UP HE POPS - AND GUESS WHERE?

blonk

Re: Amaral would have been prosecuted if he had acted like that in the UK
« Reply #57 on: Today at 07:44:21 PM »

Quote from: Saepe Sepe on Today at 05:41:11 PM

   If a recently retired policeman used his knowledge from a recent case (which had been closed without result) to write a book saying how he was right and the DPP was wrong, i doubt if he would have kept his police pension.

   He could have been prosecuted for:

   Contempt of Court
   Misconduct in Public Office

   and would have almost certainly have lost any libel case.

   Do we really laud a system which allows a mid-ranking policeman to use information from his employment to potentially ruin any future trial and call into question the whole trustworthiness of the Police?

As has rightly been pointed out by others on this thread, the law in Portugal is different from ours in a number of respects, in particular the making public of the majority of witness statements, expert reports and forensic evidence etc. in a case which is 'archived', or 'shelved' (note, not 'closed').

So, having waited until the Attorney-General's archiving of the report, Amaral was within his rights, surely, to publish details of his investigation. These details are there for all to see on DVDs and on the internet etc. The interim report of Tavaraes de Almeida dated 10 September 2007 was among the documents released. Whether Amaral libelled the McCanns with the opinions in his book remains to be determined by the Lisbon Civil Court, which will no doubt have regard to the previous decisions of the Portuguese Court of Appeal (Oct 2010) and Supreme Court (Mar 2011), both saying his book should not be banned, in reaching its verdict.

It seems that Saepe Sepe thinks Amaral should be denied his police pension. It should therefore be pointed out that in resigning from the Portuguese Police, he gave up a further 7 years' salary (at the rank of inspector and investigation co-ordinator) and also 7 years' pension entitlement - sums running into hundreds of thousands of pounds, assuming he lives at least a few years beyond retirement age.  

It might also be a useful moment to recall that it was his investigative efforts that resulted in 16-year jail terms for the two monsters, Leonor Cipriano and Joao Cipriano, who murdered 8-year-old Joana (Leonor's daughter), after they claimed that Joana had been abducted. Amaral was the investigation co-ordinator in that case as well.

By the way, if anyone has any doubt whatsoever that these two evil people were justly convicted, let them read the thorough, 75-page judgment of the Portuguese Supreme Court in this case, and the gruesome list of some 60 facts determined by the court. Both Leonor and Joao Cipriano voluntarily confessed their evil deeds - but only after the work of Amaral's investigative team gave them little alternative.

Amaral has been called a 'convicted criminal' by at least one person on this thread. That is admittedly an accurate description.

Let it be recalled that this arose from the criminal complaint of the above-mentioned Leonor Cipriano, who claimed that she was beaten and tortured into making a false confession by Amaral and four other detectives.

At the end of this trial, Leonor Cipriano was given an additional sentence for persistent lying under oath.

No police officer was found guilty of any beatings, torture or assault.

Amaral and one officer were found guilty of 'filing a false report', and received suspended jail terms. Amaral appealed against that verdict and lost. When the guilty verdict was announced, Leonor Cipriano's lawyer, Marcos Aragao Corriea, exulted: 'The target was hit' (i.e. Amaral). He forgot in that moment of apparent triumph that his client had just been handed an extra jail term, and had utterly failed to prove her false claim that the police beat her up.

Without seeing the full trial transcript, it is impossible to evaluate whether the court made a fair decision against Amaral on the evidence tendered in court. There is reason to doubt that it did.

Broho wrote:Poor man.  As if he were not troubled enough with those monthly payments to Carter Ruck.

Broho wrote:Perhaps the forum will spare some of their vast quantities of cash to assist him or Chatelaine will finally cough up for the whole thing?

Failing that, Gonc may pay for a top of the line Louis Vuitton one from his own pocket.

  

Broho wrote:Oh sh*t.  That would be terrible.   

Broho wrote:I would hope so, Rachel.  They may finally have him for harassment.   

Broho wrote:I do think that if they were made to pay a stiff fine for wasting police time, that would help.

Re: 'Anti-McCann' websites plotted to kidnap one of Madeleine's siblings - Daily Mail INCLUDES TWEETS FROM JERRY LAWTON RE MICHAEL WRIGHT TESTIMONY
Post Tony Bennett Yesterday at 11:52 pm

Whatever the views of members of this forum about the disappearance of Madeleine McCann, some sober observations about the 'twins kidnap plot' story must be set out.

I think it has appeared in at least four British newspapers, the Mail, the Express, the Mirror and the Star.

