Mother is a suspect in McCann disappearance

[Kareem]

The latest in the saga of the British girl Madeleine McCann who disappeared in Portugal during the summer is that police think she may have been accidentally killed by her mother, and subsequently police have named the mother, Kate McCann, a suspect.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6983604.stm
http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/europe/09/07/madeleine.mccann/index.html


Mr McCann's sister, Philomena, claimed the Portuguese police had offered Kate McCann a "deal" if she made a confession.

"What the Portuguese police have tried to do is get Kate to confess that she accidentally killed Madeleine," she told BBC News.

So it seems that the Portuguese police think the mom may have done it (or they simply want to wrap it up and are looking for a scapegoat to cover their ineptitude).

It's odd that the "new" evidence, which is basically blood on a car the family had rented managed to surface just now after over 100 days of Madeleine McCann missing. Even more weird is the pressure the mother is going through with the 12 hours (!) of questioning by the police and trying to get her to confess.

That said I get the impression the parents are a bit too PR-conscious. From having two spokespersons as the BBC story indicates, to the meeting with the Pope, the high profile celebrity support, etc., the whole thing seems very odd.

[JM]

They haven't shut up and the media has launched themselves into a frenzy. Visits to the pope! Announcements during England rugby games at Twickenham that she's still missing! Everton fans with banners saying "Give us back OUR Maddie"!

This stank from the start, and it's depressing how so many people got swept up in something utterly unremarkable and unrelated to them.

[Kunikos]

Oh, it's kinda like the Jon Benet Ramsey case. Probably not enough proof in this case either.

[Robert Sharp]

Ridiculous case, as if this little girl is so much more important than every other little girl that goes tragically missing. JK Rowlings offered a reward!? Beckham did a video about it? Wow.

[Funkula]

Thank god there are no world concerns more pressing than one missing white girl.

[Ed Solomon]

The case against the parents seems pretty far-fetched. They killed the kid on accident and then hid the body for 25 days while the whole country is looking for their daughter, and then use a newly rented car to dispose of the body. Are the Portuguese cop's high, or what?

Unless they get a DNA match from the blood sample, I ain't buying.

Edit: Or, I guess, proof they rented the car at the time of the murder would work too.

[Glenn]

Oh, it's kinda like the Jon Benet Ramsey case. Probably not enough proof in this case either.Does that mean the parents will turn out to be completely innocent after everyone's attention has shifted in this case, too?

[Lunch of Kong]

Thank god there are no world concerns more pressing than one missing white girl.

The average person is innumerate and overwhelmed by large numbers, and can only really comprehend suffering and misery when it's presented in very small numbers. One death a tragedy, a million a statistic.

I know you were being sarcastic. I just wanted to be all Mr. Wizard and say some scientific shit about it.

[Joel]

The average person is innumerate and overwhelmed by large numbers, and can only really comprehend suffering and misery when it's presented in very small numbers. One death a tragedy, a million a statistic.

I know you were being sarcastic. I just wanted to be all Mr. Wizard and say some scientific shit about it.

"Innumerate" is a pretty great word.

[Aleck]

While I agree that the parents have definitely seemed to be too PR conscious, honestly, I think playing the media is the only way they could keep the pressure on to find their little girl. Assuming they're innocent, and seeing the apparent ineptitude of the Portuguese police (100 days to find blood evidence? WTF?), I would say they probably did the right thing. There hasn't been a day in the last three months where I didn't see that poor little girl's picture.

[Jason McCullough]

The pope for chrissakes?

[Kunikos]

Ridiculous case, as if this little girl is so much more important than every other little girl that goes tragically missing. JK Rowlings offered a reward!? Beckham did a video about it? Wow.

Of course she is, she's white, affluent, British and "lost" in a foreign country. Even if she was alive, by now she's probably working in a brothel in Romania.

[Sarkus]

I would disregard this but the fact that the Portugese police are willing to go this route indicates they feel they have enough evidence to risk the likely public backlash. If they have blood evidence in a car rented a month after the girl's disappearance that they can show is likely hers then it does raise some questions that have to be answered.

We could also assume that the police are just morons, but I'll hold judgement on that for the moment.

[Kareem]

The father has also been formally named a suspect, though neither is charged with a crime yet:

http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/europe/09/07/madeleine.mccann/index.html

[Hans Lauring]

The pope for chrissakes?

I'm an atheist, but if one of my girls went missing I'd ask the pope for help or blow Bush if I thought it would help any.

Whether the McCann's are too pr-concious, plain desperate or trying to hide something I don't know.

(I do know that leaving your kid, while you go to a restaurant however close it is - but of course losing a child is not a fair punishment for being stupid and careless)

[Robert Sharp]

The average person is innumerate and overwhelmed by large numbers, and can only really comprehend suffering and misery when it's presented in very small numbers. One death a tragedy, a million a statistic.

