 registered. There's a Lobster's page with no date that we're assuming to be that of May 4. It hasn't got anyone from FP02. The Jellyfish one of that day also doesn't have anyone from that apartment.

For all we know, or from what he seems to tell us, Carolyn Carpenter, 5 month FC and IC aged 3 and half spent their entire day holed up in their apartment with a view only of the thick vegetation of Murat's property.


7.2. The resort's welcome meetings lapsus linguae 

On the day of arrival:

“DC Ferguson: Approximately at 16:15 of that same day [Saturday, April 28] you attended a crèche meeting …

(…)

DC Ferguson: “On Sunday, April 29, Carolyn and I participated in the Mark Warner’s tennis group morning coffee where I met Gerry, Kate, Julian, Curtis , Rachael, Annie, Georgina, Annie’s sister, and Ann, there were other tourists whose names I have forgotten. There were, in total, approximately 16 people in that morning coffee and tennis was one of the activities that you, or both of you signed up during the week”

Gerry contradicts this. He says tennis meeting was on Saturday and makes no mention of a crèche meetings:

“Subsequently, at 17h00 [Saturday, April 28], the whole group, including children, went to the TAPAS situated at the back of the apartments, next to the pool, to attend a welcoming committee arranged by MARK WARNER where they met with instructors in tennis and sailing and other resort employees, which ended at 18h30, glasses of sangria having been served to them.”

Welcome meetings are held by some holiday companies. They usually try to sell coach trips to tourist sites. But to explain how a crèche works?

What about childless couples? Did they have to listen?

Same about tennis. Those not playing the sport had to sit through it? Carpenter says that only 16 attended the tennis morning coffee but the question remains, so did Ocean Club hold small meetings for their activities?

And if one signed up for different activities that had meetings at the same time? Which one was one supposed to attend?

Jez Wilkins says he only joined tennis on Monday. So, no essential information given at that coffee morning. At least none that stopped him from taking part in the activity.

The welcome meetings are about general things that interest all. Holidays organised by Mark Warner in the Ocean Club sound more like boot-camp than a holiday.

And a crèche meeting? What for? Isn’t this kind of information given at the crèche itself to every guest who requested to know details about it?

Those who didn’t check in on Saturday couldn’t use crèche because of lack of appropriate knowledge?


7.3. The McCann's trip to the beachlapsus linguae 

“DC Ferguson: …So during the week, you played tennis with Gerry about three times'

Carpenter: Ah ha.

DC Ferguson: On Sunday, Monday and Tuesday, it says here that you got on well, that he was of easy communication, was fun, he talked to you about golf which was his elected sport but wanted to improve his tennis during the week. On Sunday or Monday he sprained his ankle, but even like that he was able to play, and on Sunday morning he only played tennis with Kate, that you saw them both practising sport and they passed by you at the bar on the beach and that was Sunday or Monday around noon.”

Gerry and Kate only say they left the resort together on Tuesday after lunch on their famous trip to the beach. Not on Sunday nor on Monday. Carpenter says nothing about the kids being with them or about any buggy, double or single.

So what were the McCanns doing at the bar on the beach on Sunday or Monday around noon?


7.4. The tennis with Gerrylapsus linguae 

But what matters is that Carpenter says he plays with the McCanns 3 times: Sunday. Monday and Tuesday.

Then later on in the interview he says he also played on Thursday:

“DC Ferguson: Do you remember if you saw them before the evening [of May 3]?

Carpenter: Humm... I think that we played tennis during the afternoon of Thursday.

DC Ferguson: Yes.

Carpenter: I'm not sure of which, I think it was on Thursday that there were four individuals with whom we used to have tennis lessons together, and I think that I mentioned that in my statement, I would say that it was on Thursday that we played tennis and I think that it was about that we talked in the Tapas bar area.

DC Ferguson: OK, if you played tennis with Gerry, do you have any idea at what time it was?

Carpenter: Humm... from two to four or from two until any hour in the afternoon, I think it coincided with leaving the kids in the crèche and picking them up.”

Why not just say that the only day he didn't play with Gerry was on Wednesday? After all, he played with him all other days.

What a fascinating memory Carpenter has.


7.5. The interactions with Edmonds lapsus linguae

“DC Ferguson: “We arrived at about seven because we had the children with us and I saw a man sitting at the table next to us with three children.

Carpenter: Yes.

DC Ferguson: “He was going to take a plane on the next day to Switzerland, as the children's mother lived there, I had never met him before that night but, he ended up joining us for a coffee, he was a MW tourist.”

and

“DC Ferguson: And I imagine that your attention would have been turned to your family and (inaudible).

Carpenter: Yes, because we obviously had our two with us and we were on this side of the table, the individual alone with the three small children was here and IC was playing with them, so we were more or less a group if you wish to call it that, of which they were part, I think that all the ten members were there, and then we talked one with the others here and on the other side of the table.”

What Carpenter says above is like one saying “I took my cat to the local kennel and he had lots of fun playing with those dogs”.

Boys aged 6, 7 and 8 do not play with girls. At that age, boys play with boys and girls play with girls and each find the other gender unworthy of any sort of attention. That simple.

And much less with a 3 and half yr old one. Boys play with boys and in a foreign country, on their own, we’re certain the 3 Edmond boys played together and not with Carpenter’s daughter.

About Edmonds and his possible early departure from Praia da Luz we have challenged readers both in the blog and on Facebook to present any other evidence, besides Carpenter's words, that it happened.

We have yet to receive a single input to that effect.

About Philip Edmonds we will do a separate post. But as far as we know, Carpenter is the only source stating that Edmonds left earlier. He's not exactly the most reliable of sources. But he is a source who hasn't been denied. Because he's telling the truth or because to deny him would mean having to explain the absurdity of his claim?


7.6. The crossing of the street lapsus linguae

 When describing crossing Rua Dr Francisco Gentil Martins:

“DC Ferguson: “When I crossed the road outside of the reception I remember there were cars parked, I remember having taken some time checking if I could cross the road because there were cars parked to my left and I was carrying IC in my arms. They were approximately six metres away from me and I calculate some (inaudible) metres from the back of Gerry's apartment, I don’t remember anything about these cars, it’s normal for cars to be parked at that place and in the morning no longer there.”

(…)

DC Ferguson: My wife Carolyn mentioned to me on the following day that she vaguely remembered having heard someone calling "Madeleine, Madeleine", this after we had crossed the road in the exterior of MW reception and before entering our home. She does not remember from where the sound came or whether it was in a despairing tone, not paying more attention and only remembered the following day when we learned of Madeleine's disappearance

(…)

Carpenter: …the actual leaving of the restaurant, the way towards home, looking to my left to check that the road was clear and I didn't hear anything, humm.... Carolyn vaguely remembers hearing "Madeleine, Madeleine" and that was all until the next morning when I watched on TV.”

This is so ridiculous that it is quite amusing to debunk.

Carpenter forgets 2 things. First, that it’s 21:30 and that any car travels at that hour with their headlights on, so if any car was moving on that street at that time it would have been seen with sufficient anticipation and safety.


The second is that he’s British. A Brit when crossing a street instinctively looks right, never left. Because in UK that’s from where the immediate traffic is coming from. In Portugal one looks left, then right and then left again to cross the street. In the UK one looks right, then left and then right again.

To say he looked left is to go again instinct ingrained a whole lifetime. It doesn’t happen.