These three British newspapers alone have a combined circulation of around 6 million - and a combined readership of double that number (around 12 million).

I have done a quick check on Google News. The 'twins kidnap plot' story appears in the online editions of at least 21 publications so far. Top of the list at the moment is this one:

[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

That means that millions, maybe tens of millions, will read a story that recycles, as a plain fact, Michael Wright's evidence that 'anti-McCann conspiracy theorists' actively 'plotted', on 'several anti-McCann websites', to kidnap the twins (even though, if there ever was such a plot, it must have been discussed well over 4 years ago and has never been reported on in the media hitherto).

It is alleged by Wright that there was a long thread on the former '3 Arguidos' site discussing this. I was a very active member of that forum for nearly a year, when it was at its height, and I never saw such a thread.

I can only presume that Michael Wright, when he was surfing the net trawling the 'anti-McCann' forums (as he has admitted), took screenshots of the said thread(s) and kidnap threats and has formally exhibited them to his signed witness statement.

However, we shall probably never know.

The fact is that a large number of people will believe that there are indeed 'anti-McCann' forums out there (and this one is the leading one and has been for 2 years) which really do stoop to discussing plots involving active plans to kidnap the twins.

I am prepared to bet that, before long, the idea that there really are 'anti-McCann forums full of conspiracy theorists who are even prepared to discuss abducting the twins' will be recycled as fact by certain newspaper columnists and media commentators.

And of course the story hugely feeds the claim that the interrnet is a lawless place that needs to be tightly regulated and controlled by governments, echoing comments last year by the anti-free press Lord Leveson in his clunking report, backed by 'Hacked Off', which recommeded state control of the British press.

The 'twins kidnap plot' story may therefore have a very long way still to run.

Unless someone can think of a quick way of killing it.

Monday, 7 October 2013
Open letter re: Proposed Crimewatch programme 14 October 2013 - Madeleine McCann

FROM:


TO:


Mr Gavin Chappelle, Production Co-ordinator and

Mr Joe Mather, Series Editor,

BBC Crimewatch Programme

BBC Broadcasting House

Portland Place

LONDON

W1A 1AA


Also for the attention of presenters Kirsty Young, Matthew Amroliwala and Martin Bayfield

And by email to:

[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]    
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Dear Mr Chappelle and Mr Mather

re: Proposed Crimewatch programme 14 October 2013 - Madeleine McCann

I am writing with a number of concerns about the above proposed programme, which has been widely trailed by the BBC itself and by many media in the past few days.

I understand that there is to be a ‘live’ interview with the McCanns and that a reconstruction of events, presumably of part of Thursday 3 May 2007, the day Madeleine was reported missing, will be shown.

The BBC has said that it will be showing a reconstruction of Madeleine’s ‘abduction’.

The alleged ‘reconstruction’ is reported in various media as taking place ‘abroad’ or in Spain but not in Portugal. If reported correctly, it will certainly not, therefore, be taking place in Praia da Luz, the place where Madeleine went missing.

I have very serious concerns about whether this programme should be transmitted at all, having regard to the issues set out below.

The duties of the BBC and Crimewatch  

The BBC charter requires that it must be truthful and accurate and, where appropriate, must provide 'balanced' coverage of any issue.  Moreover, OFCOM has the power to investigate complaints that any programme breaches similarly-worded OFCOM guidelines.

‘Crimewatch’ has a formidable reputation. That is based on setting before the viewing public accurate information about a crime, and asking for the public’s help in identifying the perpetrators. These principles must apply just as rigorously to the highly controversial case of the reported disappearance of Madeleine.

Given the highly controversial, sensitive and high profile nature of this case, I must assume that the research done by Crimewatch into the background for any reconstruction and interview of the McCanns has been exceptionally thorough and meticulous. You will be aware that there are thousands of pages of witness statements, experts’ reports, forensic reports, photographs, videos and other material which has been made public on DVDs by the Portuguese Police as long ago as August 2008, all of which have been translated into English and which have been read and analysed in great detail by numerous internet websites, blogs and forums. You will no doubt for example have read all the relevant information on the McCannFiles blog ([You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] an unusually comprehensive and vast library of factual material about the case.

Was Madeleine McCann abducted?

Given the claim by the BBC in its advance publicity for your proposed programme that Madeleine McCann was ‘abducted’, the very first question that the producers and editors of any Crimewatch programme have to answer is whether or not it is established as a fact that she was abducted.

