Tony Bennett met with criminal profiler Pat Brown today!

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US criminal profiler Pat Brown met with Tony Bennett, secretary of the Madeleine Foundation, today in Windsor, to discuss the complete mystery of Madeleine McCann.

Read the report of that meeting here ("Gerry McCann Abuse of Power" blog.)

The Madeleine Foundation and 3 Libel Actions

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THE MADELEINE FOUNDATION and 3 LIBEL ACTIONS



Statement by Tony Bennett, Secretary, 9pm, 3 December 2011


BRIAN KENNEDY

Brian Kennedy’s concerns that I had libelled him have now been settled on terms acceptable to both parties. No court order or undertaking is involved and I did not pay any of Mr Kennedy’s costs.

EDWARD SMETHURST

In Thursday’s post (1 December), I received a costs estimate (as per High Court procedures) of the likely costs incurred by Edward Smethurst if he pursues his libel claim against me, assuming I continue to defend his claim. I would be liable to pay all those costs if I lose (i.e. if the court holds that any one of my statements about him on Jill's forum libelled him).

In their letter, Carter-Ruck say that Smethurst's costs to date are £28,390 and that his future costs, assuming a three-day libel trial, will be £143,086.50, making the total £171,476.50.

This is based, as set out in a 10-page document, on much of the legal work being done by a Senior Partner at Carter-Ruck who charges £562.50 an hour for his time (inclusive of VAT).

Faced with such huge costs, I clearly must think carefully about my options in advance of a Case Management and Costs Management hearing in the High Court next Wednesday.

MCCANNS

At 6.20pm the same day (Thursday), a process server employed by Carter-Ruck came up to Chippingfield in a ‘Godfather’-style limousine, driven by another person, and handed me a large and heavy cardboard box, measuring 16" x 14" x 12" (40cm x 35cm x 30cm for those who do metric), containing 5 huge ring binders of statements on behalf of the McCanns, and accompanying evidence. These contained over 3,000 pages in total, mostly photocopies of my articles on the Madeleine Foundation website and several dozen postings on Jill Havern’s site. The cardboard box was of exceptional quality, while these were no ordinary lever arch files. They were beautifully finished in the attractive Oxford blue livery of Carter-Ruck, complete with their logo and full contact details.

There was also a summons to attend the Royal Courts of Justice to be committed to prison for contempt of court (alternative remedies being a suspended prison sentence, a fine, or seizure of assets, or any combination of these). The case has been listed for a hearing before a judge on Wednesday 8 February. The summons alleges a wholesale breach of one of the four undertakings I gave to the High Court on 25 November 2009, namely not to libel the McCanns.

I intend to defend the McCanns’ application. Arguably, as I have already been advised by one local lawyer, the undertaking I gave in 2009 was too ‘sweeping’ and should either be modified or even withdrawn, given that it amounts virtually to an undertaking to say nothing about the case ever again. The lawyer also suggested it was given under oppressive circumstances, a matter I have already raised under Article 6(1) of the European Convention on Human Rights with the European Commission on Human Rights, which is currently looking into my claim that the way British laws allows wealthy libel litigants to get their way over defendants who cannot hope to match their financial and legal resources amounts to a breach of human rights. The government has promised to rectify this manifestly unjust situation as a result of a successful campaign by the Libel Reform Campaign.

Included amongst the papers is an 84-paragraph, 27-page affidavit sworn by Senior Partner at Carter-Ruck, Isabel Hudson. I can reproduce parts of that affidavit, but not those parts that include extracts of my disputed articles and postings. We’ll therefore display a redacted version of it on our website.

In Paragraph 58 of her affidavit, Ms Hudson states that a letter sent by myself to Carter-Ruck on 8 June 2011 prompted the McCanns to say “enough is enough”. The McCanns and Carter-Ruck then began what Ms Hudson says in Paragraph 65 was “a painstaking and time-consuming process” of analysing as many postings of mine as they could find on Jillhavern’s forum, to see how many might be construed as libellous. They think that around 50-60 of my 3,700 posts on the forum might breach my undertaking, while the other 3,640-3,650 apparently do not. That explains why, as the forum-owner will confirm, Carter-Ruck have spent literally hundreds of hours on this forum in the past few months, searching for potentially libellous comments, in order to bolster their application to commit me to prison. The forum-owner’s logs record the precise time and length of each visit by Carter-Ruck.

There is a reference to all of this in Dr Kate McCann’s book: ‘madeleine’. She wrote (pp. 289-290):

“Adam Tudor and his colleague Isabel Hudson continue to do a vast amount of work for us, without payment, most of it quietly, behind the scenes”.

To have spent hundreds of hours on Jill Havern’s forum for the past few months ‘painstakingly and time-consumingly’searching, and searching, for possible libels, without any payment whatsoever, would indeed be regarded by many people as an act of very great generosity.

I cannot conclude this statement without giving an honourable mention to Mr Mike Gunnill of Kent, a past member of Jill Havern’s forum, and, for all I know, a present one, under one of his many personas, aliases, and ‘socks’. Mike Gunnill, it may be recalled, was the photojournalist who took the photograph of Debbie Butler (near whom he lives), used by the Sunday Express alongside their front-page headline: ‘The McCanns’ Stalker’ on 16 August 2009. His website at the time was remarkable for including over 100 photos he took at the gruesome ‘House of Horror’, Haut de la Garenne children’s home in Jersey, scene of decades of child abuse and possibly even child murders by depraved paedophiles. Some on this forum may recall how Gunnill e-mailed me in January 2010 under one of his many pseudonyms, ‘Michael Sangerte’, claiming he lived in ‘Berkshire’, asking to buy a copy of ‘60 Reasons’ (other names used by Gunnill in previous correspondence with me (before I knew his real identity) were Jason Peters and Peter Tarwin).

I refused. He then wrote me a further begging letter stating that he really wanted an original copy of ‘60 Reasons’ because of his ‘historical research’, adding that he was ‘willing to pay a high price’ for a copy. I then offered to obtain a copy belonging to a close relative and asked him to send £5 including postage, which he did. He asked me to send the book to Michael Sangerte - not in Berkshire, but at an address in Kent. Subsequent enquiries showed that this was Mike Gunnill’s home near Maidstone, Kent. The very day after the book was sent to him, he bragged on a McCann-believer forum that he had obtained a copy of ‘60 Reasons’ and had already sent it to Carter-Ruck, who were apparently ‘delighted’ to receive it. He later openly stated on that same forum that he was being employed ‘on a mission’.

