Blood spatter? Fact or myth?

[Alice Purjorick]

Dust. Anybody? No?

It's getting like the Elmore James appreciation society round here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkeoJggtSu0
he also did it as Dust My Blues.
Then of course don't forget Slim Dusty
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8E0aZ387M_I
Then for good measure the expression "not so dusty" meaning fairly good.....nah strike that one for this thread.

And back to the plot
http://hoaxes.org/weblog/comments/does_dust_consist_primarily_of_human_skin
http://www.livescience.com/32337-is-house-dust-mostly-dead-skin.html
Hows the betting on the three man catch weight bout ?

[slartibartfast]

It's getting like the Elmore James appreciation society round here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkeoJggtSu0
he also did it as Dust My Blues.
Then of course don't forget Slim Dusty
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8E0aZ387M_I
Then for good measure the expression "not so dusty" meaning fairly good.....nah strike that one for this thread.

And back to the plot
http://hoaxes.org/weblog/comments/does_dust_consist_primarily_of_human_skin
http://www.livescience.com/32337-is-house-dust-mostly-dead-skin.html
Hows the betting on the three man catch weight bout ?

...and then some Philip Pullman quotes.

[Alice Purjorick]

...and then some Philip Pullman quotes.

Like this one ?

You cannot change what you are, only what you do.   

[Mr Gray]

as none of these samples matched maddie are they of any relevance whatsoever

[Carana]

Does anyone know why were they not tested for blood or was it a case of being tested for several things but none showed a positive for blood.  Surely the marks on the wall contained sufficient material to be properly tested?

Whatever the specks were (and may not all have been of the same nature), the majority of the results were described as "low-level" "incomplete", aside from the cop one and presumably a few others they tried to compare to a database.

To double-check, perhaps, but I don't see how a substance can be identified in a sample containing just a few alleles. LCN DNA testing apparently can't determine what type of cellular material it was anyway. And as they had to resort to LCN in many samples in order to get any kind of result at all, there was presumably too little material to begin with.

There was only one that had a few alleles compatible with Madeleine's profile (5 alleles according to Amaral), which is so little as to be insignificant.

Therefore, whatever the nature of the specks, they didn't come from her.

Although a couple could have been a miscroscopic trace of blood (as Keela alerted in two spots, neither of which were on the wall), blood doesn't fluoresce with a torch, which is what the CSI boys used, under UK instruction.

I find it misleading that some people continue to refer to what was on the wall as "blood", even more so to describe it as "splatter" when they originated from a variety of people as opposed to a projected spray from a single source, and even worse that people in some quarters continue to insinuate that the specks were "blood splatter" (or any other gory type of splatter) from Madeleine.   



 

[Alfie]

As there is no likelihood whatsoever of establishing blood spatter as fact perhaps the thread title should be amended accordingly.

[ShiningInLuz]

Does anyone know why were they not tested for blood or was it a case of being tested for several things but none showed a positive for blood.  Surely the marks on the wall contained sufficient material to be properly tested?

The only sample tested for blood, from memory, was the plant material extracted from the rear garden.

The PT was told, I believe, not to use any reagent, so they used UV to detect spots not visible to the naked eye (again, to be confirmed).

With the exception of 2 spots matched or potentially matched (one to a PT officer, one possibly to Madeleine) they seem to have been left with 4 spots where there was sufficient info to run it through NDNAD, essentially getting no hits.  Whilst on a volunteer database, one matched youngster C Gordon, a visitor to 5A in the week before the McCanns.

At this point, they probably thought it was game over, since it was not their job to worry about rumours.

The bits of information that could be recovered were small, and did not fit Madeleine meeting her demise, IMO.

However, Amaral has raised the possibility that at least some of the marks were due to an attempt to resuscitate Madeleine, before she expired.  Therefore the concept of "blood spatter" is important, in the sense of trying to determine whether the marks are blood and whether they constitute spatter.  This in turn requires a better explanation than that provided by the FSS.

[ShiningInLuz]

so your post is pure speculation...there is no evidence to support the splatter as being blood...therefore it is not  a fact

My post isn't pure speculation - that is just another assertion which ignores the evidence.

And I have yet to accept that what the photo shows is "splatter".

I don't see how you can propose 'human dust' as a solution, then describe it as splatter.

[Mr Gray]

The only sample tested for blood, from memory, was the plant material extracted from the rear garden.

The PT was told, I believe, not to use any reagent, so they used UV to detect spots not visible to the naked eye (again, to be confirmed).

With the exception of 2 spots matched or potentially matched (one to a PT officer, one possibly to Madeleine) they seem to have been left with 4 spots where there was sufficient info to run it through NDNAD, essentially getting no hits.  Whilst on a volunteer database, one matched youngster C Gordon, a visitor to 5A in the week before the McCanns.