I know you were being sarcastic. I just wanted to be all Mr. Wizard and say some scientific shit about it.


Scientific? In what way? You quoted Stalin!


And I don't blame the parents here. If I were they, I would do the exact same thing. I blame the media and everyone else who was captivated by a cute picture into ignoring the greater issues facing the world.

[VegasRobb]

At this point, I'm just hoping that the parents were not involved in her death/disappearance. I'm hoping that the police are just taking a shot at shaking things up ... perhaps to observe the actions of other named/unnamed suspects.

[Tsuyako]

I don’t see why some are you complaining about the public pouring of support. This thing isn’t common and it’s really nice that so many people are getting involved in the case. Now this latest turn is a heart-wrenching one. I do think the appearance of blood in a car rented a month after Maddie’s disappearance is quite damning evidence, but there are still a lot of holes in the theory.

[Peter Frazier]

It's reminding me of the blood they found in the car of Lindy Chamberlain when Azaria was killed.

[Kareem]

The McCanns are now leaving Portugal. Looks like the Portuguese police was pressuring them to leave in exchange for not charging them with a crime, in order to stop the international attention drawn that would surely expose their incompetence.

I know that explanation is a bit of a stretch, but it seems really bizarre for them to name them as suspects and have them leave the country within 2 days of doing so.

[VegasRobb]

The McCanns are now leaving Portugal. Looks like the Portuguese police was pressuring them to leave in exchange for not charging them with a crime, in order to stop the international attention drawn that would surely expose their incompetence.
I know that explanation is a bit of a stretch, but it seems really bizarre for them to name them as suspects and have them leave the country within 2 days of doing so.

Where are you getting the idea that the police are incompetent? You've repeated the idea a couple of times, but I'm not seeing where the police are doing anything but trying to sift through clues and put together a case. The police are asking/allowing the couple to leave the country so the media will stop following the case? Really?

[Sarkus]

The McCanns are now leaving Portugal. Looks like the Portuguese police was pressuring them to leave in exchange for not charging them with a crime, in order to stop the international attention drawn that would surely expose their incompetence.

I know that explanation is a bit of a stretch, but it seems really bizarre for them to name them as suspects and have them leave the country within 2 days of doing so.

More than a bit of a stretch, if you ask me. As if the McCann's could escape to anywhere at this point. If the Portugese actually charge them with a crime you can bet the parents will be back in Portugal.

I think we need to relax about this whole "naming of suspects" thing. As I understand it, this is a necessary step under Portugese law that allows the police to proceed further in their investigations if they feel the need. If the reports are true that blood was found in the McCann's rental car a month later and also found in the rental they have been staying since the abduction, then you could understand the police wanting to look closely at the parents.

[Dirt]

Why don't ugly kids get this kind of publicity?

[Marsh Davies]

I don’t see why some are you complaining about the public pouring of support. This thing isn’t common and it’s really nice that so many people are getting involved in the case.
There are many, many disappearances of people and children every year, and it's only very occasionally that the press seize on one and cynically use it to sell copy. It's nice that people have been moved by the case, but at the same time its grotesque in the way it has been hyped and depressing that so few other cases get mention.

[Hans Lauring]

More than a bit of a stretch, if you ask me. As if the McCann's could escape to anywhere at this point. If the Portugese actually charge them with a crime you can bet the parents will be back in Portugal.

I think we need to relax about this whole "naming of suspects" thing. As I understand it, this is a necessary step under Portugese law that allows the police to proceed further in their investigations if they feel the need. If the reports are true that blood was found in the McCann's rental car a month later and also found in the rental they have been staying since the abduction, then you could understand the police wanting to look closely at the parents.

Also there's a vast difference in how you interrogate a witness and somebody who might be a suspect. By doing this they make sure the McCanns has the right to having a lawyer present and the right not to answer, and they ensure that the answers they get will be admissable in court if they build a case against the McCanns later - so it's kind of an insurance that goes both ways.

And the portugese police don't really care where the McCanns are - their only "escape" would be Libya or some other third world hellhole. The UK police would send them back in a minute if the Portugese requested it.

[Kareem]

I was hyperbolic.

Although I didn't mean they were escaping in a literal sense (the CNN story says they're leaving with the full knowledge of the Portuguese authorities obviously). It just seems that after staying around Portugal for so long, they're suddenly going back to the UK a day after being officially named suspects in the case.

[Robert Sharp]

I think the parents themselves have harped on the incompetence of the police. They claim DNA wasn't properly collected and the scene wasn't properly secured. I have no idea if that's accurate, but if so, it would indicate sloppy police work.