What Carpenter is trying to get across is that at 21:30 there’s no one on the street. Gerry, Jane, Jez and Bundleman have left the stage.

Carolyn’s Carpenter hearing “Madeleine, Madeleine” is just to add dramatic effects. No reasonable person on hearing that, wouldn’t go immediately to the police on hearing the news the next day.


7.7. The 4th (or 5th) man with little girl in arms lapsus linguae


But what really, really stands out in the crossing the street episode, is that we have ANOTHER man with a 3 and half yr old girl in his arms in Luz!!!

How many are there now? We have SY's Créche Dad, we have Smithman, we have the Portuguese on cellphone seen by some British woman (who was the reason for SY digging up West of Luz in June) and we now have Carpenter.

That’s 4. If we add Bundleman, there’s 5. All between 21:15 and 22:00. Amazing!


7.8. Carpenter the multi-tasker in a very, very small world lapsus linguae

Then Carpenter does a full circle by bringing up 2 characters from Jez Wilkins statement, Curtis and his girlfriend:

“DC Ferguson: And then the Mark Warner staff, obviously it was before your return while you were still investigating, the staff had photos of Madeleine that you handed to an individual called Curtis and his girlfriend for them to distribute.

Carpenter: Ah ah, yes.”

Carpenter the translator-pusher, the searcher, the investigator and now the photo distributor. Very, very active guest we would say.


7.9. The “who-you-gonna-call” lapsus linguae

When he returns home and when on May 14, and decides to intervene in the process, who does he call?

“DC Ferguson: Certainly you followed the development of the events on TV.

Carpenter: Yes.

DC Ferguson: Humm... then you say that on the 17th May you sent an email to Sky News about the description of an individual with about fifty of age, humm.... on the May 14 you caught the end of a report on the news which mentioned that Robert Murat had been referenced as a suspect.

Carpenter: Yes (inaudible) I spoke to the Sky reporter, I think Ian Woods, humm...did I put that there?

DC Ferguson: Its here, yes.”

Carpenter: Ah yes, yes and afterwards, humm...with Murat, well... I just caught a glimpse of him on TV, it was more my wife who phoned Philomena afterwards who then suggested that we contact the police support service.”

Now, from where does Philomena McCann’s phone number appear?


7.10. The missing v abducted or is it the other way around lapsus linguae

 Then we have Carpenter's outrage at the fact that people are treating Maddie as a missing girl instead of an abducted one:

“DC Ferguson: On Saturday morning, or on May 5 you spoke to a BBC TV reporter.

Carpenter: Yes.

DC Ferguson: You told them that you thought that some of the reporters were being unfair and incorrect because they were treating the situation as that of a missing child and not of a child who had been abducted.”

But, wasn’t he one of the first to assume she was only missing when he says “afterwards we walked to the beach in the attempt to find the scent, whether she had strayed alone or had fallen into the sea”.

If he really believed she was abducted, wouldn’t he have said instead whether the abductor had abandoned her at the beach or thrown her into the sea?  Did he also NOT buy the abduction?


7.11. The Carpenter family dinner lapsus linguae

One question must be asked: why didn't the Carpenters, on Thursday, May 3, use the same MW's night childcare services they used in the other nights?

Carpenter doesn't refer to any special event to celebrate that night. He doesn't give any reason for this change of routine.

No reason given for wanting to spend 2.5 hours in the Tapas having dinner with a baby and a toddler after on all other possible nights the family uses MW's available night childcare services.

But by coincidence, on the night Maddie vanishes, the Carpenter family decides, for no apparent reason, to spend, and we really mean spend time (between 19:00 and 21:30) and have dinner together.

And without a buggy, at least for the toddler as Carpenter says he carries her. The MW's double buggy Kate says she used for the family beach trip would have come in handy for this family wouldn't? Or were those only supplied to the McCanns?

But looking at the Tapas reservation sheet for that night, there are a couple of things that don't add up with the Carpenters:


Shouldn't the reservation be for “2 + 2” instead of the “2” that is there?

Shouldn't there be a “high chair” mentioned for the baby?

He doesn't speak of any high chair, or where the baby or their daughter IC and what they did during the 2.5 hours, in his colourful and detailed descriptions of the Tapas bar on the night of May 3. We're simply not buying the story about a 3 and half yr girl playing with 3 boys aged 6 to 8, and much less for that long.

Anyway, two adults, a baby and a toddler having a wholesome family time of fun for 150 minutes.

A small baby would not be able to sit in a high chair and certainly not for 2.5 hours and the 3 year old must have been stir crazy sitting at a table for that amount of time which shows it’s not realistic.


8. Questions

No, not from readers to us. Those are welcomed in the comments.

Questions from us to readers. To a very specific group of readers: our detractors.

They ask us: why would so many people lie for a group of people they didn't know from anywhere?

We return that question to them, so please consider it our question #1.

On our two previous posts “Bladderman” and “Planting a spy” we have put questions #2 and #3:

#2 - Why would 2 members of a group of 9, Gerry McCann and Jane Tanner lie for a person, Jez Wilkins, who Gerry had only supposedly met that week playing tennis and who Jane supposedly had never seen before?

#3 - Why would an ex-pat, Robert Murat, and a guest, Stephen Carpenter, who supposedly have never met each other have synchronised statements describing something that evidently didn’t happen?

At the end of the current lengthy 3-part post we ask 2 more questions:

#4 - Why would a guest, Stephen Carpenter, lie to protect other guests, Raj Balu and Neil Berry?

#5 - Why would a guest, Stephen Carpenter, lie to make an employee of the Ocean Club, Mário Marreiros, a suspect?

As we informed you last week, the content of this week's post was supposed to be part of “All the world’s a stage” which we published in 3 parts (Feb 24, Feb 27 and Mar 03).

We did it for 2 reasons.

The first, as the reader will be able to see, it’s quite long and we thought best to make it a post of its own.

The second, like we said at the end of the first third of the above mentioned post, “Carpenter is not only able to fail at these 3 tasks, as by losing himself in the script, he provides more information than he was supposed to. Even to the point of proving our blog right”.

In our opinion, Carpenter’s statement helps us prove what we have stated in our “Message to Newcomers” that is on the blog’s front page:

Carpenter helps us prove that the nannies were there to do babysitting outside the night crèche, so that the parents could have adult fun.

At a certain point of his April 21 2008 rogatory statement, Carpenter, when justifying the reason they chose Praia da Luz to spend their 2007 holiday week there, says: 

“DC Ferguson: [you, Carpenter]  Continue to describe your previous holidays and you chose this one because you were told that the “babysitter” service was available.”

Note that it's ““babysitter service” and not crèche, kids club or night crèche.

There continues to be no reference to night crèche.

According to Carpenter, Emma and Leanne took care of their children at night. Pauline, apparently during the day. Taking into account that the family stayed together and had dinner at the Millenium on Saturday and went to Tapas on Thursday we’re talking 2 nannies for 4 nights.

We do not have the Tapas Reservation Sheets for Saturday, April 28 nor for Monday, April 30, but the Carpenters don’t appear in those for Tuesday, May 01 or Wednesday, May 03.

So we can’t state that they used nannies for all the 4 nights in question but we can certainly make an educated guess that they did. After all, wasn't that the main reason they chose the holiday?


