Cops Suspect Parents In Missing British Girl Case

msolga wrote:

But really, who'll be the next suspect? How many suspects will there end up being?

Whoever they can find to take the focus off their inept investigation and protect their tourism.

I think this is a non-story from the Standard.

Clarence Mitchell, the couple's official spokesman, dismissed the reports. "We had reports that DNA had proved inconclusive and even that it put them in the clear. Now there are reports that the DNA is making them look suspect. This just goes to show what a twilight zone we are operating in."

The Portuguese police force overseeing the hunt for Madeleine McCann last night placed one of its deputy national directors in charge of the investigation, following the dismissal of the previous chief investigator and the departure of his second in command.

The Guardian[/URL] additionally reported that ...

Quote:

The Portuguese police force overseeing the hunt for Madeleine McCann last night placed one of its deputy national directors in charge of the investigation, following the dismissal of the previous chief investigator and the departure of his second in command.

This week it was suggested that DNA evidence had failed to clear the McCanns of suspicion, but today Clarence Mitchell restated the pair's innocence.

Mr Mitchell: "Officially, I cannot discuss the detailed aspects of the case - it is still very much an active police investigation.

"What I can say though is Kate and Gerry have nothing to hide at all. They are perfectly happy to answer any of this, if it comes to it.

"There are wholly innocent explanations for anything the police may or may not have found.

"I would point to some of these stories this morning - they are unsourced, they are unsubstantiated...

"Frankly, some of the headlines this morning are a complete disgrace."

Madeleine has now been missing for 159 days.

Madeleine DNA bombshell: 'New results put Gerry and Kate back in the frame'
02.11.07

New forensic tests appear to support the theory that Kate and Gerry McCann could have been involved in Madeleine's disappearance, it has emerged.

Sources say the results from a second batch of testing, conducted at a laboratory in Birmingham, have been passed to Portuguese detectives via Leicestershire police.

These findings are alleged to include the discovery of the girl's DNA - believed to have been obtained from Madeleine's bodily fluids and hair - in the McCanns' hire car which was rented 25 days after the girl went missing.

Traces of Madeleine's blood in her parents' holiday apartment are also said to have been found.

Tests on the bodily fluids found in the hire car are understood to show that they came from a corpse and that the body was moved.

Sources also indicate that the volume of material found is too great for it to have been transferred via Madeleine's toys or clothing or from her parents' possessions.

It is also believed that the tests have produced no evidence to indicate the involvement of any other person.

Madeleine disappeared from the family's Algarve holiday apartment at Praia da Luz six months ago tomorrow. She was six days away from her fourth birthday.

The McCanns were named as official suspects by Portuguese police in September shortly after the first batch of forensic results were sent to Portugal.

They strongly protest their innocence and insist their daughter was abducted as they dined with friends nearby.

Supporters have drawn hope from the fact that the Portuguese authorities have so far failed to ask the McCanns to return for further questioning.

The McCanns' spokesman Clarence Mitchell said today: "Kate and Gerry are entirely innocent and have nothing to hide. We have always maintained whatever material or evidence the police may have can be wholly and innocently explained."

Both sets of tests were carried out by the Forensic Science Service in Birmingham-Although the precise findings remain closely guarded, it is understood that they continue to support the existing direction of the Portuguese police investigation which has focused on the McCanns.

There has been no official comment on the forensic findings either in Portugal or Britain, but a source confirmed that the results had all now been passed on.

"There is nothing waiting to go and the Portuguese know all that has been found," said one person close to the investigation.

"The material that has been tested is still in the UK and it is possible that there will be requests for further work to be carried out, but, at the moment, all that has been asked for has been done."

All the test results were obtained from analysis carried out on material gathered either from the McCanns' hire car, their holiday apartment or other parts of the Mark Warner holiday complex.

Paulo Rebelo, the new Portuguese police chief in charge of the inquiry, visited the McCanns' holiday apartment this week and is said to be reexamining all aspects of the case.

Berlin - Images of Madeleine McCann, the British four-year old who went missing six months ago in Portugal, have been printed in a spoof supermarket advertisement by a German satirical magazine, outraging her parents.

The "Find Maddie" photo-spread in Titanic, a monthly humour magazine that makes a habit of breaking taboos, has prompted a chorus of complaints in the British media at the "sick joke."

Maddie's face was superimposed over images of the cute blond children usually shown on the packaging of popular brands of rusk and chocolate bar.

A "Maddie" brand of liquid soap mocked whoever allegedly removed the girl from the McCanns' holiday apartment.

The pseudo slogan says the product "cleans every smear in the home: the DNA test hasn't a chance."

Titanic, which often pretends to find its own humour repulsive, headed the spread with a popular-press-style headline: "They're going too far," and invented a story that retailers might soon use Maddie for advertising.

Satire is a minority humour form in Germany, where satirical television has never achieved much success.

'Found it funny'

Titanic, which has a circulation of about 100 000, has been unrepentant about the fuss.

A couple of days later it added a poster to its website in which Mad, the US humour magazine on which Titanic is largely modelled, was displayed as "Maddie" magazine and its mascot was given the little girl's face.

Martin Sonneborn, a staff writer who wrote the Titanic spoof, told Germany's Stern magazine the British media were just jealous "because we're fishing in their pond and making better jokes than them."

He said "many" British journalists had interviewed him about the Maddie spread and actually found it funny.

"Others are delighted that they can supply their readers with more shocking news from Germany. So both sides are quite friendly during the interviews," he said.

Mystery

The last time the Germans upset the McCanns was in June, when the couple visited Berlin and a woman journalist asked point blank at a news conference if they could in some way be involved in the abduction.

The father retorted: "I have never heard before that anyone considers us suspects in this and the Portuguese police certainly don't." Three months later the police did name the McCanns as "arguidos" or suspects.

The mystery of what happened to the child remains unsolved. The McCanns have asked the public to keep an eye out for the child and to help catch whoever abducted her.

Gerry McCann, who returned to his work as a hospital cardiologist on Thursday, has not commented, but a family spokesperson, Clarence Mitchell, said that the satire was extremely distressing.

"It is totally sick, very hurtful and in no way funny," Mitchell told the newspaper Daily Star.

German mag mocks Maddie
02/11/2007 20:28 - (SA)