First Searches

[pathfinder73]

The chaos and confusion of the First Searches.

Let's start with Mathew Oldfield:

00.48.23 4078 'And then who did the next check''

 Reply 'Well Kate went and did the next check and think because we'd, I didn't, we didn't all go at that point, just Kate went and, erm, and then came running back saying, she's gone, Gerry Madeleine's gone, and she was sort of borderline hysterical, as you'd expect, and then there was just a blur as everybody then just ran off from the table. Erm, then everybody I think left the table, I mean, I just remember being behind Dave as he was, and Gerry, as they were running, erm, Russell I think (inaudible) a bit behind and so we all ran. If you ask whether we went, you know, into the apartment and I'm almost a hundred percent sure we didn't go to the apartment, we were, because it was just so awful, so Gerry and Kate and maybe Dave, I'm not sure, but went sort of to the bottom of the steps and they sort of went in, erm, and as soon as they sort of said, you know, she's gone and everything, all hell broke loose, we went round to check firstly on Grace to make sure she was okay and we dropped Rachael up there, telling her that she wasn't to move, Jane came out of the apartment, did she come out of the apartment at that point or was it later in the evening, I can't remember, but I remember seeing them, you know, most of the time and then for the rest of the evening they were stood, you know, at the doorways to the apartments, erm, we went back round, erm, and everybody was just running around like sort of headless chickens, so I remember saying, you know, we need a plan, I mean, I don't know why I said that but I think I'd just read too many novels, because everybody just seemed to just sort of run, there was sort of no organisation, you know, and it was obviously important that we, you know, we did something constructive rather than just running around looking in the hedgerows if, you know, what we, because we all went through this, you know, is she really gone, surely she must have just sort of wandered off and we're just going to find her and she's going to be there, but, you know, she's like a four year old child and, you know, she, I mean, all the doors were shut, she wasn't really going to run off and then Jane said, the shutters up, and, you know, we sort of scarpered and Dave and Russell were just running off sort of shouting, so Fiona, I think, asked me to go and phone the Police, so I actually went down the route to where she would have gone for Nursery drop off, which his back to the, to the main reception essentially, so I went down that route looking for her at that time and I asked the reception to phone the Police, and that must have been about five past, it's difficult to know what time it was at that time, but maybe about ten past ten, five past ten, ten past ten'.

[pathfinder73]

David Payne:

1485 "Once the alarm had been raised you said that you all got up and its, with the exception of Dianne, everybody ran to the assistance.'
  Reply "Yeah.'
 

1485 "Exactly what did you do''
  Reply "Err we, you know, we ran up err to the apartment, you know, with, with err you know Kate and Gerry err and you know for me, I just wanted to know, as I say, about the access to the apartment, were those gates open, err because in my mind was that if the front door was shut there was no, you know there won't be, you know there was no way that she could have wandered out that way and nor would they have gained access in that way. Err also obviously the, the, the issue with the, the shutters had been raised, was brought up err you know on the way up as well and then I was asking about the gates being shut at that back and she said well both gates you know were shut, so in my mind, you know, that had ruled it out that Madeleine had err had wandered off. Err you know, Madeleine's err, you know, was a very bright child and you know it would just seem so inconceivable that she would have wandered off you know, especially you know, when she was sleepy you know, we put that argument forward, but then you know sleeping chil, sleepy children you know don't put, shut the doors you know behind them and child gates, you know, so, so that was my initial thoughts err and again you know we, we, I'm sure we went into the apartment, just looked and you know, incredulously you know well where, err where could she be, you know, you know we just looked in the obvious err places and then err you know obviously Kate and Gerry were just completely, you know, hysterical err you know at this stage. Err and then we just, you know then we went to do the sweeps around the place and I said, as I said before,

I went up to look at our apartment to check, check the girls were alright and you know, and the actual order that this all happened, you know, it's just err a complete eye opener up for us to see you know what other unfor, unfortunate people have been through just to what a destabilising effect, you know, that circumstances has on you or, and you know I, I think most people had a, you know, idea of, pretty exactly what happened that day leaving but you know after that I think people find it really difficult generally to say exactly what they did and when. Err but as I say we went err we went to the apartment and had a look round and then err I had a look quite earlier on to see err whether the, err girls were alright. I then at some stage went back to see Dianne and say look can you just leave the table, just go back to the apartment and then I had the sweep around the swimming pool where the, err the kiddies pool is, I went to, I just had a quick look at the tennis courts and just basically swept around the, the area just to make, make sure you know that, ah this can't, can't be what's happened,