This, however, is how this incident is reported in Isabel Hudson’s affidavit, paragraph 37:

“We continued to monitor the situation, and in early February 2010 we received evidence (again from a well-wisher) which suggested that the Defendant had sold at least one further copy of the ‘60 Reasons’ booklet (one of the publications specifically complained about in the libel claim form which had been issued for the purpose of obtaining undertakings to the court)…I exhibit a copy of the e-mail thread between this well-wisher and the defendant (which should be read from top to bottom) at page 26 of Exhibit IJH5”.

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To deal with these two separate court actions will require a great deal of time and attention. For that reason, and for other reasons, I have decided not to contribute any further postings to the publicly-viewable part this forum until at least these two sets of court proceedings are concluded. Depending on the outcome of those two court cases, I will then consider my position in relation to whether or not to rejoin in any public discussions in the future (or even whether the court will allow me to). In the meantime, and subject as always to the consent of the forum-owner, I shall continue to remain a member of the forum and to contribute where I can to those parts of the forum which are not publicly-viewable.

This withdrawal, whether temporary or permanent, comes at a time when Jill Havern’s forum has remained the most visited Madeleine McCann discussion forum on the internet for the past four months, and its membership has grown to nearly 1,500 members. Very informative discussions are taking place on the forum, to which many contribute.

As Clarence Mitchell himself said nearly a year ago, even the McCanns admit that Madeleine’s abduction is but ‘an assumption’ or a ‘working hypothesis’. Moreover, despite over four years of searching, using private investigators that have cost the McCann Team millions of pounds, the McCann Team are still unable to give us one single usable piece of information about who is supposed to have abducted her, and, if she was abducted, where she was taken. Nor do we really know which of 18 suspects, ‘persons of interest’ and ‘people we wish to eliminate from our enquiries’ (two of whom are women) we are supposed to still be looking out for.

In those circumstances I wish all of you on here committed to discussing what happened to Madeleine every success in getting ever closer to the truth.

Inside Out, Back to Front and Upside Down!

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I have not come across the BBC East Midlands Programme, "Inside Out," before, which is not surprising since the only time my telly is on these days is when my grandson is here and we watch a little bit of CBeebies, when he has run me ragged.

On Monday 22nd, part of the programme, which airs at 7.30pm, will be concerned with, "Who are the Madeleine Foundation."? Well, who are they?

The Madeleine Foundation was set up in January 2008 with the following aims:

a) to change the law in whatever way is needed in order to send out a clear message to all parents that leaving young children on their own is never acceptable, and to strive for the adoption of a new law with its key provisions ensuring that parents “Never leave young children on their own”

b) to pursue - in conjunction with others - the truth about Madeleine McCann’s disappearance on 3 May 2007

c) to investigate the facts behind the extent of British government involvement in this case and the reasons for it

d) to ensure that the media, in particular the British media, report this case accurately and give due weight to all viewpoints on Madeleine’s disappearance

e) to generally promote the welfare of children, in particular by ensuring that parents are aware of the psychological needs of their children and ensuring that the relevant authorities take appropriate action to safeguard and promote the welfare of children.

The Foundation has produced several publications, including, "What really happened to Madeleine McCann? 60 reasons which suggest she was not abducted." (Pictured below)


The members of the Madeleine Foundation have worked tirelessly over these nearly three years, sometimes attracting controversy - for example when they did a leaflet drop in the McCanns' home town of Rothley in Leicestershire - sometimes dealing with threats of legal action by the McCanns' legal team at Carter-Ruck (Yes, the company that represented General Pinochet and Trafigura, the oil company alleged to be responsible for wide-spread pollution in Africa) - but always managing to keep going with their main aim in mind: finding the truth about what happened to Madeleine McCann.

I support the Madeleine Foundation in its efforts to change the laws concerning the minimum age at which children should be left alone, and in its seeking to find the truth about what happened to Madeleine. So, I was initially quite pleased to see that the BBC was giving time to the Madeleine Foundation. However, call me cynical, but having read the synopsis on the Inside Out web page, I seriously doubt that the good people of the East Midlands are going to be presented with a very balanced view of the Madeleine Foundation and its work.

What happened to Madeleine McCann remains a mystery. Her parents were cleared of playing any role in her disappearance, but controversial group continues to campaign in support of a discredited detective who claims Kate and Gerry McCann covered up the truth. Inside Out investigates the members and motives of the Madeleine Foundation.

Yes, it remains a mystery. I have to say, though, that the Madeleine Foundation received a letter from Carter-Ruck (letters can be read on the MF web site) stating that the case must not be referred to as a 'mystery,' so, look out BBC!

Her parents were cleared? Well, no they weren't. The case was archived and the McCanns' arguido status lifted, but no one was 'cleared.' There was simply insufficient evidence to charge anyone, which is rather different.

And why describe Gonçalo Amaral, the senior police officer who coordinated the investigation, as 'discredited.'? That's hardly an unbiased description and not one held by the three judges who sat on the bench of the Appeal Court in Lisbon and overturned the ban on Amaral's book, "The Truth of the Lie." The judges decided that the book did not infringe any of the McCanns' rights, that it represented the facts as contained in the police files, and that Amaral with 26 years as a police officer, was qualified to give an interpretation of those facts (Read the full decision in English here)

Well, this group that 'continues to support,' the discredited detective - what kind of impression does that statement give? Does that make the Madeleine Foundation sound like a group of professional people, seeking justice for a small child? Or does it make them sound like they might be rather misguided? The latter, I would suggest. And we're probably getting a flavour of the slant of this programme before it's aired.

"Inside Out investigates the members and motives of the Madeleine Foundation." Now, if they said they were giving the members the opportunity to talk about their work, that would be quite positive. Viewers could make up their own minds as to whether the Foundation and its members were to be taken seriously or not. However, the programme investigates the members? That makes the object of the exercise sound more like "Watchdog." - we investigate crooked car dealers!