And Marsh is right...there are tons of cases just like this one, but they don't get any attention (and rightly so, IMO). Also, if it does turn out to be the parents who are at fault, I think that's a good thing in some ways. It will show people to wait until facts are collected, and it will reassure people that random strangers aren't just stealing children. Of course, the latter would not necessarily be true, but it might alleviate some of the unreasonable fear that seems to be going around.

[Kareem]

it will reassure people that random strangers aren't just stealing children.

As opposed to the much more soothing idea that the parents accidentally killed their daughter and proceeded to hide her body while drumming up popular support to rouse sympathy and obtain celebrity status.

[Robert Sharp]

Yeah, that is more soothing, because it means YOUR kid isn't in danger.

[Sarkus]

I think the parents themselves have harped on the incompetence of the police. They claim DNA wasn't properly collected and the scene wasn't properly secured. I have no idea if that's accurate, but if so, it would indicate sloppy police work.


That appears to have been the case early on, but the police in Portugal allowed British police experts to become involved which is interesting given the direction the case is now taking. There's a good chance that the evidence the Portugese police are basing this action on was gathered at least partially by British cops who got involved because of public pressure in the UK that was at least partially due to the success of the parents in publicizing the case.

[Tsuyako]

There are many, many disappearances of people and children every year, and it's only very occasionally that the press seize on one and cynically use it to sell copy. It's nice that people have been moved by the case, but at the same time its grotesque in the way it has been hyped and depressing that so few other cases get mention.

There aren't many disappearances of children in the UK, which is why the press seize onto them. It's not as though Madeline is one child in thousands that disappear here!

All killings and disappearances of children are big deals here. Just the other day Rhys Jones, a young boy, was killed and it's still appearing in the news.

I remember the last time something this large in the media happened here, though. The disappearance of Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman. They were killed by Ian Huntley.

[Qenan]

Looks like the blood matched: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article2427017.ece

[RepoMan]

Doesn't make any fucking sense. Why would two parents kill their kid by mistake, then make so much noise about it that the entire world starts watching? Why not just shut up about it and if the media gets hold of it, just do the usual "We want our privacy at this difficult time" business? It's fucked up somewhere, for sure. I think the "Portugal police wanted them to get the fuck off their backs" theory is more plausible than the "insane attention whore murderer parents" theory.

Edit: But I just read the above link, and now all I can say is What. The. Fuck.

[dannimal]

Parents who have accidentally killed their child are probably not going to be in a state to make decisions that we look back at a month later and say "That was sound thinking".

How could they shut up about it? It's not like they can go home from vacation and be like "Madeline is sick" to explain why nobody has seen her.

If child abduction is as rare as this thread makes it seem, it's not like they can just say "our daughter is missing but please leave us alone".

It kind of needs to be assumed that they figured nobody would ever find the body, or any trace of blood/fluid. If that assumption holds, then drawing attention to the "abduction" makes a kind of sense. All the sympathy might help assuage the guilt, and if they never find a body you're home free.

[Jason McCullough]

She dismissed the suggestion that there was the scent of death on some of her clothes and the child’s soft toy by saying that any such smell found by sniffer dogs was a result of her job as a local GP where she encountered corpses, it was reported.

Wasn't THE SCENT OF DEATH a Megadeth album? What are on earth are they talking about?

[russellmz00]

Wasn't THE SCENT OF DEATH a Megadeth album? What are on earth are they talking about?

corpses give off a distinct odor that dogs can trace. i read in a science mag years ago scientists were trying to create an artificial odor so actual corpses wouldn't have to be used for dog training.

edit: they're called corpse sniffing dogs or cadaver dogs

http://www.google.com/search?q=cadaver+dogs&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a

[RepoMan]

The scent corpses give off is technically known as cadaverine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cadaverine). Holy shit, and that Wikipedia link has slightly Too Much Information.

[Balasarius]

Boiling point of cadaverine ftw!

[Rob Beschizza]

http://www.susurrations.com/images/rochas_femme.jpg
I couldn't resist

[John E. Motion]

They haven't shut up and the media has launched themselves into a frenzy. Visits to the pope! Announcements during England rugby games at Twickenham that she's still missing! Everton fans with banners saying "Give us back OUR Maddie"!

This stank from the start, and it's depressing how so many people got swept up in something utterly unremarkable and unrelated to them.
Well, they are supporting Everton...

[Kareem]

Ok this is getting ridiculous:

Madeleine's parents launch ad blitz (http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/europe/09/15/madeleine.mccann/index.html).


The advertisements will run in newspapers, and on billboards and television broadcasts in Spain, Portugal and other parts of Europe "to remind everyone that Madeleine is still missing," said Madeleine's uncle, John McCann, who also is the family spokesman.