Brit’s Maddie investigation gets £2 million cash boost, but ‘clock is ticking’
By Natasha Donn
18 September 2015
The UK’s Home Office has given the go-ahead for another £2 million (€2.7 million) to be pumped into the British police investigation into the disappearance of Madeleine McCann. But the inference is that if no new leads come to the surface in six months it could all be over.
The ‘news’ has been in the air for weeks - with newspapers of all hues in UK intimating that the Metropolitan Police probe, dubbed Operation Grange, was due to be shelved after four fruitless years in which detectives have spent over £10 million (€13,650 million).
As we reported earlier this month (click here Second British police source slams €15 million Maddie probe), former Flying Squad boss John Connor slated the investigation through the UK’s Sun newspaper - revealing then that the full costs of the probe were due to reach £12 million (over €16 million) by April 2016.
Britain’s premier force should “stop chasing shadows”, he told the paper - which today runs with the story that Grange may only have another six months left.
The Independent carries a similar story, quoting Lord Brent of Blackwood, answering a written parliamentary question on the costs of the investigation ordered by prime minister David Cameron four years ago.
“The level of funding provided to the Metropolitan Police in relation to this investigation is reviewed regularly and will continue to be monitored,” he said.
But to be fair, the Independent does not mention the six-month deadline suggested by the Sun.
The time-limit seems to be more focused on the amount of money to be made available for the whole of 2016
.
Both papers report that the parents of Madeleine - who went missing over eight years ago, aged three - have said they are “extremely grateful” for the long-running police investigation.
Weeks ago, in a rush of Madeleine stories which came just as the appeal by former detective Gonçalo Amaral was accepted by Lisbon’s Appellate Court (click here Rush of UK “Maddie” stories precedes British PM’s visit to Portugal tomorrow), the McCann’s told newspapers they were prepared for the winding down of Grange, and had “kept some money back from the Find Madeleine Fund in case it is needed for an ongoing search”.
The Resident has repeatedly mailed the McCann’s press spokesman for an explanation on this statement. As one of our readers queried in a letter in last week’s edition: “Surely that is precisely what the Find Madeleine Fund was set up to do? Why should any money be kept back from it? And what is the rest of the money being used for, if not to fund an ongoing search?”
But to date, there have been no replies.
Commenting on the length of the Grange investigation, the Independent writes: “Numerous people have been questioned and sightings have been reported since (Madeleine’s) disappearance, but there are still many questions about what happened or where she is now”
http://portugalresident.com/brit%E2%80%99s-maddie-investigation-gets-%C2%A32-million-cash-boost-but-%E2%80%98clock-is-ticking%E2%80%99#sthash.bCtcGty5.dpuf