I hope I'm wrong, but reading the synopsis, I see - who are this bunch of people who support a discredited detective? What are their motives for pursuing this crazy objective? Well, I guess no publicity is bad publicity and at least more people will find out that the Foundation exists and some may be motivated to visit the web site and find out for themselves what the Madeleine Foundation is all about. I do hope so.

The following is a video, which was removed from YouTube for breaching terms and conditions, although it is simply a reading of the 48 questions which Kate McCann refused to answer in September 2007. These questions are in the public domain as part of the official police files and can be read on literally thousands of web sites.

The 48 questions Kate McCann refused to answer, by Tony Bennett. The questions can also be read on the video.

If you watch this programme, I would ask you to keep an open mind, if it's as biased as I think it may be. Kate and Gerry McCann were invited to take part, but I believe they turned down the opportunity.

http://www.madeleinefoundation.org.uk/

News release from The Madeleine Foundation...

..........following the lifting of the ban on Gonçalo Amaral's book, "A Verdade da Mentira," by a Portuguese court in Lisbon.

This morning, a Portuguese newspaper, Diário de Notícias, reported that the Portuguese Court of Appeal had overturned the draconian orders of two previous lower Portuguese courts, and has allowed Goncalo Amaral once again to sell his book ‘The Truth About A Lie’.

The news reached the English-speaking world through the blog of Portuguese blogger Joana Morais, who rapidly translated the news report, as she has translated so many Portuguese reports for an English readership over the post three years.

Tonight we learn that this news has been confirmed by all the major Portuguese newspapers in their online editions; these include Sol, Jornal de Noticia, Correio de Manhaã, TVI24, and A Bola. According to Google News tonight, there is a totals of 33 news items on the internet tonight, all apparently so far in Portuguese, about this stunning news. So far as we are aware, not one British newspaper has yet reported on this news, despite the saturation coverage the British press gave to the original banning of Mr Amaral’s book in September last year and to his unsuccessful appeal in January and February this year.

The Portuguese press is tonight quoting Dr Kate McCann as saying that the Portuguese Appeal Court’s decision is ‘unbelievable’. Given all the significant contradictions amongst the police witness statements of the McCanns and their ‘Tapas 9’ friends, some might say the same about their own accounts of what really happened to Madeleine McCann.

All members, supporters and followers of The Madeleine Foundation will want to join with us in congratulating Mr Amaral on a courageous and sustained fight to win the right to publish his book.

At the same time we remember that the Portuguese judicial system has yet to find judicial time to hear Mr Amaral’s appeal against his conviction last May for allegedly filing a false report, and that he also faces a further criminal case on the basis of what we say are unfounded accusations against him by the partner of serial liar and murderess Leonor Cipriano, now serving a 16-year jail term for murdering her own eight-year-old daughter, who she claimed had been abducted.

The news comes just 17 days after The Madeleine Foundation held a series of events in support of ‘Goncalo Amaral Day’ on 2 October, a day we established in honour of a man who has sacrificed much to bring us the facts about the Madeleine McCann investigation.

Though many people scoffed at our efforts, thousands of British people are now better informed about Mr Amaral through our leaflet: ‘Your Questions Answered about Goncalo Amaral’, which has been distributed in many British towns.

Finally, we have been asked about the continuing ban on our own book: ‘What Really Happened to Madeleine McCann? - 60 Reasons which suggest she was not abducted”. Whilst it is true that an undertaking was given by the book’s author, Tony Bennett, not to further sell or distribute it, as we said at the time, circumstances might lead to that undertaking no longer being appropriate.

We will be reviewing the situation at a forthcoming Committee meeting and it is possible that Tony will make an application to the High Court to be freed from his undertaking not to sell the book. High Court undertakings may be varied or nullified at any time if circumstances change.

Committee of The Madeleine Foundation

19 October 2010

http://www.madeleinefoundation.org.uk/

The Madeleine Foundation's response to Carter-Ruck

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This letter, reproduced below, is the Madeleine Foundation's response to a communication from Carter-Ruck on behalf of their clients, Kate and Gerry McCann. The communication from Carter-Ruck can be read on a previous post on this blog.

http://www.madeleinefoundation.org.uk/

Carter-Ruck
Solicitors
6 St. Andrew Street
LONDON
EC4A 3AE

Wednesday 21 July 2010

Your ref: Stevie Loughrey

AT/IH/SVL//13837.5

Dear Sirs

re: Your clients Dr Gerald and Dr Kate McCann - Your letter of 16 July

This letter follows my responses to your e-mail of 15 July by telephone from Bournemouth on Friday 16 July at 10.28am and again at 1.28pm and my e-mail to you dated 19 July (reproduced below) and timed at 7.36am.

Further actions following receipt of your letter

In addition to the actions mentioned in my previous e-mail that we have already taken in response to your letter of 15 July, we have made several further changes to the material on our website concerning Mr Gonçalo Amaral, Gonçalo Amaral Day etc. In specific response to the demands you made about our leaflet, The Madeleine Foundation has decided in addition not to distribute this leaflet any further nor print further copies of it. Several thousand copies had already been distributed in the weeks leading up to Saturday 17 July which we termed ‘Gonçalo Amaral Awareness Day’.

The claims of breaches of my undertakings given on 13 November 2009

I have carefully studied your letter.

You claim that: “We have advised our clients [the McCanns] that your conduct represented a number of clear breaches of your undertaking to the court…it is clear that on a number of occasions you have breached [your] undertaking…there can be no doubt whatsoever that notwithstanding your undertakings, you remain intent upon continuing to allege at every available opportunity that there are strong grounds to suspect our clients of being responsible for the death of their daughter, and of conspiring to cover it up”.