she must have you know, you just don't want to weigh up that option, it just wasn't an option that could have happened but you knew it had happened and err, and then as I say we spoke, me, Matt and Russell, right come on we've got to have a bit more structure to this, err you know, I'll, I'll you know so he went off down to the Police Station and you know, you know we waited as I say for the Police to arrive and we, our, I think it was in between them arriving or when they arrived that I then went down and did that sweep of you know, right down past the Supermarket err going slightly to the side and then onto the front past where the church is at the bottom. I looked, you know I say I looked in all the rocks and you know just went along the whole beach shouting out and identifying people. Err the, I say, the Mark Warner people they were around there, we, you know as I say we also at a very early stage we knew it was important that we got a picture of Madeleine just to show people, whether it be local, but, but we were also imploring the err the GNR to you know close down and circulate this picture, err and that was, you know that was something that Mark Warner team helped us set up just in the, you know the Tapas bit there.'

[pathfinder73]

Russell O'Brien

1578    “So we can go from'”
Reply    “’When Kate raised the alarm she’”.


 1578    “’When Kate raised the alarm’'”
Reply    “Erm, she didn’t get to the table, I think, ‘It was all enclosed’, I don’t know what that means, it could be just deleted really”.


1578    “So ‘It was all enclosed’ to be deleted'”
Reply    “Yeah, and it just says ‘She was at the start of the path when she shouted across to us’, which is fine.  Erm, it’s fine then down to ‘and possibly Gerry’.  I think maybe just to clarify what ‘the cul-de-sac area’ means, that’s actually the passageway and gardens in front of the apartment blocks”.


1578    “’We searched the cul-de-sac area’'”
Reply    “Erm, which is actually the passageway, I think, erm, when I said ‘cul-de-sac’, erm, I was referring to the fact that, although we’d never been along it in that direction, you can’t get out at the other side of the complex from the passageway that separates the pool from patio sides of the apartments.  But we searched down there and we done the adjacent gardens”.


1578    “So we need to describe ‘the cul-de-sac area’ as'”
Reply    “As the ‘passage’, well there, there was, erm, ‘the passageway’.  Erm, and then the last bit says ‘Shopping Centre and tennis courts’ there, that was actually on the, the sort of second wave of searching that I did.  Erm, so after we searched immediately around the, the complex, erm, and we hadn’t found her, I then went, I think around the back, or the front really, where the car park and the apartments are, to the main road, dropping down into the, into the town centre, erm, I forget the name of it, and went down round the back of the tennis courts, looking in there, round the back of the Baptista Supermarket where there’s a car park area and a bit of derelict ground, erm, and then into the Shopping Centre, which is the bottom two or three floors of a of a relatively large building just down the hill.  Erm, so that is a separate, erm, sort of search, after coming back to the foot of the apartment and clarifying that, that Madeleine hadn’t been found in the immediate vicinity”.


1578    “So after coming back to the foot of the apartment'”
Reply    “Yeah, we then went on separate searches further from the apartment and mine involved the front, and by that, I mean the car park side of the apartment and then down the hill towards the town centre, erm, and along there looking through fences, into the complex and the tennis courts, the back of the Supermarket and the derelict ground adjacent to that and the shopping, the lower echelons of this building which is a small, a small precinct”.


1578    “Sorry, back of the tennis courts'”
Reply    “Uh hu”.


1578    “Back of'”
Reply    “The back of the Supermarket and then into the, the small, slightly old, erm, Shopping Centre, which goes over one or two floors”.


1578    “Yeah”.
Reply    “Erm, it’s actually the day I met, ‘On the way back from the Shopping Centre’, in the next paragraph, I met Dave and he was running down the hill with a, with, you know, sort of panic in his eyes, saying ‘This is really bad, this is bad, they haven’t found her’.  There was obviously, a number of minutes had passed by this point, while we were looking individually”.


1578    “So ‘I met Dave on the return’'”
Reply    “On the return”.


1578    “’On my return’'”
Reply    “Heading back towards the, the, erm, the Super, well near the Baptista Supermarket, just down from there, erm, met Dave and it was him that said to me ‘This is bad.  This is really bad.  They haven’t found her.  She’s missing’”.


1578    “And he said'”
Reply    “Yeah, ‘This is really’, you know, He said ‘This is really bad, they haven’t found her’’”.


1578    “’This is bad, this is really bad, they’ve not found her’'”
Reply    “Yeah, or, you know, sort of words very similar to that.  The, erm, the next bit is, erm, sort of correct but relatively brief compared to what we discussed yesterday.  Erm, it said, erm, there was then Dave, Matt and myself shortly after this point swept down the hill towards the beach”.


