Latest news on the search for Madeleine McCann

[Carana]

Three women who could solve riddle of Maddie’s disappearance

THREE women are the key players in determining whether Scotland Yard's costly Madeleine McCann investigation will succeed or fail.

By: James Murray in Portimao
Published: Sat, October 18, 2014

The trio hold top positions in the Portuguese judiciary and police and all have privately vowed to do everything in their powers to discover the fate of Madeleine and bring those responsible to justice.

For the first time in years all the vital departments are working in tandem, which is a major relief to Detective Chief Inspector Andy Redwood, who heads the Yard's Operation Grange team trying to solve the seven-year riddle.

Ines Sequeira, the chief state prosecutor covering Praia da Luz where Madeleine vanished in May 2007, and the one with the most power, has given the case priority status.

The 49-year-old mother of four high flier is a breath of fresh air in the department.

She has instructed her team to let nothing stand in the way of bring a successful conclusion to the investigations.

She is based in a huge office in the grand marble-clad court house in Portimao, a large coastal town some 12 miles from Luz on the Algarve.

It will be she who decides on whether to prosecute or not.

Slim and stylishly dressed Ms Sequeira trained in Lisbon, where she is believed to have met her husband, now a judge.

She was the main prosecutor in the town of Silves, 10 miles from Portimao for years, working on robberies, murders, sex offences and assaults.

A colleague said: "She quickly built up a very good reputation in Silves, particularly with her work on homicides.

"She is very precise and demands high standards.

"She can see mistakes before others realise their significance and weeds them out.

"No one was surprised she won promotion.

"She likes to work away from the spotlight, quietly and methodically in her office."

She works with Ana Paulo Rito, the criminal co-ordinator of the Policia Judiciaria in Portimao, the role once taken by Goncalo Amaral, who is now locked in a libel action with Kate and Gerry McCann over his claims that Madeleine died in apartment 5a of the Ocean Club.

A legal source said: "Both women are clear thinking, driven, hard-working and utterly determined to do whatever they can to solve the case.

"They have brought fresh minds to the case and have similar character traits with no big egos and a quiet and efficient work ethic.

"They are both ambitious and career minded and they want results without cutting any corners.

"Both are quite new in their positions and they want to prove themselves and bring pride to their departments."

The third woman is Ms Helen Monteiro, who leads the Portuguese detectives' review of the case in Porto in the north of the country.

Work by her team has greatly helped the Yard in their efforts to finally solve Madeleine's disappearance.

Three Algarve men have been given arguido or suspect status and the Yard wants to speak to them further.

Last week there was clear evidence of the new spirit of cooperation with an unprecedented meeting about potentially case breaking DNA material from the flat where Madeleine McCann was taken.

Hairs found inside the apartment have not been matched to any of the people who were known to have entered the property before or after Madeleine vanished aged nearly four in May 2007.

So now they are set to be examined in Britain or Portugal in the coming months.

Francisco Brizida, Portugal's leading expert in forensic science, last week told Yard officers that curtain fabric, potentially harbouring DNA samples, is also available for testing.

http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/524393/Three-women-solve-riddle-Maddie-s-disappearance?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+daily-express-uk-news+%28Daily+Express+%3A%3A+UK+Feed%29

Thanks Brietta. An upbeat article for a change.

[Brietta]

Thanks Brietta. An upbeat article for a change.

Hopefully we will see some real "Girl Power" in action.

[VIXTE]

Three women who could solve riddle of Maddie’s disappearance

THREE women are the key players in determining whether Scotland Yard's costly Madeleine McCann investigation will succeed or fail.

By: James Murray in Portimao
Published: Sat, October 18, 2014

The trio hold top positions in the Portuguese judiciary and police and all have privately vowed to do everything in their powers to discover the fate of Madeleine and bring those responsible to justice.

