Amaral's Appeal Hearing Gets Under way!

christabel wrote:I hope isabel Duarte has seen this fat, filthy mouthed liar's remark.
He must have a death wish, mind you his witness's have helped him no end
I see STUPID Granvilles got his fizzog on.

Yes we have it on very good authority that the clip has been viewed!

Pedro, Maria, or Alex

Has this Amaral dropping the f word been on Portuguese tv?

And in your opinion was he swearing in English?

I would also be interested in your opinion of the proceedings today, and the Portuguese coverage of it. Only if you wish to give it of course.

Rosiepops wrote:Note he is so hard up that the 50 year old idiot with recently pierced ear is wearing a £10.000 diamond stud in his ear.

Why doesn't he sell it?

It's a ruddy diamond earring?

What a stoopid idiot.

Along with the F word it shows the type of person we are dealing with.

A ruthless ,cold hearted , avaricious barsteward.

MADDIE 'DIED' IN APARTMENT, PORTUGESE POLICE CHIEF TELLS COURT

Madeleine’s accidental death was concealed by her parents, Portuguese police claim

Wednesday January 13,2010

By Nick Fagge in Lisbon

MADELEINE McCann died in her family’s holiday apartment as the result of a tragic accident and her parents concealed her body, a police chief told a court in Portugal yesterday.

Kate and Gerry McCann neglected their children and lied to detectives investigating Madeleine’s disappearance, a senior government lawyer also claimed.

And detectives intercepted text messages between the couple in the days after the youngster vanished from the Algarve resort and looked into ways of preventing them from leaving the country.

One officer even claimed that Portuguese police changed their inquiry from a missing person search to a murder investigation after Kate told him she had a nightmare and had seen Madeleine’s body lying on a hillside. The allegations – which have all been vehemently denied by the McCanns – were outlined during the dramatic opening of a case brought by Goncalo Amaral, the former detective who headed the initial investigation.

He wants to overturn a ban on his controversial book on the case.

In a separate legal action, the McCanns are seeking £1million compensation and a final ruling preventing Mr Amaral from repeating the claims he made about them, which they say are untrue and based on a deeply flawed investigation. The couple have said any money would be used to help try to find Madeleine.

The McCanns have never been charged with any offence and were cleared by the Portuguese authorities after they admitted there was no evidence to prosecute the couple.

After a tense opening, their spokeswoman confirmed that the couple found listening to the allegations very painful. She said: “I think it is hurting them. They can feel hurt by these things being repeated again and again and again. However, they know what really happened so they are confident. They just want to find their daughter.”
Chief Inspector Tavares de Almeida told the court that he believed the couple, from Rothley, Leicestershire, were directly involved in Madeleine’s disappearance – a theory he said was shared by Portuguese and British officers working on the case.

He said: “The conclusion that was arrived at was that Madeleine McCann died at the apartment and the McCann couple simulated the abduction to hide the fact that they had not taken care of their children.

“There was a tragic accident in the apartment that night and they neglected the care of their children. It was the conclusion of both Portuguese and British police. We have always spoken of a tragic accidental death. There was no homicide.”

Asked if he thought Madeleine was dead, Mr de Almeida replied: “Yes. She is dead. It was not only the police who believed this but the public prosecutor. The McCanns did not kill her but they concealed the body.” Mr de Almeida was giving evidence on behalf of his former colleague Goncalo Amaral who is seeking to overturn a ban on the book he wrote about the Madeleine case entitled Maddie: The Truth Of The Lie.

The detective described the book as a “true history of the facts”. He said: “Goncalo Amaral was very careful to come to this conclusion with the facts.”

Luis Neves, the head of Portugal’s anti-terrorism unit, told the court they had employed a British profiler who gave him the impression that the McCanns were guilty of involvement in Madeleine’s disappearance.

Mr de Almeida said their suspicions about the couple appeared to be confirmed when sniffer dogs found traces of blood and the smell of death at the McCanns’ holiday apartment.

One of the dogs was in a nervous, excitable state and wanted to get into the room, said Mr de Almeida.