1578    “So ‘we’ needs to be changed with ‘Dave, Matt and'”
Reply    “’Dave, Matt and myself’, yeah”.
 

1578    “’Searched down towards the beach area towards the Ocean Club’'”
Reply    “Erm, well it’s, yeah, I mean, that’s, that’s sort of later, no, it’s a bit misleading really.  Erm, we actually dropped down, almost directly, as the roads would take you to the beach”.
 

1578    “So ‘We searched down towards the beach area’'”
Reply    “Yeah, you can remove ‘towards the Ocean Club’”.
 

1578    “And we can remove ‘towards the Ocean Club’'”
Reply    “And the addition there was what we described, that Matt searched the, the beach immediately in front of where we came down at, which would be the sort of west, yeah, the western end of the beach, as far as, erm, Matt and Dave came into, erm, the area in between, and I went over towards the eastern part of the beach, erm, predominantly walking down the, the beachfront away from”.
 

1578    “Sorry, just repeat that again for me please.  Matt searched'”
Reply    “Matt searched, yeah, well, what would be the sort of west, he, where, where we came out we were sort of the west end of the, the beach anyway and he stayed and searched the rocks and the, the surrounding immediately there”.
 

1578    “’Matt searched west end of beach’'”
Reply    “Yeah, Dave took a sort of central portion of it and I went right over towards the sort of the, the main sandy area of the beach, erm”.
 

1578    “’And I went over to’'”
Reply    “Sort of on the west, well the eastern part of the beach”.
 

1578    “’Main sandy part of beach’'”
Reply    “Yeah, and dropped down to the waterline because it was quite easy to see back towards the town, because it was, there was street lighting, erm, but you couldn’t, certainly from further in, you couldn’t see if, you couldn’t see the beachfront terribly well.  And there was quite a lot of beach in that direction, so I went a certain amount, I didn’t, I didn’t go all the way over to, erm, I think it’s called Black Rock, but I got to a certain point and thought, you know, it’s actually, you know, well away from the beach (inaudible), turned back and, erm, on the return journey, this was when I bumped into, erm, somebody who, who, who was already aware that someone was missing. 

 

I think, I don’t, I don’t remember her necessarily being, erm, definitely somebody I recognised form MARK WARNER, but she was an English woman in her, in her early or mid-twenties, fair or blonde’ish sort of hair, erm, I’d asked her if she’d seen, erm, you know, a little girl wandering around and, you know, I can’t remember what she said, but she was already aware that somebody was missing, so clearly she’d either bumped into Dave or somebody else searching around higher up in the town.  Erm, and then, before we kind of rejoin here, I sort, I sort of zigzagged back up through some of the roads, such that you, I would have covered a sort of triangle, from the apartment down to the beach, along the beach a little bit, and then, and then sort of heading back up to the starting point, over, over a number of minutes, I mean, it was certainly not every road or every garden, but, you know, just, as I headed back I tried to take in a number of, a number of roads and entrances just to see if there was anything there.  And during the course of this I’d spoken to a few people, there weren’t, there weren’t masses of people around actually and, erm, you know, a couple of holidaymakers and I can, I can remember speaking to some relatively elderly, erm, Portuguese people who were just walking along near the front at one point, but, erm, and the only other person I spoke to was, I presume, a Bar owner in that, in the Shopping Centre, and there was just one other, erm, elderly Portuguese man in there having a drink, erm, and they just sort of shrugged and, so.  Those are the kind of people that we discussed the other day who I met during that search.  Erm, and then, then it picks up back here really, where it says ‘We went back to five ‘A’, it was clear that panic was setting in on Gerry’ and certainly, certainly this was my first, erm, experience of, of, erm, of the anguish that Gerry was in, you know”.
 

1578    “Yes”.
Reply    “So, I don’t know whether this, at this point here was where Gerry was on the phone, I, I had spoken to him at some point about what he was like on, on the patio, and he feels that this may have been a little bit later on, but, you know, it was around, it was around, erm, it was around here, erm, we certainly went back, erm, and whether this was immediately after I returned or perhaps a little bit later on, I’m not sure.  But the rest of this is, is absolutely correct, ‘He was speaking to somebody, a member of his family’.  And, you know, Gerry is, you know, a very determined, a very, a very strong guy, he doesn’t get flustered easily, he doesn’t, erm, he shrugs off the minor nuisances of life with consummate ease and he was just, as described here, erm, you know, just ‘like a’, ‘like a’, ‘like a sobbing child, absolutely hysterical’ and I just, erm, you know, stood, stood there pretty useless really, erm, you know, none of us knew, none of us knew what to say, so that is correct.  Erm, I think around this, huh, I think as I said yesterday, in terms of the recollection, and certainly at this point I had gone back to, to my flat or to the doors of five ‘D’.  I think I may well have actually gone back, erm, to speak to Jane briefly in between, erm, the, the searches as well, so I’m not, as you can imagine, it’s a little bit of a blur in what order some of this happened”.
 

