Was Martin Smith mistaken about his 60% - 80% certainty after all?

[ShiningInLuz]

you could go on to say that in light of this any article in the telegraph and in any newspaper may not be reliable...and that is true. The fact is though that posters pick and choose what they want to believe



the fact remains...who else could have drawn up the efits apart from the smith family

That's not the point being made here.

The point being debated is whether the members of the Smith family drawing up the e-fits is Martin and Mary, or some other combo.

[Carana]

That's not the point being made here.

The point being debated is whether the members of the Smith family drawing up the e-fits is Martin and Mary, or some other combo.

I agree although I'm not sure what difference it makes.

[Mr Gray]

That's not the point being made here.

The point being debated is whether the members of the Smith family drawing up the e-fits is Martin and Mary, or some other combo.

as it was dark and none of the got a good look at his face...as all of them had seen Gerry countless times in newspapers and tv before making the efits..it is of no importance

[ShiningInLuz]

as it was dark and none of the got a good look at his face...as all of them had seen Gerry countless times in newspapers and tv before making the efits..it is of no importance

I'm happy to make up my own mind as to whether it is of importance or not.  I will leave it to other readers to form their own opinion.

Personally, I would like to know which Smith members participated in the making, precisely when it was done, and the techniques used to construct them.

They were trotted out on Crimewatch 2013, and the Portuguese media reports I have seen of that labelled this man as a SUSPECT, as opposed to simply someone OG wished to be able to eliminate from the enquiry.

While I have not tracked every move Amaral has made, I believe he has been interviewed to the effect that OG had finally come to the same conclusion that he did before he was taken off the case, thus bolstering his standing.

Those impacts are not 'of no importance' in finding and potentially eliminating Smithman, and impact quite significantly in progressing the case in this respect. IMO.

If your opinion is different, so be it.  You are entitled to your opinion, as I am entitled to mine.

[Mr Gray]

I'm happy to make up my own mind as to whether it is of importance or not.  I will leave it to other readers to form their own opinion.

Personally, I would like to know which Smith members participated in the making, precisely when it was done, and the techniques used to construct them.

They were trotted out on Crimewatch 2013, and the Portuguese media reports I have seen of that labelled this man as a SUSPECT, as opposed to simply someone OG wished to be able to eliminate from the enquiry.

While I have not tracked every move Amaral has made, I believe he has been interviewed to the effect that OG had finally come to the same conclusion that he did before he was taken off the case, thus bolstering his standing.

Those impacts are not 'of no importance' in finding and potentially eliminating Smithman, and impact quite significantly in progressing the case in this respect. IMO.

If your opinion is different, so be it.  You are entitled to your opinion, as I am entitled to mine.

It is important in eliminating smithman...but can you tell me why it is of so much importance as to which of the smith family drew up the efits......none of the family saw him particularly well and as Mr Smith thought it was Gerry by the way he held the child his memory may well have been affected having seen Gerry's face at a  later date...

[ferryman]

I'm happy to make up my own mind as to whether it is of importance or not.  I will leave it to other readers to form their own opinion.

Personally, I would like to know which Smith members participated in the making, precisely when it was done, and the techniques used to construct them.

They were trotted out on Crimewatch 2013, and the Portuguese media reports I have seen of that labelled this man as a SUSPECT, as opposed to simply someone OG wished to be able to eliminate from the enquiry.

While I have not tracked every move Amaral has made, I believe he has been interviewed to the effect that OG had finally come to the same conclusion that he did before he was taken off the case, thus bolstering his standing.

Those impacts are not 'of no importance' in finding and potentially eliminating Smithman, and impact quite significantly in progressing the case in this respect. IMO.

If your opinion is different, so be it.  You are entitled to your opinion, as I am entitled to mine.

I don't know if this helps, SIL, but this is how English police typically produce efits:

http://www.thamesvalley.police.uk/pub-policiesandprocedures-production-of-e-fits.pdf

[ShiningInLuz]

I am broadly of the opinion that the Smith e-fits are useless for identification purposes.

The issue is public perception of them.

It is my opinion, based on what I know about the case and how valid e-fits are, versus Andy Redwood's opinion, who probably has better knowledge in this instance than I do.

Therefore, if I assert the e-fits are useless, and in fact may actually be hampering the search for the truth, anyone can counter that a DCI knows better.

If the e-fits really are useless, why did DCI Redwood reveal them?  Was it a mistake?  Or does he simply know more, and concluded that the e-fits have value?

Until I get more detailed information on who, when and how, there is obvious scope for speculation.

If the Telegraph writer has gone to the Smiths and they have stated it was Martin and Mary, I would have more confidence in this respect.

I happen to be of the opinion it was Martin and Peter, based on what is in their statements.  But I can hardly state that conclusively.

The who, what and when became important when DCI Redwood nearly ruled out Tannerman, ruled in Smithman, and produced the e-fits.

He did not make Smithman the suspect, but others have. "This could be the man that took Madeleine, but very importantly there could be an innocent explanation" became suspect.