In support of this claim, your letter refers specifically to the following six matters only:

1. My letter to Theresa May, Home Secretary, dated 4 July 2010, a copy of which you and your clients have clearly seen
2. A posting on a thread on a forum now called ‘The complete mystery of Madeleine McCann’, run by a Mrs Jill Havern. The title of this forum was I understand named after your clients’ Chief Public Relations Officer, Mr Clarence Mitchell, himself referred to the disappearance of Madeleine as ‘a complete mystery’ in a Channel 4 TV interview in March this year
3. The contents of The Madeleine Foundation’s recent leaflet: ‘Your Questions Answered About Gonçalo Amaral’, of which you claim “…readers of this publication will have understood it to mean that here are indeed strong grounds to support Amaral’s suspicions that Madeleine McCann died in our clients’ care and that they subsequently conspired to cover up her death…”
4. An internet posting by me on a forum, said to have been made at 1.03am on 12 July which you said “…would lead readers to have understood that Amarals’ theory is correct and that our clients did indeed conspire to cover up the death of their daughter. This theory is, however, completely untruehe sees as the truth [my underlining] about… Madeleine…” [your underlining] and simply does not withstand proper scrutiny’. You based this on my words that “Amaral…has sacrificed the rest of his career to bring us what
5. Allegedly ‘hiding behind’ quotes or purported quotes from other people ‘when publishing outrageous slurs of our clients’ (although you do not cite a single example in your letter)
6. The video recording: ‘Madeleine McCann: The 48 Police Questions Kate McCann Refused to Answer’.

You do not give particulars of any other alleged breaches of my undertakings.

You also in the penultimate paragraph of your letter advised that any individual ‘linked to’ The Madeleine Foundation’ who ‘disseminates serious falsehoods’ about your clients places her/himself at risk of being pursued for ‘appropriate legal relief’.

On page 3 of your letter, you made four demands. I respond as follows:

Demand 1. The Madeleine Foundation has agreed not to republish ‘Your Questions Answered About Gonçalo Amaral’ nor to authorise anyone else to republish it. We shall not be making any further distribution of the leaflet.

Demand 2. The downloadable version of ‘Your Questions Answered About Gonçalo Amaral’ was removed on 18 July from The Madeleine Foundation website as a result of your request. The non-downloadable version has also been removed from our website since your letter. Other material about Gonçalo Amaral remains on our website though in view of the undertaking I gave to the court we do not on The Madeleine Foundation website link to his book nor indeed to the documentary he made, although as you must know, many other forums and blogs do so.

Demand 3. The YouTube video you refer to which went live on 13 July was removed by YouTube as you already know on 16 July. We have no plans to republish it on YouTube or elsewhere. Having said that, we do not accept that to reproduce what the Portuguese Police have themselves published as the official record of the questions they asked Dr Kate McCann can possibly be construed as ‘libellous’, especially since these have been in the public domain for almost two years and, so far as I am aware, your clients have made no challenge to date as to their authenticity. The BBC website carries exactly the same list of 48 questions that your client refused to answer; it can easily be found in its archive for 2008

Demand 4. I have endeavoured at all times to draw a distinction between the information which Mr Amaral gives in ‘The Truth About A Lie’ about his investigation and the deductions he makes from that information. For example, in explaining the ‘Gonçalo Amaral Support Project’, we wrote this: “Why is G.A.S.P. needed? ANSWER: Before giving you the details, why did we set up our new campaign on behalf of Mr Amaral? Our reasons include: The fact that without his book, A Verdade da Mentira (‘The Truth About A Lie’) there is much important information [my underlining] surrounding the disappearance of Madeleine McCann that otherwise we would not know”. To give one example, in one chapter of his book, Mr Amaral explains how your clients’ friend Jane Tanner on the afternoon of Sunday 13 May came to identify Robert Murat as the man wearing mustard chinos she said she’d seen carrying a child at around 9.15am on Thursday 3 May, the night Madeleine was reported missing. These and other facts, we say, are important to an understanding of the case, whether Mr Amaral is right, or mistaken, in his views on what really happened to Madeleine.

To give a second example, Mr Amaral explains how, when he was re-interviewed by police on 10 and 11 July 2007, Mr Murat gave a very different story about his movements from 1 to 4 May 2007 inclusive than he did when first taken in for questioning on 14 May. We are advised that there can be no ban on reasonable discussion of these and other important facts in Mr Amaral’s book. His theory is another matter.

I am happy to repeat my undertakings given previously to the court. In particular, in the light of your e-mail, I will refrain from suggesting that Mr Amaral’s suspicions about your client may be correct, whilst at the same time we are advised that to continue reasonable discussion of the information he has provided us is not libellous.

So far as Mr Amaral is concerned, it must also be remembered that your clients’ libel action against him has not yet been heard. It could well be that the Portuguese libel court will not uphold your clients’ allegation of libel. He has just as much right to defend himself against what he sees as lies and smears against him in the British media (and to have people in Portugal, the U.K. and elsewhere support him), as your clients have a similar right to defend themselves against what they claim is libel.

In your clients’ case, they appear to have been able to call on the services of your firm with regularity. As your clients have but one wage-earner, it seems reasonably clear that your fees must be being paid from other sources, possibly unnamed benefactors (such payments would of course be liable to be declared to the Inland Revenue as income). One assumes that the donations made by the general public to the Find Madeleine Fund are not being used since we recall statements by your clients and their Chief Public Relations Officer that those donations would not be used to fund lawyers’ fees and court costs etc. Mr Amaral is in a very different and difficult financial position. There does not appear therefore to be an ‘equality of arms’ in the current libel action against Mr Amaral although this principle is now enshrined in British civil litigation. That is another reason behind our support for him.

Furthermore, the legal advice I have received is that neither myself nor anyone else can be prohibited by a libel court or otherwise from reporting on and making reasonable comment on information in the public domain, and especially so given that this information comes specifically from police sources. I give two examples. The interim report of Inspector Tavares de Almeida, dated 10 September 2007, gives an accurate summary of the police investigation up to that point. It has been published. It can therefore be commented on, both by those who disagree with what he says, and those who agree.

Similarly, in the interlocutory hearing in your clients’ libel action in Lisbon in January 2010, the Public Ministry Prosecutor, Magalhães e Menezes, who made the decision to archive the investigation into Madeleine’s disappearance, was quoted by the press as saying: “The death thesis is the most likely one to explain Madeleine McCann’s disappearance”. Furthermore, Inspector Tavares de Almeida, who was actively involved in the investigation, was quoted in the same hearing as saying: “Gonçalo Amaral does not usurp the conclusions of the investigation; his conclusions come from investigation itself”.

These comments were made on oath in a court of law. They cannot easily be dismissed. The legal advice I have received is that anyone is entitled to publish these statements (as the Portuguese press and media have done) and, within reason, comment on them. Similarly, as you will appreciate, the final report of the Policia Judiciara archiving the investigation specifically left on the table the two main theories in the case: (a) that Madeleine was abducted and (b) that Madeleine died in your clients’ apartment.