He said: “Inside the apartment there were two places where the dogs gave a sign. One was in the bedroom, the other was in the dining room.

“It was also found in the McCanns’ new apartment on a piece of clothing and in the rental car.”

Asked if it was the dog’s reaction that led police to make the McCanns formal suspects in the investigation, he said: “No, they were already suspected of simulating a kidnapping and concealing the body.”

The McCanns’ lawyer, Isabel Duarte, challenged this claim, arguing that the sniffer dog results did not constitute proof and were not allowed as evidence in the case.

Mr de Almeida said the investigation was hampered by the British authorities who provided only one sheet of paper of information when asked to look into the background of Kate and Gerry and their friends.

Earlier, District Attorney Jose Magalhaes e Menezes told the court how text messages sent by Kate and Gerry were intercepted by police who were suspicious about their role in their daughter’s disappearance.

He said: “The phone taps were set up in order to clear or implicate the McCanns.” But the texts were not considered as part of the investigation because a judge would not allow it.

Giving evidence via videolink, Mr Menezes claimed that the couple lied to police about how long they had left Madeleine alone.

He said: “The truth is that the McCanns did not seem concerned about the safety of their children. They neglected to take care of them.

“They told police that checks on the children had been made every half an hour that evening – then how could there be an opportunity for her to go missing? So it was therefore a longer interval – maybe 45 to 50 minutes.”

Under fierce questioning from Amaral’s lawyer, Mr Menezes was asked again and again if he thought Madeleine was dead.

He refused to give an answer until he was again asked by Judge Gabriela Rodrigues for his opinion on whether she was dead or alive.

He replied: “Fifty-fifty”. He added his team looked into ways of preventing Kate and Gerry returning the UK.

However, under cross-examination, he conceded that the McCanns had always made themselves available to detectives for questioning during the investigation.

Yesterday, the McCanns sat just feet away from Mr Amaral in the cold, stone floored courtroom in Portugal Palace of Justice.

Dressed in a pretty floral dress, tights and boots Kate and husband Gerry whispered to each other as the legal proceeding took place in front of a packed public gallery.

Their lawyer told the court that the couple were prepared to give evidence but only after Mr Amaral had done so.

The McCanns’ legal team also intend to call a new witness which could result in the case lasting longer than the expected three days.

Madeleine was nearly four when she went missing from her family holiday apartment in Praia da Luz in the Algarve on May 3 2007 while her parents dined with friends nearby.

Later, another witness told the court that the investigation changed from a missing person’s inquiry into a murder hunt after Kate had a nightmare and told police where to look for the body.

Police liaison officer Ricardo Paiva said: “The turning point of the investigation came after I received a phone call from Kate McCann.

“She said she had had a nightmare and saw Madeleine’s body lying on a hillside.” Police carried out a thorough search of the land overlooking the beach at Praia da Luz but found nothing.

Asked if he had ever got the impression from the McCanns that they thought Madeleine could be dead, he said: “Yes.”

However, he added that he did not think that claims that she was dead had hampered the police investigation as officers continued to get regular sightings of the missing youngster.

He said: “In this week I have received a dozen sightings of Madeleine.”

Mr Paiva, who was removed from the inquiry at the request of the McCanns, said he received the call at the end of July when Gerry was away and Kate was in Praia da Luz on her own.

At this point the Portuguese police were told about British search dogs that could find dead bodies.

He added: “At the end of July Kate phoned me. She was alone as Gerry was in the UK and she was crying, saying she’d dreamt Madeleine was up in the hills and we should do searches there. She gave the impression that she thought Madeleine was dead.”

Mr Paiva said detectives became suspicious of the McCanns the moment they disobeyed police advice to keep quiet while they investigated. Instead the couple turned the case into a media circus.

He said they claimed they had to do everything. “From the minute they shunned our advice we suspected them,” he said.

However, under cross examination he accepted claims that the couple contacted the media before the police were not true. Judge Rodrigues asked him why he could not accept that Madeleine could have been kidnapped and then killed. Mr Paiva did not answer.