2. Name-remembrance, a Carpenter oddity

To remember the nannies names, Pauline, Emma and Leanne, so well seems to reveal that Carpenter suffers from some sort psychological disorder which only allows him to remember the name of those with who he has very brief contact with.

Neil Berry and Raj Balu, with who he says he spoke briefly with on May 03 in Tapas, he's able to remember their names but Philip Edmonds who he says his daughter plays with and gets into a conversation intimate enough to be told the other man would be leaving earlier the next day, he can only remembers him by “Tapas Guy”.

The only other interaction that Carpenter says he has with Berry and Balu, is what appears to have been a brief encounter with them during the searches, only long enough for them to tell him they had found suspicious “Greyhairman”, a 50 yr old man who apparently had bought all the apartments of Ocean Club's block 2.

The “Greyhairman” tale is of 2 men telling another about someone who they thought suspicious during a search for a missing girl.

Conversation between strangers while searching is not a personal one. For example, Cecília Pires, when invited to search (trespass) by a 50 yr old man, doesn’t get to know his name nor that of the elderly woman who the same man invites to join the trespassing. 

Searching is a collective effort with an objective. There's no “Hello, I’m Stephen Carpenter, would you like join me in the searching? What are your names?”

Unless, one does spend a long time with the same person in the same search. After a while the “I’m sorry, what can I call you? My name is Steve, what’s yours?” is inevitable.

Funny enough with Carpenter the opposite happens. The person he seems to spend the most time with searching is the one whose name slips away from him, starts as Dave the Englishman and then becomes the person who he no longer remembers the name of.

But he remembers John Hill’s name. Why?

Observe how is seems to be so familiar with who John Hill is, so certain of  his identity while trying to remember the name of the man he’s spent a lot of time with:

Could it have been John Hill instead, asks SY, oh, no, no, no, I know very well who John Hill is and not talking about him, Carpenter answers. Does the reader get to know the name of the manager of the hotels the reader has been to? Or remember the name of the manager of the last hotel the reader has been to?

The only interaction we know having happened between Carpenter and John Hill is when Carpenter observes Hill being literally ordered by Murat to open the apartments and complying:

“DC Ferguson: After he [Murat] left, he explained that Gerry was frustrated with the way in which the process was running and they went to talk to John Hill.

DC Ferguson: In Mark Warner and he [Murat] demanded that he [John Hill] open up all the Mark Warner rooms so that he [Murat] could check them and he [John Hill] called the cleaning ladies etc. to help and open all the empty apartments that were not necessarily in the Mark Warner complex, but for which they could have the key. At this time you also met an English man called Dave who lived in the area and helped the Ocean Club give you [plural, so Murat and Carpenter] the authority to enter in all possible apartments, some of the apartments in Gerry's block belonged to local owners and Dave helped to get the key to these same apartments so that you could search them, and then and then began the search, searching all in general.”

John Hill is not referred to as the “manager” or the “the man from the Ocean Club” who had the keys to the apartments. He’s John Hill. As in first and last name memorised.

Meanwhile the man who “helped the Ocean Club give you [Murat and Carpenter] the authority to enter in all possible apartments” is just vague Dave, the Englishman.

Also the two of Gerry’s friends who he has quite a long walk with that morning and are the ones who tell him that the child missing is indeed Maddie, are remembered only as Gerry’s “surfing friends”.

So, to remember the nannies who took care of their children, Pauline, Emma and Leanne, is strange to say the least.


3. Childcare in the Ocean Club that particular week

If by “babysitting services” Carpenter means it's the night crèche, then the contact between him and the nanny in question would be of only two courtesy greetings, one when filling up the night crèche register sheet when dropping off the children and the other when signing them off when picking them up.

But, as we will see later, the night crèche worked with 3 nannies each night, so to say “Emma and Leanne” is to be precise as to who took care of their children and the 2 can’t have worked all the nights in question. What about the names of all others?

And to say they only used the night crèche once (justifying knowing the names of the 3 nannies) then why choose a holiday because it has “the“babysitter” service” available if one only intends to use it once?

So it isn't the night crèche the kind of childcare that Carpenter says he used.

Let's see what Pauline, Emma and Leanne have said.

Pauline McCann, on May 07 2007, says nothing about night crèche or being a babysitter in any apartment. In fact, all she tells us is that she worked “at the Baby Club which is destined for children of ages between four months to one year of age”.

Emma Wilding, on May 07 2007, like Pauline, says nothing about night crèche or being a babysitter in any apartment:“...she has worked at the Mini Club that is destined for children between 3-5 years of age since April 29 up to now”.

Leanne Wagstaff, on May 06 2007, says nothing about being a babysitter in any apartment but does speak about some sort evening childcare service:

She refers to a “dinner service” (that continues to work on Sundays, a day that, according to Leanne all other childcare services are closed) and to a “19.30 to 23.30” free service.

Leanne doesn't specify whether this “19.30 to 23.30” free service is in the night crèche or in the guests' apartments.

Leanne says “she cannot think of anything that would be of use to the investigation” and we disagree- We think what she said would be very useful for the investigation.

Leanne surprises us with the allegation that the “19.30 to 23.30” service or “dinner service”, or what we are supposing to be the night crèche, was free of charge.

Haven’t we been led to believe all this time that the night crèche was an additional paid service? Could Leanne be confused?

To find out, nothing like going to see what Lyndsay Johnson, Childcare Manager and Leanne’s supervisor says:

“That she is in Portugal since last March 15, date from when she started to work in the tourist resort called the "Ocean Club", located in Praia da Luz (Algarve) where she performs the functions of supervisor of the infant educators ['educadores de infância' which literal translation would be kindergarten teachers, the term for nanny is ‘ama’, the first teaches, the latter is a carer] in the mentioned resort, as per working contract  previously signed in London (England).”

Lyndsay clearly assumes she’s the person responsible for the childcare services provided by the resort, as per Mark Warner’s personnel list, in which she's referred to as “Luz Ocean Club Childcare Manager”.

She describes quite well how the childcare was set up, namely for the group of children where Maddie spent her days while in Luz:

Questioned, further refers that the mentioned group of children, belonging to the "MiniClub", is supervised by one of her colleagues, with the name of Amy Thierry [we suppose to be Amy Tierney]. who, in turn, coordinates a group of nannies, with the names of Catriona Baker and Emma Wilding [who babysat at Carpenters], workers who were on duty to that group during the week in question, from April 29 to May 4 2007.

Lyndsay then describes how things worked:

“That the "MiniClub" starts at 09H00, making a pause for the lunch period between 12H30 and 14H30, beginning the afternoon period that goes from this time until 17H30. Further refers that from 19H30 the crèche of the resort  provides a complementary [as in additional] service "of dinner" (sic) which ends at 23H30, being that it has an additional cost, still the parents can request another service of "babysitting" that doesn't have a fixed schedule, being agreed between the parents and the deponent.”

Leanne was wrong, the “19.30 to 23.30” service or “dinner service” wasn’t free, according to her supervisor, Lyndsay, “it has an additional cost”.

So there were 2 different night childcare services offered that week in the Ocean Club:

One the “a complementary service "of dinner"” (between 19:30 and 23:30), NOT free of charge, and the other a “service of "babysitting" that doesn't have a fixed schedule, being agreed between the parents and the deponent”.


