CMOMM Ullapool thread how to turn an unsavoury news topic into a Madeleine Topic

I have mentioned this completely unrelated thread to anything Maddie previously.  It was an extremely popular thread about how a teacher with an indecent image of children and a bestialty image came to be struck off.  It’s the way of the world these cases get reported regularly in the Press.  What’s interesting is how it became a Madeleine McCann thread.  The first few replies tut! tut! This sorry state of affairs before the Master manipulator Tony Bennett introduces this on Friday 8th of November.

‘There is a potentially sinister connection between the conviction of Martin Ingrams, History Teacher at Ullapool High School, and Philomena McCann, sister of Dr Gerald McCann, who teaches 'Modern Studies' there. The potentially sinister connection is not the fact that she teaches there, after all, there can be no 'guilt by association' just be being a teacher at the same school. The sinister aspect relates to the involvement of her husband, Tony Rickwood, in the deviant sexual fetish of publishing 'quicksand fetish photos'. To the uninitiated, this involves producing photos, or 'art', of women sinking in quicksand or swamps.

Rickwood has posted some of his work on this site: http://scopertonosol.deviantart.com/ - where his username is 'auroraman'. Not surprisingly he keeps his real name off that forum. Moreover, his obsession with the quicksand fetish has been passed to DCI Andy Redwood of Operation Grange. A group has been working on this now for some months, but details have now been published on Twitter, as these tweets reveal:

Now, all of a sudden we have the connection to a McCann.  Philomena's husband has a fetish about women drowning in quicksand and he posts some of his illustrations on a deviant art website.  The idea here is to implicate Gerry McCann as being no better than his brother-in law, though he has no blood ties to the individual.  We are encouraged to believe the tacit approval of his sister into Rickwood’s very unsavoury though not illegal pursuits.  Oh Dear!! While Bennett continues to ladle on the facts in a further post, students of the disappearance, such as member Daisy, vow to examine and study Tony’s revelations still further. And this is only the first page of the thread.

You went to Ullapool once didn't you?
you must be related to Gerry McCann you Pervert!!

Bennett later gives us entirely irrelevant material relating to Rickwood on page 2, namely he has a job on a salmon farm, he’s a birdwatcher (Twitcher variety)  and he’s interested in the Aurora Borealis.  Thank you Tony, the explanation for the mystery becomes clearer by the second.  There now follows another round of tut! Tutting together with a few scattergun remarks from assorted members.

On page 3, inevitably the Gaspars are introduced into the thread (suspicions of paedophilia made known to the police by friends of the Paynes over a conversation between David Payne and Gerry McCann) together with the empty CATS file (please look it up if you are interested) and Eddie & Keela sniffer dog alerts in the apartment.  Ullapool seems a long way away now thanks to Tony Bennett. Any vestigaes of what this thread is about go up in a puff of smoke with this post by SmokeAndMirrors, a CMOMM nominated researcher for the Forum on November the 9^th..

‘I have no doubt whatsoever in my mind, that newspaper editors, SY, PJ, various criminal psychologists and so on, are aware of MUCH MORE about this case and the people involved (even those involved by association) than these unsavoury "co-incidences' that keep cropping up, they have tools of detection beyond those we can access, and it has long been my view, and indeed hope, that the drawn out and prolonged nature of the investigation is to ensure that the whole rancid lot can be scooped up and disposed of.

Whilst we all long for some sort of conclusion to this case so that an innocent child may receive justice, I would not wish it to be in any way expedited at the expense of allowing a single one of these sordid characters to evade justice.

We have long gone past the possibility of co-incidence with all these grotesque anomalies, this is becoming something depraved beyond our worst nightmares.’

Rickwood and the teacher now provide 2 school based perverts according to PeterMac, another reaseacher for CMOMM.

The subject matter drifts back to Ullapool for a short while reaching a crescendo with this Tony Bennett post

‘More from Tony Rickwood a.k.a. 'Auroraman' a.k.a. 'scopertonosol' - writing as 'scopertonosol' on the 'Deviant Art' website (under pic of naked lady in quicksand):

"I've always wanted to do a sort of tribute to Enrique Romero who did, among others, the amazing AXA comic strip. A formative scene for me was when the heroine is led into quicksand by a jealous rival and left to sink to her doom. Now ordinarily I'm not for doing nude artwork, but since it is in the spirit of the original comic series, I am making this one exception. It's not the best render, but I hope that it comes across OK".  

