I would expect that the parents would have provided a good source for the scent on the basis they would wish the exercise to produce a result, but there is an assumption that the scent source was provided in good faith.
The dogs could not discriminate date/time any scent was laid down. The requirement for bare feet, combined with the known fact that the shoes remained in the apartment, is a pointer that scent could have been laid down at the relevant time. It is not definitive, and it can never be definitive. IMO there is a tendency for parents to put shoes on their children when they leave at normal times. Therefore, there is a pointer, or more accurately a very real possibility that the dogs tracked MBM.
There were three potential exit routes from 5A:
1) Front Door
There is no reported evidence this door was deadlocked. This exit route ties up closest with the scent trail. If the door was confirmed to be deadlocked, and no other exits were available this theory would be disproved, but there are other exits available.
2) Patio Door
The door is accepted by all parties to have been unlocked. IMO MBM could physically open this door. The stair gate would provide an obstruction, but it is possible to climb over the gate. I think the stair gate provides more of an obstruction on any return journey, because of the location at the top of the stairs. If MBM exited via this route she may have found it harder to return.
3) The Window
MBM could open the curtains and window. But, I believe it is unlikely she could raise the shutters. A test of this would have been useful. There was a case in Egypt at another MW resort where a young child 'escaped' from an apartment, which was subjected to 'listening checks'. Presumably this apartment would have had shutters, which were opened by the young child. But, on balance, I believe this exit route to be improbable.
On balance I favour the front door for exit, but the patio door is a viable alternative.
I will provide some views on route and possible accident, or indeed possible abduction, later today.
All IMO. Also, this is not an attempt to discount other theories, such as abduction directly from the apartment.
Please do not forget the patio door in the parents bedroom.
There are FOUR potential exit routes not three
If you had been there as it was in 2007, you would immediately believe that only The Front Door was likely.
- The front door was recessed right back and virtually unseen from outside
- No-one passed it en route to their apartment.
- No one passed it at all because the walled passageway ended there .
- The front door was in almost total darkness, because the nearest streetlight had its lamp actually within the head of a tree and apart from that there were just a couple of more distant ones that had the entire heads of trees in the way, blocking the light.
- There was no moonlight until 10pm, when the moon rose
- There was no big light on the front of 5A as is shown on more recent photos
- There was a chest high pathway wall in front of the front door, which any intruder could have bobbed down behind had any one come at all close, say when parking a car almost directly in front of the front door. Some one parking a car was the only danger, but with that pathway wall an intruder could have easily hidden himself
The recessed front door was hidden from view, and in blackness
All the other doors were open to view, altho I dont think that the parents bedroom patio doors were illuminated from the street lamp opposite as the main patio was.
Tbh, in my opinion, exiting throught the parents bedroom door would have been safer than using the patio door to the sitting room, cos not only was it not illuminated, but there was alsio a bush in the line of vision of the Tapas group for part of the window
To me, the obvious safe way in and out was via the front door
