So what actual searching was there?

[mercury]

IMO a child going to the bathroom would possibly turn a light on.

But a child urgently hiding would not turn a light on.

Oh i see what yu mean but why would a child hide when its mother left the door open for them to go out fnd her, surely would go look for mum if the boogie man was at the window

[Alfie]

All nonsense of course. A mother finding her child missing would clutch at any straw she could until she was forced to accept the inevitable.

 If she had left the apartment Madeleine may just have arrived at Jane's apartment and Jane may have been in the process of taking her to her parents, after perhaps comforting her if she was upset. At that point Kate  wouldn't have been able to rule that out until she had seen Jane

There is absolutely nothing nonsensical about what I have written, unless you care to demonstrate what is nonsense and why?
In the nine years I have been following this case, it is only recently that I have come across this stick to beat Kate with, which seems to suggest to me that it has taken the best part of 9 years to come up with it, and yet you seem to think that one of the first things Kate should have thought on finding her child missing (a child who had never got up and left the apartment on her own before at night) was "oh she's probably just nipped round to Jane Tanner's apartment for some comfort"  - now that really IS nonsense.

But as it happens, within a few minutes of finding Madeleine missing, Kate WAS running in the direction of JT's apartment, searching for Madeleine - so....your argument really is in tatters IMO, sorry.

FromJT's Rogatory:

"...the next thing I can remember is seeing Kate and Fiona, they came running from the direction of Kate’s flat, say sort of along the, sort of it’s, I’ll try and describe how it is, but as you come into the flats there’s sort of a passageway and there’s flats above so there’s a roof and there’s a passageway, it’s really badly described, but they came running along there and they were shouting ‘Madeleine’ and they were like looking in the stairwell and what have you".

[faithlilly]

There is absolutely nothing nonsensical about what I have written, unless you care to demonstrate what is nonsense and why?
In the nine years I have been following this case, it is only recently that I have come across this stick to beat Kate with, which seems to suggest to me that it has taken the best part of 9 years to come up with it, and yet you seem to think that one of the first things Kate should have thought on finding her child missing (a child who had never got up and left the apartment on her own before at night) was "oh she's probably just nipped round to Jane Tanner's apartment for some comfort"  - now that really IS nonsense.

But as it happens, within a few minutes of finding Madeleine missing, Kate WAS running in the direction of JT's apartment, searching for Madeleine - so....your argument really is in tatters IMO, sorry.

FromJT's Rogatory:

"...the next thing I can remember is seeing Kate and Fiona, they came running from the direction of Kate’s flat, say sort of along the, sort of it’s, I’ll try and describe how it is, but as you come into the flats there’s sort of a passageway and there’s flats above so there’s a roof and there’s a passageway, it’s really badly described, but they came running along there and they were shouting ‘Madeleine’ and they were like looking in the stairwell and what have you".

So my illogical theory is suddenly logical ! Hilarious.

BTW did Kate make a beeline for Jane's apartment or was she simply searching indiscriminately ?

[Alfie]

So my illogical theory is suddenly logical ! Hilarious.

BTW did Kate make a beeline for Jane's apartment or was she simply searching indiscriminately ?

What are you finding hilarious?  The fact is, Kate searched the apartment, raised the alarm and then went searching when she encountered JT, all within the space of a few minutes.  At what point exactly would you have expected her to have the amazing revelation that Madeleine left the apartment by herself in the middle of the night (something she had never done before) and gone to seek comfort with JT?
You really are going to have to come up with another stick now, this one is snapped in two, soz la!

[faithlilly]

What are you finding hilarious?  The fact is, Kate searched the apartment, raised the alarm and then went searching when she encountered JT, all within the space of a few minutes.  At what point exactly would you have expected her to have the amazing revelation that Madeleine left the apartment by herself in the middle of the night (something she had never done before) and gone to seek comfort with JT?
You really are going to have to come up with another stick now, this one is snapped in two, soz la!

Wouldn't any frantic mother have checked first before raising the alarm ?

[Alfie]

Wouldn't any frantic mother have checked first before raising the alarm ?

The clue is in the word "frantic". 

[faithlilly]

The clue is in the word "frantic".

Are you saying Kate wasn't frantic ?

Okay let's put this in a different setting. You're child is in bed and you see this as an opportunity to pop to the shop. When you get back they're not there. Your friend lives two doors up from you and although she is usually at work at this time occasionally she comes home early. Even knowing your child probably wasn't at your friend's, wouldn't you check anyway, even by phone, before having to consider that something more sinister has happened ?

[Brietta]

Are you saying Kate wasn't frantic ?

Okay let's put this in a different setting. You're child is in bed and you see this as an opportunity to pop to the shop. When you get back they're not there. Your friend lives two doors up from you and although she is usually at work at this time occasionally she comes home early. Even knowing your child probably wasn't at your friend's, wouldn't you check anyway, even by phone, before having to consider that something more sinister has happened ?

You return from popping into the nearest shop to discover your nearly four year old missing from her bed and the bedroom window, closed when you left now wide open.

After a quick check she isn't curled up asleep somewhere in the house ... you run to your husband who is with friends thirty seconds away at the foot of the garden ... screaming to raise the alarm.