It seems he has a number of fans of his work on the site, for example:

PM2K: "I loved that AXA scene - pity there were no really good scans of it available - and this really is a great tribute".

pete1672: "Can only echo PM2K's statement, this is excellent".

It’s only page 3 I’m hoping by now I have made my point about discussion groups. There is another 33 pages of this drivel, touching on subjects such as the Ullapool school trip to Turkey,  Philomena McCann’s personal, and entirely understandable involvement being brought under the spotlight (she is employed by them for crissakes) in a most insidious way, Kate McCann’s book, paedophilia being treated leniently by the courts, and adobe photo-shopping images.  A shining light of integrity briefly appears with this post from ProffessrPPlum on 10^th November.

‘At the risk of being unpopular, I worry that some people have gone a bit overboard trying to make mud stick to this guy. I know there are people who believe the 'last' photos are faked (particularly the pool picture) and latch on to anyone in the McCann's immediately family who can do clever things with photoShop.

I've got a lot of experience working on images (including faking images which is great fun as my avatar shows) and I am confident that while the pool photo may have been taken on some other date, it certainly hasn't been photoshopped. I've made this point to folks with a lot less experience than me on a couple of threads in this forum but many want it to be true so much that they ignore my advice and go looking for the photoshop wizard in the McCann family to back up their conspiracy theory.

As to whether creating pictures of women in quicksand is anything more than an unpleasant (but essentially harmless) middle-aged fetish or fantasy, who know? At worst, it suggests to me the kind of low-level misogyny you find everywhere online in Facebook, YouTube, discussion forums, Twitter and so on - but that doesn't make him a pervert or a dangerous individual.

For your information, 'Deviant Art' is one of the oldest and - in internet terms - most respected creative websites for showcasing all kinds of digital 'artwork'. To go off on one about it being perverted and obscene reveals a lack of understanding of that community. Deviant Art is just a cross-section of the internet; it represents everything and stands for nothing in particular. Of course there are some pictures there that make you uncomfortable but that's a matter of preference, a subjective judgment.

The eagerness with which people have pounced on this man in the quest to find some kind of paedophile angle (the Holy Grail of the McCann case?) does this forum's credibility no favours IMO.’

This leads us into another old chestnut of ‘The last photo’ being doctored.

Sorry, but I've just lost the will to live!! I am leaving this blog entry right now.

Ullapool, Cristobell, Tigerloaf, Bennett, Kepharel. It makes you want to weep.

Before I look at the Ullapool/indecent images thread I spoke of yesterday it may be worthwhile taking a look at some characters involved in Forum wars, and internal strife within CMOMM.  After all, I did say in my blog of 30^th December:

‘Madeleine McCann Forums are curious animals that allow themselves no compromise; there is no half way, no balance in the way they have evolved. There are only pro and anti McCann Forums, and within each Forum is often an internecine battle between members, usually fundamentalists and free thinkers or in other words long term members and transients.’

And here is some proof of my point of view.  In order to present this to you I would introduce you to Cristobell of the anti McCann CMOMM Forum and Tigerloaf, of the pro McCann Stop the Myths Forum, who were involved in a bit of a spat recently.  I also came upon evidence of internal repression in CMOMM within Tony Bennett’s twitter correspondence with someone under the name of Kepheral who was banned sometime back in August.

First off, the inter-Forum Wars J  Cristobell, it would appear is a published author, R V Hutton, and a search of Amazon throws up 2 of her works which appear to be of a period drama genre.  Amazon does allow you to look-see inside one of her works and it left me with a feeling of each to his own. Her work titled Cry and you cry alone. The summary of this work is along the lines of

‘After an idyllic early childhood in Surrey, Linda's life descended into poverty and chaos when her parents' marriage crumbled and her unstable mother's sanity declined.

She experienced a brief period of comfort in a caring foster home before being plunged into the dark, terrifying world of a 1960s institution. St Anne's Convent, Orpington, was a Catholic children's home run by the infamous Sisters of Mercy and a former monk who inflicted bizarre and barbaric beliefs and practices on the children in his care.