4. In-apartment babysitting in Luz?

Could Lyndsay be saying that the “service of "babysitting"” she speaks of was simply an extension after 23:30 of the “service "of dinner"”? If requested, on case-by-case, the nannies on duty at the night crèche would work extra-hours there? That the “babysitting” was a complementary service to the complementary “service "of dinner"” (19:30 – 23:30)?

We would think that if Lyndsay had meant to say this then she would have used the expression “after this time there was still another service of "babysitting" that doesn't have a fixed schedule, being agreed between the parents and the deponent.”. She doesn't.

But we have someone that clarifies that for us and that person is Catriona Baker, under whose care Maddie was that week, in her statement of May 06 2007:

So, the babysitting was done in the guests' apartments.

However, the same Catriona Baker, strangely or then maybe not, forgets to mention anything about both the “Dining out Service” and the in-apartment babysitting service in her rogatory statement of April 14 2008, except when rectifying something in her May 06 2007 statement.

We can't understand what exactly she is trying to have corrected but here is what she said: ““dining out service” that I mentioned being available to the adults, being that the children would be given to the care of a responsible one during dinner time”.

But Stacey Portz, Head of Juniors, on May 06 2007, confirms the existence of both services:

No question about it. 2 childcare services. Three childcare personnel mention both of them clearly, Lyndsay (Childcare Manager), Catriona (Nanny) and Stacey (Head of Juniors).

One service closely linked with the parents’ dinner that was between 19.30 and 23.30, taking place directly in the floor above the resort’s main reception (which we presume to be what is presently designated as the night crèche) and the other, a babysitting service in the guests' apartments.

And why is there no mention of this babysitting service by any of the T9? Didn't they know about it? Was it because they missed that Saturday crèche meeting that Carpenter speaks of?

But the question remains, the service directly linked to guests’ dinners, the one we're supposing to be night crèche, was it for free or did the guests have to pay for it?

Leanne says it’s free,

Lyndsay says it’s paid,

Catriona and Stacey say nothing about it. We’re tied at this point. Let’s see what others have to say about it:

Amy Tierney, on May 06 2007, confirms it’s free: “To question asked, states that in case guests desire it, they can request from the "Staff" services to take care of the children between 19.30 to 23.30, however, Madeleine's parents never did it, although this service was free.”. Leanne’s exact words by the way.

Shinead Vine, on May 07 2007, also confirms said service was free: “Adds that Madeleine McCann’s parents could have used, free of charge the dinner time service, or could have requested a babysitter (paid service), questioned answers she cannot see any reason for not having done so.”

Jacqueline Williams, on May 08 2007, not only confirms that it was free as well but also confirms the existence of the second paid babysitting service: “Questioned, the deponent clarifies that the crèche of the resort in questions, also offers free of charge the possibility for the parents of leaving their children at the care of infant educators during the dinner period, between 19H15 and 23H00…”

If democracy was truth, then the childcare service linked to parents’ dinner was free. If there was a poll, only 1 vote said it was paid (Lyndsay Johnson) while 4 votes said it was free (Leanne Wagstaff, Amy Tierney, Shinead Vine and Jacqueline Williams).

However, 9 of the 14 childcare personnel wouldn't have voted in that poll. Catriona Baker, Charlotte Pennington, Emma Wilding, Kirsty Maryan, Pauline McCann, Rhiannon Fretter, Sarah Williamson, Stacey Portz and Susan Owen simply provide no opinion about it.

But majority doesn't necessarily mean truth. Our blog, in it's lonesome fight in our corner of the internet is quite the proof of the opposite.

This question needs further clarification.

So why all the secrecy about this babysitting service when it comes to the Maddie case? For all we know, the McCanns had only the option of night crèche and that was it.

Maybe it was made a “secret” because if outed would help explain why no child was left unattended that week in the Ocean Club while their parents were out doing what they thought of doing.

But the in-apartment babysitting service which has been “hidden” from  all of us interested in this case was never a secret: The MW's website announced it quite clearly:


First note, shouldn't something like “Mark Warner do ask that if you require this service that you book at least 24 hours in advance. Due to high demand this service is subject to availability and unfortunately cannot be guaranteed”, which is said about the Babysitting service, be also said somewhere else in the site about the Tapas restaurant and its extraordinary high demand for reservations to dine there?

The wording seems pretty apt for what is said to have been happening with the unusual high demand the Tapas restaurant dinners are said to have. Who can forget the queues to get a reservation? We're sure that all those who were in them, won't ever.

Second note, the “Babysitting” service is “for an additional cost” but no extra costs referred to the “Evening crèche service” so it was for free. Question settled.

So Jacqueline, Leanne and Shinead, the nannies, were right and Lyndsay, the supervisor, is wrong!

What we find very strange is that having there been 2 night childcare services available to guests, “Babysitting” and “Evening crèche service”, 6 out of 14 childcare personnel mention neither.

It's the cases of Emma Wilding, Kirsty Maryan, Pauline McCann, Rhiannon Fretter, Sarah Williamson and Susan Owen. Even stranger when one of them, according to Carpenter, had been a babysitters that week Emma Wilding.

Of the rest of the 8 childcare personnel, 4 mention the “dinner service” but say nothing about babysitting: Amy Tierney, Charlotte Pennington, Leanne Wagstaff and Shinead Vine. Why mention one and not mention the other?

Leanne Wagstaff mentions the “dinner service” but says nothing about babysitting even though, according to Carpenter, she had been one that week.

Only 4 out of the 14, do speak about ALL the childcare services available to guests that week: Catriona Baker, Jacqueline Williams, Lyndsay Johnson and Stacey Portz

One of them, the supervisor Lyndsay Johnson, gets wrong the fact that the “dinner service” was free by saying it had an additional cost. If anyone was to know that wasn't the case, it would be her, so why make this incomprehensible mistake?

To make us believe the T9 didn't use the night crèche because it was paid for?

All this time we thought that the T9 were just a group of misers who didn't want to let go of a few quid and use the night crèche. Now we find out they're just lazy. The childcare “dinner service” was free. Zilch. Nothing. Niente.

This slothful group preferred to set up a tiring child checking system rather than drop and pick up their children from crèche, which they did twice a day anyway.

One of them, David Payne, even brought along a listening monitor. As Jane Tanner says she also does in her rogatory statement. Are Payne and Tanner saying they had planned all along to leave the kids on their own, even before they realised the Mill was too far to walk?

But this “miser” perception is just a myth. As far as we know, no financial reasons have been given for the T9, allegedly, not using the childcare “dinner service”.

Gerry McCann says it’s because the brochure said “the resort did not provide a “"baby listening" service”:

“He adds that the only stipulation by the group was that the apartments had to be close to one another because, contrary to the tour brochure, the resort did not provide a "baby listening" service, that is, a service in which a group of employees would ?listen? to hear if children were asleep in their apartments while the parents were away. He doesn't know exactly how it works in practice, he never having used it, but he knows that other MARK WARNER resorts use this form of checking, some of his group members having had access to it on previous holidays, though he does not know exactly who. He relates that, for this reason DP decided to use the listening devices (personal intercoms) to monitor his children, though he had not used them on other holidays that they had spent together”.

In fact, he’s right. Ocean Club didn’t provide a baby listening service, only a much safer and personalised babysitting one, done by professionals. Or a night crèche, with the same professional people, for no additional cost.