For the first time in years all the vital departments are working in tandem, which is a major relief to Detective Chief Inspector Andy Redwood, who heads the Yard's Operation Grange team trying to solve the seven-year riddle.

Ines Sequeira, the chief state prosecutor covering Praia da Luz where Madeleine vanished in May 2007, and the one with the most power, has given the case priority status.

The 49-year-old mother of four high flier is a breath of fresh air in the department.

She has instructed her team to let nothing stand in the way of bring a successful conclusion to the investigations.

She is based in a huge office in the grand marble-clad court house in Portimao, a large coastal town some 12 miles from Luz on the Algarve.

It will be she who decides on whether to prosecute or not.

Slim and stylishly dressed Ms Sequeira trained in Lisbon, where she is believed to have met her husband, now a judge.

She was the main prosecutor in the town of Silves, 10 miles from Portimao for years, working on robberies, murders, sex offences and assaults.

A colleague said: "She quickly built up a very good reputation in Silves, particularly with her work on homicides.

"She is very precise and demands high standards.

"She can see mistakes before others realise their significance and weeds them out.

"No one was surprised she won promotion.

"She likes to work away from the spotlight, quietly and methodically in her office."

She works with Ana Paulo Rito, the criminal co-ordinator of the Policia Judiciaria in Portimao, the role once taken by Goncalo Amaral, who is now locked in a libel action with Kate and Gerry McCann over his claims that Madeleine died in apartment 5a of the Ocean Club.

A legal source said: "Both women are clear thinking, driven, hard-working and utterly determined to do whatever they can to solve the case.

"They have brought fresh minds to the case and have similar character traits with no big egos and a quiet and efficient work ethic.

"They are both ambitious and career minded and they want results without cutting any corners.

"Both are quite new in their positions and they want to prove themselves and bring pride to their departments."

The third woman is Ms Helen Monteiro, who leads the Portuguese detectives' review of the case in Porto in the north of the country.

Work by her team has greatly helped the Yard in their efforts to finally solve Madeleine's disappearance.

Three Algarve men have been given arguido or suspect status and the Yard wants to speak to them further.

Last week there was clear evidence of the new spirit of cooperation with an unprecedented meeting about potentially case breaking DNA material from the flat where Madeleine McCann was taken.

Hairs found inside the apartment have not been matched to any of the people who were known to have entered the property before or after Madeleine vanished aged nearly four in May 2007.

So now they are set to be examined in Britain or Portugal in the coming months.

Francisco Brizida, Portugal's leading expert in forensic science, last week told Yard officers that curtain fabric, potentially harbouring DNA samples, is also available for testing.

http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/524393/Three-women-solve-riddle-Maddie-s-disappearance?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+daily-express-uk-news+%28Daily+Express+%3A%3A+UK+Feed%29

The curtain?
What about the blind pulling cord? I hoped they took that off too.. They should have done that on the day1. They had a chance to know who pulled that blind up.

[Eleanor]

This is a Thread on The Latest News on The Search for Madeleine.

You have been asked before, so please stick to The Topic.

[pathfinder73]

28/10/2014 15:24
Maddie: 444 by DNA was subjected to analysis
In 2007, the partial 25 samples of blood and saliva tests were performed.

By Rui Gomes Pando
Experts from the National Institute of Legal Medicine (INML) analyzed the 444 that were collected by the Judicial Police in following the disappearance of Madeleine McCann months in 2007, in Praia da Luz, Lagos. When the CM was found, were still subject to forensic testing 25 samples of blood and saliva and three other traces found in the room from where the child disappeared and the boot of a car. These are some traces that Scotland Yard now wants to bring England to analyze again, a British private laboratory.