1578    “Okay”.
Reply    “But the detail here about when I went back to Jane is certainly true in terms of content, whether it occurred at the point we’re writing here or whether it occurred in between one of the other searches, I’m not sure, but”.

[pathfinder73]

Fiona Payne

00.43.59
  1485
  'Sorry, his steak arrived when Kate went to go and check or when Kate came back''
 
 
  Reply
  'I remember the steak being here sort of just before Kate came back'.
 
 
  1485
  'Did you see her go''
 
 
  Reply
  'Erm, I was aware she'd gone, erm, at what exact point, again, it's got to be between quarter to ten and ten o'clock, somewhere in that time period'.
 
 
  1485
  'Yeah. Okay. So tell me what happened when Kate, how long Kate was away and how she came back and what were you doing, what was the mood of the table like''
 
 
  Reply
  'The mood was, as I say, it was very jovial that night, everyone was in really, really good humour, erm, there was a lot joking. Erm, Kate, she was gone, again, I wouldn't have said it was for any longer, it didn't strike me as a long period of time, she was gone any longer than any of the other checks. Erm, but I do remember her coming back, erm, you know, I never will forget'.
 
  00.45.09
  1485
  'Go on''
 
 
  Reply
  'Erm, tut, she sort of raced back and she just appeared at the doors of the sort of reception area and just shouted across, erm, 'She's gone. Gerry, Madeleine's gone'. And, you know, well you can just imagine the shock maybe. So everyone was just sort of still for what seemed like, sort of five seconds or so. Gerry jumped up and went 'She can't be gone' and raced off with Kate. And obviously we all followed, bar my mum, who I had said, I had the baby monitor, our baby monitor, and, plus, at that point, I just thought well, you know, the assumption was that she must have just wandered off, so I said to mum, you know, 'You stay put here just in case Madeleine comes down to the pool area' and gave her the monitor, our baby monitor, and said 'You you listen out for our kids'. So we all were sort of racing behind Kate and Gerry, erm, back up to the apartment. Erm, we didn't go in at that point, I think Kate, erm, Gerry must have rushed in with Kate and pretty much immediately Dave, erm, Matt, Russell and myself split up in four different directions just to do a search, you know, again assuming that she must have just wandered off. Erm, tut, so, you know, I don't know which way they went, but I, I went round the back of, erm, tut, well this way around the back of the apartments and round the back of the tennis courts on the main road and then cut down in front of the Baptista Supermarket and back up, that was the route I did'.
 
 
  1485
  'Yeah'.
 
 
  Reply
  'And by the time I got back everyone else had done their loop and at that point then no-one had seen Madeleine. Erm, I remember saying to Matt at that point 'You go down to main reception and phone the Police'. Erm, and I, I don't know what Matt, erm, I don't know what Dave and Russell did at that point. I said 'I'm going to go up to the', erm, 'Kate and Gerry's apartment'. Gerry had come down at that point. They hadn't found Madeleine, erm, panic was starting really. Erm, tut, after that really I stayed with Kate for the rest of the evening, I didn't, other than going onto their sort of balcony and out the front area of their apartment, I was with Kate. Erm, and Gerry, he was to'ing and fro'ing, in and out, in and out. Erm, it was just awful'.
 
  00.49.05
  1485
  'So having got back from your search around the corner, did you go then straight into the McCANN's''
 
 
  Reply
  'Yeah'.
 
 
  1485
  'What did you see when you walked in, describe it''
 
 
  Reply
  'At that point, Gerry, I don't think was in the apartment, it was mainly Kate. And Kate was just, huh, utter disbelief and I had disbelief, thinking she's got to be here, you know, what, how can this have happened. And by that point Kate was already saying that the, what she'd found when she'd gone back, which was that the, she'd found the window open and the shutter open and she was convinced at that point that somebody had taken, taken Madeleine and that's what she was telling me and I was like 'They can't have done. They can't have done this', you know. And I looked, I looked throughout the whole apartment and I looked in all the cupboards, under the drawers, under the beds, behind the curtains, everywhere, erm, just, you know, trying to, knowing it had already been done, but you just do. Erm, tut, I looked, when I went into the room that Madeleine was sleeping in, the room was dark, Madeleine, erm, Madeleine's bed was sort of folded back, the sheets, quite kind of neatly really, erm, Sean and Amelie were fast asleep in their cots, they didn't stir, you know, I was opening the cupboards in the room and moving around the room, they didn't stir at all, which that was, that was odd. Erm, we were trying to ascertain whether Madeleine could have got out, and I've already said earlier the shutters were very heavy, and I was almost trying to convince Kate that she could have opened the shutter and climbed out, although knowing that wasn't a likely thing, but at that point we were just trying to pacify Kate in that Madeleine was going to be alright. Erm, and I, I think I touched the webbing in that room, but because Sean and Amelie were asleep, I didn't actually open the shutter in that room, we went, I went to the front of the house and I was trying to lift the shutter at the, at the back, just to prove whether, you know, whether it could have been opened and whether Madeleine could have opened it from the inside'.
 