Kate McCann, on May 09 2011, says to the Daily Mail that she really didn’t even think about it but if she had it would have been unwise to leave the kids with “someone neither we nor they knew”:

She said: 'I could argue that leaving my children alone with someone neither we nor they knew would have been unwise, and it's certainly not something we'd do at home, but we didn't even consider it.”

Thank goodness she didn’t find it unwise to leave them with people neither they, Gerry or Kate, nor Maddie and the twins knew during the day otherwise the children would have spent their holiday, with the exception of one beach trip, holed up in the apartment. Certainly the McCanns would have interrupted their tennis and jogging so they could check on them every half an hour.

Leaving the children with professional childcare carers during the day, wise, leaving the children with professional childcare carers during dinner, unwise. Go figure.

So we agree with Shinead Vine that the McCanns “could have used, free of charge the dinner time service, or could have requested a babysitter (paid service), questioned answers she cannot see any reason for not having done so.”

Why there’s a general perception that there wasn’t any in-apartment babysitting service available that week in Luz and that there was a night crèche available for an added fee which the T9 were unwilling to pay, we can only congratulate those who have strived all these years to create misinformation about the case on a job well done.

Gleefully supported by those who claim to have read the files thoroughly.

Why? Because it makes the McCanns (and the T7) look bad and anything that makes the McCanns (and the T7) look bad is very easy to pass on and have assimilated as fact.

As the wise Mark Twain said, “It's easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled”. We won't stop trying.

Yes, the service was offered and Carpenter says he has used it, but was there really in-apartment babysitting in the guests' apartments?

To find out let's see how each childcare worker describes how they got to know Maddie had disappeared.

Amy Tierney, Head of Minis, May 06 2007 – “States that on the night of the disappearance she was on duty and immediately went to the room to check if the child was hiding. She saw that the shutters were raised and that the window was partially opened. It was then that she began looking in the closets to see if the child was hiding there.”

Jacqueline Williams, Nanny, May 08 2007 – “That on the past May 3 2007, at 22H15, being the deponent exercising her functions in the MiniClub, in the service called “Dinner period” (sic), together with her colleagues Charlotte and Amy…”

Charlotte Pennington, Nanny, May 07 2007 – “That on the past May 3 2007, at 22H15, being the deponent exercising her functions in the MiniClub, in the service called “Dinner period” (sic), together with her colleagues Jackie and Amy…”

Lyndsay Johnson, Childcare Manager, May 06 2007 – “Questioned the deponent clarifies that when [at 22:20 by her colleague Amy] she was informed of Madeleine McCanns disappearance she was alone in her residence, having immediately gone out and initiated the procedure above described”.

Catriona Baker, Nanny, April 14 2008 – “At the end of the work day that day, I headed home. Some of my colleagues were going out but I was too tired to accompany them. I stayed in the apartment with my friend Rhiannon Fretter and we ended up falling asleep. Two colleagues, returned later and asked me where I had been, because Madeleine had disappeared. I was confused and did not understand was happening. They eventually explained to me what had happened around 22h30-22h35. Emma Wilding told me that Madeleine was reported missing. Leanne Wagstaff also was present”.

Rhiannon Fretter, Nanny, May 07 2007  - “That on the past May 3 2007, at 23H30, while she was in her apartment where she resides, accompanied by Cat [Catriona Baker] , who equally resides there, she was told by Leanne that Maddie had disappeared and no one could find her. Quickly, the deponent got dressed and went outside where she integrated a group composed by staff elements, who did searches in the tourist resort and all over Praia da Luz without effect.” Catriona Baker says she’s warned around 22:30 by Emma Wilding in the same apartment.

Emma Wilding, Nanny, May 07 2007 – “That night around  22.00 she took knowledge that Madeleine had disappeared and together with another colleague helped in searching for her”. Emma doesn’t specify exactly where she is but Catriona Baker says she’s in the apartment when around 22:30 she’s warned by Emma Wilding, with Leanne Wagstaff present. However, as will be seen, Susan Owen places her in the ‘Mirage’ bar at 22:45.

Leanne Wagstaff, Nanny, May 06 2007 – “…on the night in question, wasn’t on duty and had gone to a bar with two colleagues” and “when she was heading from home to the bar, around 22H30, she saw her colleague Amy in the garden, with a torch looking for something. [She] Immediately questioned her [Amy] about what was happening, having she [Amy] said that a child has disappeared. At the beginning she thought it was a prank, but after believed and began equally to search”. However Catriona Baker places her in apartment at 22:30 and Rhiannon says she’s there but an hour later, at 23:30.

Kirsty Maryan, Nanny, May 07 2007 –“That on the past May 3 2007, at 22H30, after having gone out of the apartment where she lives, near the mentioned resort, together with two other colleagues of her, with the names Leanne and Sarah, she found her colleague Amy. That during such contact she was informed by her colleague Amy that Madeleine McCann had disappeared, and so they were looking for her. For this reason, the deponent, together with the mentioned colleagues, initiated also the search for Madeleine McCann”.

Sarah Williamson, Nanny, May 06 2007 – “That in the past May 3 2007, at 22:30, after having gone out of the apartment where she lives, near the mentioned resort, together with two other colleagues of her, with the names Leanne and Kirsty, she found her colleague Amy. That during such contact she was informed by her colleague Amy that Madeleine McCann had disappeared, and so they were looking for her. For this reason, the deponent, together with the mentioned colleagues, initiated also the search for Madeleine McCann”

Susan Owen, Nanny, May 07 2007 – “That on the past May 3 2007, around 22H45, being in the bar called “Mirage”, together with her colleagues, whose names she only knows to be Emma, Shinead, Najoua [Najoua Chekaya - Aerobics Instructor], Hayley [Hayley Aldridge - Head of Viva Sports and Massage Therapy] and Stacy, which is near the delimitation of the area of the mentioned resort, after returning from the washroom, was informed by her colleague Hailey that a child with about 3 (three) years of age who  was lodged in “the Ocean Club”, had disappeared.”

Shinead Vine, Nanny, May 07 2007 – “States that on the night of the disappearance, she wasn’t on-duty, so she had gone to a bar with some colleagues. States that around 22h45, a group of people entered the bar, already looking for the child, it was when she had knowledge that she had disappeared. It was then that she equally started to search for the girl”.

Stacey Portz, Head of Juniors, May 07 2007 – Doesn’t mention where she was but Susan Owen says she was at the ‘Mirage’ bar with her and other colleagues Emma, Shinead, and Stacey

Summing up:

- 3 on duty at the “Evening crèche service” – Amy Tierney, Jacqueline Williams and Charlotte Pennington.

- 3 in their residences: Lyndsay Johnson, Catriona Baker and Rhiannon Fretter

- 3 at the ‘Mirage bar’: Susan Owen, Shinead Vine and Stacey Portz

- 2 having gone out of apartment, we suppose on the way to the ‘Mirage bar’: Kirsty Maryan and Sarah Williamson

- 2 unclear: Leanne Wagstaff and Emma Wilding. Leanne says she’s going to the bar with Kirsty and Sarah but at same time Catriona baker places her inside apartment; and Emma who is placed by Catriona Baker inside the apartment at 22:30 already knowing about the disappearance and by Susan Owen at the ‘Mirage’ bar at 22:45 ignorant of what had happened.

All accounted for, except one, Pauline McCann who only says “in what concerns the disappearance in itself, refers that she was shocked as this was the first time such has ever happened to her”

None refer having done any babysitting that night.