Cry and You Cry Alone is the achingly honest story of a survivor of shocking child abuse that took place in the heart of an English suburb.

Based, it would appear on true events.  The story has been reviewed 6 times, with plaudits it has to be said, but with one reviewer, having first hand experience of St Annes, clearly unimpressed as so

‘3 of 4 people found the following review helpful

 How sad??, 18 April 2013

Being one of the girls who was at St. Anne's convent for a number of years during the 1960's and knowing the nuns mentioned. Their characters described in this book are totally alien to me and to my friends who were also at St. Anne's.
Yes, the nuns were strict but..they certainly did NOT abuse us in anyway shape or form.
This book does not portray the real truth to what it was really like to be in St. Anne's!
How sad that the author felt the need to take legal action!
The author lost her case......need I say more?’

If you wish to see Cristobell/Huttons lengthy defence of her position it may also be seen on the Amazon site.

Having now introduced Cristobell a quick look at her adversary, Tigerloaf, reveals his/her more modest credentials as an active pro McCann Forum member (Stop The Myths) who clashed swords with Cristobell within a thread called

Debate between Tigerloaf and Cristobell

That spilled over onto twitter.  The exchange has all the hallmarks of a couple of drunks swinging punches at one another without ever connecting.  What the spat may actually be about may be found under another Tigerloaf post  on the StopThe Myths Forum entitled

Rosalind/Rosalinda/RV/Linda Hutton shows her hate openly

posted on 11^th December.  The following discourse may be found as so

Cristobell Today at 10:42 pm
Gerry was deluded into believing he could fool all the people, all of the time, and lets face it, we almost had another tragedy on the scale of the death of Diana, such was the public response. 

This sentence is not a question inquiring about the case. It is a nasty and vicious slur on a man who has committed no crime and is desperate to find his missing child? Is it any wonder when you post such vicious and hateful claims that you are labelled “a hater”?

Their campaign was successful beyond their wildest dreams. 

No it was not. Do you not have the tiniest amount of understanding in that nodding head of yours that the success that the McCanns dream of is them being re-united with their daughter. Your sick pretence to understand their dreams is tantamount to an evil rejoicing in their failure to find her. Yet more good reason for that label of ‘hater’ to stick to you like glue.


I tend to think these days that the McCann case will forever be linked to the birth of social networks, I may have said this elsewhere. Within hours Madeleine's face was was part of a chain mail campaign, one of those pass this on to at least 10 people or your doomed emails that are now happily spammed out, but they flourished in 2007. 

I tend to think that you are now showing your truer colours. This nastiness is the real you isn’t it? There was no “doomed email” with Madeleine’s picture. There was a great swell of love for a missing child and a real and perceived desire to do whatever could be done to find her, no matter how small that action might be. Thus thousands stood in cold stadia and watched videos in virtual silence, football stars begged for news, people went up to Brian Kennedy and literally forced money on him in the hope it might help, people passed emails willingly with the little girl’s picture in the hope they were helping. But you see none of that. You call those efforts spam and doomed emails. Your comments are absolutely sick and perverse.

From the photos we have seen Kate and Gerry rarely left their laptops, 

That is simply not true. I challenge you to provide proof of that claim. But I know you cannot do so because you have once again been caught in the act of posting pure lies.

the internet is a great leveler and they not only had access to the great and good, they were having doors flung open for them. They managed to convince 'everyone' that they were victims, money would help them find their daughter and it was evil to question them.

Your vicious nature is so evident in those two lines. The parents of a missing little girl are being vilified by you and you cannot substantiate any of the claims you are making about them. Your actions are bordering on evil they are so perverse.

Unfortunately for them, those heady days have now gone. The internet which turned them into a Cause Celebre, has blown apart their flimsy story because information is freely available, its not confined by borders anymore. 

Again you sound like a nasty, spiteful person attacking the very vulnerable parents of a missing child. Why are you posting such spite and hate? You claimed on Icke TV to be simply questioning and inquiring but that was yet another of your lies. There has not been a question yet in this post of yours. It has been a stream of demented harridan-style shrieks of anger and hate at missing Madeleine’s parents? What is it about you that is making you so vicious?

The British public can find the true story behind this case, simply by Googling Madeleine McCann. 

