I think it is about time that this issue got its own thread.
The record shows that the Portuguese lawyer from the Atlantic island of Madeira, Marcos Aragao Correia, only got involved in the Cipriano case after Spanish private investigators Metodo 3 agreed to fund him. Correia has gone on record to admit that M3 paid him expenses but has refused to say who his true employer and paymaster was.
Leonor Cipriano's former lawyer João Grade has also gone on record to say that M3 originally approached him prior to doing a deal with Correia. Grade claims that M3 offered to fund him if he was to take on the case against Goncalo Amaral. Grade refused and made the knowledge of the approach public.
For anyone who still doesn't know, M3 were at that time under contract to the Madeleine Fund and were receiving substantial funding from it and for very little obvious return.
Given that Goncalo Amaral was lead investigator in the disappearance of Madeleine McCann, the involvement of a firm of private detectives directly employed by the McCanns was at the very least a conflict of interest but may be so much more. Only an in-depth police investigation can clear up this matter once and for all.
