Top Madeleine McCann cop slams trolls for harming tot's siblings – calls for police actionA TOP Brit detective has lashed out at trolls for attacking Madeleine McCann's parents Kate and Gerry and creating a "vile cesspit" of allegations.
Jim Gamble was the UK’s top child protection police officer in the UK and heavily involved in the initial search for Maddie.
The experienced cop spent years examining the case and analysing evidence – and has now called for the police to step in over Kate and Gerry's abuse.
The tragic tot disappeared from her family's holiday apartment in Praia da Luz, Portugal, on the evening of May 3, 2007.
British and Portuguese police afterwards launched an enormous operation, but the desperate hunt continues 12 years on.
Since then, sick trolls have made allegations about Kate and Gerry – despite their being no evidence to support their claims.
The family have been relentlessly abused on social media, with keyboard sickos posting cruel jokes and baseless theories on Facebook and Twitter.
Mr Gamble helped Gerry draft a statement during the initial investigation.
He told Daily Star Online: “The trolls take the view that Kate and Gerry can ignore Twitter and not go online, but that is in essence harassing someone from a public place where they have every right to be.
“The hypocrisy of the trolls that really gets me is: they hide behind anonymous names, they rant at the parents, and they do so claiming to be child protection advocates – to be only interested in doing what’s best for Madeleine and children.
“Yet they’re failing to grasp the irony that Sean and Amelie (Madeleine’s siblings) will now be at an age when they’ll be occupying online spaces.
“And every time they search their names or search anything about their sister, they’re going to come across this cesspit of vile comments that these self-proclaimed child protection advocates – who are in essence trolls – have left there for them.
“I remain disappointed at the police’s failure to hold those who are clearly committing offences of criminal harassment online responsible.”
Sean and Amelie are Maddie’s twin siblings, and were born in February 2005, meaning they are now aged 14, so highly likely to be aware of social media.
They were two years old at the time of their sister’s disappearance on May 3, 2007, and are thought to have been asleep during her disappearance.
Cops are still trying to trace 13 suspects seen acting suspiciously in and around the resort before Madeleine’s disappearance.
Despite high profile police appeals and the release of a series of sketches and e-fits in the 12 years since, no trace of Maddie has been found.
One suspect is feared to have carried out up to 28 sex attacks on other children within a 40-mile radius of the apartment from which then-three-year-old Madeleine went missing.
Wearing a surgical mask, he apparently got into bed with a seven-year-old British girl but fled when she woke up and asked: “Is that you daddy?’’
Another was chased from a holiday apartment after a horrified mum caught him standing over her young daughter.
https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/latest-news/782147/madeleine-mccann-2019-disappearance-news-detective-slams-trolls-missing-parents-latest