I assume, therefore, that you must have considered all of the following facts:

1.      The detailed investigation report by Inspector Tavares de Almedia dated 10 September, and publicly available on the internet, which gives numerous clear reasons for concluding that Madeleine died in the McCanns’ holiday apartment and that they and/or others hid her body

2.      The contents of the book ‘The Truth Of The Lie’, written by Dr Goncalo Amaral, which as you will be well aware is currently the subject of the final trial in the-long running libel action  the McCanns brought against Dr Amaral

3.      The fact that the content of Dr Amaral’s book has been repeatedly shown to be entirely consistent with the contents of the police files released to the general public in 2008 (indeed this fact has been repeatedly emphasised during the first six days of this trial)

4.      The fact that the concluding report signed off by the regional Attorney-General in July 2008, whilst archiving the investigation and deciding there was insufficient evidence to charge anyone,  made it plain that the Portuguese judicial authorities by no means established as a fact the McCanns’ claim that Madeleine had been abducted

5.      Moreover the possibility that Madeleine had died in her parents’ apartment and her body hidden was explicitly acknowledged in the very same report.

If you have carefully considered the above facts, I am at a loss to understand how the BBC can proceed with this programme at all, and refer to ‘the abduction’ of Madeleine.  Notwithstanding the fact that the DNA of blood and body fluid samples taken from the McCanns’ flat and hired car could not be proved to have come

from Madeleine (though the Forensic Science Service certainly also said they could have done, the alerts of two sniffer dogs belonging to top police dog handler Martin Grime cannot be ignored in considering whether or not Madeleine was abducted. The McCanns for example have never been able to explain the presence of the dogs’ alerts to the past presence of a human corpse in four locations in the McCanns’ flat, on three items of their clothing, in the hired car and other locations associated with them. Dr Gerald McCann has claimed that sniffer dogs are ‘incredibly unreliable’ despite the fact their reliability is becoming ever greater and their use in ever more fields of detection, drugs, explosives, medicine and other disciplines  is growing rapidly.

The BBC cannot consider making a programme telling the viewers that Madeleine was ‘abducted’ without informing viewers of the contrary evidence. If they did , it would be a wholly dishonest programme.

Furthermore, legitimate complaint could be made to the disciplinary body of the National Union of Journalists if any member of the NUJ had contributed to a dishonest programme which ignored or set aside relevant facts. Sections 1 to 4 and 9 of the NUJ Code of Conduct appear to apply to the possible circumstances of this proposed broadcast.

The history of reconstructions or attempted reconstructions  

In the Portuguese criminal justice system, reconstructions of events surrounding a murder or disappearance or other crime are used to test the validity of the witnesses’ statements. The actual persons involved in such events are the witnesses themselves. They will be invited to the scene of the crime. Such reconstructions are commonly video-recorded for the benefit of the criminal investigation. This is especially true where there are obvious contradictions between the witnesses’ statement, as is manifestly the case regarding Madeleine’s disappearance. Your researchers must be fully aware of these. They have been extensively catalogued and analysed (a) in the interim report of Tavares de Almeida (b) in the Attorney-General’s final report (c) in Dr Goncalo Amaral’s book and (d) on numerous Madeleine McCann information and discussions sites on the internet.

This type of ‘reconstruction’ is very different from a ‘Crimewatch’-style televised reconstruction.

Dr Amaral wanted to do such a reconstruction as it was clear from the first week of the investigation that there were significant  inconsistencies  in the witnesses’ statements. As he explains in his book, he decided not to carry one out because of the intense media spotlight he and his team were under.

A reconstruction of some of the events of 3 May 2007 were shown on the BBC’s Panorama programme on 19 November 2007.

A second attempt by the Portuguese police to hold a reconstruction occurred in the spring of 2008. The McCanns and their friends all declined to take part, giving a variety of reasons for not doing so. Dr Gerald McCann specifically said at the time that he saw no purpose in such a reconstruction as the police would not be showing the reconstruction on TV. He said he wanted a ‘Crimewatch-style’ reconstruction.  Therefore the proposed Portuguese police reconstruction could not proceed.