Mr Paiva said if Madeleine was alive and being held captive publicity would be more likely to hasten her death. Mr de Almeida told the court that well-wishers who gave cash donations to the Madeleine Fund had been conned as the girl was dead and the money was being wasted.

He said Portuguese police investigated whether they could launch a fraud inquiry to protect the £2million in the fund.

But they abandoned the idea after it became apparent they had no jurisdiction – as the fund was held in the UK.

He said: “There was a discussion with the British police about the fund because we couldn’t understand its purpose. We were concerned that there was a fraud being carried out. We asked our British colleagues about it and were told it would be very complicated.

“But Portugal had no jurisdiction over the Madeleine Fund because it is based in the UK.”

He said the British authorities refused to carry out any investigation into the McCanns or their friends.

He told the court: “All they sent us was one A4 piece of paper. We were told the British would not accept an investigation of the McCanns.” Portuguese police found the “merchandising” of the Madeleine Fund – the sale of wristbands – very strange.

The McCanns’ status as suspects was lifted when the investigation was shelved in July 2008. The same month, Mr Amaral published the book.

Arriving in Lisbon, Mr McCann said: “No one can be allowed to say that our daughter can’t be found without very good evidence. That’s what this court case is about.”

Mrs McCann said: “We’re looking for justice.”

Mr de Almeida told the court that well-wishers who gave cash donations to the Madeleine Fund had been conned as the girl was dead and the money was being wasted.

He said Portuguese police investigated whether they could launch a fraud inquiry to protect the £2million in the fund.

But they abandoned the idea after it became apparent they had no jurisdiction – as the fund was held in the UK.

He said: “There was a discussion with the British police about the fund because we couldn’t understand its purpose. We were concerned that there was a fraud being carried out. We asked our British colleagues about it and were told it would be very complicated.

“But Portugal had no jurisdiction over the Madeleine Fund because it is based in the UK.”

No mention of any of this in the files. Why would this be left out?

Did it never occur to them, that the McCanns had nothing to do with Madeleine's disappearance, and that since the PJ were not looking for her, then private funds would be needed to search? They cannot be so stupid.

And here is the most telling thing so far. The PJ have absolutely no evidence that the Mccanns were involved, or that Madeleine is dead, or that the fund is not being used to search for Madeleine. All they are doing is repeating libel in court. This is not a defense it is a joke. Just getting other officers to repeat the libel doenst make it any less libellous. Yet, without any evidence, they suspected the McCanns of fraud, kidnap, cover up etc etc. They dont search for Madeleine (why werent they searching for a dead body if they were so sure she was dead), and never get any evidence at all, even after all their 'work'. And then they still have the nerve to say that Madeleine wasnt abducted.

And one other thing. What would investigating the Fund have shown? The money is being spent on private investigators. Did the PJ think that the Mccanns were funnelling money to their private accounts or something like that? Because nothing else makes any sense, as to why they wanted to investigate it. And of course, without due cause, they would not be able to investigate the bank accounts or look at the books, and they had no due cause.

And then to top it all off, they keep on with this defamation. They are raising these things to try to show that their conclusions are justified. But they are not, because they never found any evidence. Not allowing the texts, or allowing them access to bank accounts is not a reason for not finding any evidence. They needed just cause to see these things, and they didnt have them. Luckily, the previous judges understood these things, as will this one.

The defense seems to be confused about what they are doing here. They are not supposed to be showing why they investigated various things. There was nothing wrong with investigating the McCanns. But their investigation showed nothing, except, and here is the big smoking gun, they DIDNT BELIEVE THAT THE PARENTS CHECKED THE KIDS EVERY 30 MINUTES. They are meant to be showing that Madeleine died in the apartment, not why they investigated that Madeleine died in the apartment. And the fact they did investigate and couldnt prove anything, NOTHING, means that they should not state as fact that she is dead and that her parents are involved. This is DEFAMATION and they are doing it in front of a judge.

the investigation changed from a missing person’s inquiry into a murder
hunt after Kate had a nightmare and told police where to look for the
body.

