Pages 825=828 statement of CI Vitor Matos
- As you know, yesterday, 8 May 2007 at 23h45, the undersigned joined a search effected by the GNR dog team which targeted Blocks 5 and 4 of the Ocean Club resort and adjacent areas, with the objective of trying to reconstruct the possible route taken by the missing child on 3 May 2007.
- The search was led by GNR 1st Sergeant A.F.Silva, head of the search and rescue team who coordinated all the work done by the "dual track" [method] which was performed by two tracker dogs with their handler, GNR officer P.Fernandes.
- The members of the GNR advised that the tracker dogs are trained to search mainly in rural areas, given the fact that the best capability of the animal is to identify a different and strong smell in a wide, open area, it being sure that in terms of timing they said that after 48 hours from the event it is difficult to obtain positive results. Concerning urban areas, or areas with identical characteristics, they advised that due to the fact of there being a large number of odours in the air, it becomes impossible for the tracker dog to manage to identify/locate the "target smell", because it is diffuse [dispersed; broken up], [the dog] ending up becoming confused and indicating its disinterest in continuing the search.
- Further, in an informal conversation with the GNR team, they advised that on the 4 May they had done the same work, with no control over the direction taken by the dogs, i.e. they were not directed into the buildings, it being certain that they took the same route described above, with the same attitude, losing the trail next to the car park of Block 6.
*Snip*
- The GNR team performing the search had in its possession, packed in a plastic bag, a towel supposedly used to clean the missing youngster - Madeleine McCann - furnished by her parents.
*Snip* (final paragraph)
- According to the GNR team and after the work was finished, they gave their opinion about what had happened, saying it is difficult the be precise about the dogs' achievement given the conditioning factors involved - smells, time of day, area concerned - adding still more the degree of uncertainty, because the clues revealed by the dogs can only be significant by confirming if in an area of intense odour, the intended [hunted; sought after] smell is found.
- Laid bare, in their understanding, the interest demonstrated by the dog at the doors of some apartments can not signify that the scent of the missing child was detected, but solely a mere confirmation and going off track [straying], because it never showed the handler that it had found the intended scent.
Whilst much of the information in the above statement was the Chief Inspector's interpretation of the information relayed by the dog handler's he accompanied on the second s&r dogs' operation, I feel that the "48 hour" point for living scent is as significant as the 28day time limit for cadaver odour.
I question why the dogs could follow the same ground route on 2 occasions 4 days apart (aside from signalling at the upper apartments). It sugests to me that the scent came from an individual who was using only the route the dogs followed, and leaving via the carpark on more than one occasion.
