Face-to-face meeting with Home Secretary Alan Johnson

Come on Mr Johnson, do what you should have done 2 years ago.

'We're just keeping our heads above the water': Desperate and angry, Kate McCann begs British police to take over Maddie hunt

By Vanessa Allen
Last updated at 9:33 AM on 20th February 2010


Missing: Madeleine McCann has not been seen since May 2007

A tearful Kate McCann yesterday begged the Government to help find her missing daughter as her husband said they were 'just managing to keep our heads above water'.
The desperate mother of three and her husband Gerry had a face-to-face meeting with Home Secretary Alan Johnson to plead for Interpol to review the botched Portuguese investigation.
The couple, both 41, fear that their own £2million investigation has hit a brick wall because British and Portuguese police have ignored the potential leads their private detectives have uncovered.
Their frustration was evident as they spoke about their anger that no police force is searching for their daughter Madeleine.
Although hundreds of witness statements and photographs of potential sightings of the missing girl have been handed to officers in Portugal, they have been filed as 'irrelevant' and left to gather dust.
Mr McCann said: 'You would hope that the parents of a missing girl wouldn't have to be here begging for assistance, and that the authorities would do everything in their power in the first place.
'There are instances where information which we think is very credible and worthy of investigation has not been actioned.
'We're gutted, it's absolutely shocking and difficult.We are just managing to keep our heads above water.' Mrs McCann said: 'Some of the information that has been handed in was very credible. It's heartbreaking to know that it seems to end there.'

Plea: Kate and Gerry McCann held a press conference yesterday and called for a full case review into their daughter's disappearance

Sources said the pair had received ' commitments' from Mr Johnson at a meeting in December that he would pursue the issue with his counterparts in Lisbon. The McCanns, from Rothley, Leicestershire, have also held a series of meetings with Home Office and Foreign Office officials.
The McCanns acknowledged that there were political issues which could obstruct a Portuguese-English review, and that failures in the high-profile case have caused international embarrassment for the Portuguese government.
But Mrs McCann, a former GP, lashed out angrily at suggestions that political or individual failure could halt the search.
'It is difficult but I don't think that's a reason not to do it,' she said, appearing to fight back tears.
'I don't think that's adequate, to say there are problems and we're not going to do it.
'There's a little girl still missing, and you can't just write her off and say "Well we've tried and that's just too bad". It's not good enough.'
The McCanns this week won a legal case against the former head of the Portuguese police investigation, Goncalo Amaral, who had claimed they faked Madeleine's abduction to cover up her death.
Madeleine disappeared from her parents' rented holiday apartment in Praia da Luz in May 2007, shortly before her fourth birthday.

Emotional: Kate McCann said police efforts to find Maddie were 'not good enough'

Despite a global search for the missing girl, there have been no confirmed sightings of her since she vanished.
Mrs McCann said: 'We have worked incredibly hard, day in day out for the last two years. It is just so hard when somebody's doing their utmost to stop your efforts and stop the search. To me it's inhumane. Hopefully our search will now have more effect.'
Her husband, a hospital heart consultant, said it was 'unacceptable' that Portuguese police were refusing to investigate new information, and that British police were powerless to take over the investigation.

Speaking at a press conference in London, he said: 'I think people are reluctant to undertake a review because there's been difficult, sensitive issues.
'But Madeleine's rights should be put first. She's missing, she's innocent, and whoever's taken her is still out there, and that has to be of paramount importance.'

Portuguese authorities shelved the case in July 2008 after failing to find any evidence of what happened to Madeleine.
A source close to the couple said: 'The reality is there will only be a new investigation if Portugal asks for one, and Portugal is just too proud to admit that it is needed.'
A spokesman for the McCanns' local police force, Leicestershire, said: 'We, nor any other UK law enforcement agency, has jurisdiction in Portugal.
'This does not alter just because the person involved is a British citizen.
'Therefore any deployment of officers to Portugal would have to be requested and sanctioned by the Portuguese authorities.'

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1252286/McCanns-criticise-heartbreaking-failure-police-Madeleine-launch-fresh-appeal-help.html#ixzz0g520fMu9

Come on Mr. Johnson, if you can send British troops to Iraque or to any other conflict, for God´s sake man, use YOUR INFLUENCE TO HELP FIND A MISSING BRITISH CHILD CALLED MADELEINE McCANN, USE YOUR INFLUENCE WITH GORDON BROWN TO FORCE PORTUGUESE GOVERNMENT TO ALLOW IMMEDIATELY THE PRESENCE AT PRAIA DA LUZ OF A SCOTLAND YARD PROFESSIONAL TEAM, TO BE IN CHARGE OF THIS INVESTIGATION WITH THE ASSISTANCE OF DAVID EDGAR´S TEAM. ALSO TO PLEAD INTERPOL IMMEDIATELY TO REVIEW PORTUGUESE BOTCHED INVESTIGATION. SURELY THAT THE OLDEST FRIENDSHIP ALLIANCE IN THE WORLD CAN BE USED WITH THIS PURPOSE. THIS IS / WAS, AS ALWAYS, AN INTERNATIONAL CASE.