This incidentally is why I and others have raised perfectly legitimate concerns with the Home Office about the statements that have been made in the press since March about your clients having meetings with the former and current Home Secretaries and their senior civil servants about a possible ‘review’ or ‘re-investigation’ into Madeleine’s disappearance. It appeared to us (we may be wrong) that your clients were seeking to persuade the Home Office to approach an as-yet unnamed British police force to carry out a re-investigation into Madeleine’s disappearance which would have concentrated exclusively on your clients’ assertions that Madeleine was abducted, and would not examine other possibilities.

As I have done in the YouTube video of the ‘48 Portuguese Police Questions’ which your client refused to answer, I will in any comments on the disappearance of Madeleine give due prominence to your clients’ ‘take’ on any matter. In that YouTube video, I refrained from making any comment except to ensure that, right at the beginning, your client’s position was fairly explained, i.e. your client’s right to silence, your client having relied on legal advice in refusing to answer questions, and your client believing the police were wholly wrong to place her under suspicion instead of looking for Madeleine.

The Madeleine Foundation Committee has asked me to point out that under our Constitution, our objects include: “To pursue - in conjunction with others - the truth about Madeleine McCann’s disappearance on 3 May 2007”. The Committee plans to continue to research and analyse all aspects of the disappearance of Madeleine and that includes giving due prominence to all cogent evidence that Madeleine was abducted.

I reproduce my e-mail sent on Monday (19th) below.

Yours faithfully

Anthony Bennett

E-mail sent to Stevie Loughrey of Carter-Ruck 19 July 2010

Dear Sirs,

Both myself and some members of The Madeleine Foundation Committee have now had an opportunity to view your letter.

This follows my telephone call to you from Bournemouth at 10.42am on Friday 16 July and my voicemail message left at 1.28pm the same day, to neither of which you responded.

In response to your letter e-mailed to me at 6.10pm on Thursday 15 July:

(1) The '48 Questions' video with myself reading out the 48 questions that your client Dr. Kate McCann refused to answer on 7 September 2007 does not seem to us to be capable of being construed as libellous. Not only is it merely the reading out of the questions she refused to answer, but I took the specific precaution in the introduction to the video, acting on legal advice, to put your client's point of view, namely:

a) that she had the right to remain silent (under both Portuguese and British law) and was acting on legal advice, and

b) that she believed the Portuguese Police were in error in suspecting her and her husband of any involvement in the disappearance of Madeleine, and were not therefore looking for Madeleine as she believed they should have been.

Your letter asks me to "Remove the video referred to above from YouTube'.

The video was taken down by YouTube during Friday 16 July. Your letter urged us to 'seek legal advice upon this letter...' I am in the process of seeking legal advice and that will include advice on whether that YouTube video is libellous.

(2) You asked for the leaflet about Mr Goncalo Amaral 'to be removed from our website(s)'. The Madeleine Foundation Committee agreed to remove this last night, and where the downloadable version used to be, there is now the following notice:

"On 15th July Carter Ruck asked us to remove this downloadable leaflet on Goncalo Amaral. We have agreed to this request pending receipt of legal advice".

(3) You objected to a paragraph in a posting I made on 4 July this year on a forum run by Jill Havern, at this link.

http://jillhavern.forumotion.net/mccann-case-f3/a-short-letter-to-theresa-may-about-her-proposed-re-investigation-into-the-disappearance-of-madeleine-mccann-t1151.htm

I have taken immediate action to remove the paragraph you objected to and the following notice now appears on Mrs Havern's forum instead of the offending paragraph:

NOTE: The first sentence of this posting has been removed following legal objections to it raised by Mr Stevie Loughrey of Carter-Ruck in a letter I received from them on 15 July 2010.

(4) In the light of your letter, an urgent review of the content of The Madeleine Foundation website has been undertaken, and last night additional material and links have been removed where there was a doubt in our minds as to whether any material could be construed as libellous.

I shall address the remainder of your letter as soon as practicable and of course after taking the legal advice which you urge me to take in the final sentence of your letter.

Finally, your letter is marked: 'STRICTLY PRIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL'. I should like to advise you that a vociferous and regular supporter of your client on the internet, namely 'muratfan', whom we believe to be Mr Ian West of Norwich, is boasting that he has read your letter.

Yours faithfully

Tony Bennett

Carter-Ruck's three page letter to Tony Bennett of The Madeleine Foundation.

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This letter was sent to Tony Bennett of The Madeleine Foundation following the uploading to YouTube of the video of Tony Bennett reading the 48 questions that Kate McCann refused to answer in September 2007.

Baroness Eliza Manningham-Buller has been noted as saying: confidential means everyone knows about it, whereas MI5 has 'secrets and top secrets.' So, here is the 'STRICTLY PRIVATE & CONFIDENTIAL,' letter from Carter-Ruck to Tony Bennett.

Tony Bennett reading the 48 questions Kate McCann refused to answer

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Another video deleted, but you can still view it here: http://gasparstatements.blogspot.com/





This is the video that was removed from YouTube. It is simply Tony Bennett of The Madeleine Foundation reading aloud the 48 questions that Kate McCann refused to answer in September 2007 when she was questioned under the status of arguida by the Portuguese police.

Your Questions Answered About Gonçalo Amaral

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Doctor Gonçalo Amaral, former police officer in charge of the Madeleine McCann case.

On July 15th, Carter Ruck, acting for their clients Kate and Gerry McCann, asked The Madeleine Foundation to remove a downloadable leaflet from its web site. The Madeleine Foundation has complied with that request pending receipt of legal advice. The following is the content of that leaflet.

In this leaflet, we try to answer your questions about Mr Gonçalo Amaral, the Portuguese detective who led the investigation into the reported disappearance of Madeleine McCann on Thursday, 3 May 2007. Four months later, Mr Amaral stunned the world by pulling in the McCanns for questioning as suspects in the disappearance of their daughter. Three days later, an interim report from Chief Inspector Tavares de Almeida, the senior investigating officer in the case, gave reasons for the police’s belief that Madeleine had died in her parents’ apartment.

