Madeleine McCann #5

[Lady_H]

On a previous evening the neighbour heard one of those babies crying for over an hour. So they could easily have been left for at least 1.5 hours at a time. Add in that Madeleine had ‘stay in my bed at night time’ (paraphrasing) on her reward chart - something she therefore had an habit of not doing - and it’s really not a stretch at all.
I do think stranger abduction is possible, but I think it makes it difficult to square a lot of Gerry & Kates behaviour away. For example
why you would you say they were being checked every 20 minutes when it was patently untrue and it makes the timeline false. Tell the truth to find your missing child no? What are you covering up that is more important than your daughter?

That part is so heartbreaking. Yes the neighbour heard a child crying from their apartment for over an hour. According to the McCanns, who clearly realised they had to publicly address this, Madeleine told them the next morning that the children were crying for them, and asked where they were and why they didn’t come. “So we thought, oooh that’s a bit strange” and suggested maybe it was because someone was lurking around outside the apartment. No, it was because your three small children were crying for you in the night and and you did not come.

And they still felt it was fine to leave their children all alone again the next evening to go out with their mates.

 

[InTheDollsHouse]

There are so many things that - as a parent - I can’t understand about their actions, and that’s what makes it so difficult to move past the feeling that something happened in that room, and was covered up.

Washing my child’s most loved toy for example would be the last thing I’d do in that situation.

 

[AFlyOnYourWall]

You know what one of the greatest injustices of this case is? That those two negligent cunts didn’t face any repercussions for their actions. If they were working class they would have been publicly scrutinised and shamed. Makes me so mad

 

[Londonlady68]

didn’t they have a nanny who couldn’t come with them on the trip?

They should have just left the kids at home. They were in Kid's Club all day and alone in their bedrooms all night.
Maybe then all THREE of them would have returned to the UK alive.
Fucking feckless parents!

 

[missloveisland]

I know not everyone agrees but if this does bring closure at all I wonder if the McCanns will ever hold themselves remotely accountable for leaving those poor babies alone whilst they went off and ate and drank the night away.

 

[Wackie Jeaver]

I know not everyone agrees but if this does bring closure at all I wonder if the McCanns will ever hold themselves remotely accountable for leaving those poor babies alone whilst they went off and ate and drank the night away.

Nope, never have, never will.

I'm on the fence about the police comments tbh - I think there may well have been wheels within wheels (coughs loudly), I'm very suspicious about the levels of funding given to this case when compared to so many others.

 

[8ForestWood]

I still believe the parents are to blame…..maybe didn’t deliberately murder her but she died at their hands/neglect and that I’ve always been sure of. Their behaviour straight after was not what you’d expect of genuine loving parents.

 

[sassmaster3000]

People are horrible fuckers. Putting a puppy in a bag then chucking it in the reservoir/lake isn’t that uncommon.
Knocks me sick. I can’t even begin to imagine how you think that’s an okay thing to do.

 

[Toothbrush]

I went down a rabbit hole with this back in the day. I read all the interview transcripts when they were released, for example.

I've my own thoughts about the case: one of which is that no one has ever really questioned the room changes that took place at the beginning of the holiday, nor whether Madeleine and the twins were the only children in the room that night, or, indeed, if they were in there at all.

Logically, if you are on a holiday with other families, and you all wanted to enjoy your evenings, it would make far more sense to put all the children to sleep in one apartment, and have an adult sit with them for 30 mins each in a rota. Then when you go to bed, you pick up your sleeping child and take them back to the room with you.

What you don't do is leave 18 month old twins in a room on their own with someone checking every 30 mins. It's bonkers. No one is going to do that. Children of that age wake up, they cry, they try and climb out of travel cots.

So I really don't think they did that. That narrative is just a story to confuse what really happened, which may have even occurred in another room (though it makes sense for it to be that apartment as it was the largest).

One thing I do know is that the British police know the "official" story is off. I had a very interesting conversations once with someone who specialised in this area who was delivering training, and was told they do not believe Madeleine was abducted from the room for the very simple reason that it is very hard to abduct children of that age because they are too difficult to control.

