Halligen: Private detective unable to afford barrister

March 26, 2010
Court News UK
OXFORD

A private detective accused of conning the McCann family of £300,000 to find their missing daughter Maddie could not afford to be represented in court today (Fri). Security consultant Kevin Halligen, 48, is fighting extradition to the United States over claims he cheated Dutch company Trafigura out of £1.3million by offering to secure the release of their employees from an Ivory Coast jail.

Continue Reading... Labels: 2010, Madeleine McCann

Two-thirds of ICoast toxic waste victims compensated

25 March 2010
Agence France Presse

More than 20,000 victims of toxic waste dumped by a ship in Ivory Coast in 2006 have received compensation over the last three weeks, the head of an association representing them said Thursday. "We have delivered more than 20,000 cheques in three weeks, two thirds of the people to be compensated," said Claude Gohourou, who heads an association managing the payouts jointly with British law firm Leigh Day and Company. "We're taking a break to perfect the organisation and review the situation with the bank," he said during a press conference. So far more than 15 billion CFA francs (22.9 million euros, 31 million dollas) have already been paid and the remaining 8,000 people to be compensated will get payouts when the operation starts up again on March 31, he added.

Continue Reading... Labels: 2010, Find Madeleine Fund

Dutch capital to be put on trial over ICoast waste dump

11 March 2010
Agence France Presse

The city of Amsterdam is to be prosecuted over the dumping of toxic waste by a ship in Ivory Coast in 2006, the Supreme Court has ruled in a decision made available Wednesday. "The Supreme Court refers the case back to the Amsterdam district court ... to be considered anew," said the judgment, overturning earlier decisions to dismiss the case against the city.

Continue Reading... Labels: 2010

Translation of Interview - Goncalo Amaral

8 March 2010
Correio TV / Joana Morais Blog

(Note:  Comments disabled - please visit Joana's blog to comment.)


At the time of the presentation of his new book «The English Gag» at Fafe's Library, video via Correio TV

Continue Reading... Labels: 2010, Gonçalo Amaral, Madeleine McCann

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McCANNS: TIME FOR NEW HUNT

6 March 2010
The Sun
Antonella Lazzeri in Portimao

POLICE in Britain and Portugal were under increasing pressure yesterday to reopen the Maddie McCann case after The Sun revealed how sightings of her had been ignored. Maddie's parents Kate and Gerry have asked Home Secretary Alan Johnson to order the search to be relaunched.

Even their arch enemy, former Portuguese police boss Goncalo Amaral, has said the case should be reopened.

Continue Reading... Labels: 2010, Antonella Lazzeri, Antonio Jimenez, Gonçalo Amaral, Madeleine McCann

LOST: MADDIE DOUBLE WHO CRIED 'HELP ME'

5 March 2010
The Sun
Antonella Lazzeri in Portimao, Portugal
No probe over hotel girl

A girl the double of Madeleine McCann shouted "Help me!" in English as she was dragged out of a hotel in Austria, police files have revealed. A tourist couple who had already commented on how much the child looked like missing Maddie were stunned when she cried out as a "tubby" man hurried her away. The couple, visitors from Norway, rushed outside to look for the man and girl but they had abruptly vanished.

Austrian cops sent a list of all the guests then staying at the hotel to their counterparts probing Maddie's disappearance in Portugal — but NOTHING was done. The report is one of many buried away in a huge mountain of official Portuguese police files obtained this week by The Sun.

Continue Reading... Labels: 2010, Antonella Lazzeri, Madeleine McCann

The Conservative Party to recruit McCann spokesperson as head of media monitoring
4 March 2010
PR Week
Danny Rogers



The Conservative Party is set to hire Clarence Mitchell, best-known as spokesman for Madeleine McCann's parents, as the head of media monitoring for its general election campaign, PRWeek can exclusively reveal.

Mitchell will join the Tory comms operation, reporting directly to director of communications Andy Coulson.

