Would a Portuguese Crimewatch have helped find Madeleine McCann?

[misty]

I'm not suggesting anything. The Met said there was a sighting by an Irish family and two members of that family created two e-fits of the same man. They never gave the name of the family. They never said when the e-fits were made. It's highly likely that their name was Smith, but that hasn't been said either by Crimewatch or by the Met.

IMO the Smiths have played a blinder.
They couldn't produce efits to go with their original statements to the PJ.
They could produce efits for a firm of private investigators, which would be inadmissible as evidence under Portuguese law.
They efit they produced was for PI's who have no legal jurisdiction in the UK therefore the Smiths have committed no criminal offence.
One of the efits produced looked like it had walked off the page of GM's passport, so that wasn't the outcome both the PI's & McCanns were anticipating.
If SY finally took the decision to release those efits to the public, safe in the knowledge that GM was not Smithman, they were not compromising the Smiths' legal position in any way.
If the Portuguese media took the decision to release those efits in their country, they would be proving the Smiths to be unreliable & untruthful witnesses, thus undermining their own police force's investigation.
Does that make sense?

[pathfinder73]

IMO the Smiths have played a blinder.
They couldn't produce efits to go with their original statements to the PJ.
They could produce efits for a firm of private investigators, which would be inadmissible as evidence under Portuguese law.
They efit they produced was for PI's who have no legal jurisdiction in the UK therefore the Smiths have committed no criminal offence.
One of the efits produced looked like it had walked off the page of GM's passport, so that wasn't the outcome both the PI's & McCanns were anticipating.
If SY finally took the decision to release those efits to the public, safe in the knowledge that GM was not Smithman, they were not compromising the Smiths' legal position in any way.
If the Portuguese media took the decision to release those efits in their country, they would be proving the Smiths to be unreliable & untruthful witnesses, thus undermining their own police force's investigation.
Does that make sense?

This was a group of nine - 5 kids. The Smiths are telling the truth and Aoife saw his face. Seeing that person again could bring it back. Did SY say on CW it was not who Martin Smith said it was in 2007. No way but knowing who he is doesn't solve a case.

[G-Unit]

IMO the Smiths have played a blinder.
They couldn't produce efits to go with their original statements to the PJ.
They could produce efits for a firm of private investigators, which would be inadmissible as evidence under Portuguese law.
They efit they produced was for PI's who have no legal jurisdiction in the UK therefore the Smiths have committed no criminal offence.
One of the efits produced looked like it had walked off the page of GM's passport, so that wasn't the outcome both the PI's & McCanns were anticipating.
If SY finally took the decision to release those efits to the public, safe in the knowledge that GM was not Smithman, they were not compromising the Smiths' legal position in any way.
If the Portuguese media took the decision to release those efits in their country, they would be proving the Smiths to be unreliable & untruthful witnesses, thus undermining their own police force's investigation.
Does that make sense?

They weren't asked to produce e-fits by the PJ because they said they wouldn't recognise the man again.
Jane Tanner's e-fit was publicised by the PJ who didn't produce it. Why would other e-fits be inadmissable?
It is rumoured they produced e-fits for PI's. We don't know if that's true.
The e-fits are said to be of the same man.
How do you know SY were safe in the knowledge the e-fits weren't of GM?
The Potuguese media could easily show the e-fits as 'released by Operation Grange, who say they were produced by two members of an Irish family'. How does that undermine the PJ investigation? One of the e-fits looks like GM as you say. One of the Smiths was 60-80% sure the man he saw was GM, but he didn't base it on his recognition of GM's facial features. That's the real problem with the e-fits. If the Smiths did them, where in the world did they get those features from? Memory or an assumpton of who they saw?

[misty]

They weren't asked to produce e-fits by the PJ because they said they wouldn't recognise the man again.
Jane Tanner's e-fit was publicised by the PJ who didn't produce it. Why would other e-fits be inadmissable?
It is rumoured they produced e-fits for PI's. We don't know if that's true.
The e-fits are said to be of the same man.
How do you know SY were safe in the knowledge the e-fits weren't of GM?
The Potuguese media could easily show the e-fits as 'released by Operation Grange, who say they were produced by two members of an Irish family'. How does that undermine the PJ investigation? One of the e-fits looks like GM as you say. One of the Smiths was 60-80% sure the man he saw was GM, but he didn't base it on his recognition of GM's facial features. That's the real problem with the e-fits. If the Smiths did them, where in the world did they get those features from? Memory or an assumpton of who they saw?

JTs efit did not include facial features. It was an artist's impression of what she saw sideways on from a distance, which amounted to little more than clothing description, height, build & hair colour. This was consistent with the information she supplied in her statement to the PJ and they had done their own artist's impression (which must have been as much use to their investigation as a toddler's drawing).
We know that SY cannot place GM at the Smithman sighting location at the time the Smiths reported in their statements. Even GA conceded that, and attempted to alter the time to as much as 25 minutes later.
The original Portuguese investigation would be undermined because the Smiths did return to Portugal & do a reconstruction of their sighting yet nothing was followed up. A demonstration of why a reconstruction by the Tapas 9, so important to the PJ, would have been pointless.