No, they cannot. That is an absurd and ridiculous claim. If the true story was actually known why would there be no solution to the case? Why would the police forces of both the UK and Portugal be actively seeking that truth? You are simply posting idiotic nonsense now.

Gerry's posturing with Hacked Off is comparable to King Canute attempting to order the tide to turn back. 

Gerry is just one of the victims of the horrendously poor reporting which UK papers have descended into over the years. There are many other cases which your post also is decrying. For the sake of those people and everyone else who deserves not to be misused by the press there are people making a stand. Just because you are so engrossed in your campaign against the McCanns and cannot see the full picture does not mean it does not exist.

He truly believes he can keep the facts of the case away from the UK forevermore, and who can blame him, thus far he has been successful. 

Again, that cannabis-addled brain of yours has missed two vital points. It is not success for Gerry till he has closure (preferably the return of his daughter alive) and it is not the aim of the McCanns to keep the case of Madeleine hidden. Only the most pot-riddled brain could believe that rubbish.

But back closer to topic, unfortunately such is the standard of education in this country we are still faced with the mentality, 'well I've got nothing to hide, so I don't care'. 

There is much evidence of the appalling standard of illiteracy and poor education on all the anti McCann sites, even in your own blog where spellings and grammatical errors abound but as you say so frequently, “Ce la vie!” (sic). Actually I laughed uproariously earlier today when I was informed that you were once a Lecturer in English. Go on prove me wrong a 110 times about that and demonstrate that you were. I bet that you cannot and that is yet another lie from you.

I usually ask such people if they are happy to have their medical and financial details on a large database, accessible to to every penpushing jobsworth who may, or may not, decide to make their lives a misery.

And you are part of the anti McCann group who are demanding to see the private records of Kate and Madeleine McCann. Your pathetic hypocrisy is there for all to see.

I am truly disgusted that you went on air the other day bemoaning the fact that you were called a hater, telling the viewer that you were merely inquiring and asking questions when you have posted this shrieking hatred with not a question in it. 

You are beneath contempt for your vicious hate demonstrated so clearly here and for your continual lying.

Only coming into this spat late I can only assume this remark below from Cristobell on Twitter on 17th Decemeber was her response to the above.

'If you think I am wasting my time reading all that shite you are mistaken.  As if LOL'

Yes, this is what passes for debate on Maddie Forums...do you want to be part of it?

Now on to Tony Bennett in Twitterland.. and a tweet I noticed on 27th August from a disgruntled banned forum member calling himself Kepharel

Anthony Bennett ‏@zampos27 Aug

@Selbars ...in which case I apologise sincerely for my error. All tweets and threads on JillHavern forum referring to you and Mirror removed

Quite what the Daily Mirror had to do with it I don’t know but it would appear that Kepharel and that newspaper formed part of an accusation by Bennett.  I have checked postings on CMOMM and found the postings of the Kepharel character to be entertaining though he personally exhibits a high degree of conceit and a ‘look how clever I am’ attitude.  I can understand why he was banned in the context of CMOMM’s intolerance to debate.  What is irritating is Bennett’s remark that all tweets and threads on CMOMM have been removed so we will never know for sure why Kepharel was banned.  What was I saying again about a Cold War Central European State and a Maddie Forum?

Taking a break now and then on to that Ullapool thread discussion, maybe later today.

The McCanns and the Tapas 7 maybe.. a distinction?

Bearing in mind the purpose of this blog should be primarily one of the disappearance of their child, it may be better if the focus was split between the McCanns and the rest of the party.  Remember too, like Dianne Webster, the McCanns rarely, if ever, met communally at lunchtime at the Payne's apartment with the rest of the Tapas, preferring to make their own arrangements. Some critics, clutching at straws in the author's view, suggest a tension within the group prior to the mayhem that was to unfold on May 3rd and 4th.

As close friends of the Paynes, Kate and Gerry had had several holidays together with them and other friends of the Paynes. Goncalo Amaral, a lead investigator in the disappearnce tells us, in his book 'The Truth Of The Lie', that In September 2003 they attended the Payne's wedding in Umbria, Italy, and took a holiday in Lanzarote in January 2005 and again in Majorca in the September of that year. According to Rachael Oldfields testimony of 15th May, the group, without the McCanns, also took a holiday in Zante, Greece in 2006.  This group, it would appear, were no strangers to one another and comfortable in each others company.  From Rachael Oldfield's testimony:

"When asked she says that all the couples have been together for various years (between 8 and 12 years).