Police liaison officer Ricardo Paiva said: “The turning
point of the investigation came after I received a phone call from Kate
McCann.

“She said she had had a nightmare and saw Madeleine’s
body lying on a hillside.” Police carried out a thorough search of the
land overlooking the beach at Praia da Luz but found nothing.

Im not surprised they found nothing.It was a nightmare you fools.The woman is in turmoil her heads in the shed, her hearts been ripped out, shes an emotional wreck.She been hurt beyond imagination.............. of course shes going to have nightmares.

They fail to investigate many many leads however they thoroughly search the hills after a nightmare?? And then in the next breath they tell the world they will not investigate claims from psychics who stress they have visions of where Madeleine is being held??

Clairesy

The mind boggles that they would even attempt to use a dream as part of an investigation.

I would be more surprised if Kate never had a dream like this. It must prey on her mind that Madeleine may be dead, and that she may never see her again. She wants to beleive that Madeleine is alive, but doubt would surely creep in. And so of course it came out in a dream.

How can these PJ be considered detectives, if they cant even understand basic human emotions? They must have known the dream was irrelevant, and is totally irrelevant in the current court case. Why bring it up? It makes them look foolish.

clairesy wrote:

the investigation changed from a missing person’s inquiry into a murder
hunt after Kate had a nightmare and told police where to look for the
body.

Police liaison officer Ricardo Paiva said: “The turning
point of the investigation came after I received a phone call from Kate
McCann.

“She said she had had a nightmare and saw Madeleine’s
body lying on a hillside.” Police carried out a thorough search of the
land overlooking the beach at Praia da Luz but found nothing.

Im not surprised they found nothing.It was a nightmare you fools.The woman is in turmoil her heads in the shed, her hearts been ripped out, shes an emotional wreck.She been hurt beyond imagination.............. of course shes going to have nightmares.

They fail to investigate many many leads however they thoroughly search the hills after a nightmare?? And then in the next breath they tell the world they will not investigate claims from psychics who stress they have visions of where Madeleine is being held??

Yes they fail to investigate leads but investigate a nightmare, maybe they were quite happy to do this because they knew that Madeleine was not there?
I am beginning to smell a far bigger corrupt rat than I ever thought possible!

Something else which was claimed in court today, that this week alone there have been many Madeleine sightins reported to the PJ!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ARE THEY INVESTIGATING THEM? What are they doing with them? Telling the people to "go away and stop wasting their time because the little girl is dead" Just like they admitted before?

Pathetic isnt it...any normal police officer would have been on the phone to her therapist or support worker and telling them to get around there and offer the woman some support.Not jump into a frenzy and base a missing child abduction case on the nightmare of her traumatized mammy.
Its the job of a therapist or support worker to analyze a persons nightmare or depressed state so that they can offer some support and relief from the hurt they are going through.It isn't the job of the police to analyze a nightmare and then twist it around so as to use it as evidence in a court of law to jail a victim of crime.

Kate as got every right to feel desperate and suffer nightmares.She been through a traumatic experience that's still ripping her heart out everyday.

Just because they cant do their frigging jobs properly and investigate a crime the way it SHOULD BE Investigated doesn't give them the rights to push the blame onto a woman who was (at that time) crying out for help,not crying out a confession over the bl@@dy phone.

Thank you Maria, how did it go today? The de Magalhaes e Menezes you mention, would this be one and the same Jose de Magalhaes e Menezes the prosecutor who along with Joao Melchior Gomes, wrote the 58 page report? (which can be located in the final volume of the files)

Which said this (among other things)

"the investigation had not been able to find any proof which would allow "the formulation of any lucid, sensible, serious and honest conclusion" about the circumstances of the girl going missing. It continued: "This includes the most dramatic thing, ascertaining whether she is still alive or dead – which seems the most probable.""The investigators are fully conscious that their work is not exempt from imperfections. They worked with an enormous margin of error and they achieved very little in terms of conclusive results, especially about the fate of the unfortunate child."This is not, unfortunately, a detective novel, a crime scenario fit for the investigative efforts of a Sherlock Holmes or Hercule Poirot, guided by the illusion that the forces of law and justice can always re-establish order.