Why would you waste time checking with your friend somewhere along the street ... bearing in mind the proximity of your child's father ... who along with friends will check out all that needs to be checked in the hope of finding the child before the police need to be alerted.

I think the open window was the clue.

Besides the point, what kind of friend is it who doesn't immediately take a wandering child straight home??

[Alfie]

Are you saying Kate wasn't frantic ?

Okay let's put this in a different setting. You're child is in bed and you see this as an opportunity to pop to the shop. When you get back they're not there. Your friend lives two doors up from you and although she is usually at work at this time occasionally she comes home early. Even knowing your child probably wasn't at your friend's, wouldn't you check anyway, even by phone, before having to consider that something more sinister has happened ?

Of course Kate was frantic. Frantic people in such a situation, knowing that their other half is sat not 100 meters away will raise the alarm asap, not calmly consider all the possible permutations of where the child might be and check them all out first.  I can assure you that in a similar scenario it would not even cross my mind for a second that my child had, in the middle of the night, taken themselves off to the neighbours for comfort. 

[Alfie]

You return from popping into the nearest shop to discover your nearly four year old missing from her bed and the bedroom window, closed when you left now wide open.

After a quick check she isn't curled up asleep somewhere in the house ... you run to your husband who is with friends thirty seconds away at the foot of the garden ... screaming to raise the alarm.

Why would you waste time checking with your friend somewhere along the street ... bearing in mind the proximity of your child's father ... who along with friends will check out all that needs to be checked in the hope of finding the child before the police need to be alerted.

I think the open window was the clue.

Besides the point, what kind of friend is it who doesn't immediately take a wandering child straight home??

Well exactly - sorry I should have read your response before replying as I have pretty much repeated exactly what you have said.

[Brietta]

Well exactly - sorry I should have read your response before replying as I have pretty much repeated exactly what you have said.

I think the whole argument, like a lot of other things when it comes to Madeleine McCann's case is just too complicated to be workable;  if we ever find out what happened to Madeleine we will probably discover that the explanation was the simplest one.

The suggestion that an individual would not immediately take action if a child arrived hypothetically at their doorstep in the middle of the night strikes me as being an odd one.

One Sunday morning some years ago an uncommunicative, sweet elderly lady arrived at our door.  It was chilly and although properly dressed her outerwear was a light cardigan.  She had slippers on her feet.
We of course took her in.
We assumed she had wandered from the nearby nursing home;  actually, she hadn't ... but that is another story.

It was incumbent on us to

• find out where she came from by contacting and alerting the appropriate people, in this case not the nursing home along the road ~ we knew someone would be frantic about her whereabouts (and they were)
• if we had been unable to do that, we would have alerted the police
• we discovered where she had come from and arranged to take her home (we didn't have to do that as she would have been picked up, but she seemed OK with us doing so

We felt it was incumbent on us to help a vulnerable person to be returned to a place of safety.  Can you imagine the situation had that been a vulnerable almost four year old child at our door that Sunday morning, and the lengths we would have taken to reunite her with her parents.

It is a non-starter to castigate Madeleine's mother for not thinking Madeleine was with a friend.  In my opinion that is a situation that would never have happened.

However, had she done as suggested and wasted time by leaving the twins and going into the main entrance of the building and Jane Tanner's door ... I rather imagine she would have been criticised for that too.

[G-Unit]

All this does suggest that the front door could have been locked and the key needed to open it was with Gerry. Seeing the open window would suggest at first that Madeleine had gone that way. Kate looked out, but would perhaps have run out of the front door for a better look round up and down the road, for cars just about to leave, etc if she was able. There wasn't much of a view from the window.

[Brietta]

All this does suggest that the front door could have been locked and the key needed to open it was with Gerry. Seeing the open window would suggest at first that Madeleine had gone that way. Kate looked out, but would perhaps have run out of the front door for a better look round up and down the road, for cars just about to leave, etc if she was able. There wasn't much of a view from the window.

Better than from the recessed front door.

[Miss Taken Identity]

Wouldn't any frantic mother have checked first before raising the alarm ?

Checked where? Kate knew right away she was taken BUT didn't phone the police right away- lost valuable time. Speaking of which... what time has been established regarding Maddies Disappearance? anytime between 8ish and 10ish?
"After a quick check she isn't curled up asleep somewhere in the house ... you run to your husband who is with friends thirty seconds away at the foot of the garden ... screaming to raise the alarm."



Run? why not shout from the apartment, the one that was only 30 seconds away, and like almost like in a garden... like  you could see the apartment like...screaming? what? really?  no, I don't think she was screaming. myth making?
She ran because the children nor she, could not be seen or heard from that tapas table - Neither could ANY of the entrances be seen. IF we are going to play silly beggars then how about you see your child drowning... do you run to where your partner is sitting to tell them? OR do you scream *frantically*  Help my child is....but maybe that is not what intelligent Doctors would do, just chavvie types.

[Alice Purjorick]

Better than from the recessed front door.

Stepping beyond the recess and having a bleedin' good shufti is completely out of the question I suppose ?