The Channel 4 reconstruction, 2009

In May 2009, Channel 4 screened a reconstruction made by Mentorn Media.  This was heavily criticised by many on a number of grounds, including these:        

(1)  It featured the description of a possible abductor by Jane Tanner, despite numerous indications that her alleged ‘sighting’ was fabricated (see below)

(2)  It attempted to link an alleged sighting of a man carrying a child by Irishman, Martin Smith, at around 10.00pm in a different part of Praia da Luz, with Jane Tanner’s claimed ‘sighting’ at 9.15pm. The unlikelihood of any abductor walking around the village for 45 minutes or more carrying a child is so obvious as to hardly require mention

(3)  It attempted to suggest that the man allegedly seen by Jane Tanner and the man allegedly seen by Martin Smith were one and the same, despite Jane Tanner describing the man as having ‘long, black hair’ whilst the man described by Martin Smith had ‘short, brown hair’

(4)  Three witnesses, namely Jane Tanner, Jeremy Wilkins and Dr Gerald McCann gave significantly contradictory statements about the very moment when Jane Tanner claimed to have seen the abductor at 9.15pm. These were contemptuously dismissed on the TV reconstruction by the McCanns’ then chief private investigator, ex-Detective Inspector Dave Edgar, as ‘inevitable inconsistencies’.  Any serious detective would have probed the contradictions, which should have been fully aired on the programme

(5)  The man shown in the documentary as carrying a child away from near the McCanns’ apartment did not look the same as Jane Tanner’s description. In any case, of course, Jane Tanner admitted to not seeing his face.      

Severe doubts about the credibility of Jane Tanner

The reasons for discounting the evidence of Jane Tanner are many but include:

a)     changes in her accounts, such as changing the direction in which the person she claimed to have seen was walking

b)     her recollection of details about the abductor and the child improving with time, such as ‘recollecting’ on a second interview precise details of the pattern of the pyjamas of the girl being carried (in line with what she already knew about Madeleine’s pyjamas)

c)      rambling and over-elaborate descriptions of the abductor and what he was wearing, both when interviewed by the Portuguese police and later when re-interviewed by Leicestershire Police

d)     her positive identification on 13 May 2007 of Robert Murat as the person she’d seen carrying a child away from near the McCanns’ apartment - only for her to change her mind about this months later

e)     her willingness to claim that the person she claimed to have seen looked like a moustachioed man seen by a Mrs Gail Cooper, despite the fact that Jane Tanner admitted never having seen the man’s face on 3 May

f)       the fact that at a press conference in August 2009, the McCanns’ chief investigator, Dave Edgar, said that Jane tanner might have been mistaken and seen a woman carrying a child, not a man

g)     the fact that her story was so vague and inconsistent that the Portuguese police dismissed it as a fabrication from very early on in their investigation.          

  Other facts that the BBC need to take into account if they are to proceed with this broadcast          

If the above matters are not considered by the BBC to be sufficient reason for not proceeding with their Crimewatch programme, I invite you to consider the following additional points:

1.                  The thread of criminality running through the McCann Team’s investigators. If the BBC has researched the background material to this case correctly before even considering to screen this reconstruction, then you will be aware that the McCanns’ first preferred detectives, the Spanish firm Metodo 3, has a long record of criminal conduct. Two of Metodo 3’s investigators who worked very closely with the head of the McCann Team’s private investigators, Cheshire businessman Brian Kennedy, have served time in prison. Antonio Giminez Raso spent four years in prison on remand due to his association with a 27-criminal gang of drug-dealers who were convicted of serious criminal charges in a Barcelona court last year. Julian Peribanez who also worked very closely with Brian Kennedy has spent much of this year after his arrest for illegally taping the conversations of Spanish politicians, an offence he has now admitted and for which he is awaiting sentence. The McCanns also employed Kevin Halligen, who charged the McCann Team £500,000 plus expenses yet, as exposed in a 2009 article in the Evening Standard and elsewhere, spent most of the time he was employed by them on high living in London, Oxfordshire  and the U.S. with his girlfriend Shirin Trachiotis, and was arrested in 2009 on serious fraud charges in the U.S. which he eventually admitted. He spent a total of four years in Belmarsh and another top security prison in the U.S.  None of these investigators had any experience in locating missing children but most had expertise in such areas as  money laundering and fraud.

These private detectives have together with the McCann Team produced a bewildering variety of so-called ‘suspects’ and ‘person of interest’, 21 in total so far, two of them women, a fact which also undermines the  credibility of the McCann Team’s private investigators.

Should the BBC in its proposed broadcast continue to promote the clsaim that Madeleine McCann was abducted, you must take full account of this record and indeed many other matters of real concern about the McCanns’ private investigations, which again your researchers must know.      

2.                 Dr Kate McCann’s refusal to answer any one of 48 questions put to her on interview by the Portuguese police on 7 September 2007.

