I'm confused too Cariad
It seems ferryman is suggesting the 'source' of the rogatory interviews is not the police files, but some fellow called Levy
Most odd
The source of the Tapas Group Rogatory Interviews is categorically not the Police Files as contained in the DVD which Pamalam reproduces on her blog.
If you disagree with that statement. please show where in those files they are to be found.
I will even give you a link to the files to make your life easier.
This site contains the contents of the main DVD which the PT authorities released to journalists after the archival of the case. That DVD contains 1.07 GB of data which is reproduced on the site below.
http://www.mccannpjfiles.co.uk/PJ/PAGE_ORDER.htmThis is the only time that the files of a case have been released in this way in Portugal. The normal system is that the files are released but only to be viewed by the journalists through an appointment system at the relevant police staion. The journalists are not normally allowed to copy directly information or to take away information from the office where they are allowed to see it. They can simply make notes and report on it.
In this case there was such a demand for access to the files that the normal system could not cope. Therefore the journalists were issued with DVDs containing the files. On being issued with the copies of the DVDs though, the assembled journalists were reminded that the rule relating to the copying wholesale of the material was forbidden. It could be quoted and reported upon but remained copyright and was not to be published as a complete file.
Clearly that rule has not been upheld since as two clear breaches are known.
First, the extremely "mysterious" journalist Duarte Levy broke the rule and released copies of the DVD with which he had been issued. This was the 1.07 GB version which Pamalam has produced which contained four files - Apensos, Cartos Rogatorias, Outros Apensos and Processo. The DVD was released to the world by Levy not in the press or on his own blog which was very active at the time but literally by hand to various chosen people who he had seen posting derogatory statements about the McCanns.
You might think that the Tapas group Rogatories were in that Cartos Rogatorias section of that DVD with the list of questions to be posed to them and the other witnesses. But you would be wrong. All the other witness statements are there but not theirs. That seems very odd. Why include the questions to be asked of them but forget to include the answers? All the other witness statements are there with the list of questions each was to be asked.
The document containing the list of questions for all the witnesses (Tapas Group and others) is there but the responses are only from the Non Tapas group members.
Something, as an aside, that not many people know is that only one other witness besides the Tapas group who was questioned at the Rogatories was videoed. The remainder were not.
Now, did Levy tamper with the original DVD and remove the Tapas rogatories to be released later or where they on a separate DVD which he then released later?
The Tapas group interviews were contained in video format on 26 separate DVDs.
The Tapas Rogatories were released by Levy at a later date. Again he chose someone who had been posting online about the McCanns, this time in a more bipartisan way but who nevertheless was associated with anti McCann feeling. Her online ID was Nicked and she came from Northern England. To this day it is only that copy of the Tapas Rogatories which exists in public. No other source more direct than Levy and this poster exists.
After they had been released in this bizarre way, they were posted on his own blog and backdated to May 2008.
The archival of the case did not take place till after this date and no journalist had access to any of the files till then (late June 2008).
It has always amused me that those who rely on the PJ Files as the fount of all knowledge, forget the route which that information took before they were allowed to clap eyes on it. They talk of the files as though they are exactly as the PT Prosecutor released them into the hands of the journalists but they may well not be.
Levy, a great friend of Amaral, could possibly have released the material on these two occasions without the slightest alteration. That is true. But just as possible is the other option, that he tampered with that material. And before anyone asks why that might have been, don't forget that Levy was one of Amaral's greatest supporters. A motive could lie in that support especially as by the end of 2008 it was clear that the McCanns were not entirely happy with the work of Amaral on the case or the book he wrote and published just as the case was archived.