[Brietta]

IMO the Smiths have played a blinder.
They couldn't produce efits to go with their original statements to the PJ.
They could produce efits for a firm of private investigators, which would be inadmissible as evidence under Portuguese law.
They efit they produced was for PI's who have no legal jurisdiction in the UK therefore the Smiths have committed no criminal offence.
One of the efits produced looked like it had walked off the page of GM's passport, so that wasn't the outcome both the PI's & McCanns were anticipating.
If SY finally took the decision to release those efits to the public, safe in the knowledge that GM was not Smithman, they were not compromising the Smiths' legal position in any way.
If the Portuguese media took the decision to release those efits in their country, they would be proving the Smiths to be unreliable & untruthful witnesses, thus undermining their own police force's investigation.
Does that make sense?

**Snip
In the United Kingdom, just 10% of composite faces are released to the media.

The remainder are used for internal police enquiries: around half are shown to informants familiar with the appearance of local criminals and another third used for house-to-house enquiries in the hope that it will cue a tentative identification (Kitson, Darnbrough & Shields, 1978).

Inevitably many composites end up neglected in police files or thumb tacked to bulletin boards.
http://www.valentinemoore.co.uk/trv/DVfacialcomposite.pdf


Which seems to suggest another reason why the efits were not released until it suited SY decided they wanted them released to the public domain.
It is apparently procedure to use efits in different ways and sometimes not to release them at all.

There is no set formula or preferred system for getting the information required to construct an image; but I think it would probably be true to say that a prerequisite is that immediately after seeing a person the witness should be capable of recalling features to enable a reconstruction.

The three members of the Smith family whose statements we have seen are on record as stating they were unable to do that.

The descriptions came from somewhere: I for one would be interested in the methodology used to generate memories which could not be recalled in 2007, in the weeks after the event.

[misty]

**Snip
In the United Kingdom, just 10% of composite faces are released to the media.

The remainder are used for internal police enquiries: around half are shown to informants familiar with the appearance of local criminals and another third used for house-to-house enquiries in the hope that it will cue a tentative identification (Kitson, Darnbrough & Shields, 1978).

Inevitably many composites end up neglected in police files or thumb tacked to bulletin boards.
http://www.valentinemoore.co.uk/trv/DVfacialcomposite.pdf


Which seems to suggest another reason why the efits were not released until it suited SY decided they wanted them released to the public domain.
It is apparently procedure to use efits in different ways and sometimes not to release them at all.

There is no set formula or preferred system for getting the information required to construct an image; but I think it would probably be true to say that a prerequisite is that immediately after seeing a person the witness should be capable of recalling features to enable a reconstruction.

The three members of the Smith family whose statements we have seen are on record as stating they were unable to do that.

The descriptions came from somewhere: I for one would be interested in the methodology used to generate memories which could not be recalled in 2007, in the weeks after the event.

That's an interesting piece of information, Brietta.
From that, I would assume that perhaps SY detectives had shown those efits to everyone they interviewed who was in PdL that week and may have been able to identify the person. The negative response necessitated public release.

[ShiningInLuz]

...
If the Portuguese media took the decision to release those efits in their country, they would be proving the Smiths to be unreliable & untruthful witnesses, thus undermining their own police force's investigation.
...

The e-fits were reported and shown in Portuguese media around the time of the Crimewatch prog. 

What I can't see is anything significant in Portuguese media linking the e-fits to a phone number to call, or other contact method, in those reports.  Or that Smithman is merely someone whom OG would like to eliminate from their enquiries. 

[pathfinder73]

JTs efit did not include facial features. It was an artist's impression of what she saw sideways on from a distance, which amounted to little more than clothing description, height, build & hair colour. This was consistent with the information she supplied in her statement to the PJ and they had done their own artist's impression (which must have been as much use to their investigation as a toddler's drawing).
We know that SY cannot place GM at the Smithman sighting location at the time the Smiths reported in their statements. Even GA conceded that, and attempted to alter the time to as much as 25 minutes later.
The original Portuguese investigation would be undermined because the Smiths did return to Portugal & do a reconstruction of their sighting yet nothing was followed up. A demonstration of why a reconstruction by the Tapas 9, so important to the PJ, would have been pointless.

No JT couldn't see a face and he morphed into George Harrison. The Smiths passed close not like Tanner. Aoife said they left at 10 so that connects to 10:02/3 sighting time.

[Brietta]

That's an interesting piece of information, Brietta.
From that, I would assume that perhaps SY detectives had shown those efits to everyone they interviewed who was in PdL that week and may have been able to identify the person. The negative response necessitated public release.

There is so much that we don't know about police procedures and operational matters, Misty, and it allows assumptions to be made.
I had no idea at all that usable efits would be withheld ... and that the percentage not publicised was as high as the research suggests.
I think your suggestion that all avenues had already been pursued is a sound one.
 