Less than a month later, Mr Amaral was removed from the investigation (not ‘sacked’ as the media claimed). The British media have, since then, criticised his investigation, often referring to him as ‘disgraced’. He was accused of beating a Portuguese woman, Leonor Cipriano, into falsely confessing to murdering her daughter. He retired from the police to write a book, A Verdade da Mentira, ‘The Truth About A Lie’. In it, he explains why he and his team had good grounds for believing Madeleine had died in her parents’ apartment and covered up her death. A year after his book came out, the McCanns brought a libel action in the Lisbon High Court claiming, as damages, the £1 million profits he and his publishers had made from the book’s sale in 9 European countries. The case will be concluded later this year. We felt it was time the British public knew the facts about Mr Amaral. Here we answer some frequent questions people have about him:

1. What career did Mr Amaral have before he led the Madeleine enquiry?

ANSWER: Mr Amaral was an experienced, respected, senior detective. One of his colleagues described him as ‘incorruptible’. He had many successes in bringing drug dealers to justice and in one year netted the biggest haul of illegal drugs of any detective in Portugal. His most famous case was his success in bringing the killers of 8-year-old Joana Cipriano to court and ensuring that they served long jail sentences for their appalling crimes.

2. Wasn’t Mr Amaral accused of beating and torturing Joana Cipriano’s mother into making a false confession?

ANSWER: Yes he was. And most unjustly. Joana was reported missing by her mother, only after she had apparently been missing for two days. The sad truth was that Joana had come back from the village shops to find her mother in bed with her uncle. After an intensive investigation led by Mr Amaral, both voluntarily confessed to having brutally murdered her and disposed of her body. Today they are serving 16-year-jail terms for her murder.

3. What about the photos of her in the press showing her with black eyes?

ANSWER: Since being convicted of their crimes, both the mother and the uncle have tried to claim they were beaten by Mr Amaral and his men and forced to confess to something they had not done. However, it is clear that Leonor Cipriano suffered her injuries as a result of a beating by fellow female prisoners after being taken to Odemira Prison. During a recent court case, the Director of Odemira Prison was forced to admit to asking her Prison Medical Director to lie about the cause of Ms Cipriano’s injuries. Ms Cipriano changed her story many times.

4. Why was Mr Amaral removed from the Madeleine investigation?

ANSWER: Shortly before he was removed, he made some ‘off the record’ comments to a Portuguese journalist detailing how the British government was interfering with his investigation. A leading Portuguese newspaper published his remarks, giving the Portuguese authorities an excuse to remove him from the enquiry. As Mr Amaral has set out in a second book, ‘The English Gag’, Prime Minister Gordon Brown was told of his being removed from his post before he was. Mr Amaral has provided evidence of British government interference in his enquiries in his two books on the case. As we have shown elsewhere, the British government heavily influenced this investigation from the outset, sending several top-level people out to Portugal in the first week alone, including staff from MI5. We aim to cover this topic in more detail on our website in the coming months.

5. Wasn’t his enquiry incompetent, as the British news media suggest?

ANSWER: No. As was clear from the interim police report of 10 September 2007, the investigation was severely hampered by overwhelming international media coverage, requiring the police to follow up literally hundreds of false ‘sightings’ of Madeleine. Despite that, the police conducted a meticulous investigation with the help of hundreds of police officers. The interim report was very thorough. We have reproduced the whole of it in our recent book on the case: ‘The Madeleine McCann case Files: Volume 1’, available for purchase from our website.

6. But isn’t it true that the police failed to secure the crime scene properly?

ANSWER: This is one of many false stories about the Madeleine McCann investigation put about in the British media. What most people do not know is that despite the McCanns and their friends apparently genuinely believing that an abductor had taken Madeleine from her room, they themselves tramped all over the McCanns’ apartment and allowed several others to do so before the police arrived. This contaminated the crime scene, making the Portuguese police’s task much more difficult. In fact, the police sealed the crime scene later that night as soon as they were reasonably able to. The McCanns also criticised Mr Amaral, amongst other things, for never meeting them and never visiting the crime scene. But then the head of any major criminal investigation must be a good delegator. Mr Amaral’s enquiry was also hampered by many inconsistencies in the accounts given by he McCanns and their friends and by the McCanns’ refusal to disclose certain information such as their telephone, credit card and medical records.

7. Is it true that Mr Amaral and his publishers have made £1 million from the sale of Mr Amaral’s book?

ANSWER: Yes. We must remember that in trying to bring us the truth about what really happened to Madeleine Mr Amaral gave up his job many years ahead of his normal retirement date, thus losing huge amounts of both salary and pension entitlement. The McCanns threatened to sue Mr Amaral and his publishers for libel when his book. ‘The Truth About A Lie’, was first published in July 2008. But they did nothing about it until over a year later, by which time his book had sold over half a million copies across Europe. The McCanns have never explained why they waited for over a year to take action, but they are now claiming the £1 million profits the book has made. As a result of the McCanns’ libel action, Mr Amaral’s book has been banned from sale in Portugal since September 2009.

8. Was Mr Amaral convicted of filing a false report in the Cipriano case?

ANSWER: Yes. However, he has appealed, and under Portuguese law his sentence, a suspended prison term of 18 months, cannot take effect until his appeal is heard. He was found not guilty of any suggestion of being involved in the alleged beating of Leonor Cipriano and her brother. On the basis of precious little evidence, he was found guilty of ‘filing a false report’ about the case. There are many indications that Mr Amaral’s trial was politically motivated. In this connection we would commend our article on the prosecutor in this case, Mr Marcos Correia. We have a lengthy investigative article about him on our website.

9. What kind of help and support does Mr Amaral need?

ANSWER: His most urgent need is for financial help towards the huge costs of his legal expenses for defending the McCanns’ libel action and the various unjust criminal charges bring levelled against him. It is very easy to support him; his representative Mr Paulo Sargento has created a website to give practical help to him. You can donate by PayPal. Here is the link: http://pjga.blogspot.com/

http://www.madeleinefoundation.org.uk/Leaflet-eng.html

Updated - Madeleine McCann: the 48 questions Kate McCann refused to answer in September 2007

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Tony Bennett of The Madeleine Foundation reading the questions that Kate McCann refused to answer when she was interviewed as an 'arguida,' or formal suspect, in September 2007.





This video has been removed by YouTube for stated, "Terms of use violation," which does not make sense to me as the 48 questions being read aloud by Tony Bennett have been in the public domain for quite some time.