  00.50.31
  1485
  'And''
 
 
  Reply
  'I mean, it was fairly obviously, I think, that that wasn't what had happened and what could have happened'.
 
 
  1485
  'So what did you do, walk out of the apartment and round the other side then''
 
 
  Reply
  'No, I'.
 
 
  1485
  'Or did you do it from the inside''
 
 
  Reply
  'I did it from, I'm talking about, so, again, the back or the front, I did it from the back, which is where their balcony was'.
 
 
  1485
  'Yeah, yeah'.
 
 
  Reply
  'Erm, I don't know'.
 
 
  1485
  'How was Kate''
 
 
  Reply
  'Awful, erm, I've never seen such horrible raw emotion in my life and I've seen a lot of it in my job. Erm, tut, she, she was just bereft, she didn't know what to do, she was just panicking, extremely frightened, extremely frightened for Madeleine and, erm, was wondering where she was or what was happening to her. And the helplessness, erm, of not being able to do anything, what should she be doing, what could they do. Erm, she was angry, really angry, tut, punching walls, kicking walls, she was covered in bruises the next day, because she just didn't know what, what else to do. She was angry at herself, she kept saying 'I've let her down. We've let her down Gerry', you know, 'We should have been here'. Erm, tut, she was praying a lot. Erm, I just don't think she knew what to do, what to do. And she was just howling. It was just, just awful. I think as time went on it just seemed a massive delay from when we said to Matt to phone the Police, erm, that hour, it was an hour, it just seemed like an eternity, where nothing was happening, tut. Erm, you know, we're all intelligent people, we were all trying to think what we should be doing and, you know, what's going to make a difference. And Kate's ringing, Gerry's ringing anybody under the sun, family, they just don't, they honestly just didn't know what to do. So there was a lot of, Gerry's in and out, I mean, they were just sobbing, going between sobbing and then feeling helpless and then ringing people and this frantic activity. Kate was desperate to have a Priest, which, you know, people find weird, but I think that was just her way of thinking 'At least I can pray for Madeleine' and her way of feeling that she was doing something. Erm, tut, but she wasn't functioning'.
 
  00.53.22
  1485
  'Did the twins wake up at all''
 
 
  Reply
  'They didn't. They didn't'.
 
 
  1485
  'In the aftermath''
 
 
  Reply
  'No, and that was the other thing, she kept going into the twins, she kept putting her hands on the twins to check they were breathing, she was very much concerned in checking that they were okay. But they were okay, I mean, they were fine, they didn't, they were asleep, but at the time it did seem weird, I remember thinking, you know, when the Police came they turned the lights on, there was loads of noise, obviously from the moment Kate discovered that Madeleine was gone, the screaming and the shouting and there was a lot of noise and they, they didn't, you know, so much as blink'.

[pathfinder73]

Dianne Webster:

 4078    ”Can you remember what conversation was going on in the time before Kate discovered Madeleine missing?”

 Reply    ”Well again now, because err you know when you’ve got a group of nine people you’re not all talking…”

 

  4078    ”No.”

  Reply    ”In the middle of the table, you know, I would be, I was probably talking to Russell when he came back you know and talking about the fact he’d got a new steak, he didn’t get a warmed up one. Err no I can’t remember any conversation, I mean obviously one of the jokes err probably was the fact of err Russell rescuing Matt, being able to steer the boat to pick him up out the water, you know.”

 

  4078    ”Were you aware of Kate mentioning about Madeleine being awake the night before?”

 Reply    ”Err no, not at that point, I didn’t know anything about that.”

 

  4078    ”So that became…”

  Reply    ”That was…”

 

  4078    ”Known to you after Madeleine had gone?”

 Reply    ”That was after, because I remember err once I’d gone back to our apartment you know I sat, sat out on the veranda, I felt, felt quite helpless really, I mean I had to stay there and look after the two children and I just remember err Kate screaming, banging, hitting things and she was shouting, she says we’ve, we’ve let her down, you know, it was really very distressing.”