Three to four year olds are neither young enough to be largely oblivious but not old enough to have the reasoning capacity that allows you to threaten them into silence.

The same person said that if it were a commissioned abduction for money, the twins would have been the target, not Madeleine - - because, to be blunt, a pair of 18 month old twins would be worth upwards of £1.5 million on the black market, plus they are far easier to carry and have no real language skills.

I guess we will never know. And I wonder whether Kate McCann even really knows exactly what happened.

 

[CyanideKiss]

I have always believed that Madelaine died accidentally in the apartment. Whether she fell and hit her head, or vomited and choked, I don't know. But, she never left the apartment alive. What followed was a group of very well educated, intelligent adults (probably far more intelligent than the police) swiftly collaborating to bring about as much damage limitation as possible. Afterward, it was clear that Kate was beside herself with shock and grief, whereas Gerry was basically frog marching her around with grim determination to style it out. Never forget Gerry was a successful surgeon and every surgeon I have ever worked with has had towering self arrogance and sociopathic tendencies. He was 100% determined that their neglect and subsequent tragedy wasn't going to ruin him or their lives.

 

[Facehugger]

I've said this many, many times before but, as much as I do want to know what happened to Maddie, I've always wanted complete closure for Kerry Needham, and Ben. Working class family, they didn't have half the help the McCanns were afforded. Why not??

 

[Nelly's mum]

It will bring closure though if they find anything of her

Yes, I can understand this But all those millions spent looking for MM for the past 20yrs, when she is surely deceased, the money could have made such a difference to children who are alive and suffering. Children who are missing, trafficked, abused, sold into slavery etc.
So sad

 

[Loppylou89]

I fucking hate the McCanns. Ultimately they are responsible for this. If they’d taken proper care of their children this wouldn’t have happened. I’m sick of seeing Kate’s simpering face walking around with ‘cuddle cat’ when her gross negligence as a parent was to blame.

There are so many people missing- why do they not get the same level of attention and money put into their searches?! Because Kate and Gerry are middle class they’ve always been viewed as respectable and beyond derision and people merrily chuck thousands of quid at them to find Madeleine.

Andrew Gosden is the perfect example of another missing child- and his case hasn’t had a tenth of the the coverage theirs has.

If I was to leave my house unlocked and fuck off down the road to eat tapas and drink, and some sick fucker walks in my house and takes my kid, I’d be to blame because I should have locked them in and stayed home to take care of them.

Fucking McCanns.They boil my piss.

I agree with you. Whilst Madeleine deserves to be found and laid to rest (if she isn't alive), I find it very hard that so many families do not get the same level of exposure for their missing loved ones. I hadn't even heard of Andrew Gosden until I came to Tattle. It's very sad

 

[Shinealight]

And this narrative of ‘they made a terrible mistake and are now paying more for it than anyone could ever possibly imagine.' First up it’s Madeleine who paid the ultimate price - with her life, in all probability.
Second what is this mysterious singular mistake? It doesn’t exist. Because there are mistakes and then there are repeated patterns of behaviour - things you do over and over because you find it acceptable and/or it suits you. How Kate and Gerry neglected to care for those children was no mistake, it was how they parented. Otherwise leaving them in an unlocked apartment that night would have been some sort of anomaly.

We don’t know exactly what went on in that family of course but we know enough from just that holiday - how the days and evenings were spent - for me to feel desperately sad for all three babies. Even if the twins were properly cared for in the years after Madeleines disappearance, being left to cry like they were really fucks people up for the rest of their lives - they are unable to bond properly but will have no idea why.

A mistake!
Forgetting to put the bins out is a mistake.
Ordering the wrong flavour latte is a mistake.
Leaving your small children unattended in a holiday apartment while you go out to eat & drink is neglect.
Neglect isn’t a mistake.