Despite a global search for the missing girl, there have been no confirmed sightings of her since she vanished.
Mrs McCann said: 'We have worked incredibly hard, day in day out for the last two years. It is just so hard when somebody's doing their utmost to stop your efforts and stop the search. To me it's inhumane. Hopefully our search will now have more effect.'
Her husband, a hospital heart consultant, said it was 'unacceptable' that Portuguese police were refusing to investigate new information, and that British police were powerless to take over the investigation.

Speaking at a press conference in London, he said: 'I think people are reluctant to undertake a review because there's been difficult, sensitive issues.
'But Madeleine's rights should be put first. She's missing, she's innocent, and whoever's taken her is still out there, and that has to be of paramount importance.'

Portuguese authorities shelved the case in July 2008 after failing to find any evidence of what happened to Madeleine.
A source close to the couple said: 'The reality is there will only be a new investigation if Portugal asks for one, and Portugal is just too proud to admit that it is needed.'
A spokesman for the McCanns' local police force, Leicestershire, said: 'We, nor any other UK law enforcement agency, has jurisdiction in Portugal.
'This does not alter just because the person involved is a British citizen.
'Therefore any deployment of officers to Portugal would have to be requested and sanctioned by the Portuguese authorities.

This is what some of us have been saying and pushing for, for some time now. I have many letters and emails relating to this subject, I and I know others have also, have written to the Home Secretary, Mr Alan Johnson, who never bothers to write back personally, instead I receive replies from David Hanson instead. (See Below) This is the 1st page of a two page letter, but you get the gist from this.






It makes me so cross, because I know from the response of this letter that David Hanson has NOT read my original letter properly, it wasn't along verbose document like Bennett has the habit of writing, it was a half an A4 page.

I never suggested that the British police just march into Portugal and take over the investigation, I am not foolish, I do understand the rudiments, however, what I suggested should happen is that the Home Secretary Alan Johnson liaise with Portugal with a view to a cold case team from Scotland Yard going out to Portugal and working WITH their Portuguese counterparts as a team and the use of HOLMES in Scotland Yard and other technology be put at their disposal, to help them wade through the thousands of pages of information.
I did not write to David Hanson, I wrote to and expected a reply from Alan Johnson and I expected a reply to the points raised in my letter, not a stat reply that does not address my concerns. One of the whole points of contacting the Home secretary was to bring to his attention that the Portuguese Policia Judiciaria, were NOT following up leads and there was NO investigation, not in Portugal or in the UK and I was proved right when during Goncalo Amaral's trial, it was revealed by Ricardo Paiva, that nothing was being investigated, all information coming in was being filed in a dossier and marked irrelevant to the investigation. Indeed, one of the points I raised with "Mr Johnson" was that information was being ignored and how would they find Madeleine if no official law enforcement agency here or in Portugal was looking for her? Again my point was clarified when Dra Isabel Duarte, Kate and Gerry's libel lawyer raised the very same question.

I agree with Kate McCann and Kate McCann again reiterates something that is covered in the above letter, when David Hanson alludes to this all being too difficult because the Portuguese maintain primacy and the UK police have no jurisdiction. Just because it is difficult, does NOT mean that it should not be attempted and in any case, I cannot see that there is anything here that is insurmountable, nothing that could not be sorted out by talking and negotiation, it seems that the Rt Hon David Hanson uses protocol as an excuse to do nothing about a missing child and is another that cannot be bothered to get off of his backside and actually do something to help this child.

Does the Home secretary need reminding through David Hanson that Madeleine is a British citizen and a minor, she is also a ward of court, which means the state has care and control of her welfare, I ask, when is the state going to start acting in her best interests?

If Portugal is embarrassed then I would suggest they do something about the one person that is heaping shame and embarrassment on them and prevent him from causing Mr Mrs McCann further distress and prevent him from frustrating and impeding the search for Madeleine.
For too long the Portuguese government allowed Amaral to strut around doing what he likes, upsetting people, threatening people with violence, threatening to shoot them with "golden bullets", ignoring the fact that they have someone in prison who was tortured, and who's torture was proved, yet she remains in prison on an unsafe conviction, someone that Amaral put there. (Yes Goncalo Amaral again!) Already under the eye of Amnesty International, Goncalo Amaral should never have been allowed anywhere near the Madeleine investigation, however he was and there is nothing we can do about this, but there is something we can do about the situation now.

Forget protocol and get a team from Scotland yard into Portugal to work with their Portuguese colleagues, it really is a s simple as that. The sooner this happens the sooner we will discover what happened to Madeleine and the sooner Portugal can return to normal.
Portugal should understand that this is not going to go away, children have a right to be put to bed and to stay sleeping in that bed safely, whether someone else is in the building or not, that is wholly immaterial and irrelevant!