 

  4078    ”And how, I was just going to ask you a very leading question, then what happened after that?”

 Reply    ”What, after err…”

 

  4078    ”You were back at that apartment you say you just sat out on the balcony and felt helpless.”

 Reply    ”Yeah, you see there’s, there’s, I can’t quite get the timeline together because err at one point I also went out and had a walk round looking for her but I didn’t travel very far and I can’t remember at what point that was. It was obviously before I went back to the apartment to look after err Lily and Scarlet, now on that assumption I can only, I can only, I can only think that Fiona must have been in the apartment looking after them while I was out and my whole purpose of going back to the apartment was to let Fiona out for, to be with Kate.”

 

  4078    ”Do you remember where you went when you had a little look?”

 Reply    ”Err well I wandered about, because I’ve got no sense of direction, but I certainly wandered about err to where they had, there was road works going on but I didn’t feel too happy being about on my own at that err because it was quite late.”

 

  4078    ”Did you notice anybody else around when you were out?”

 Reply    ”No I didn’t, err and that’s what made it seem creepy, the fact I was wandering about on my own.”

 4078    ”What was the traffic like around your apartments and around the Tapas at that time of year?”

 Reply    ”I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t say there was err a great deal of traffic, nothing that really made me think oh it’s you know, overrun by cars.”

 

  4078    ”And on the times where you’ve gone through the events that night, have you ever recalled any specific car or car noise, somebody opening or shutting car doors?”

 Reply    ”No, I just can’t, you know, I’ve gone over this before in my head and I just can’t think of anything.”

 

  4078    ”Mm.”

 Reply    ”Some, you know, you’re just not looking for…”

 

  4078    ”So when you’ve ended up back at the apartment, you described how helpless you felt because you were confined to your apartment, is there anything that you can describe about what was going on around?  I mean you’ve already described about Kate and the noises they made.”

  Reply    ”Well yeah the noise, the noise coming from err Kate and Gerry’s apartment, err I could hear lots of noises in the distance but this is when a lot of the other people in the area had been woken up to all the noise. I could hear err I guess it was the men you know in the distance, you could just hear them shouting Madeleine, err I don’t know how far away they were, they could have been down at the beach I have no idea because sound does travel at night and err I mean I, I just err it just seemed so unreal what was going on. Err I can’t, I mean I just, I just sat there for hours, I couldn’t go to bed, I couldn’t do anything.

 

  4078    ”Did you get any sleep that night?”

 Reply    ”Err well eventually err the twins were brought up into our apartment err and that again to me was err a very odd thing because they were fast asleep, they did not wake up.”

 

  4078    ”Were they brought up, so had they been taken out of their cots and brought up?”

 Reply    ”Yeah, yeah. They were being carried, I think Fiona and Dave carried them up.”

 

  4078    ”And they were still not awake?”

 Reply    ”Still not awake, and the cots were, because they were travel cots they brought up, you know and err put in the living room and they were put into the cots and they just carried on sleeping.”

 

  4078    ”In your experience, obviously you’ve had children yourself and you’ve got plenty of grandchildren, and am I to understand that Sean and Amelie stayed in your apartment for longer than that night?”

 Reply    ”Err I can’t remember if they, no I think they just, just the one night, or two nights.”

 

  4078    ”But with all your experience of small children, you thought that was odd that they had not woken?”

 Reply    ”Oh yeah definitely. Well even err the noise that was going on in the apartment and they slept through it all.”

[pathfinder73]

Jane Tanner

4078    “And what can you remember after that?”

Reply    “Erm, well Evie was still up, so I was just with Evie in the room and I think it was getting quite and Russell had sort of said ‘I’ll go and finish my meal and then I’ll come back’.  So the next thing I can sort of really remember is thinking ‘Oh I wonder why he’s not’, you know, I think I was thinking ‘Oh he’s got chatting, he’s not gonna’, you know, ‘he’s not gonna come back’, blah, blah, sort of thinking along those lines.  So I don’t know whether it was the first time I’d looked out of the window to check, but I know it was the first time I thought, because I think it was odd, I looked out of the window to check, to see if I could see them still there, and that’s when the only person I could see still at the table was, erm, Dianne and everybody else seemed to have, seemed to have gone.  Which I thought was a bit odd, because I thought even if Russell would have come back, you know, I wouldn’t have expected everybody else to, to  have left at, you know, left at that point, so.  So, I mean, that’s the first time I thought ‘Oh’, you know, ‘What’s happened’, because I couldn’t, you know, I could see them actually sitting in the, sitting in the restaurant. But I don’t know how long that is from, but I think it must have been a fair while from, because I was actually thinking ‘Oh he should be back by now’, sort of actually, you know, to actually look out of the window”.