 

[dorydaryl]

I know it's been said countless times before, but whatever happened to Madeleine, I grew very uncomfortable with the Mc Cann's aggressive pursuit of funding and almost complete lack of accountability, in terms of leaving their kids alone in the way they did. The way they tried to 'normalize' it. I've never been able to get my head around that. As a kid, I went on a couple of Pontins holidays (1970s) with families and friends (a mix of working and middle- class people). We kids were never left alone without somebody responsible in charge. The usual 'modus operandi' was that we went with our parents to the main entertainment venue until relatively late and when the adult 'cabaret' entertainment was on, we were all grouped into one chalet where we mucked about until we fell asleep or our parents came to collect us. The adults, over a two week period, would take it in turns to do a spot of babysitting. As there were a good few of them, nobody missed out much. Everyone happy. We did do kids' activities during the week (and were glad to get away from our parents for a couple of hours) but were never left in a creche/ childcare facility for the whole day. I think the Mc Canns have been overly defensive about this and I'd have had more respect if they'd taken ownership of their stupidity.

 

[Tiare Tahiti]

There were a few mentions that she had some issues with Madeleine. Imo for a couple who had to get ivf to get pregnant they were extremely careless with their kids and quite cold, as if they were more like accessories than extremely valued babies they were trying for so long.

A lot of parents struggle with their kids. Parents who had to do IVF perhaps even more - IVF is gruelling, and the guilt / unhappiness when things turn out less than perfect can be even worse than if you didn't have to invest so much money, effort, and physical pain to have your children.

People like to paint parents who struggled to have children as somehow superior and more deserving - they had to do SO much, they must have REALLY wanted their children. As if really wanting children and going to great lengths to have them, means you will or would be a better parent than parents who conceived at the first try.

That's a fallacy.

People who struggled to have children can be just as unhappy, disengaged or indeed downright abusive as people who had their children easily.

 

[Rita Chevrolet]

They HAVE got away with it though. How many cases have we seen (particularly in Spain) where young women have left their kids alone in a holiday apartment or hotel room to go off out on the razzle then they are caught and locked up then given a rough-ride by the SS on return to UK?
Yes I know these two never saw their child again and nobody actually knows what happened to her, but these two fine upstanding citizens ARE just as guilty of child abandonment / neglect as Tracey or Sharon ever were for doing exactly that, yet they got away with it.

 

[Twintwin]

In her book, Kate put that Madeleine had asked ‘why didn’t you come when Sean and I cried last night’.

And she still went out the next night. As a mother of a 2 and 6 year old I find this absolutely appalling.

 

[Warriorqueen]

Maybe “we recommend the James Bogart YouTube videos for a better understanding of this case” could become a standard response here rather than getting drawn into trying to explain it all over and over again. You just cannot condense 20 plus hours of research plus other sources into a pithy paragraph that satisfies people who still believe the McCann version and frankly don’t want to be convinced otherwise. Perhaps Bogart doesn’t have it all exactly right (although I think he does) but the painstaking research from source material is absolutely astonishing and fascinating and anyone who is genuinely curious about this case should at least give it a go.

This thread always devolves into two conversations, one group who know a lot or are at least aware of the massive complexities of this case and one group who…don’t. It is like trying to hold a PhD conference and a toddlers lego-building session at the same time and it gets a bit tiring

I have been heavily involved in the online community discussing the McCanns in the past. The whole ‘Pro and Anti’ division drove me insane. I went in deep and my conclusion was the McCanns were responsible however, 10 years later, I am looking at it with fresh eyes. But what no one will appreciate on tattle is the Pro and Antis setting up camp in a thread with their patronising and condescending passive aggressive posts. There are plenty of Facebook groups around for those to battle it out, dox each other and generally behave like dogs scrapping in the street. Let the normal, casual person enjoy some healthy debate without feeling imposed upon.

 

[Rita Chevrolet]

At least the girl knows from grim experieince that when she has a child one day that you don't go off out on the razz leaving said precious child alone in an unlocked holiday apartment. Or go off for your tennis lessons you have already paid for as the rest of the resort searches for your missing child.