Mitchell, who was the director of the Government's media monitoring unit for two years (2005-2007) will take a back room role, monitoring the progress of the Tories' campaign in the media.

PR Week understands that Mitchell will not be an active spokesman for the party.

The appointment of the well-respected Mitchell is a boost to the Conservatives' campaign, which has lost ground in the opinion polls in recent weeks, despite last weekend's Spring Conference.

Since September 2008 Mitchell has balanced his role as spokesman for the McCanns and the parents of murdered teenager Jimmy Mizen, with a crisis management role at Freud Communications.

Mitchell is known to be close to Coulson, who was a former editor of News of the World. Late last year Mitchell expressed an interest in standing as a Conservative MP. He began his career as a reporter on the Hendon and Finchley Times in 1982. Since then he has worked for The Sunday Express, BBC Radio Sheffield and as a correspondent and presenter on BBC TV News

Continue Reading... Labels: 2010, Clarence Mitchell, Leveson Inquiry

Was this rag doll given to Maddie by her captors

4 March 2010 
The Sun
Antonella Lazzeri in Portimao, Portugal
RIDDLE OF NEW SIGHTING
 
THIS little girl's rag doll could have been given to Madeleine McCann by those who snatched her, investigators believe. The cuddly plaything was among evidence suggesting Maddie was held at a remote house — but Portuguese cops abandoned the line of inquiry.

Private detectives hired by the missing tot's parents Kate and Gerry found the white bungalow in an orange orchard outside Silves, Portugal, after trailing a woman seen earlier with a Maddie lookalike. They staked the place out and spotted the doll and a child's drawing. Portuguese police on the Maddie case were tipped off, but the McCanns camp claim they did not fully investigate.

A source close to the McCanns said yesterday:

Continue Reading... Labels: 2010, Antonella Lazzeri, Madeleine McCann

Adjectives used by the British Press to describe Goncalo Amaral

Adjectives used by the British Press to describe
Goncalo Amaral and/or the Portuguese police
(Source: Factiva database)

• 53 articles: "boozy" or "boozer" (Examples)
  
• 418 articles: "disgraced, disgraceful, disgrace" (Examples)
  
• 440 articles: "outrage, outrageous" etc. 
  
• 37 articles: "bungling"
  
• 23 articles: "Keystone cops" (or Kops) (or Keystone cretins)  ("Keystone" cops has been used by English speaking people to describe bumbling or inept cops; based on old movies of the Keystone Cops.  Extremely insulting articles.)
   
• 42 articles: "Goncalo Amaral" and "lunch"  (includes all the "boozy lunch" "two hour lunch" etc. Many accuse him of "boozy three hour lunches" etc.  Why is it newsworthy that a man eats lunch?)
  
• 45 articles: "inept" 
• 220 articles: "sacked" or "fired"  (Note: Amaral was TRANSFERRED off the Maddie case and then chose to quit.)
  
• 49 articles: "hampered" "hampering" "hindered" "hindering" (the investigation);
  
• 43 articles: "outburst" (regarding his statement re: McCanns and the British police)
  
• 43 articles: "shameful" "shame" "shamed"
  
• 14 articles: "evil"
  
• 146 articles: "torture" "tortured" "attacked" (re: Leonor Cipriano)

Other terms used to describe
Goncalo Amaral and/or his colleagues

• "Oh, up yours, senor" (Title of column in the Daily Mirror by Tony Parsons - about which the Press Complaints Commission received 485 complaints.)
  