 

4078    “And what happened after that?”

Reply    “Erm, I think that’s when I went back to the roadside, I sort of looked out of the roadside door.  I think I heard some shouting, erm, so I actually went to sort of put my head out the roadside door.  And I think it was Rachael that I saw first because she had run back I think to check that Grace was obviously okay.  And then I think Rachael said, you know, she told me what had, you know she said ‘Oh Madeleine’s gone’ or, you know, something along those lines.  And that’s, it was almost straightaway as she said that I sort of had that, this person sort of came into my head at that”.

 

4078    “It was that quick was it after you?”

Reply    “It was almost, yeah, I was sort of like, oh, it just sort of seemed a bit, the connection made, you know, I thought ‘Oh that person was a bit odd’, he sort of seemed a bit, a bit odd.  But I think at that point I was obviously, I think I actually might have wondered, wondered and, you know, I was sort of thinking ‘Well I’m sure it couldn’t have been’, but it did come that immediate into my mind”.

 

4078    “So what happened from then?”

Reply    “Erm, well I think I was in a bit of a, I mean, obviously, erm, 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.  And Fi started running upstairs and that’s when I ran to Fi and said what I thought, you know, I said ‘I think I’ve seen somebody’.  I didn’t want to say to Kate at that point, which might sound odd now, you know, ‘Oh why wouldn’t you say straight away to Kate’, but, you know, the thought of telling the mother of a child that you might have seen being carried away is, it’s too horrible to even say.  So I just said to Fi, erm, you know, ‘I think I might have seen somebody a bit odd when I came back to do one of the checks’.  And I don’t know whether she, I mean, she was just sort of like, I don’t know whether she took it in properly, but, erm, and then they just carried on, carried on the searching.  They were sort of running around, I mean, I just stayed, erm, me and Rachael just stayed with, in our own, but we were sort of out in the alley, in the sort of stairwell outside our rooms, and we were sort of staying with the kids at that point, so we weren’t actually involved in any physical running around, searching”.

 

4078    “Did you stay sort of pretty much near to your apartment all night?”

Reply    “Yeah, yeah, well Evie was still up at this point so I’d sort of got her, she was still awake, so, I’d sort of, well I’d got her, I was holiday her but sort of just standing outside the, the door of the apartment mostly, I didn’t really move.  Rachael, because Grace was asleep, she was more moving around more, trying to, you know, see what was happening.  But, no, I was more or less at the bottom, as I say, at the bottom of the stairs, I’d come down”.

 

4078    “Who else did you speak to?”

Reply    “I’m trying to think of the order, it was sort of like, it was Rachael first, then it was Fi and I can’t remember when Russell and Matt came back, they came back at, erm, tut, I don’t know whether they came back first or I told them or who else was there, but as soon, the Police, when the Police came, I know Rachael went straight away to get them to say, so that I could tell the GNR, I think, yeah, the GNR, what I’d seen, but I don’t know if I told anybody else, I can’t remember when people like Sylvie, who was the translator, I’m not sure when she arrived whether it was before the Police arrived or after the Police arrived or whenever, but”.

 

4078    “But you told the Police when they came?”

Reply    “Yeah, when they arrived Rachael I think went and got the GNR and I told the GNR chap and then when the PJ actually arrived they came and got me to go and talk to the, the PJ”.

[pathfinder73]

Rachael Oldfield

1578 'When you, when you rose from the Tapas table and you followed Kate'.
  Reply 'Mmm'.
  1578 'To their apartment 5A, you said that you didn't go into the apartment'.
  Reply 'Yeah didn't go in'.
 

1578 'Who were you with at that point''
  Reply 'Well we were altogether really, I think I was probably at the back with Matt, had some high heels on that I couldn't really run very fast, remember that'.
 

1578 'And then''
  Reply 'I got to the bottom of the steps and Dave and Fi and Gerry and Kate were already sort of on the balcony of Gerry and Kates apartment, and I think had maybe already gone inside, erm and I think, I think Russell and Matt maybe went into the garden and just had a quick scoot around there to make sure'.
 

1578 'And then shortly after yourself and Matt''
  Reply 'Yeah'.
  1578 'Went round'.
  Reply 'Went round'.
 

1578 'To your apartment''
  Reply 'Yeah'.
 

1578 'How soon after''
  Reply 'Well literally like you know a minute, was sort of a minute, no more than that'.
 