3.                 The refusal of the McCanns and their friends (in 2008) to attend an official police reconstruction.

4.                 The numerous contradictions in the witnesses’ evidence about the events of 3 May 2007.

This is a vast subject. Again, no doubt your researchers, together of course with D.C.I. Andy Redwood and his team, are aware of the following contradictions and changes of story etc. These contradictions would need to be resolved if possible before any realistic re-construction could possibly take place. If you proceed with a reconstruction, you will be faced with the problem of which version of events you will be presenting to viewers. In my view, the only honest way for the BBC to proceed would be to present the viewer with all the contradictions, letting the viewer see for her/himself what they are, and allowing the viewer to draw her/his own conclusions. Among the main contradictions are the  following:

(a)  Three different versions about a claimed ‘high tea’ that Madeleine is said to have had with her parents  and crèche staff at about 5.30pm

(b)  Two entirely different versions (Dr Kate McCann and Dr David Payne) of an alleged visit by Dr Payne to the McCanns’ apartment, when he claims to have seen all three children alive  

(c)   Three different accounts (Dr Gerald McCann, Jane Tanner and Jeremy Wilkins (whose partner, Bridget O'Donnell, we understand has worked for Crimewatch before) about events at around 9.15pm on 3 May, the time when Jane Tanner claims she saw a man carrying a child

(d)  Whether or not the curtains of the children’s room in the apartment were  wide open (Dr Kate McCann’s first version) or closed (Dr Kate McCann’s later version)

(e)  Whether you will be showing the shutters smashed, broken, and jemmied open (the McCanns’ first versions) or completely undamaged (reality - and subsequently admitted as such by the McCanns’ spokesman, Clarence Mitchell)

(f)    Whether you will be showing Dr Gerald McCann entering through the ‘front door using his key’ (Dr McCann’s first police statement), or ‘going in through the unlocked patio door’ (Dr Gerald McCann’s second police statement)

(g)  Whether you will be showing Madeleine tucked up in bed because it was a cold night (Dr Kate McCann’s version -  the cold also being testified to by the rest of the McCanns’ friends and indeed by weather records ) - or lying on top of the covers because it was so hot (Dr Gerald McCann’s version).

5.                 The extremely limited ‘window of opportunity’ for any claimed abductor to have removed Madeleine from the apartment.  On the basis of statements made by Dr Gerald McCann,  Jane Tanner and Jeremy Wilkins, with very precise timing included within them (Dr McCann for example says he left the apartment at 9.10pm, and Jane Tanner says she saw a man carrying a child in the area at 9.15pm) the time available for the abductor to remove Madeleine is somewhere between 1 minute 20 seconds and three minutes. During this time, the McCann Team suggest that an intruder could have  entered the apartment (either via an open patio door or by having a key to the front door, sedated three children, selected one of them, picked her up, turner her round so that her feet are now to the right, open the curtains, window and shutters as some kind of ‘red herring’ (see ‘red herring’ statement made by Dr Kate McCann) and then exit, all of this being accomplished without being seen or heard by anyone except Jane Tanner and without leaving any forensic trace. (The suggestion that Madeleine and the twins were sedated is a repeated theme of the McCanns and their team over the past six years).

6.                 The only fingerprints on the window found by police being those of Dr Kate McCann, strongly suggesting that she opened the window in order to promote the abduction scenario.  

7.                 In the very unlikely event that Madeleine is still alive and is being held by the abductor or others, has BBC Crimewatch assessed the risk that its programme could lead to Madeleine being harmed by the person who now has her?

A useful summary of the many contradictions, changes of story and other inconsistencies  amongst the witness statements in this case can be read on this e-book by Michael McLean at: [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] or

[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]  



Yours sincerely

coco wrote:bennett must like giving money to carter ruck  

Never before has Tony Bennett, 66 year old, disgraced ex-solicitor of Harlow, Essex, shown what a nasty minded little prat he really is so clearly!

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

His sick humour. His lies about never commenting on the McCann case again.

What more proof does anyone need about this man being a deluded old buffoon?

By pretending to be clever he comes across as precisely the opposite.

By clearly inferring that the McCann case is a conspiracy involving our current Home Secretary and the Prime Minister. What other implication can be seen in this other than that the McCanns are with the collusion of these people covering something up?

How much longer before Bennett goes that step too far and Mr Justice Tugendhat summons this little irritating pimple before him to answer as to why he has not kept (once again) to the agreements he made in court? How mucb longer will this prat remain free? Not long I would suggest. He is deliberately sailing close to the wind and we know he really can't help himself. Now what jail was it?

From pistonheads.com
Breadvan72
Name:
Member Since: 28th September 2010
Total Posts: 11,880
Occupation: Barrister�
Region: Oxfordshire�

   The letter from the retired policeman set out in full above is plainly defamatory and I would recommend caution in republishing what the letter says. The burden of proving that a defamatory statement is true lies on the person who publishes or republishes the statement.