So how did the abductor enter and leave the apartment?

[AnneGuedes]

Observing a flat without any movement because it's day-time and occupants are busy outside in order to plan a night-time abduction is rather unexpected. A red herring ? Focus on Spottyface leaves Noface out of trouble ?

[AnneGuedes]

the trees in the parking lot are now a little more grown up

They cut the beautiful false pepper trees.

[Luz]

Gerry didn't 'tamper' with the shutters, he checked them to see if they could be raised from outside - which must have taken him a matter of seconds.    I've explained why I think he may have done that - so I'm not going to repeat it.

You quite clearly said that professionals would not/should not react the same as other people to a terrible shock concerning one of their children.   My analagy was to portray that loving parents' professions have no bearing on sudden shock involving their childlren - no matter what the cause of that acute shock may be.   Death or abduction are both monumental shocks in anyone's book.

Of course I don't think Madeleine was found dead in the apartment - because if her parents were cold, cruel and calculating enough to decide to dispose of her body, then they would have coldly and calmly devised a much simpler plan to cover that up  - than the super-complicated, convoluted one which is put forward.   

That elephant in the room just won't go away will it?

You may think all you wish, the fact is that if he believed there had been a crime he knew better than to mess up with every little part of the "crime scene" as he and all of the Tapas did. Do you believe they were so ignorant or stupid that they didn't know they couldn't/shouldn't do that?!
Come on, that was deliberate and tells a lot.

By the way, what better plan could they have envisioned to get rid of their little girl's body than the one they used? They got away with it, didn't they?

[faithlilly]

This is something Ocean Club would like to keep secret for obvious reasons.  We can't say for definite that a key was used but it is a distinct possibility.

We do know however that staff keys for the rental apartments were kept in a safe in the garage and that most of the staff had access to them routinely.

We also know that there had been burglaries and attempted burglaries at apartments at Ocean Club Garden in which the perpetrators appear to have had access using a key.

Do you have any evidence supporting the use of a key in the burglaries John ?

[Benice]

Don't you see that abduction was the only way to dismiss any blame on them (the broken shutters fairytale is exemplary) ?
There's nothing particularly "cold, cruel and calculating" there, it's just human !

But Anne, there were much easier ways to dispose of the body and then claim abduction - which wouldn't have needed to involve anyone else at all. 

If you really don't think you have to be cold calculating monsters to be capable of doing what the McCanns are accused of doing - then I'm very surprised.






 

[John]

Lurking?! What the F does that mean? If I pass a house and look at the garden or stop at the front porch to smoke a cigarette is lurking?!

In a town with a little over 15 hundred inhabitants and a few hundred tourists, 2 "lurkers"?!!!, that's very significant, indeed.

The McCann were not in the desert, in case people don't know. They were in one of the most frequented resorts at that time of the year.

Lurking means exactly that.  A stranger lurking suspiciously in a place where he had no business who moved away when seen.  Had it not been suspicious it would not have been reported to the police.

[Albertini]

As correctly pointed out by Sadie, what you can now see of the front of apt 5a at Ocean Club Garden and what you could see 6 years ago are two very different things.

Are there photos from then and now showing the differences?

[Luz]

Lurking means exactly that.  A stranger lurking suspiciously in a place where he had no business who moved away when seen.  Had it not been suspicious it would not have been reported to the police.

In that case we have a problem because portuguese people are naturally inquisitive and seldom stop at places just to look at.

About the cases you mention, I only recall it being reported by british subjects, after the fact. For me those were just forceful attempts to produce alleged facts, as significant as the thousands of false leads the police received all those months. In fact after evaluation they were dismissed as not significant.

[Benice]

You may think all you wish, the fact is that if he believed there had been a crime he knew better than to mess up with every little part of the "crime scene" as he and all of the Tapas did. Do you believe they were so ignorant or stupid that they didn't know they couldn't/shouldn't do that?!
Come on, that was deliberate and tells a lot.

By the way, what better plan could they have envisioned to get rid of their little girl's body than the one they used? They got away with it, didn't they?

They could have disposed of the body in the middle of the night - in the same unfindable place which they apparently knew about.    Then they could go to bed and in the morning call the police and say they woke up to find the front door ajar and their daughter missing.     What could be simpler? 

[Albertini]

Lurking means exactly that.  A stranger lurking suspiciously in a place where he had no business who moved away when seen.  Had it not been suspicious it would not have been reported to the police.

But how does that constitute clear proof that the McCann's and an abductor were actively watching the McCann's?

Also if the McCann's were being watched then wouldn't the abductor know they checked every 30 minutes or so?

If so why would he attempt to get in whilst Gerry was there or just leaving?

If the statements are true he had a window of opportunity of around 1 minute 30 seconds to perform the following:

Enter the apartment
Sedate all three children - in the dark
Select Madeleine as the victim - in the dark
Open the (curtains) shutters and window - if he used the front door to enter
Pick Madeleine out of her bed - in the dark
Turn her round so that her head is now to his left, rather than to his right,
which is the way he would have approached her in the bed.
Exit the apartment, either through the opened window and shutters, or through the front door, which he must then close silently behind him.

So bearing in mind what he could could achieve in 1 minute 30 seconds why would he take the risk of entering the apartment right at the point of Gerry leaving and being on the street next to the apartment when he knew if he waited 5 or 10 minutes until after Gerry had left the scene he would still have had enough time to perform the abduction.

