Is support for Leonor Cipriano based on a desire for Justice or it related to the officers involved in the case?
My interest in the Cipriano case is that there is a missing child. There is no probative evidence that she even got home that night, let alone any that can ascertain what happened to her. For the court to state that under the "rules of common experience" children do normally arrive home safely and that therefore it can be taken as fact that she did as well is something I find totally bizarre.
Like many other people, I hadn't heard of the Cipriano case prior to Madleine's disappearance. There was evidently the connection with the officers involved, but also the fact that she had disappeared not far from PdL, albeit a few years earlier.
It was only years later, when I was able to skim through the Supreme Court ruling, that I realised what a shambles the investigation and the trial were.
I don't place the blame entirely on Amaral as it shouldn't have gone to court in the first place, based on such flimsy "evidence". The prosecution service should have followed the investigation more closely and told him to go back to square one, which seemingly didn't happen.
The Ciprianos are simple rural folk caught up not only in the tragedy of Joana's disappearance, but were subject to interrogations in more than dubious conditions and relied on their various lawyers.
The drip feed of leaks prior to the trial led to a public outcry similar to the one over Baby P in the UK, except that in the Cipriano case, there was no substantiating forensic evidence. In fact, there was no probative evidence of anything. The entire trial lasted only a few days with 40+ witnesses to be heard (most of which were neutral to positive, but weren't translated).
The shock-horror factor was the video of João's "reconstruction" presented on the last day. Whether this was actually done out of his own free will (as opposed to under duress) couldn't be verified. Whether it was or it wasn't, the "reconstruction" wasn't corroborated by forensic evidence.
A total mess.