The mechanics of the e-fits are very important.

[Carana]

Blonk has gone again. I'm still interested in the sources on which he bases his assertions.

[ShiningInLuz]

I don't know if this helps, SIL, but this is how English police typically produce efits:

http://www.thamesvalley.police.uk/pub-policiesandprocedures-production-of-e-fits.pdf

Thank you very much - this is excellent.

I have had a quick first read and I need to go back and read it in more detail.

From my first read, Thames Valley Police would never have tried to make an e-fit via Martin, Peter or Aoife, given that there statements are almost totally devoid of a facial description.

So, did someone else in the Smith family step into the void?  If other members could remember Smithman's face, would they have kept silent about it?  Unlikely, IMO.

Does OG have markedly different procedures to TVP?  Unlikely, IMO.

That would place Redwood as using e-fits that procedures say are not fit for purpose.  Weird!

It happens to fit my assessment of Crimewatch 2013 though.  Namely that it was not a targeted operation, but instead a wide trawl in the hope of finding anything, anything at all.

Hmm, I wonder if the person named by more than one person as e-fit-man was Gerry?

From memory, there was an FOI on who was involved in the production of the e-fits, and it received the rather obscure answer that it was 'two members of the Irish family'.  I wonder if this lack of clarity was to avoid the question of why OG was using goods apparently not fit for purpose.

Further, I can't see how OG could use e-fit responses directly, nor any evidence that subsequently arose as a result of such responses.  How very curious!

Great stuff, so thanks again!

[Lace]

Didn't Mr Smith say the man didn't have glasses?   If he didn't see his face how come he knew that?   

[blonk]

Could you provide sources for where Martin Smith made public statements "calling on the public to look for the abductor, expressing sympathy for the McCanns' plight", please?

This is one of the sources, an article dated 10 August 2008 in the Irish Mail on Sunday:

QUOTE (EXTRACTS ONLY)

“Friends of the McCann family said last night that the decision of the Portuguese police to pursue Mr Smith's claims prove that they were determined to pin the blame on Maddie's parents come what may.

One said: ‘'Look at the facts. This man sees an individual carrying a child on the night Madeleine vanished. He waits 13 days to report this to the police, going back to Ireland. The McCanns return to England…it  was this image that alerted Mr Smith in the meantime.

"At this stage he admits he has no idea who the man is, other than a basic description. A further three, almost four months go by before, after seeing him on television, he feels it could be Gerry. By now the police have dozens of statements putting Gerry back at the apartment complex at that time. Yet the Portuguese ask a combination of the Leicestershire police and the Garda to re-interview this witness. About what?’

''And why? The truth is that this is part of the victimisation of Gerry and Kate which has gone on from the very beginning by the Portuguese, who were clearly desperate to get something against them."

“As they made their way back, the [Smiths] crossed paths with a slim man with a full head of chestnut coloured hair and dressed in beige trousers coming in the opposite direction.

“In the statement to Portuguese police on May 26th, the grandfather - who wears glasses but was not wearing them at the night in question - said he would not be able to identify the man he saw. Significantly though he was able to tell Police that the man was not Robert Murat, as he had met him on a number of previous occasions.

“This weekend, Mr Smith's wife Mary told the Mail on Sunday her husband had no regrets about coming forward. ‘He [Martin] doesn't want to talk, said Mrs Smith. He said what he had to say. I was with him [that night]. We saw a man carrying a child and that's all we know. We told them all that and that's it. The man he saw had the same stature as Gerry McCann. We felt we had to help. We're happy we did. We reported exactly what we saw…our hearts are breaking for her parents, as it would be if it were one of ours. 'I feel very much for them [the McCanns]. I have six grandchildren of my own and six children of my own. The poor McCann family must be heartbroken.''

There is at least one more source but I can't lay my hands on it at the moment.

[Carana]

This is one of the sources, an article dated 10 August 2008 in the Irish Mail on Sunday:

QUOTE (EXTRACTS ONLY)

“Friends of the McCann family said last night that the decision of the Portuguese police to pursue Mr Smith's claims prove that they were determined to pin the blame on Maddie's parents come what may.

One said: ‘'Look at the facts. This man sees an individual carrying a child on the night Madeleine vanished. He waits 13 days to report this to the police, going back to Ireland. The McCanns return to England…it  was this image that alerted Mr Smith in the meantime.

"At this stage he admits he has no idea who the man is, other than a basic description. A further three, almost four months go by before, after seeing him on television, he feels it could be Gerry. By now the police have dozens of statements putting Gerry back at the apartment complex at that time. Yet the Portuguese ask a combination of the Leicestershire police and the Garda to re-interview this witness. About what?’

''And why? The truth is that this is part of the victimisation of Gerry and Kate which has gone on from the very beginning by the Portuguese, who were clearly desperate to get something against them."

“As they made their way back, the [Smiths] crossed paths with a slim man with a full head of chestnut coloured hair and dressed in beige trousers coming in the opposite direction.