Not a single one.

Was the Carpenter family the only one that used the Babysitting service that week? It seems to be the case.

By the way, we find it strange that the Carpenters use this paid service because they chose a modest 1 bedroom apartment having 2 children and then prefer a paid service to a free one that takes place in the same building in which they are lodged in. Except, by coincidence, on Thursday, May 03 2007, the night Maddie disappears.

But who are we to judge? They preferred to save on the apartment fee and rather spend it on a personalised babysitting service. It was their choice to make and we respect that.

But it seems that on the night they decide to dine as a family, May 03 2007, no else in the entire resort uses the Babysitting service. Fascinating!

The only one who could be babysitting would be Pauline McCann. She doesn’t even hint at that.

We would like to point out a detail that we think important about her not being “included” in the other groups: age difference.

From the eldest to the youngest on May 03 2007: Pauline McCann (41,4 yrs),Stacey Portz (27,0 yrs), Lyndsay Johnson (24,5 yrs), Rhiannon Fretter (22,6 yrs), Emma Wilding (22,1 yrs), Shinead Vine (22,0 yrs), Susan Owen (22,0 yrs), Amy Tierney (21,7 yrs), Jacqueline Williams (21,0 yrs), Sarah Williamson (20,3 yrs), Charlotte Pennington (20,2 yrs), Catriona Baker (19,7 yrs), Leanne Wagstaff (19,0 yrs) and Kirsty Maryan (18,9 yrs).

Clearly an age difference between Pauline and the rest which might explain why her statement differs from all others. She, in our opinion, possesses the wisdom of saying as little as possible that comes with age to certain people.

Fortunately for us seeking the truth, not all.

But even if Pauline was a babysitter that night, she would have been the only one so why the heads-up “Mark Warner do ask that if you require this service that you book at least 24 hours in advance. Due to high demand this service is subject to availability and unfortunately cannot be guaranteed” that MW had up on their website about this service?

A service with no demand gets a warning about scarce availability while another, with a VERY high demand, the dining at Tapas bar, gets none. Fascinating.

That’s a sure way of getting unhappy customers. Look at what happened to Neil Berry and Raj Balu who had to resign themselves to a take-away dinner in the apartment just because Berry couldn’t get a reservation for one of Tapas bar scrumptious and mouth-watering dinners.

A take-away meal so bad that the only thing Neil Berry remembers about it was that it had red cabbage.

Taking into account that the night crèche was for no additional pay, as we have seen it was, shouldn’t there be a warning about availability about this service as well?

Pauline McCann, on May 07 2007, in answer to a question says that “there are parents who leave their respective children all day and during all days of the vacations in the respective clubs and such is normal within the English culture”.

It’s a fact that dinner time in Latin countries is much later than it is in the UK. In Portugal to dine before 20H00 is to have an early dinner, and if one is dining out, then 22:00 is not an uncommon hour to start.

So, we think that if there would be an occasion for British parents to have a time of their own in Luz, would be at dinner time.

Kids would have their meals at normal UK-time would then be dropped off at this free of charge service allowing parents to enjoy an evening, on their own, eating in a restaurant downtown, or even renting a car go to Lagos.

Children taken care of responsibly means heads clear to enjoy a pleasant evening in each other’s company.

And if one didn't use the daytime childcare, it would be a family holiday during the day and a romantic one in the evenings and night. Quite an idyllic set-up, we would say. 

As we saw, there were only 3 nannies on for night crèche duty. That means, surely, the service had a limited capacity and as we have just explained, we think it would be a service with a high demand.

So, we repeat, such an offer should have come with a warning about its limitations. So instead of putting “Mark Warner do ask that if you require this service that you book at least 24 hours in advance. Due to high demand this service is subject to availability and unfortunately cannot be guaranteed” associated with the “Evening crèche service” but it doesn’t:


Two services provided that need the warning, Tapas dinners and “Evening crèche service” don't get it. The one that doesn't, Babysitting, does.

According to Andy Redwood, on May 03 2007, 8 families used the “Evening crèche service” while, as we have just shown, no one used the Babysitting one.

Apparently the Ocean Club prefers to let its clients have a “Berry experience” which is to find out at the last minutes they have their immediate plans ruined and so have to opt for something else at the last minute.

By the way, has anyone seen anything referred to anywhere about this possible limitation in terms of number of children that the “Evening crèche service” could take in?

We haven’t but it seems obvious to us if the childcare service meant to keep their ratio of  children-per-nanny they were providing during the day intact then with only 3 nannies on-duty it couldn't possibly risk having all the kids that were there during the day be left there in the evening, now could it?

After all, there’s only so many children 3 nannies can take care of, right?

But what strikes us as really, really strange is how 14 childcare workers differently name the exact same service for which 13 of them are put on a rota for.

As shown, MW’s website calls it “Evening crèche service”. Note, it has the word “crèche” in it.

Let’s see what the childcare personnel call it:

Lyndsay Johnson, Childcare Manager, May 06 2007 – “a complementary service "of dinner"”

Stacey Portz, Head of Juniors, May 06 2007 – “Dining out Service”

Amy Tierney, Head of Minis, May 06 2007  – “the dinner time service” and ““Staff” services who take care of the children between 19h30 and 23h30”

Catriona Baker, Nanny, May 06 2007 and April 14 2008– “Dining out Service”

Jacqueline Williams, Nanny, May 08 2007 –“service called “Dinner period””

Charlotte Pennington, Nanny, May 07 2007 – “service called “Dinner period””

Leanne Wagstaff, Nanny, May 06 2007 – “19.30 to 23.30” service” and “dinner service”

Shinead Vine, Nanny, May 07 2007 – “Dinner time service”

“Service "of dinner"”, “Dining out Service”, “the dinner time service”, “Dinner period”, “dinner service” and “19.30 to 23.30 service”, are all about dinner. Nothing, absolutely nothing about crèche or even evening.

Plus, 6 nannies, Rhiannon Fretter, Kirsty Maryan, Susan Owen, Emma Wilding, Pauline McCann and Sarah Williamson, do NOT even refer to a service which they are on a rota for and have done it many times since they arrived in Luz.

If one is to divide 13 nannies required to be on duty by 3 then that results in an average of doing this particular service every 4th night. The rota for 3 nannies on duty out of 13 nannies refreshes itself every 14th rota day:


How is it possible for them to forget to mention it? Was it available or was it not?

Did we say 13 nannies?

Well, even there, it seems there is some confusion:

Amy Tierney, Head of Minis, May 06 2007 – “Adds that the staff dedicated to the children has a total of eleven workers, who work in shifts in what concerns the 19h30 to 23h30 schedule.”

Leanne Wagstaff, Nanny, May 06 2007 – “Adds that the staff dedicated to the children has a total of eleven workers, who work in shifts in what concerns the 19h30 to 23h30 schedule.”

Shinead Vine, Nanny, May 07 2007 – “Adds that the staff dedicated to the children has a total of 15 workers, who work in shifts in what concerns the 19h30 to 23h30 schedule.”

Honestly, we cannot come to the 11 or 15 nannies.

The closest we could was to take out of that service's rota Lyndsay Johnson (Childcare Manager), Stacey Portz (Head of Juniors) and Amy Tierney (Head of Minis) and end-up with Amy’s and Leanne’s 11. The only problem is that we know that Amy was on-duty on May 03, so her name is on the rota.