Here are the questions as published by the BBC on August 6th 2008. The first 48 are the questions that Kate McCann refused to answer, while number 49 is the one question she did give a response to.

1. On May 3 2007, around 22:00, when you entered the apartment, what did you see? What did you do? Where did you look? What did you touch?

2. Did you search inside the bedroom wardrobe? (she replied that she wouldn’t answer)

3. (shown 2 photographs of her bedroom wardrobe) Can you describe its contents?

4. Why had the curtain behind the sofa in front of the side window (whose photo was shown to her) been tampered with? Did somebody go behind that sofa?

5. How long did your search of the apartment take after you detected your daughter Madeleine’s disappearance?

6. Why did you say from the start that Madeleine had been abducted?

7. Assuming Madeleine had been abducted, why did you leave the twins home alone to go to the ‘Tapas’ and raise the alarm? Because the supposed abductor could still be in the apartment.

8. Why didn’t you ask the twins, at that moment, what had happened to their sister or why didn’t you ask them later on?

9. When you raised the alarm at the ‘Tapas’ what exactly did you say and what were your exact words?

10. What happened after you raised the alarm in the ‘Tapas’?

11. Why did you go and warn your friends instead of shouting from the verandah?

12. Who contacted the authorities?

13. Who took place in the searches?

14. Did anyone outside of the group learn of Madeleine’s disappearance in those following minutes?

15. Did any neighbour offer you help after the disappearance?

16. What does 'we let her down' mean?

17. Did Jane tell you that night that she’d seen a man with a child?

18. How were the authorities contacted and which police force was alerted?

19. During the searches, with the police already there, where did you search for Maddie, how and in what way?

20. Why did the twins not wake up during that search or when they were taken upstairs?

21. Who did you phone after the occurrence?

22. Did you call Sky News?

23. Did you know the danger of calling the media, because it could influence the abductor?

24. Did you ask for a priest?

25. By what means did you divulge Madeleine’s features, by photographs or by any other means?

26. Is it true that during the searches you remained seated on Maddie’s bed without moving?

27. What was your behaviour that night?

28. Did you manage to sleep?

29. Before travelling to Portugal did you make any comment about a foreboding or a bad feeling?

30. What was Madeleine’s behaviour like?

31. Did Maddie suffer from any illness or take any medication?

32. What was Madeleine’s relationship like with her brother and sister?

33. What was Madeleine’s relationship like with her brother and sister, friends and school mates?

34. As for your professional life, in how many and which hospitals have you worked?

35. What is your medical specialty?

36. Have you ever done shift work in any emergency services or other services?

37. Did you work every day?

38. At a certain point you stopped working, why?

39. Are the twins difficult to get to sleep? Are they restless and does that cause you uneasiness?

40. Is it true that sometimes you despaired with your children’s behaviour and that left you feeling very uneasy?

41. Is it true that in England you even considered handing over Madeleine’s custody to a relative?

42. In England, did you medicate your children? What type of medication?

43. In the case files you were SHOWN CANINE forensic testing films, where you can see them marking due to detection of the scent of human corpse and blood traces, also human, and only human, as well as all the comments of the technician in charge of them. After watching and after the marking of the scent of corpse in your bedroom beside the wardrobe and behind the sofa, pushed up against the sofa wall, did you say you couldn’t explain any more than you already had?

44. When the sniffer dog also marked human blood behind the sofa, did you say you couldn’t explain any more than you already had?

45. When the sniffer dog marked the scent of corpse coming from the vehicle you hired a month after the disappearance, did you say you couldn’t explain any more than you already had?

46. When human blood was marked in the boot of the vehicle, did you say you couldn’t explain any more than you already had?

47. When confronted with the results of Maddie’s DNA, whose analysis was carried out in a British laboratory, collected from behind the sofa and the boot of the vehicle, did you say you couldn’t explain any more than you already had?

48. Did you have any responsibility or intervention in your daughter’s disappearance?

And question 49, to which Kate McCann responded:

49. Q. Are you aware that in not answering the questions you are jeopardising the investigation, which seeks to discover what happened to your daughter?

A. 'Yes, if that’s what the investigation thinks.'

Madeleine Foundation letter 3/05/10 to Jim Gamble, CEOP

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Mr Jim Gamble Monday 3 May 2010

Chief Executive

Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre
33 Vauxhall Bridge Road
LONDON
SW1V 2WG



Dear Mr Gamble



re: (1) Freedom of Information Act 2000 Questions

(2) CEOP’s close relationship with the McCanns - New video produced by Jon Corner and released by the McCanns, using images of Madeleine McCann with make-up and jewellery



We write to express our concern about the images of Madeleine used by the McCanns in relation to Madeleine on the recent video made by Jon Corner, which they released yesterday to much fanfare.



We do so for a number of reasons, including the very close nexus between yourself, CEOP and the McCanns (to which I shall refer below), and also of course because of your role as Chief Executive of CEOP, an organisation apparently dedicated to eliminating or minimising all forms of the exploitation of children.



The Madeleine Foundation is a membership organisation founded in 2008, partly to help learn the lessons from Madeleine’s disappearance, not least to campaign against the practice of leaving very young children on their own, thus exposing them to all manner of serious risks, not least that of being abducted. In a context where the McCanns’ spokesman, Clarence Mitchell, said as recently as 19 February in a Channel 4 interview that Madeleine’s disappearance remains ‘a complete mystery’, we also continue to work with others to try to establish what really happened to her and we campaign on a number of child welfare issues.



The video in question features three images of Madeleine. One very striking one shows her in an unusual pose, shot from well below her face, wearing make-up, including much blue eyeshadow, lipstick and jewellery, and looking unhappy.



The McCanns have claimed that ‘the photo shows her when she was three after a raid on the dressing box’. However, it is very unlikely that Madeleine could have put the necklace on herself, nor applied eyeshadow in the manner shown in the photograph, nor applied the pink bow to her hair. The evidence from the photograph suggests that an adult made her up and of course an adult was on hand to take that particular image of her. Even if Madeleine had ‘raided the dressing box’, it is one thing to take a photo of something like that for your family photo album, but altogether another thing to release it for millions to see.