It seems to me that the human rights of this child Madeleine McCann are being ignored, she is a victim of a heinous crime, her parents are victims of a heinous crime, yet they are being treated like convicted criminals when they are totally innocent, the only convicted criminal involved in this is Goncalo Amaral himself.
The REAL criminals, the abductor or abductors are being allowed to get away with this most appalling of crimes, not only is this a shocking indictment on both Britain and Portugal, it puts at risk every single child in Portugal, no matter if they are a visitor or a resident or a national, every single child in Portugal is at risk until these people are caught.

IS THIS ONLY GOING TO SINK IN WHEN THERE IS ANOTHER ABDUCTION?

Look at the last part of this letter, "there is no question that Mr Mrs McCann having to deal unaided with any responsee to the new appeal""

Well sorry to prove you wrong there Mr Hanson, because that is exactly what they are having to do.


Today I will be contacting my MP again and I will be pointing out what Kate and Gerry McCann have said and I urge everyone who cares about Madeleine and the plight of all missing children to do the same. Governments act when pressure is put on them, for Madeleine's sake and her parents and family's sake, let's try and do something.

Edited To Add Last Part Of Letter 19.00 hrs 20th feb 2010

Never mind about the protocol, never mind about the maintain primacy, never mind about the jurisdiction. It´s so easy to get a Scotland Yard Team into Portugal to work with Dave Edgar´s team, to work with Portuguese counterparts. Reopen the case immediately, send immediately a Scotland Yard team to Praia da Luz.

Scotland Yard should have been involved right at the beginning - rather than this guise of 'police investigation" we got from Portugal. When I look back and remember how critical some of us were of the investigation and how the antis all said, "Portugal knew what they were doing" - everything was secretive and then we got leaks...and suspected they were coming from the PJ. It was a disgraceful investigation....

You´re absolutely right Calcite, I agree with you.

i have written to alan johnson before and have also received a reply from hanson. both are as useless as each other. perhaps now kate and gerry have asked david cameron for help it may spur the ignoramuses that are in power at the moment into action, as they are trying to gain 'brownie points' for the pending election. i think that david cameron is the perfect person to bombard as he seems to be a dedicated family man. what a coup it would be for him if he could instigate something that would result in madeleine being found, and returned home!!!

The point is that my letter never made it through to Alan Johnson and the reply I received from Hanson just proved he had not read my letter properly or taken correct note of the concerns I was trying to raise with the home secretary.
I will try again, and this time I will strike while the iron is hot and ask my MP to also contact the prime minister, whom I believe to be a family man too, both David Cameron and Gordon Brown most unfortunately know what it is like to lose a child, they have both been through and no doubt are still going through the grieving process for their dear children, so they will naturally have empathy with Mr Mrs McCann.
I believe that the McCanns contacting David Cameron is normal, whoever is in power after the next election, they want action to help them find Madeleine, I would do exactly the same in their position, but I do not want to wait until May to discover this, I want to keep pushing now, this is why I will try and contact Mr Brown myself, who knows perhaps he will try and help?
Incidentally, I have already sent a reply off to Alan Johnson, hopefully this time he will actually get to read it and just maybe he will do something?

A diplomatic incident will occur if nothing is done, because the McCanns feel aggrieved about the way this investigation has been abused by those charged with running it, first abuse by Amaral himself and then when Rebelo handed over to Ricardo Paiva, we see the same thing happened.

I don't care how difficult it is, our government must contact the Portuguese government and work out a solution to send cold case detectives from Scotland Yard over to Portugal to work with and alongside the Portuguese detectives, there needs to be a review of this case and then the case taken back to scratch and the investigations made again, this time using the sophisticated technology like HOLMES at Scotland Yard, which was never available to the Portuguese investigation.
I think that Ricard Paiva should be removed from the investigation, it is obvious the man is biased and has no urgency to investigate Madeleine's disappearance, in any case he has appeared as a witness for Amaral who has publicly accused the McCanns of killing their daughter and concealing her body, so he could not be in charge of this investigation he has given himself a clear conflict of interests, in fact in any case Ricardo Paiva must now be removed from the Madeleine investigation. It is up to the Portuguese authorities to investigate why Ricardo Paiva an acting police coordinator has chosen to publicly alli himself with a convicted criminal perjurer and bear witness for him. Paiva himself has made his position untenable, if the Portuguese authorities do not remove Paiva, then they are allowing exactly the same situation to develop as they did by allowing Goncalo Amaral to be head of the Madeleine investigation in the first place!

I agree with you Rosiepops. This cannot wait until May, enough of wasted time, ACT NOW: IMMEDIATELY.

GGRR..this is why I have ended my emails/letters with the following.......

" Please do not answer me with... this is a Portuguese Investigation. This is a MISSING BRITISH CITIZEN that I and many others are concerned about!

ive sent an email to david cameron

and i will send a copy of my response to kate and gerry
maybe we should all forward replys back to kate and gerry