They all have stable relationships. She does not know whether any female or male members of the group have had any other relationships between them, other than the current.
She does not have any knowledge of whether any member has a parallel relationship with any other members of the group.

When asked, she says that there is no friction or conflict between those that make up the group as they are in total harmony as regards the kind of holidays they take, they all have good jobs and identical levels of living as well as having the children in common, whom they all have to look after and they try as hard as possible to do everything together.

She says that in terms of harmony and friendship the group is very close."

 Excluding events between the 28th April and 2nd May, some might feel, is appropriate because, in essence 'nothing' happened.  To do so would, my opinion, give no indication of how the dynamics of the group, especially including the children, worked during that period, and offer no insight into why some of the things that happened during the 3rd May happened in the way that they did.  Each member of the group had their own routine, and this can be teased out from the content of the testimony, so each person will be looked at seperately.

In looking at testimony and events prior to 3rd May I have tried not to be too analytical regarding timelines as this detracts from the nature of what a holiday actually is.  The Butlin Camp regimentation of a 1950's holiday has long gone, thankfully, though I daresay, tongue in cheek, it would have been of some considerable help in this investigation.  The events of May 3rd, however will be examined a lot more closely. As I have said at the beginning, what is apparent, though, is that the McCanns were not so group oriented as the others and as such their holiday experience was a little more insular, though they took full advantage of the crèche facilities for their children much as everyone else.

It must be said that many who have read material regarding this case have raised a critical eyebrow over the alacrity and regularity with which this group deposited their children in creches while pursuing their own holiday interests during the week. Neither did any of the group feel, it would seem, that an evening meal with their children was ever an option, preferring instead to leave them asleep in their apartment while they dined free from care in the nearby Tapas Bar: Much more will be said about this later on because this action in particular sits at the eye of the storm of this mystery. So, not so much a family holiday then, some might say, as a singles holiday with children.

So tomorrow I will start to look more closely at the characters and what they got up to on their holiday until the day of the disappearance.  The disappearance itself is a whole new matter.

Flatters to deceive

Good morning!

Let’s carry on for a moment with how the CMOMM presents itself to new users.  As I pointed out, the home page offers a shop window of seemingly respectable research groups, and the prospective member (PM) may find titles such as ‘The Knutsford Research Group’ and ‘The Madeleine Foundation’ reassuringly highbrow and heavyweight titles of respectability. The ‘tecs’ in ‘The Fund and Private Tecs Research Group’ might even sound, to the naïve, like some kind of acronym of authority, but this is not the case.

If the PM does see through this window dressing, and has conducted previous independent research, he/she will have come across the name Tony Bennett, maybe read one or two of Bennett’s posts in the Forum even. He or she may therefore be aware that ‘The Madeleine Foundation’ is his vehicle of bias and subjectivity.  A cynical PM might even see his lack of status within the Forum, though a founding member, is at odds with the presence of his ‘Madeleine Foundation’ which carries, by way of a green legend, some kind of status within CMOMM.  Two members of the Forum, ‘hentie’ and ‘maebee’ are colour coded green to signify they operate within the auspices of the Madeleine Foundation and must surely be under the control of Bennett. So why does Bennett not associate himself with the Foundation within CMOMM and give himself a ‘green’ persona, after all, it is his Foundation?  Who knows? J.

Look, this is not a rant at the Forum itself, I shall be taking an equally critical look at pro McCann forums and websites too.  It is merely an observation on the disingenuous  way this particular Forum presents itself to the world; something akin to a magician with a deck of cards in my opinion; illusion rules perhaps. So for the PM seeking enlightenment and the chance to share their insights, caveat emptor!! 

I have said in a previous post there is a fundamentalism in Maddie Forums that feed the preconceptions and egos of the Forum owners, and like some 50’s style central European state they are primarily unhealthy and repressive in their outlook. This Forum is not shaping up well to open and honest debate.