  
• sweaty oafish
  
  
• Inspector Clueless
  
  
• corpulent figure in an ill-fitting jacket
  
  
• fat, sweaty cop
  
  
• out of his depth
  
  
• liar
  
  
• lazy
  
  
• failed police chief
  
  
• giant ego
  
  
• manufacturing a case
  
  
• dishing dirt
  
  
• making stuff up
  
  
• feeding smears to the press
  
  
• spends hundreds of pounds per week at Carvi fish restaurant
  
  
• witch hunt
  
  
• stupendously stupid
  
  
• fragile macho pride
  
  
• swaggering plods
  
  
• lumbering yokels
  
  
• clueless
  
  
• corrupt
  
  
• biased
  
  
• Portuguese tormentors
  
  
• leaked information to the media
  
  
• vital evidence was ditched
  
  
• crucial documents were ignored
  
  
• weeks were wasted
  
  
• a shambles from the outset
  
  
• ignored sightings
  
  
• worked only four hours a day
  
  
• dirty tricks
  
  
• scarily amateur police investigation
  
  
• flawed inquiry
  
  
• beleaguered police
  
  
• evil suggestions (re: the McCanns)
  
  
• bizarre allegations
  
  
• vile slurs
  
  
• just want a convenient confession, true or false
  
  
• career in tatters
  
  
• abysmally mishandled Portuguese police investigation
  
  
• "Amaral was the main reason Kate and Gerry were named as suspects, despite there not being a shred of evidence that the couple were involved" (Blogger note: Cadaver dog alerts to McCann items only, Gaspar statement, Smith family sighting, refusal to answer police questions or return to Portugal for reconstruction, changes to statements re: the night Maddie disappeared, etc.) 
  
  
• "Life on Mars" police (refers to a British television program, extremely insulting articles)
  
  
• "It was bad enough for the McCanns that their child was snatched. It was worse luck still for it to happen in a backwater policed by incompetents."  (In other words, Portugal is a backwater country and it's police force is incompetent.)
  
• spectacularly stupid, cruel Portuguese police”
  
  
• pigs
  
  
• filth
  
  
• fitting up her parents
  
  
• it is the Portuguese police who are the clowns
  
  
• Cruel, stupid, spiteful clowns
  
  
• bunch of clueless amateurs
  
  
• turned their rage on the McCanns
  

Portuguese citizens

• leering bumpkins
  
  
• sardine munchers (This began when Tony Parsons said about the Portuguese Ambassador to Britain "If you can't say something constructive about the disappearance of little Madeleine, then you just keep your stupid, sardine-munching mouth shut.")

• "... a scathing attack by Sir Richard Branson on the Portuguese media...'The Portuguese press have behaved abysmally, fed inaccurate stories by the Portuguese police, which all turned out to be a load of garbage,' he told The Observer" 30 Sept. 2007

******

The most recent example of the outrageous treatment of Dr. Amaral is the BBC broadcast claiming he had said "F*** the McCanns".  Native Portuguese claim that Amaral actually said "'Não, força aos McCanns" "Ask the McCanns" in response to a reporter's questions.  (GONCALO AMARAL DOES NOT SPEAK ENGLISH -  a fact widely reported.) 

UPDATE:

ECU Ruling: East Midlands Today, BBC1 (East Midlands), 

12 January 2011

Publication date: 30 May 2011

Complaint
The programme included a brief exchange between a reporter and
Gonçalo Amaral (a former policeman who had worked on the
disappearance of Madeleine McCann and had since written a book on
the case). One word in the exchange was bleeped, and the report gave
the impression that this was because Sr Amaral had used offensive
language about the MrCanns. A viewer complained that this was
inaccurate and unfair to Sr Amaral.

Outcome
The reporter’s belief, reinforced by others on the programme team
who viewed the recording, was that Sr Amaral had indeed used an
English phrase which included an offensive term applied to the
McCanns. On further examination, however, it became clear that Sr
Amaral had been speaking Portuguese, and that an inoffensive phrase
had been misconstrued. Upheld

Further action
The Editor of the programme has discussed the outcome with the
producer and reporter involved. In future, the team plans to use
interpreters if clips from interviews are unclear.

BBC Complaints
http://www.bbc.co.uk/complaints/content/ecu/ecu_eastmidlandstoday120111

Continue Reading... Labels: BBC, Carvi Scandal, Clarence Mitchell, Gonçalo Amaral, Madeleine McCann