How would he know for example that Gerry would not go back into the apartment after his chat with Jez?

It's a huge risk and completely nonsensical.

[Luz]

Are there photos from then and now showing the differences?

I was there last weekend and there are differences, but I don't think it is important for the case in question. If nobody has actual pics I may take some next time I go visit my family, maybe next week.

[AnneGuedes]

But Anne, there were much easier ways to dispose of the body and then claim abduction - which wouldn't have needed to involve anyone else at all. 

If you really don't think you have to be cold calculating monsters to be capable of doing what the McCanns are accused of doing - then I'm very surprised.

The McCanns did with their holiday companions what they did on the phone with their family members and friends : they hammered the abduction doxa as the truth.
Disposing of a body isn't a crime like killing a pregnant wife and two kids as Doctor McDonald (who looks nice) did, don't you think ?
If there are "much easier ways" to dispose of the body, what are they ?
The fact you unconditionally approve whatever the McCanns do or say reveals amazingly well that they ruled very efficiently out any possible blame.

[icabodcrane]

Are there photos from then and now showing the differences?

I'd like to see those photos too

In order to support the claims being made   (  that,  at the time of the disappearance,   the McCann apartment front was so  secluded  that it could not be seen from the apartment block opposite )   we really do need  'before and  after'  photos in order to make a comparison

Unless that comparison can be established with evidence,  the claim is speculative and worthless

[Albertini]

They could have disposed of the body in the middle of the night - in the same unfindable place which they apparently knew about.    Then they could go to bed and in the morning call the police and say they woke up to find the front door ajar and their daughter missing.     What could be simpler?

No its not. That's because under that scenario they have no alibis nor independent witnesses able to show that they were not there at the time of the crime.

If it is presented as an abduction whilst they are elsewhere they can say they were not at the scene when the crime took place.

[Albertini]

Gerry didn't 'tamper' with the shutters, he checked them to see if they could be raised from outside - which must have taken him a matter of seconds.    I've explained why I think he may have done that - so I'm not going to repeat it.

You quite clearly said that professionals would not/should not react the same as other people to a terrible shock concerning one of their children.   My analagy was to portray that loving parents' professions have no bearing on sudden shock involving their childlren - no matter what the cause of that acute shock may be.   Death or abduction are both monumental shocks in anyone's book.

Of course I don't think Madeleine was found dead in the apartment - because if her parents were cold, cruel and calculating enough to decide to dispose of her body, then they would have coldly and calmly devised a much simpler plan to cover that up  - than the super-complicated, convoluted one which is put forward.   

That elephant in the room just won't go away will it?

The definition of tamper is:

interfere with (something) in order to cause damage or make unauthorized alterations

Gerry interfered with the shutters to case damage to the crime scene.

Let me quote a piece on it:

Solid-state & materials analysis is a well financed and internationally based investigative tool of great sophistication, primarily owing  to its importance in  blast investigation and aircraft accident reconstruction. As an internationally significant case the cost was fully justified here. Laboratory analysis of the shutters would have aimed at answering the question: was the shutter opened from inside or outside?

Raising,  via a drive belt and drum,  involves measurable distributed  tensile forces on the lightweight metal shutter –  the metal is pulled up. Raising the shutters from outside involves quite different stresses: tensile forces are insignificant while compressive and torsion  forces are heavily present—the metal is pushed up and twisted. Micro-examination can reveal  the effect of such forces on the paint surface, for example  and, by the redistribution of particulates, recent creasing (the result of torsion forces) may be identifiable.

On May 4 and subsequent evenings video/DVD recording from outside and from the bedroom doorway at corresponding and sunset-corrected times would provide court exhibit evidence of the following:

    The light entering the bedroom from outside
    The obviousness or otherwise of the open shutters to passers-by on the street
    Visibility in the room at the appropriate corrected times and
    Whether, therefore, Mathew Oldfield's claimed inability to describe the lighting conditions and shutter state was credible or obviously untrue.
    Finally, knowing how open the window was would enable controlled testing to establish the feasibility of the famous curtain blow and slamming bedroom door (with patio doors already closed) described by Kate McCann.

The exact shutter height at 10PM  was the critical parameter for the forensic examinations. Kate McCann  said the shutters were "fully open". So what did the parents do? Gerry immediately  "lowered the shutter" (Madeleine page 73), destroying any possibility   of the load forces test or other aperture dependent tests, including visibility tests,  producing any meaningful results. The police have never known how far the shutter was actually open.

The other critical area for study was, of course, laboratory investigation  to determine whether the shutters were opened from inside or out. So what did Gerry McCann, keeper of the "crime scene", do? He "rushed outside" and pushed the shutters upwards, thus destroying at a stroke all possibility of materials analysis:thenceforth any lab results could be put down to Gerry and were therefore forensically worthless. Mathew Oldfield's 9.30 PM evidence at once became incapable of assessment against the facts. And just to complete this triumph of evidence preservation, Kate McCann, as well as "throwing cupboards and wardrobes open" – making it impossible for police to assess at a glance any signs of intrusion or struggle – handled the window, presumably to close it.

The couple had destroyed all the known material evidence  of the child's exit from the apartment.

That's the significance of tampering with crime scenes.

I covered your claim about simpler ways in a previous post.