English as the CM reported yesterday, still want to re-do tests to a curtained room where Maddie slept, which was targeted by the skill INML in 2007, and where nothing relevant was found. The collection of the remains was made in homes, cars and sofas by experts of the Laboratory of Forensic Science of PJ. Among the remnants are still samples of hair and saliva of several people who were deemed relevant to the investigation. In the list of the 444 subject to testing, are 432 human and 12 nonhuman, 98 had no correspondence with any DNA profile and 19 partial results were obtained. The request for a review will be part of the remains of a 6th letter rogatory. This despite the new prosecutor for the Public Ministry of Portimão, Agnes Sequeira, the decision does not already exist for the 5th letter, sent by the British to Portugal.

http://www.cmjornal.xl.pt/nacional/portugal/detalhe/adn_de_444_pelos_foi_alvo_de_analise.html

[pathfinder73]

Madeleine McCann: Untested human hairs provide new hope in police hunt for DNA clues

BRITISH detectives probing the Madeleine McCann disappearance in Portugal want to retest hairs after it was found previous DNA tests carried out during the original investigation were incomplete.


By: Gerard Couzens Published: Wed, October 29, 2014

Nearly 100 strands of hair tested during the original Madeleine McCann investigation were never DNA-matched, it emerged today.

Portuguese forensic experts analysed 444 hair strands they believed could hold the key to the youngster’s May 3 2007 disappearance.

They found 432 were human and 12 non-human. They were unable to DNA-match 98 of them and only obtained partial results from 19 of them, Portuguese daily Correio da Manha reported.

MADELEINE MCCANN: THE SEARCH CONTINUES

British detectives probing Madeleine McCann’s disappearance want to retest some of the hairs as well as curtains hanging in the Algarve apartment where she vanished.

Scotland Yard are expected to apply for permission in a sixth international letter of request to take the samples from a Portuguese lab so experts can look at them in the UK.

The fifth letter, understood to contain a request to reinterview three new suspects quizzed in the summer, has yet to be answered by new Madeleine McCann prosecutor Ines Sequeira.

A Met Police team led by DCI Andy Redwood announced their wish to look again at forensic material collected in the early days of the Madeleine McCann investigation during a visit to the university town of Coimbra earlier this month.

They met with the bosses of Portugal’s Institute of Legal Medicine and Forensic Sciences in Coimbra, two hours drive north of Lisbon, where most of the material, also said to include 25 blood and saliva samples, is held.

Institute president Francisco Brizida, said afterwards: “I have the certainty they went away very happy.”

“The tonic of the meeting was about the possibility of the tests on samples collected in 2007 being re-done.

“The British police wanted clarification on the examinations the institute had carried out during the early stages of the inquiry in the areas of genetics and biology.

“We talked about non-identified material that was collected in Madeleine’s apartment.

“I can’t say for sure new DNA tests that didn’t yield a conclusive result in 2007 could now yield an objective result.

“But technology nowadays allows us to go further than years ago in areas like genetic markers.

“Several possibilities are open. One could be that British police do the tests in Britain with British technology and another that the institute does them.

“But that’s an area in which the institute does not have the last word. There’s a situation of judicial cooperation and a new international letter of request would be necessary.

http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/528865/Madeleine-McCann-human-hairs-hunt-Portugal

[jassi]

I wonder how many different people this represented and who they actually managed to identify?

[Carana]

I wonder how many different people this represented and who they actually managed to identify?

In 5A - Of the 100+ hairs in 5A, 1 hair was positively identified via nuclear DNA. That's it. The other hairs corresponding to the haplotypes of mtDNA testing don't identify any specific individual, only that the haplotypes of individuals known to have been in 5A happened to share the same ones... and that therefore it could correspond to them.

Aside from possible corresponding haplotype matches in 5A (which is rather vague), there are numerous ones that none of the reference samples appear to correspond to. Some could well belong to previous occupants, as not all of these appear to have been checked - few in fact.

However, if a nuclear DNA could be established as that of someone who had no reason to have been there... then that might take the puzzle a step ahead.

A nuclear DNA result from the bedcover stain was not semen as originally thought, but the saliva from the male baby of previous occupants.