Let’s leave all that for a moment though and look at one of the two discussion groups I had mentioned previously, as in my opinion there are effectively only two.  The ‘Latest News’ discussion group is intended to cover all the breaking news associated with Madeleine McCann, however as such news surfaces only 

First off!! I've never heard of The Complete Mystery Of
Madeleine McCann Forum and second!! they must be mistaken

occasionally there is often not much choice other than to recycle old news over and over again.  So what goes on in this group?  I have taken a look at the previous 3 months (Oct-Dec) to see what typically taxes members and prompts them to post.

What makes a dynamic discussion group?  well ideally thoughtful subjects for debate argued with pro's and cons by a wide range of members over a fair period of time.  in the Latest News section there were 90 or so posts by 40 odd members.  Largest contributors were Candyfloss, the site moderator with 9 posts, Petemac with 17, and Tony Bennett with 10. The effective life of a topic of up to 2 days ocurred with 24 posts.  That's to say almost 30% of topics were, effectively duds with little group interest.  Hot topics, say over 10,000 views each numbered 23 of the 90.  By a narrow margin, the most viewed topic was

Former Ullapool teacher struck off for indecent images

viewed 16,773 times at the time I did my analysis.  It was authored by Candyfloss, a site moderator. and has absolutely nothing to do with Madeleine McCann. At it's inception this topic may have been more suited to the 'Have your say: News Topics' discussion group where it would have died a quiet death, but that's just my view, not that of a site moderator.  The topic has been live for 16 days, and my suspicion is that the original subject matter has morphed somehow from a schoolteacher who hordes indecent images of children into recycled news about Madeleine.  It will be interesting to see how this topic has evolved, who got involved etc etc and I'll let you know tomorrow. 

Misunderstood or just a plain devious bunch of villains

Let the Tapas speak please, and without interruption...plenty of time to ask awkward questions about what they got up to later on...thank you for your patience.

 The Tapas 9 - How Could They?!!

Hindsight, they say, is a wonderful thing.  If the reader can just place themselves at the Tapas bar in the Mark Warner Holiday resort for a moment please, go on, close your eyes! Thank you.

It's May 1st 2007 and there you are, having a quiet beer and just people watching; looking around at those dining al fresco, until your gaze rests upon a large group laughing and joking among themselves.  You decide they are a well heeled middle class bunch who must know one another pretty well; seemingly relaxed, old buddies and definitely not people befriending on the holiday itself.

Turning back to your beer, you think no more of it, then, one morning a few months later, taking a sandwich at lunch at your desk you casually pick up a newspaper and catch an article about a little girl who disappeared while on holiday at the same resort as you were, and not only that the same time as you.

Intrigued, you take a look at the pictures in the paper accompanying the article and, you have a vague feeling you saw them yourself while you were there.  The article tells you they were all senior medical professionals and the like; heart surgeons and such, and the little girl went missing while she was left alone in her apartment for an entire evening, every evening, unsupervised.  How could they, of all people, do such a thing?

It's a question often asked of these people.

So who exactly were they? Well, first off, let's introduce them. This summary from the gerryccannsblogs.co.uk website and elsewhere.

Kate McCann: Mother of three. Studied medicine at University of Dundee, initially Gynaecology, then Anaesthesiology.  Family commitments led her to become a part time G.P.

Gerry McCann: Studied medicine at Glasgow University, initially specialising in sports related medicine, then splitting his time as a Cardiologist between a private consultancy with BUPA and The University Hospital Leicester.

David Payne: Held a temporary post as a Senior research Fellow in Cardiovascular Sciences Leicester University unitl 2003, then a surgeon at Leicester Royal Infirmary specialising in strokes.

Fiona Payne: Mother of two. From her rogatory interview on 10th April 2008 with Leicester Police we learn she is an anaesthetist working at Leicester working in obstetrics, on the labour ward doing epidurals and caesarean sections, in ICU and theatres and resuscitation.

Jane Michelle Tanner: Mother of two, and a marketing manager by profession.

Russell James O'Brien: A Consultant working with Gerry McCann.

Matthew David Oldfield: Previously a work colleague of Gerry McCann at Leicester, he moved to Kingston Hospital in Surrey working as an Endocrinologist ( a specialty of diagnosis and treatment of diseases related to hormones).

