Gerry: Can I, can I just say I think the worst thing about you know, the fact that many people have blamed us and vilified us and and with hindsight you know it was clearly a mistake with hindsight but the worst thing for me about that is there's an abductor out there and that person stole our child and went into an apartment and took a child and he's anonymous and blameless.
Oprah: You believe it was a he?
Gerry: Almost certainly a male almost certainly
Oprah: And is that because one of your friends Jane...
Gerry and Kate: Tanner
Oprah: ...had seen was err explain to me because I had read that she was coming out of her villa at nine fifteen. So let's go back to that night if you don't mind.
Gerry: Yeah
Oprah: Let's go back to the night. Nine oh-five, you all are at dinner and you made the-the-the check at nine so you're checking every half hour.
Gerry: It was actually nine o'clock while the whole group were in the restaurant and one of our friend's Matt already went up and checked his err daughter and as he came back I went up to check on Madeleine [hesitation] and the twins and I went into the apartment and err really just checking the crying and the door...
Oprah: Checking to see if there was any crying
Gerry: Yeah that was it and the door was erm open more, I'd, I'd left it just ajar about 5 degrees and we checked them before we left and they were sound asleep
Oprah: Which door are you talking about?
Gerry: This is the bedroom door, to err their room, the three children were in the same room so I actually stepped into the room and the twins were sound asleep and Madeleine was lying in her bed exactly where she was when I left, Cuddle Cat up beside her head on her blanket and err and I closed the door and went to...
Oprah: And this is about nine-oh-five?
Gerry: Just yeah, so I went outside and I was outside the apartment and I met err one of the other guests and he was coming the other way with his kid and I actually crossed the road to erm to chat to him and we were sort of chatting for about five minutes and during that, Jane went to check on her children and it was at that point she was just passed us going up to the corner and she saw a man carrying a young girl with almo.. she described independently the pyjamas that Madeleine had on and she didn't see the child's face she didn't you know she saw me there she'd seen that I'd just been in the apartment and so she at the time she thought it was something odd but it didn't raise enough alarm bells to challenge the person or anything
Kate: The child was barefoot and bare armed and he had a quite heavy jacket on so I think it was one of those things that just seemed a little bit odd but obviously it's not until later on that you realise.
Oprah: So this is the sketch of that person that err your friend Jane err remembers seeing but Jane, Jane didn't say anything when she came back to the table, yeah, because she saw you standing there.
Gerry: Yeah yeah
Oprah: So erm you discovered that Madeleine was missing so you checked it about 9:05 another friend sees this man at 9:15 and you went back to check again at...
Kate: Well actually at 9:30 I stood up to go and check on Madeleine, because it was my turn. And at the same time Matt our friend stood up and we both started walking and he said well I'm going to check on G***e they were the next apartment to us he said "I'll check on Madeleine" and he hesitated a bit and then he said "no, I'll check" so he went to check at half nine came back said fine everything's fine so I then went at 10 o'clock the next check erm...
Oprah: Did he see her in the bed at 9:30?
Kate: No he just went in and listened and there was no crying
Oprah: So he came back and said everything's fine cause you all everybody's just checking to see if there's crying and there's no crying so everything's fine and so then you went at ten.
Kate: I went at ten and I went into the apartment and there was no crying I stopped and there was no crying. And then I just noticed that the door was quite open
Oprah: Which door?
Kate: Their bedroom door sorry, and we usually have the door as Gerry said sort of not closed but ajar just so that a little bit of light gets in and it's not too dark in the room so I thought oh Matt must have gone in and left the door open
Oprah: same thing he thought
Kate: Yeah, so I thought well I'll just close it over again, and as I went to close it over it slammed shut and I thought and it was like sort of you know a draught had caused it to shut so I turned behind me and I thought are the patio doors open and they were closed and I thought well that's strange so then I opened the door thinking I'll open it ajar a bit again and that was when I kind of looked into the room and when I just looked and it was quite dark and I was just looking and looking at Madeleine's bed and I was thinking is that her that I was looking for why isn't Madeleine there? And then in the end I walked over and thought oh, she's not in bed and then I thought maybe she's wandered through to our bed and that's why the door's open so I went through to our bedroom and she wasn't there and then I kind of see then I'm starting to panic a bit and I ran back into their room and literally as I went back into their room the curtains that were drawn over just "whoooosh" flew open and that's when I saw that the shutter was right up and the window was pushed right open. And that was when I just knew that erm someone had taken her. So I, I mean I ran to the window and I didn't know what I thought was going to see but I ran to the window and then I quickly hmm quickly looked through the wardrobes I had I suppose this temporary thought she was cowering in a wardrobe or something anyway she wasn't there and I just ran out and soon as...
Oprah: was she in a closet, in a closet?
Kate: Yeah just in case, just in case she's hiding or something I don't know and then I just went flying out the backdoor and erm ran to Gerry and just as soon as I saw the table where they were sitting I just started shouting "someone's taken her, Madeleine's gone" you know and erm that's how it all started really but erm [hyperventilates]
Oprah: Why did you feel immediately, I'd heard that you'd said "They've taken her, they've taken her"
Kate: nnnn....I didn't say that I said, said "somebody's taken her Madeleine's gone". Well from the way I found the room it was obvious because a child could not open those shutters and the window
Oprah: uh huh
Kate: erm so it was obvious to me
Gerry: You know when she came back and she she shouted "someone's taken her" and there was just disbelief
Kate: Taken her that's fine they all jumped up and they were saying if Kate don't worry she's fine, she's fine she'll be there she'll be there and I said she's gone, she's - tak, somebody's taken her you know it was just like...
Gerry: And the way the room was you know.
Kate: It was just like disbelief you know...
Gerry: The way that window was and the shutter up and the window open there was no way Madeleine could have done that err at that age and err it was just terrifying.