A partial result from a DNA result in the living-room wall area was most likely one of the cops (but that was months later).

That seems to be basicly it from 5A.

There is one detail that I'd need to double-check that I'd found intriguing, but had dismissed as irrelevant.

[John]

[pathfinder73]

4 November 2014

Maddie Case: 10 witnesses to be questioned within the scope of the English investigation

by Marisa Rodrigues

New witnesses of the English investigation to Madeleine McCann's disappearance are going to be questioned at the request of Scotland Yard (SY). The fifth letter rogatory is already in the hands of the Judiciary Police (PJ), who will now have to schedule the questionings.

The new Public Ministry prosecutor, to whom the Maddie process was recently attributed, authorized the questionings and forwarded the letter to the South PJ Directory, in Faro, so they can be carried out. JN was able to establish that there are about ten witnesses and that all of them are going to be questioned for the first time within the scope of the English investigation. Some of them are, however, already known to the Portuguese investigation and they had nothing relevant to say regarding the English child who disappeared seven years ago in Praia da Luz, in the Algarve.

Even though the English police has expressed their interest in questioning again the four men constituted as arguidos [formal suspects], that had been questioned back in July, the English ended up leaving them out of this letter rogatory, which arrived to the Public Ministry in August. These new investigative steps should take place in the very same manner as it happened three months ago, with a notice for the witnesses to appear at the PJ headquarters. When the date is set, Scotland Yard may then request to the National PJ Directory to be present, without being able to intervene, just as before.

Last time they were in Portugal, on the 14th October, the English police expressed their desire to make a new letter rogatory (the sixth) requesting for the re-analyses of the samples that had been collected in the apartment from where Madeleine disappeared, namely hair samples and the fabric belonging to a curtain.

In a meeting at the National Institute of Forensic Medicine (INML), in Coimbra, which gathered detectives and forensic experts, Andy Redwood's team also spoke about the possibility that some of the samples could be taken to England and analysed in a private lab. Until the end of the afternoon, yesterday, no request had been made in that sense to the Public Ministry of Portimão, whose role is to assess and decide on the letters rogatory.

in Jornal de Notícias, paper edition, November 4, 2014

http://joana-morais.blogspot.com/2014/11/maddie-case-10-witnesses-to-be.html?m=1

[misty]

Taken from Joana Morais blog

New Prosecutor in Portimão authorized the investigative steps requested by the English Police

by Rui Pando Gomes

Some of the people who are going to be questioned by the Judiciary Police (PJ) soon, at the request of the English police who are investigating Madeleine McCann's disappearance, are going to be interrogated under an arguido [formal suspect] status. The new investigative steps were authorized by the new Prosecutor at the Public Ministry (MP) of Portimão, Inês Sequeira, and are set out in the fifth letter rogatory that was sent by the British authorities to Portugal.

In the interrogatories list, CM was able to establish, are about ten people, Portuguese and British. Most of them will be questioned as witnesses, but some will be constituted as arguidos before the questioning takes place. All of them are going to be heard formally for the first time after the MP Prosecutor gave the go ahead.

The questionings will be carried out by officers from the PJ of Faro, who are cooperating with the British authorities, and these should take place until the end of the current month. The English detectives are going to be able to suggest questions in advance, but they still have to ask for permission to be able to assist to the questionings.

Among the new Scotland Yard suspects, CM found out, are former Ocean Club workers, the resort from where the child disappeared in May 2007, and also residents of Praia da Luz, in Lagos. These are people the British detectives consider suspects of being involved in Maddie's disappearance, following the thesis that the child was abducted during a botched break-in.