Rachael Oldfield (nee Mampilly): Mother of one and qualified solicitor worked as a tax lawyer and now employed as a 'head hunter' specialising in placing Finance Directors.

Dianne Webster: A credit controller by profession, mother to Fiona and grandmother to the two Payne children.  Apart from her blood ties she doesn't appear to have much in common with the rest of this high flying group which is reflected in the author's, and many others, view with her independent outlook to holiday activities, gravitating only when necessary back into the collective fold.

Tomorrow I'll take a quick look at the dynamics of the relationships inside this group, nothing in depth though, just scene setting is all.

Madeleine herself

Before I start, happy new year world!!! May the year bring all you wish for you and yours.... Now lets continue with the Madeleine mystery.....

You are reading these words because you are interested in the disappearance of a little girl by the name of Madeleine Beth McCann, while asleep, on holiday in Apartment 5A at the Mark Warner Holiday Complex in Praia Da Luz, Southern Portugal on 3rd May 2007: That or your internet browsing experience has taken a rather odd turn and you are about to hit the browser back button.  Of course I'm interested too, enough to write a blog on the subject that will explain how the state of affairs we are at now has evolved, for the benefit of new recruits to the mystery.

Apt 5A showing the steps leading from the
balcony onto Rua Dr Fransisco Gentil Martins

The more pertinent question, however is why are we so interested.  People disappear every day and are never seen again, many of them children.  Sometimes the disappearance makes it into a national newspaper, footnoted alongside adverts for deaf aids and competing with reports of World Conker/Bungee jumping competitions.  So why has Madeleine McCann become a global news story?

Putting a face to this little girl is easy, for images of her abound throughout the internet.  What we see is a pretty, but otherwise physically unremarkable young girl. She was not even special as a personality, how could she be? Not even four years old; a personality is still embryonic; evolving, and therefore generic in terms of any other little girl; nothing to point her out in a crowd.

Some may argue that the 'social status' of the parents, being professional people to whom we would trust our well-being, even our lives, is part of the fascination.  Personally, I disagree, if only because, in my opinion, their perceived complicity in the girl's disappearance - or not, has shallow roots in the chattering classes who inhabit internet forums:  They are a subset to the mystery; the tail of the dog, and we all know the tail never wags the dog.

This is no reason, though, to ignore what little information we have about her short life up to the point of her disappearance.  To do so would relegate her to a debating point devoid of any personality; any humanity, however much it may be a mere work in progress for one so young. So let's, out of respect take a look at what we do know, little as it is, to reinforce our understanding that she did have an effect on those she came into contact with, however superficial that may be.

Whatever the reader may feel personally about Kate McCann, as Madeleine's mother she knew the little girl best.  We have a few of these recollections from Kate in her book. Madeleine suffered from colic and cried for much of the first 4 months.  In 2006 Kate tells us of a little girl on a visit to Stonehurst Farm who loved feeding the sheep, talking to donkeys and swinging on a rope in the Barn, and chatting away to the farmer.  She was a confident independent little girl who at 3 was incredibly bright and perceptive.  She loved Harry Potter, introducing an imaginary Harry, Hermione and the rest to her mum one at a time.  Some insight too can be found from others.

From Karen McCalmen's Rogatory interview with Leicester Police on 16th May 2008.

"I never saw Madeleine ill and I consider her a healthy child. I never saw changes in her behaviour.

Madeleine never made complaints about anybody. She never showed bad behaviour, in fact she was almost the perfect child. We could hear her reason [talk/discuss/argue] like she was an adult.

She never seemed scared. She was not hyperactive.

Regarding the sleep habits of Madeleine, Kate told me that when they lived in Queniborough Madeleine used to wake in the middle of the night and come to bed with the parents for the rest of the night. When they moved to Rothley she began to do this less often and the parents used to give her stickers as a bonus to sleep all night alone.

I remember that many of these stickers were there at home, by night she slept the night all alone. The stickers were stuck on the door of the refrigerator.

Kate and Gerry never seemed tired and never argued about how to handle the children.

I have no knowledge of Madeleine at any time to have been subjected to medication. I only remember her being given paracetamol once when she had a cold.

I think the behaviour of Madeleine appropriate for her age. She was very energetic, but a model child. She liked to swim, play tennis and ride a bicycle and attend kindergarten."