The McCanns explicitly approved the very public release of this video. As one newspaper reported: “Parents of Madeleine McCann, who went missing three years ago, have released a new video and photo of their missing daughter to mark the third anniversary of the girl's disappearance”. The photo the McCanns specifically chose to feature was the one with Madeleine made up, apparently by an adult and not by herself.



There has been strong adverse reaction by many members of the public to this image being used in connection with a missing child. Not least was that of Mr Mark Williams-Thomas, a former police detective and now leading criminologist and child protection expert, who has often in the past spoken with strong sympathy and understanding for the McCanns. His unambiguous reaction to this particular photograph yesterday, and promoted on his ‘Twitter’ blog, was that it was ‘so inappropriate’ and ‘so damaging’. With respect, we agree with him.



The McCanns have from the day Madeleine was reported missing claimed explicitly and on many occasions that Madeleine must have been abducted by a paedophile, or paedophiles, often described by them as ‘predatory’, ‘evil’, or ‘ monsters’. Yet the photo of Madeleine featured by her parents shows a child looking much older than her actual three years, due to the make-up and jewellery, as all the news media yesterday quickly picked up.



You may recall statements made by the McCanns claiming that they were advised by the police ‘not to show any emotion’ in front of the cameras. As one newspaper reported around the time the McCanns appeared on the Oprah Winfrey Show: “The couple also admitted they had been advised not to show any emotion while in front of the media, because any potential abductor ‘may get a kick out of it’.”



It is therefore a matter of concern to us that the McCanns should project and promote an image of Madeleine which might well appeal to certain paedophiles, some of whom are unfortunately attracted to young children.



The general topic of the early sexualisation of young girls has recently been addressed by the Home Secretary, to whom you report and who appointed you. As a Guardian editorial earlier this year noted:



“It is a year since Jacqui Smith invited the TV psychologist Dr Linda Papadopolous to head a ‘fact-finding’ review. Her report describes a world where young girls who can barely walk are first cajoled into wearing high heels and T-shirts with Playboy motifs, before progressing into a grim future dominated by an internet-based youth culture that pressurises them into dress and behaviour which defines them overwhelmingly as sexual objects”.



The Home Office report stated: “The evidence gathered in the review suggests a clear link between consumption of sexualised images, a tendency to view women as objects and the acceptance of aggressive attitudes and behaviour as the norm”.



I enclose a copy of a letter sent yesterday to the chief public relations manager for the McCanns, Clarence Mitchell, expressing our concerns. In the light of the exceptional degree of publcity given by CEOP to the disappearance of Madeleine McCann and your own high degree of personal involvement, we would request you to give appropriate advice to the McCanns as to whether it is right to use these particular images, and especially the ‘make-up photo’, to draw attention to a missing child. We consider it sets a most unfortunate precedent if the one girl whose image has most frequently been used by CEOP to promote concerns about missing and exploited children should now be portrayed by an image which clearly shows her lookijg like a much older child (as the press realised straightaway) and wearing make-up applied by an adult.



May we also draw your attention to one specific comment made on ‘Twitter’ yesterday: “If CEOP endorse this type of public relations for a supposed missing child, then their role in child protection has to be questioned!” This is your opportunity to say unequivocally on behalf of CEOP and on behalf of missing children everywhere that CEOP does not approve of the use of such inappropriate images.



Your degree of commitment, on behalf of CEOP, to the McCanns, has been immense, despite the doubts prompted by their being made ‘arguidos’ and being pulled in for questioning and the contents of the interim police report of senior police inspector Tavares de Aleida.

You have heavily featured Madeleine McCann on your website and in other publications about your work. You appeared together with the McCanns 12 months ago in a one-minute ‘viral video’, strongly emphasising that Madeleine was still alive and needed to be found. You also appeared on morning news shows side by side with the McCanns.

You also invited Dr Gerald McCann in January to be the keynote speaker at a conference of the abduction of children by paedophiles, a matter that concerned many of us, as there is not a shred of evidence that Madeleine was abducted by a paedophile. On top of all that, Home Secretary Alan Johnson recently asked you to recommend a new British police force to carry out a review and possibly a re-investigation into Madeleine’s disappearance and, according to press reports, you have already delivered your recommendation to him. In view of this intense activity on behalf of the McCanns, then, you are without doubt in a powerful position to advise them as to their choice of images being used to remind people about Madeleine. We trust you will provide suitable advice to them.

The role and activities of CEOP: Freedom of Information Act 2000 requests

We understand that CEOP has a role as a police force and has powers to investigate alleged crimes relating to missing, abducted and exploited children. We have also seen recent publicity in which, as we understand it, you have advised children, young people and their parents to report possible crimes against children such as ‘internet grooming’ directly to yourself and not to their local police force. We have also seen recent publicity in which you have publicly threatened ‘Facebook’ with various sanctions if they do not adopt your suggestion of a compulsory ‘panic button’ linked to your website.

We presume that as a public authority you must be covered by the Freedom of Information Act and therefore under the FOI Act we ask the questions below. If you are not covered by the Freedom of Information Act, we trust you would answer our questions anyway, as they are clearly in the public interest:

1. What legal powers are available to CEOP and its staff?

2. Under what powers can CEOP insist or encourage children, young people and their parents to report alleged crimes to CEOP rather than to their local police force?

3. What action does CEOP take if they have reasonable grounds for believing that an offence against children has been or is being committed; do they investigate and if necessary charge the offender themselves, or do they refer cases to the local police service, or does it depend on the circumstances? If so, what are the criteria for deciding whether a case is investigated by the police or by yourselves?

4. What campaigning work, if any, has been carried out by CEOP to stem the rising tide of the sexualisation of young children, upon which so many commentators have remarked recently?

5. How many staff does CEOP employ?

6. What was the annual cost of CEOP for the last year for which figures are available?

7. Please refer us to any campaigning work CEOP has done on the risks to children posed by known sex offenders released into the community or to any statements made by CEOP on this issue.

8. Has CEOP expressed a view on current proposals, supported at the last annual conference of the Liberal Democrats, to allow 16- and 17-year-olds to view pornography and visit sex shops; if so, please direct us to where any such statements may be found.



Finally, to the extent that CEOP is effectively addressing the main issues concerning missing, abducted and exploited children, we fully support your organisation’s work and I would be pleased if you could kindly send us a paper copy of your latest annual report.



We look forward to hearing from you.



Yours sincerely



Tony Bennett,

Secretary