[G-Unit]

JTs efit did not include facial features. It was an artist's impression of what she saw sideways on from a distance, which amounted to little more than clothing description, height, build & hair colour. This was consistent with the information she supplied in her statement to the PJ and they had done their own artist's impression (which must have been as much use to their investigation as a toddler's drawing).
We know that SY cannot place GM at the Smithman sighting location at the time the Smiths reported in their statements. Even GA conceded that, and attempted to alter the time to as much as 25 minutes later.
The original Portuguese investigation would be undermined because the Smiths did return to Portugal & do a reconstruction of their sighting yet nothing was followed up. A demonstration of why a reconstruction by the Tapas 9, so important to the PJ, would have been pointless.

The PJ decided that GM was at the Tapas restaurant at the time of the Smith sighting. If all the statements are read it's clear that the times reported that evening varied widely. We don't know why the PJ reached the conclusion they did.

How should the PJ have followed up the Smith sighting in your opinion, and why does that make a reconstruction pointless?

[misty]

The PJ decided that GM was at the Tapas restaurant at the time of the Smith sighting. If all the statements are read it's clear that the times reported that evening varied widely. We don't know why the PJ reached the conclusion they did.

How should the PJ have followed up the Smith sighting in your opinion, and why does that make a reconstruction pointless?

It would have been useful for the PJ to take the 3 Smith family members to the Dolphin restaurant & Kellys Bar when they were there at the end of May. Staff memories would have been fresher, audit rolls could have produced precise timings for purchases instead of that information not being obtained until the October. If it was important enough to fly the Smiths back to Portugal to assure the PJ it was definitely not RM they saw that night, surely it was equally important to investigate the sighting as fully as possible.
A reconstruction in the case of the Tapas 9 would only have been useful if it could have produced a definitive timeline AND been the focus of jogging local memories to obtain information which had not previously forthcoming. How long did it take for Jenny M to come forward with information about the woman in the purple top acting suspiciously outside block 5 between 8 & 8.30? Would that suspicious woman have featured in the PJ reconstitution?

[Brietta]

It would have been useful for the PJ to take the 3 Smith family members to the Dolphin restaurant & Kellys Bar when they were there at the end of May. Staff memories would have been fresher, audit rolls could have produced precise timings for purchases instead of that information not being obtained until the October. If it was important enough to fly the Smiths back to Portugal to assure the PJ it was definitely not RM they saw that night, surely it was equally important to investigate the sighting as fully as possible.
A reconstruction in the case of the Tapas 9 would only have been useful if it could have produced a definitive timeline AND been the focus of jogging local memories to obtain information which had not previously forthcoming. How long did it take for Jenny M to come forward with information about the woman in the purple top acting suspiciously outside block 5 between 8 & 8.30? Would that suspicious woman have featured in the PJ reconstitution?

The focus of the inquiry seemed to revolve less around solving what had actually happened to Madeleine McCann or whether she was to be found alive or dead but all about locating and prosecuting a likely suspect.

Once the Smith family failed to identify Robert Murat it seems interest was totally lost in what other evidence might have been found from closer study of their version of events ... the least of which might have been as you suggest, retracing their footsteps of May 3rd.

[mercury]

The focus of the inquiry seemed to revolve less around solving what had actually happened to Madeleine McCann or whether she was to be found alive or dead but all about locating and prosecuting a likely suspect.

Once the Smith family failed to identify Robert Murat it seems interest was totally lost in what other evidence might have been found from closer study of their version of events ... the least of which might have been as you suggest, retracing their footsteps of May 3rd.

tHere was no focus, the original inquiry was far ranging up to a pong months later, and it's extremely disingenuous if you to suggest otherwise

[Brietta]

tHere was no focus, the original inquiry was far ranging up to a pong months later, and it's extremely disingenuous if you to suggest otherwise

Is your predictive text acting up? ... I cannot make sense of what you are saying.

[mercury]

Is your predictive text acting up? ... I cannot make sense of what you are saying.

Yes, so sorry, must change my settings, post remains in totality apart from the pong which should have read point! Well spotted

There is no way yu can say the PT police did NOT look for Madeleine, did NOT conduct other massive operations and did not follow up sightings..at least up until they became a little ludicrous lets say
It becomes a little boring and nauseating to read posts that read like Kate  and Gerry McCann and co's comments IE the police did nothng and do nothing whilst in their other breath sayng they're very pleased with what police have done and are doing, it's a bit of a joke at best...bit rich too when they left their kids on their own and didn't notice one was abducted for a good while after then go to complain it's someone's else's fault she's not found??? let alone Kate McCann mak veiled accusations to  so many in her book! Talk about farming out the guilt to innocents...quite despicable behaviour all in all...NEXT TIME don't leave your BABIES on their OWN out of sight and sound when you go OUT...really is NOT hard to understand...is it?