1578 'And you've, you've walked past the front or car park side of the apartments''
  Reply 'Well yeah, you, well you go through the car park, you go up the road and turn left and then kind of cut in through the car park and then to get to our apartment, erm you go down a ramp and there was that courtyard area, I could draw it (inaudible)'.
 

1578 'Yes'.
  Reply 'Erm because'.
 

1578 'There is, there's a number of sketches that I'd like you to do'.
  Reply 'Yeah okay'.
 

1578 'We'll come on to this, as you're walking across'.
  Reply 'Mmm'.
 

1578 'Across the car park to your apartment, you've obviously, I dare say got Grace on your mind haven't you''
  Reply 'Yeah'.
 

1578 'Did either of you at that point look across to the shutters and window of Gerrys apartment''
  Reply 'No, no, we didn't know at that time that they were kind of up and the window was open and the sort of view you get as you're walking across the car, you walk across the car park there's a diagonal to get to the sort of ramp that goes down into the apartments, so Gerry and Kates you know shutters were here, erm that you kind of come into the car park and walk that way, so I don't remember looking there at all, it was just like you know, get to our apartment and make sure that Grace is okay'.
 

01.24.36 1578 'So on the route that you walked to your apartment'.
  Reply 'Mmm'.
 

1578 'Would there be anything in the way, preventing you from seeing the shutters, or would you have had a direct line of sight of the shutters''
  Reply 'We would of, well if you'd kind of, if you turned to look that way, you'd have had direct line of sight of the, for the shutters but we were walking that way, so and I think you know, didn't really look round, I mean there might have been a car parked there I don't know but I don't think there was, cos the car park was at this level and then there was a wall, erm and you know it was quite a big drop, maybe sort of about, like a four or five foot drop down from the car park onto the path that ran in front of the, Madeleines bedroom and, and the bedroom that we were in'.
 

1578 'Yes'.
  Reply 'So it was kind of down in a, I mean you know the shutters were there, at probably a car park level but you know there, there was quite a big drop off the car park'.
 

1578 'Okay'.
  Reply 'Onto that path'.
  1578 'So lets just continue then, you spoke about the conversation you had with Jane''
  Reply 'Mmm'.
 

1578 'What happened next''
  Reply 'Erm, erm it was just sort of you know, chaos really, erm Matt went down to call the Police, erm I mean people just, I mean you know Russell and Dave kind of went off and looked just around the roads'.
 

1578 'What did you do''
  Reply 'I basically just hung near our apartment, I didn't want to leave Grace, erm I mean she was'.
 

01.26.28 1578 'Did you have Grace with you''
  Reply 'No, no she was asleep and I didn't, you know I didn't want to leave the apartment by itself'.
 

[AnneGuedes]

Chaos and confusion. And that was one year later, after reading their first statements and sometimes others' statements. It seems they had no map, were asked to do sketches that we don't have.

[Benice]

Anyone who can read those statements and then claim they were all lying their heads off and that Kate and Gerry's distress was all put on  - needs to have a word with themselves IMO.    The whole group would have to be mega oscar winning actors for that to be true.   Is that remotely likely?   Not a chance IMO.

[pathfinder73]

I don't believe any of them are lying as it would have been chaos and confusion with people running round like headless chickens re MO. The only one I have a question mark on is David Payne - the one who last saw Madeleine before she disappeared but I need to look further into that before coming to any conclusions.

[Benice]

I don't believe any of them are lying as it would have been chaos and confusion with people running round like headless chickens re MO. The only one I have a question mark on is David Payne - the one who last saw Madeleine before she disappeared as his statements seem to contradict Kate's but I need to look further into that.

Both statements are not identical - but that is quite normal.   Why would they have any reason to make meticulous mental notes of every second of that short visit?    They could not see into the future or know that such a  little event which had no significance at all at the time would turn out to be important.

[pathfinder73]

At present I think they are all telling the truth including David Payne.

[Lyall]

Both statements are not identical - but that is quite normal.   Why would they have any reason to make meticulous mental notes of every second of that short visit?    They could not see into the future or know that such a  little event which had no significance at all at the time would turn out to be important.

But they certainly knew the importance of it just three hours later, didn't they Benice.

[Sherlock Holmes]

Anyone who can read those statements and then claim they were all lying their heads off and that Kate and Gerry's distress was all put on  - needs to have a word with themselves IMO.    The whole group would have to be mega oscar winning actors for that to be true.   Is that remotely likely?   Not a chance IMO.

Agreed. How they could make all that up - and everything else since then - is beyond credulity.

[Benice]

But they certainly knew the importance of it just three hours later, didn't they Benice.

Not IMO  - why would they?