These new suspects are only going to be constituted as arguidos in the inquest opened in the United Kingdom and will join the four other arguidos that were already questioned back in July, also within the scope of judicial cooperation. At the time, eleven witnesses were also questioned.

in Correio da Manhã. Nov. 5 2014

[Carana]

Nov 4

The new Public Ministry prosecutor, to whom the Maddie process was recently attributed, authorized the questionings and forwarded the letter to the South PJ Directory, in Faro, so they can be carried out. JN was able to establish that there are about ten witnesses and that all of them are going to be questioned for the first time within the scope of the English investigation. Some of them are, however, already known to the Portuguese investigation and they had nothing relevant to say regarding the English child who disappeared seven years ago in Praia da Luz, in the Algarve.


Nov 5:
In the interrogatories list, CM was able to establish, are about ten people, Portuguese and British. Most of them will be questioned as witnesses, but some will be constituted as arguidos before the questioning takes place. All of them are going to be heard formally for the first time after the MP Prosecutor gave the go ahead.



So some of these people were asked informally if they knew anything relevant, but had not been formally interviewed before?

[VIXTE]

Nov 4

The new Public Ministry prosecutor, to whom the Maddie process was recently attributed, authorized the questionings and forwarded the letter to the South PJ Directory, in Faro, so they can be carried out. JN was able to establish that there are about ten witnesses and that all of them are going to be questioned for the first time within the scope of the English investigation. Some of them are, however, already known to the Portuguese investigation and they had nothing relevant to say regarding the English child who disappeared seven years ago in Praia da Luz, in the Algarve.


Nov 5:
In the interrogatories list, CM was able to establish, are about ten people, Portuguese and British. Most of them will be questioned as witnesses, but some will be constituted as arguidos before the questioning takes place. All of them are going to be heard formally for the first time after the MP Prosecutor gave the go ahead.



So some of these people were asked informally if they knew anything relevant, but had not been formally interviewed before?

This makes me very curious. I remember reading the OC worker's statements first thing when the files were released and coming back to them, and again and again and I always had a feeling the answer lies in there..

I cannot wait for the reports on who these people are and whether it has anything to do with who parked their car  in where the GNR dogs lost their trails.

[Carana]

This makes me very curious. I remember reading the OC worker's statements first thing when the files were released and coming back to them, and again and again and I always had a feeling the answer lies in there..

I cannot wait for the reports on who these people are and whether it has anything to do with who parked their car  in where the GNR dogs lost their trails.

It might be.

On the whole, I dislike the press insinuation that anyone they want to question is necessarily really suspect, even if they do end up with arguido status. The Met could simply be interviewing some of the people to get more detailed information, either about them, or any details they may know, which may be routine work.

I've no idea whether Jenny Murat might be one, for example. She ran a stall to try to help, but doesn't appear to have ever been interviewed.

ETA. Correction, yes, she was, but mainly about Robert.

[Brietta]

It might be.

On the whole, I dislike the press insinuation that anyone they want to question is necessarily really suspect, even if they do end up with arguido status. The Met could simply be interviewing some of the people to get more detailed information, either about them, or any details they may know, which may be routine work.

I've no idea whether Jenny Murat might be one, for example. She ran a stall to try to help, but doesn't appear to have ever been interviewed.


ETA. Correction, yes, she was, but mainly about Robert.
« Last Edit: Today at 10:33:15 PM by Carana »

There is nothing in the files which indicates if any of the information which was given to her was passed either to Leicestershire constabulary to be passed on to the PJ or to the PJ direct.

Did anyone speak to her at the time?
Did she keep a record?

It is possible that SY want to interview her, solely as a witness, if she was at one time in possession of statements made to her.  Or even just to clarify if anyone did come to her stall to make a statement or not. 

I don’t think she will be a witness.

It is perfectly possible that the ten to be interviewed will be to enable SY to tie up loose ends or to clarify a situation.   
It is a pity what are probably routine interviews which would probably have taken place in a front room in Britain, are by necessity taking place in the full glare of the media spotlight.

I think SY have a goal in sight and these interviews are just milestones on the way to building a case. 

Edit to add she was interviewed ... also amended Carana's post to include her edit