No idea where Shinead got her 15 nannies from.

Another question that assaults us is this, why, of the 8 childcare personnel, who mention the “whatever-dinner-whatever” service  do 2 get its schedule wrong?

Lyndsay Johnson (supervisor), Amy Tierney, Catriona Baker, Leanne Wagstaff, Shinead Vine and Susan Owen say it is from 19:30 to 23:30 but Charlotte Pennington and Jacqueline Williams, by coincidence on-duty at that service on May 03 2007, says it's from 19:15 to 23:00. Why this discrepancy?

Then there’s Catriona Baker, on April 14 2008, describing, in detail the childcare procedures about what is done when a child is dropped at and collected from the childcare facilities:

Quite detailed indeed, only fails to mention that the page also has location of parent and room number.

Constructive criticism, we think that rather than parent’s location it would be better have there the parents' contact information.

In fact the parents' location seems quite a useless piece of information. If a parent at 09:00 writes down that s/he’s at the pool, does that mean s/he can’t go to the beach? Or any other place s/he decides to go? Does s/he first have to pass by the crèche and change it?

But the question that has to be asked is, why when Catriona speaks of “there is a separate page for the morning shift and another for the afternoon one” she doesn’t speak about the one for the dinner/evening/night shift?

There had to be one, right? If it didn't, why didn't it?

She doesn’t mention it, does she? Why? Maybe because there wasn't one?

And by the way, the group in which Catriona works, the Lobsters, couldn’t care less about procedures and rules. The Lobsters’ pages have the mornings and the afternoons sessions on the same page:


Catriona speaks of rules she’s the first to break.

The suspicion that childcare shown to be provided in the Ocean Club that week was not exactly the one that was really available is further confirmed when we're told that a service provided by a tourist resort has a “day-off”.

In hotels, all services that involve direct contact with guests work 7 days a week, 365 days a year. Some, like the reception, work 24/7/365. People have the days off (they’re rightfully entitled to them) but services don’t.

In Luz, we have already seen and found very strange, that the Tapas restaurant is said to close on Saturdays.

As on Tripadvisor customer reviews the Tapas is hardly referred to and we only have the word of people we don’t grant any reliability and documentation which we know to be false to prove that it was so, we will maintain our disbelief in that weekly closure..

Now, we have the childcare services closing a day a week. Two nannies say it was on Sunday:

Amy Tierney, May 06 2007 – “To refer that the schedule of the Club is from 9h00 to 12h30 and from 14h30 to 17h30, and that is closed on Sundays, working only the dinner time service”.

Leanne Wagstaff, Nanny, May 06 2007 – “To refer that the schedule of the Club is from 9h00 to 12h30 and from 14h30 to 17h30, and that is closed on Sundays, working only the dinner time service”.

But unlike with the Tapas, with the childcare service we have proof that someone is not telling the truth and that proof comes from the nannies themselves:

Stacey Portz, Head of Juniors, May 06 2007 – “That since Sunday, April 29 to Thursday, May 3, she was with those two children [McCann twins] every day”.

Catriona Baker, Nanny, May 06 2007 – “More answers that from that day [Sunday, April 29], until Thursday, May 3 2007, she was with the child [Maddie] every day, however not being able to specify if she attended on Sunday morning”

Charlotte Pennington, Nanny, May 07 2007 – “So the deponent clarifies that on 2 distinct days, to know on Sunday (April 29 2007) and on Thursday (May 3 2007) the deponent contacted Madeleine McCann personally, telling her stories and talking to her”

Both Amy and Leanne are mistaken or Stacey, Catriona and Charlotte are. No way around it.

We would say Amy and Leanne are, otherwise this Jellyfish page for “29th April 2007” page makes no sense at all:

Are both Amy and Leanne confused? Could it be the day-off is Saturday, like Jacqueline says it is?

Jacqueline Williams, Nanny, May 08 2007 – “Questioned clarifies that the resort’s crèche offered to the guests of “The Ocean Club” works every day of the week, except on Saturdays, day off of all infant educators who work in the mentioned tourist resort, working only a support service for any eventuality that involves only two educators on a rota for it”.

If so, then what meeting did the Carpenters attend on Saturday?

And a day-off is not something one gets confused about. If the company where one works at has a set weekly day-off then all those who work for it, without exception, know on which day of the week that day-off is.

And why do only 3 of 14 childcare personnel speak about this day-off? Lapsus linguae or uncoordinated invention?

Also Catriona Baker, on April 14 2008 speaks clearly of continuity, of uninterrupted service between weeks: “The work in the clubs was rotational and the personnel is changed weekly. If a family stays lodged for a period longer than a week, I would stay in the same club to continue to take care of those children”. 

As can be easily seen, there’s something completely not right about the childcare that is said to have been provided that week in Luz. At least in the way it is described to have been by its various participants.

Are we implying that there was no childcare in Luz that week? No, we aren’t. We think there was and it was an appropriate and a professional one.

What we are saying is that we think is that the childcare services “normally” (as per high-season) offered by the resort were simply not in place yet. Nor, at that time, were meant to be in place.

Let us try to use another service as an example.

If, on that particular year of 2007 one decided to spend some days in that resort, say, in February, would one be able to use the resort's watersports facilities if one wanted to?

No, one couldn’t. Why? Because it wasn’t in-place yet.

The watersports personnel, according to the Mark Warner staff list, says they arrived in Luz mid to late March 2007. Before they arrived there was no Ocean Club watersports available.

So was the website lying when it advertised watersports then on their website? No, because any reasonable person knows that seasonable products are seasonable. The Ocean Club's watersports weren't, logically, YET in place. They would be when the right time came.

The childcare personnel also arrived at the same time. So in 2007, before March, we can assume that any guest who came found, just like with the watersports, that the childcare wasn’t in place yet for that year. The guest wouldn’t protest and understand it was seasonable.

We are supported in this reasoning by Kirsty Marian, on May 07 2007: “Clarifies that she started to work on this resort last year [in 2006] where she worked from July to October”.

That makes sense. High season starts in July, ends in September. Probably her 2006 contract ended early October.

What doesn’t make sense is being hired from March 21 to Nov 07. That’s 14.5 weeks before Jul 01, when “Summer Surge” begins. And even if one considers high-season beginning on Jun 01, that’s still 10 weeks too early!

What in our opinion, happened in Luz, was that between the arrival of the childcare personnel in March 2007, was the childcare provided was tailored to the kind of guests expected, mid-upper and upper class swingers.

During the day, that particular childcare, used the existing MiniClub (children below 5 yrs of age) facilities and for the night, various “night crèches” would be set up scattered all over the resort, one per building where these specific guests were lodged, in one of its unused apartment.

We’re not talking about trespassing.

In our opinion, that particular apartment per building would be rented just like all the others rented ones were. Only instead of being rented by a person it would be rented through some sort of arrangement between the resort and the swinging organising structure.

It wouldn’t be used by a “family” but during the evening and night would be used as mini-crèche by the children and respective childcare personnel performing their professional duties. The children would be taken care of waiting to be collected by the parents when they returned from their night out.

For the owner and the resort, it would be renting the apartment earlier than expected and for the swinging organising structure a way of guaranteeing proper childcare to their “clients” to meet their expectations that their children's safety was being well taken care of and to their full satisfaction.

With their satisfaction their return. With their return their funds. And any local economy welcomes mid-upper and upper class funding.