At this point, they probably thought it was game over, since it was not their job to worry about rumours.

The bits of information that could be recovered were small, and did not fit Madeleine meeting her demise, IMO.

However, Amaral has raised the possibility that at least some of the marks were due to an attempt to resuscitate Madeleine, before she expired.  Therefore the concept of "blood spatter" is important, in the sense of trying to determine whether the marks are blood and whether they constitute spatter.  This in turn requires a better explanation than that provided by the FSS.

they are not confirmed as blood...they are not splatter....they are not related to Maddie......and you criticise the FSS...

[Mr Gray]

My post isn't pure speculation - that is just another assertion which ignores the evidence.

And I have yet to accept that what the photo shows is "splatter".

I don't see how you can propose 'human dust' as a solution, then describe it as splatter.

my explanation is skin cells from sweaty hands...not dust..

which evidence am I ignoring.......there is no splatter...no confirmation of blood...no link to maddie ...thats the evidence...

[ShiningInLuz]

nothing lit up.....they were just stains...and there would be dust containg human cells all over then sofa

how extensive was Gordons bleed ...did any drop on the floor....what was used to clean it up...what importance is any of this as there was no match to maddie...

Let me see if I've got this right.  Are you claiming that these are stains visible to the naked eye?  Just how big is this 'human dust'?  Why didn't someone clean it if it was visible to the naked eye?  Why didn't the PT team on the afternoon of 4 May eyeball this 'human dust'/stains?

How extensive was Gordon's bleed?  Read Paul Gordon's statement.  Read Saleigh Gordon's statement.

And it does matter.  The only potential alert to Mr Gordon's cut was the one in the parents' bedroom.  This suggests Mr Grime may have been over-egging the capability of the dogs, one way or another.

What importance is it?  What?  It was important enough for the FSS to run the results against NDNAD.  Why do you think they did that?  It was important enough for the FSS to establish a volunteer DNA database from 282 people and run the results against that.  Why do you think they did that?

[ShiningInLuz]

Why is it a no?  Do you concede that you got the height of spot 9 wrong?

You haven't given an estimate of the height of spot 9, nor a justification for your opinion, so why would I think I've got it wrong?

I derived my estimate based on the height of the window sill.  The only other independent estimate happens to be by Textusa, and is based on floor tile size.  Two independent calculation methods which produce roughly the same result.

[ShiningInLuz]

God know why you are getting so irate.  It is a fact that there is no way of you proving it's a fact that there was blood spatter on the walls, or do you think you can?  If so, how?

I have not started with the objective of proving either that it is blood or that it is spatter.  The photo is known widely as the Blood Spatter photo, just as the picture by the kids pool is widely known as the Last Photo and the photo of Madeleine clutching tennis balls is widely known as the Tennis Balls photo.

As I explained in my OP, I got asked where my "blood spatter" post was on my blog, to which I replied I did not have one. (I've now got two, with more to come.)

I then tried to find out what the position was on this forum.  It appears there is a single topic of a related nature, though it does not address the core question of what the pattern is.

So I chose a thread title intended to work on search engines, so if someone is looking for some non-partisan information about the so-called "blood spatter" they have a port of call on this forum.

I think I have enough information to come to a more informed understanding of the photo than currently resides in a single location on the Internet.  As to whether that understanding will be complete - I would be surprised if anyone can come up with a perfect explanation, or an explanation accepted by all.

[ShiningInLuz]

So let's see, the FSS failed to indentify blood from the spatter marks on the wall, but that doesn't mean that there wasn't blood there. So I don't see it as fact or myth, rather, just another unknown in this case.

Can I just add, even if blood had been found and identified as a perfect match to Madeleine, that in itself doesn't prove anything either way.

It would if it was indeed 'spatter'.  It would mean that not only there was an incident, but there was a serious incident.

The reverse is not certain, though highly likely.  If it transpires there is little or no evidence of a major incident, then many of the ideas floating the Internet would be trashed. [ moderated ] Was there a botched burglary in which someone bashed Madeleine?  Hardly likely, if there is no spatter.  Did Madeleine fall off the sofa and crack her head?  Hardly likely, if there is no spatter.

So spatter would tell us a lot, while no spatter would tend to rule out many suggestions for a violent death.

[ShiningInLuz]

both dogs totally ignored visible remains so if it was blood both dogs are useless

I pointed out way back that if this is blood, which we don't know, then the dogs are called into question.

Now, what makes you assert that the remains were visible?  That makes no sense.  It does not match the evidence.