“In the statement to Portuguese police on May 26th, the grandfather - who wears glasses but was not wearing them at the night in question - said he would not be able to identify the man he saw. Significantly though he was able to tell Police that the man was not Robert Murat, as he had met him on a number of previous occasions.

“This weekend, Mr Smith's wife Mary told the Mail on Sunday her husband had no regrets about coming forward. ‘He [Martin] doesn't want to talk, said Mrs Smith. He said what he had to say. I was with him [that night]. We saw a man carrying a child and that's all we know. We told them all that and that's it. The man he saw had the same stature as Gerry McCann. We felt we had to help. We're happy we did. We reported exactly what we saw…our hearts are breaking for her parents, as it would be if it were one of ours. 'I feel very much for them [the McCanns]. I have six grandchildren of my own and six children of my own. The poor McCann family must be heartbroken.''

There is at least one more source but I can't lay my hands on it at the moment.

Thanks for that Blonk. Could you provide a link to the original, please? I can wade through the entire article.


From the article that you have extracted snippets from:
“In the statement to Portuguese police on May 26th, the grandfather - who wears glasses but was not wearing them at the night in question - said he would not be able to identify the man he saw. Significantly though he was able to tell Police that the man was not Robert Murat, as he had met him on a number of previous occasions.



In the interest of objectivity, and in the light of Mr Smith's account - who was not wearing glasses at the time?

This doesn't appear to correspond to Mr Smith's statement

(Edited for clarification)

[blonk]

I'm happy to make up my own mind as to whether it is of importance or not.  I will leave it to other readers to form their own opinion.

Personally, I would like to know which Smith members participated in the making, precisely when it was done, and the techniques used to construct them.

They were trotted out on Crimewatch 2013...

I think we can pinpoint roughly WHEN these efits were drawn up. Henri Exton, former Head of Covert Intelligence at MI5 (a relevant fact in itself) admits to drawing up these efits. Brian Kennedy got involved in approaching the Smiths in December 2007 or January 2008. But by the last week of August 2008, the entire Oakley International Team (Kevin Halligen, Henri Exton and Tim Craig-Harvey) had been sacked by the Directors of Madeleine's Fund amid widely-reported recriminations in the media about Halligen's profligacy. We can perhaps be a bit more precise, as Oakley was not appointed until April 2008, so the efits must have been drawn up between April 2008 and the last week of August 2008. I would suggest that May 2008 is as likely a month as any, and that would make it one whole year after Madeleine was reported missing.

There are at least two aspects of the efits which cast doubt on whether the efits were drawn up by the Smiths at all:

1. How could they possibly do so a year after only seeing this man for a few seconds in the dark? - and
2. How on earth could the Smiths, between them, produce two very different images - look e.g. at the overall size and shape of the face, the huge difference in chin size, differences in the length of the nose and hairstyle, and so on?

Here is a hypothesis that I suggest must be considered:

'That Exton drew up these images from another source and the Smiths were simply asked to assent to them'. Which they have done for the past 7 years             

[blonk]

Thanks for that Blonk. Could you provide a link to the original, please? I can wade through the entire article.

From the article that you have extracted snippets from, this extract from an article doesn't appear to correspond to Mr Smith's statement:

“In the statement to Portuguese police on May 26th, the grandfather - who wears glasses but was not wearing them at the night in question - said he would not be able to identify the man he saw. Significantly though he was able to tell Police that the man was not Robert Murat, as he had met him on a number of previous occasions.

In the interest of objectivity, and in the light of Mr Smith's account - who was not wearing glasses at the time?

I do not have the original link. I cut-and-pasted it either from mccannfiles or from the Irish Mail on Sunday website.

On the subject of who was not wearing glasses, debate has raged because if you look at the English translation in the PJ files, it is not actually clear.

Some argue that he meant that he was somehow referring to Robert Murat.

I and most others are persuaded that he was referring to himself i.e. 'I normally wear glasses but wasn't on this occasion'.

I think elsewhere I have listed SIX separate reasons for suggesting that Martin Smith (and other members of his family) could not possibly have been in a position to draw up one, let alone two different, efits a whole year after (allegedly) seeing this man.

If he was not wearing his glasses, that would be a SEVENTH reason...         

[Carana]

I do not have the original link. I cut-and-pasted it either from mccannfiles or from the Irish Mail on Sunday website.

On the subject of who was not wearing glasses, debate has raged because if you look at the English translation in the PJ files, it is not actually clear.

Some argue that he meant that he was somehow referring to Robert Murat.

I and most others are persuaded that he was referring to himself i.e. 'I normally wear glasses but wasn't on this occasion'.

I think elsewhere I have listed SIX separate reasons for suggesting that Martin Smith (and other members of his family) could not possibly have been in a position to draw up one, let alone two different, efits a whole year after (allegedly) seeing this man.

If he was not wearing his glasses, that would be a SEVENTH reason...         

Perhaps you could quote Martin Smith's statement on that point?