Also from Hayley Plummer in her Rogatory interview with leicester Police on 6th May 2008

"Madeline was a very polite and affectionate girl, particularly in respect to the twins. At the nursery she was a very popular girl and it was a pleasure to have her near.

She seemed to be a very alert girl and she always adapted well. The only time I remember her feeling a little intimidated was when she changed classroom for the first time and she was placed with more children who were a bit older.

She would show some shyness when she was left by her parents but she adapted rapidly so that they would leave after she finished her breakfast.

Madeleine made many friends at the nursery but her best friend was Sophia. I think that Kate and Sophia's mother (Sally) became good friends based upon the friendship between their daughters."

And from Sharon Lewin, a teaching assistant in her Rogatory on 21st April 2008

"I always think of Madeleine as an alert and affectionate girl who liked to live. She was very advanced for her age and independent. She liked to dance and to dress up."

Not much I'm afraid, but at least we can remind ourselves she was a living breathing little human being with it all in front of her.

The Complete Mystery of Madeleine McCann Forum (CMOMM) some facts and figures

Any stats I come up with here are to be taken at face value when you decide whether such Forums are of any use to you.  I don’t know whether they are good or bad because I have not compared them to any other Forum.  In any case, the personality of the Forum is probably more important, and whether this is a place you will love, or wouldn’t be seen dead in.  There again, looking at the structure of CMOMM does no harm and might be informative.

As I speak this morning there are 118 users on-line, 111 of them guests. The total number of registered users (members I guess) is 3,206, up from 2084 in November 2012 which tells us this Forum continues to grow at a healthy rate.  How much of the increase is due to a drive to enlist in October 2013, following the BBC Crime-watch re-enactment is not known but could be significant…who knows J  In any 24 hours there may be around 200 registered users popping in for a look-see.

The Forum owner ‘joined’ on 25^th November 2009 so we can take it that is when the Forum came on-line.  Interestingly, Tony Bennett, their most high profile member joined on that date too; I will leave you to make your own assumptions here. More peculiar, given his ‘national’ status, is his pervasive and very influential presence in the running of the Forum while not appearing to hold any official status.

The forum is policed and supported as follows.

Forum Owner

Co-Admin

Moderator

Forum Support

MM research Group

Knutsford Research Group

Fund and Private Tecs research Group

Madeleine Foundation.

All pretty impressive eh?  Well maybe, we’ll see.

Let’s take a look at these pretendy research groups.

The Madeleine McCann Research Group appear to be behind a publication entitled “50 facts about the Maddie case that the British Media are not telling you” At least according to one pro-McCann blogger I have found on the ‘net. (I told you it would be like this didn’t I?). It is manned by Forum members such as ‘Tigger’ and ‘PeterMac’ What is the poor, uninformed, prospective Forum member to make of this?

The Madeleine Foundation is a vehicle for Tony Bennett, publishing such titles as “The Madeleine McCann Case Files Volume 1” and “What really happened to Madeleine McCann? 60 reasons which suggest she was not abducted” A visit to the site has piqued my interest in Bennett and I shall be taking a closer look at him at some point.

The Knutsford Research Group enforcer.

Of course you've heard of them. They're big
in Research and Investigation don't you know.

The Knutsford Research Group draws a blank I’m afraid.  It may be something to do with the David Edgar/Arthur Cowley investigation into Madeleine’s disappearance set up by Brian Kennedy, a wealthy McCann supporter, which operated out of Knutsford.

The Fund and Private Tecs Research Group maybe is just that, somebody somewhere is looking into matters relating to the McCanns considerable No Stone Unturned fund, and maybe into the shenanigans involving the antics of the sometimes farcical private investigators Kate and Gerry have employed over the years.

All in all this offering  to prospective members by the Forum of serious research by research groups which sound like respectable bodies of integrity is a bit of a sham.  For research read propaganda maybe.

NOW IS THE TIME TO REMIND AND REASSURE PEOPLE ONCE AGAIN I HAVE NO BIAS!! Just a wish to inform!!

Tomorrow I want to continue with some stats, look at the Forum members who are officers assigned with responsibilities, and maybe start taking a peek inside what gets discussed in discussion groups.