Is Joao Melchior Gomes going to testify and make a king size prat out of himself too I wonder?

I cannot understand what Jose de Magalhaes e Menezes hoped to achieve by going to court today, because all that has done for him is to make him lose all credibility. Something is not right there!

Also, he did not read the book, and answering a question from Isabel, he states that, to him, the title seems an attempt of saying that the book is the truth about a flawed investigation (an investigation that lead to a false conclusion, final report). That one is very serious.

This is VERY damning Maria, very, you see we missed these bits, we had a next to useless live link, but it told us nothing about what Isabel was saying!

Thank you Maria for your input. Being there gives you a very special perspective, which we are all happy that you share with us.

Rosiepops wrote:Something else which was claimed in court today, that this week alone there have been many Madeleine sightins reported to the PJ!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ARE THEY INVESTIGATING THEM? What are they doing with them? Telling the people to "go away and stop wasting their time because the little girl is dead" Just like they admitted before?

Yes i noticed that to rosie.I was goign to comment on it but got so irate with the nightmare theory that i forgot.

Fresh leads??like what...someone from down the road had a day dream whilst sitting in the pub??

gonc needs to know the public are not as dull as he assumes we are.

maria wrote:Hi!

Yes, Amaral got a nice bunch of witnesses;

1. The prosecutor (Magalhães e Menezes) who signed the final report stating or reinforcing the conclusions in there, which are, as you remember, in a nutshell, there is not enough information to decide on which crime has been committed, let alone who committed it. It was him who corrected Cabrita about the role of the dogs: a means of proof, not a proof. Also, he did not read the book, and answering a question from Isabel, he states that, to him, the title seems an attempt of saying that the book is the truth about a flawed investigation (an investigation that lead to a false conclusion, final report). That one is very serious.

2. Then Amaral's pal (Tavares de Almeida) putting all on the boicot by the 'english' police, politicians (en passant), the McCanns. Yes he did write the report stating that the parents should have their status aggravated because they were suspect of having concealed their daughter's body. Yes, the book is a summary of the investigation. Yes the dogs are super and marked everything, if forensic evidence wasn't found it is all down to FSS, who first said that there were 15 markers out of 19 and then said there was contamination, how could they do that as they (PJ) were getting all the directions on how to recover the indices from them (FSS)? (my comment, what great investigators we've got, they need directions on how to collect residues, evidences, indices!!!). Just remembered, Isabel showed him a map in the book where Amaral explains that the Smiths saw a man that would have come from OC. They had a slightly heated argument, and he lead Isabel to conclude, without any denial, that that map was incorrect, so what else was incorrect in the book?

3. The liaison officer (Ricardo Paiva) speaking in a very very low voice, who basically confirmed everything that is in the book (I think as I haven't read it), being the dogs the main 'dish'. Isabel asked him if he didn't think if the book and the thesis it expresses could hamper the search for Madeleine, to which he answered no, only last week he received several messages that were duly investigated and then he was in complete disarray when Isabel put a question to him ,sorry, can't remember which one because she was careful to remind him that he was under oath!!! And then Isabel asked him 3 (three) times how did the parents hide the body for at least 23/24 days (he wasn't sure about the time) and everytime he answered that they must have hid the body cause the dogs marked the car...blablabla... then Isabel wrapped up her questioning with a 'Right, I understand you do not want to answer my question. That's all, thank you'

4. And finally the director of the national unit of combat of terrorism, formerly and at the time, the unit of combat of bandistry (Luís Neves). A heavy weight, strong voice, but deaf of his left ear (Isabel was on his left). Only one meeting with the British Ambassador (10-15 minutes), two or three meetings with the parents, the consul, Guilhermino Encarnação and two high rank british officers, very helpfull the british police, no, he doesn't know Clarence Mitchel, no pressure while he was there (until August), the dogs came very highly reccomended, no false positives in 100 or 200 cases. Suggestion for the dogs to come from the british. No he did not read the book, he just went through it quickly on the eve of the December hearing so that he could prepare his statement... Yes, what is in the book is also in the files. But the book is a view over an investigation, an 'outburst' of GA, so angry he must have been by loosing 'his' investigation .'We' hate that, 'we' do not like when an investigation does not lead to a charge. Yes, if Gonçalo stayed in the investigation it would probably end in a different way.

