The responding officers seem to have abrogated all responsibility for taking control of the crime scene.
They allowed the scene to become contaminated by all and sundry walking through it leaving prints and DNA in their wake.
Not content with that they added to it by smoking and dropping cigarette ash on the floor.
Surely they did not have to wait for the arrival of the Portuguese Judiciary on the morning of the 4th to secure the crime scene, should they not have done that on arrival?
Breaking the code of silence that Portuguese police are normally expected to adhere to, the pair said they were among the first to arrive on the scene and watched, appalled, as people went in and out of the two-bedroom flat.
"It was chaos," one said. "The world and his dog were in that room just to look under a bed. It was crazy allowing so many people to trample through.
"There was nothing we could do. The damage had already been done."
His colleague added: "It's not brain surgery and probably, in this case, could have saved a lot of speculation, heartache and unnecessary investigation time and money.
"The world's eyes are on us and we mucked up big and there's nothing they can do to change things - it's too late."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1568477/Portuguese-police-admit-Madeleine-circus.htmlIMO the victims of this crime, Madeleine and her family were badly let down in the first hours and days after Madeleine’s disappearance, when evidence was fresh and might have been there to be found if looked for.
For example, the bedclothes were allowed to be removed by housekeeping and washed!! no thought was given that the DNA or other traces of an intruder could have been present.
It could even have been considered appropriate to make the Drs McCann arguidos at this point when it might have afforded them the full protection of the law without prejudice.
Doing it at a later date when everything else had failed and based on misinterpretation of forensics caused a media frenzy and unwarranted suspicion which has lasted to the present day.