It was a win-win situation for all. Only a disaster could spoil this. But disasters do happen and they do come in many forms, sizes and shapes.

In this case it was not the unfortunate loss of a life of a little girl when two adults were together when “conventional behaviour” provided no reason for them to be together. The disaster was how all reacted to that loss of life, simplifying what couldn't be simplified and underestimating the consequences of their actions and the capabilities of the actions by others.

This would explain why the childcare personnel refer to a specific service on very vague terms, each one calling it what came to mind and none by what MW’s website calls it. Why because what was announced by the site wasn't yet in place, and what was in place was not announced in any site.

“Service "of dinner"”, “Dining out Service”, “the dinner time service”, “Dinner period”, “dinner service” and “19.30 to 23.30 service”, are simply terms used by people who are, in our opinion, speaking about a service they have never performed and want to hide the one they are indeed performing. The first has to have “conventional”written all over it while the second is completely unconventional.

Any service that is shared by a group of people that have to perform it every 4 days certainly has a shared name by that group. If they started performing this service on March 22, then on May 03, (43 days) then it would mean that all of them (except for one) would have performed it 10 times. No way would they not be totally familiar with it. With its name, its schedule, its procedures.

The varied terminology used to identify it denounces that is not the case.

And that’s why the term “night crèche” appears.

Note that in the Daily Mail article from which we quoted Kate, it’s referred to as “babysitting service offered by the Ocean Club”. Gerry speaks of a “babysitting listening service”. None of the T9 refer to it as night crèche. Almost a year later, Charlotte Pennington still doesn’t call it that.

The term “night crèche” only appears later, much later.

While the vague “whatever-dinner-whatever” terminology seems to indicate something that may only be sporadically used.

Calling it “night crèche” makes it seem to be much more of a permanent, fixed and structured service.

It reinforces the alleged neglect of the T9. The “night crèche” was there, it was visible (Carpenter even went to a meeting exclusively dedicated to it) and there’s absolutely no reasonable justification for them not to have use it so the fact they didn’t, aggravates their negligence even further.

We have seen that on duty for the “Evening crèche service” were 3 nannies – Amy Tierney, Jacqueline Williams and Charlotte Pennington.

Let's see how they get involved in the Maddie case.

Let’s start with Charlotte Pennington, on May 07 2007:

Jacqueline Williams, on May 08 2007, confirms it was a woman guest who informs those on duty at the “night crèche”:

The other nanny on-duty, Amy Tierney, on May 06 2007, doesn’t describe how she got to know that Maddie had disappeared. Her statement reminds us of Kate McCann when describing the family trip to the beach where she starts the story with the family already the beach, as we showed in our post “Is Kate McCann a liar?”.

Amy starts almost already in the apartment but is sufficiently clear “she was on duty” that she first is at the “night crèche”.

The Portuguese have 4 ways of describing time, from the most precise to the least: “às 20H00”, “pelas 20H00”, “cerca das 20H00” and “por volta das 20H00”.

The first two show certainty and would be translated as “at” and the other are much more generic and would be by “about” or “around”.

So when Charlotte says “pelas 22H15” and Jacqueline “pelas 22.05”, they are being quite precise in terms of the time the mysterious woman guest walked into the “night crèche” facilities and informed them that Maddie had disappeared. And that the parents needed the nannies' help.

But who is this woman guest, who between 22:05 and 22:15, is the one who initiates the involvement of Ocean Club's childcare personnel into the whole affair?

We're not told.

We know she’s a mother of a child belonging to the Toddlers 2 group, the one the McCann twins attended.

We know she has her child in the “night crèche” that night.

We know that, according to Jacqueline she “ended her stay last week”, which means she had reservations up until either May 04 (Friday) or May 05 (Saturday) as on May 03 she was there warning Maddie had disappeared.

How Jacqueline knows this last detail, amazes us. Whatever reason she has to know that mystery woman has ended her stay must necessarily mean she's able to recognise her and identify her. But for Jacqueline she's just “an individual of the female gender whose name she cannot indicate”.

We also know that she's not one the McCann’s women friends, Jane, Rachael or Fiona because by May 07/08 (4/5 days after the event) both Charlotte and Jacqueline would have identified the woman at least as “one of the couple’s friends”.

Besides, none of the T9, we have repeatedly been told, had any of their children in the “night crèche”.

Taking into account that Kate raised the alarm at 22:00, the only possibility for a guest to have known so early that Maddie had disappeared is for that guest to have been at Tapas on Thursday, May 03 2007:

Checking the Tapas reservation list for that night, we start by crossing out the Tapas group.

Also cross out Edmonds, because he has no woman accompanying him and his children are at Tapas.

Cox doesn't count as she's not, allegedly, there. She is with her partner Raj Balu having take-away dinner at Neil Berry's apartment, as we showed in our “Two men and a baby (cot)” post.

The Carpenters have a reservation only for “2” but we have been told that the entire family was there that night, so mystery woman cannot be Carolyn.

Neither the Irwins (O108) nor the Sperreys (FP05) had children at the “night crèche” as both are confirmed to be registered as childless couples in the Ocean Club’s check-in list:

The Manns have a reservation for “2 +1” confirming the presence of their 3 yr old son AM, as per Mark Warner's room property arrival lists, so no child at the “night crèche”:

Same thing with the Patels who have a reservation for “2 +2” confirming the presence of their 4 yr old daughter TP and their 11 month old son KP:

As a sidenote, one has to wonder why Carpenter’s 3.5 yr old daughter IC choses to play with the 6, 7 and 8 yr old Edmonds’ boys when she had a girl of her age, TP (Patels’ daughter) to play with and doesn't.

We’re left with the Bullens.

Their reservation shows “4ad”. We don’t know what the “ad” stands for but the “4” appears to be counting with another couple who we don't know who they are but apparently was with them. The “4” on the sheet means clearly their son is not with them at Tapas:


Looking at the arrival list, we can see that they are 3: the couple and their 2 yr old son OC and that they are returning on May 05 2007:

The Bullens stayed in apartment O302:

There is a boy named O*** registered for that apartment in Toddlers 2’s crèche sheets:
 

So, Dawn Bullen, is at Tapas restaurant, has a son who attended Toddler's 2 group during the day and is not with his parents at dinner, so can only be at “night crèche” and the Bullens return on May 05 2007.

There can be no doubt. The woman guest who, between 22:05 and 22:15 warns the “night crèche” can only be Dawn Bullen when she goes to pick up OC from the “night crèche”.

We have found the mystery woman: Dawn Bullen.

However there seems to be a slight problem of feasibility in terms of time for Dawn Bullen to be able to be at the “night crèche” at the time the nannies say she was.

Kate went to check at 22:00.

She would take a couple of minutes to get to apartment 5A. Has no reason to hurry. Then check the door and have the door slamming against her. After that she searches for Maddie. Checks the bed, checks the rest of the room, checks other room, check the bathroom, check the kitchen, return to rooms to check wardrobes and then probably outside front door and garden, even if only to check “abductor” hadn't dumped her outside, run back, tell them what's happened

Let’s say, 2/3 minutes there, 5/6 minutes searching, 1 minute back? And we think we’re being generous.

So, at 22:08/22:10 is when she's back at Tapas. All, except Dianne Webster, run back to 5A.

None of the other guests can possibly comprehend what was happening.