Some or all of them said that Kate 'started' admitting that Madeleine 'was' dead when she asked for Krugel to be called and even asked that his searches to be widened to the rocks, some scrubland...

Sorry for the scattered report, it is my first court case... Tomorrow I will take notes, it will be easier.

About the questions, you were complaining that without knowing the questions it became difficult to understand the answers. Well, Cabrita is not very imaginative. Always the dogs (why, what, how), the 'coincidence' between the files and the book, the strange behaviours, namely Kate's, no much more than that.

Oh, and the mad woman was there! I didn't see anybody besides the media at the door, but ten meters away I heard her 'long live Dr. Gonçalo Amaral'. I believe she was completely alone.

My opinion? Amaral must be thinking to himself 'with friends like these who needs ennemies?'

Well, and I'm going to try to get some sleep, I'll have to get up at 4:30...

Night all, hope this very very short summary is of any use.

Maria, I am just bringing this over to this page, it is important people read this as much was missed from inside the court room. we were told that Isabel got a bit heated with the witness, but we were not told why! Do they film in your court room?
So the map was incorrect? Which could have meant that the time discrepancy was NOT a time discrepancy at all?

Clairesy, I am really having a hard job trying to understand how a person In Paiva's position did not and seems unable to understand how a traumatised mind works. Why was he even a liaison officer if he has not got this basic psychological training?

Kate was most like suppressing what she really thought was happening to her daughter, this is what people do and the result is when she fell asleep her subconscious mind worked to release it, if it didn't she would have been in a worse state than she obviously was and here is something else another lie of Amaral's exposed by his own men!

Amaral said they suspected Kate and Gerry because they were cold and showed no emotion, first Amaral contradicts himself and says they were throwing themselves on the floor begging the police to find their daughter. NOW we learn that Kate was in such a terrible state she was phoning up the liaison officer during the night begging for his help, telling him abut the nightmares she was having.

My God Amaral you are one lying conniving corrupt piece of work you idiot! (sorry, sorry he makes me so mad)

09.45 hrs....Kate, Gerry and Isabel have just arrived for the start of day 2 of the case. I wonder if Amaral will be on time today? I see they are accompanied by that tall chap today, I cannot remember his name, he is the man that shut Joana Morais up the time the case got cancelled before.

Gerry speaks out on his way into court

There is absolutely no evidence that Madeleine is dead.

He really spoke out, the poor man.

I will try and get the link to put up here.

Well done Gerry, I would have like to hear what the male reporter was trying to say, i think he was going to tell the world that Amaral said "F**k the McCanns."

Great language for Amaral.

Amaral's claims are pathetic, oh boy is he worried, he knows yesterday went really badly for him.

jondipaolo: Mr amaral claimed victory outside court, saying the witnesses had borne out his argument.

Wednesday January 13, 2010 10:15 jondipaolo



Huh now I know the specimen Amaral is seriously deluded!
Even the microphones want to smack him one!

To Kate and Gerry

While we are waiting for today's proceedings to begin, I just wanted to bring to people's attention, that we are far from getting the true picture here, if you read what our Maria has to say (she is our Portuguese poster inside the courtroom - see her thread on this category) we see that Dra Isabel Duarte is really making an impact in that courtroom.

Maria will be reporting again on here tonight some time.(Hopefully)

10:44

jondipaolo: Flores is an acquaintance of amaral's and wrote the preface to the sequel to his book about madeleine. Wednesday January 13, 2010 10:44 jondipaolo

10:41

jondipaolo: Flores: this case involves a question of freedom of speech.

Flores has nothing to do with this investigation, what can he add? Why has amaral called him? Scraping the bottom of the barrel.