By Mark Saunokonoko - Mar 9, 2019
The UK’s largest police
force hope their search for Madeleine McCann is about to be boosted
by $500,000 (il s'agit de dollars australiens, à peu près 150 mille livres, la demande de SY couvrant maintenant un an) so detectives can continue hunting for the missing girl.
But a former top
detective who at one time was tipped to lead London Metropolitan
Police’s search for Maddie told nine.com.au the apparent narrow
focus of Operation Grange - the UK police investigation into
Madeleine’s vanishing - could well have been flawed, pointing to
the lack of transparency surrounding it.
The difficulty I have with Operation Grange is nobody really knows what they are doing because they are so secretive about it. Colin Sutton
Sutton said he "always
had an issue" with the starting point of the Operation Grange
inquiry, which he believes was primarily focused on a theory of
abduction. Madeleine went missing in
2007 aged just three years old while on holiday with her family in
Portugal. She would be due to celebrate her 16th birthday in May.
I believe … what Operation Grange is doing is following one line of inquiry, one theoretical route, one hypothesis about what happened,
Sutton,
who has solved 30-plus murders including catching notorious English
serial killer Levi Bellfield, said.
My view is you should start [an investigation] from scratch, and you look at everything.
However, since 2011,
London’s Metropolitan Police have given away few specifics about
the work they have done or the final remaining leads detectives state
they have been chasing for the past few years.
Last week it was reported
Operation Grange had requested $560,000 from the UK Home Office to
extend the search for another 12 months, to March 2020. Typically,
Operation Grange has only applied for six-month tranches of funding,
totalling almost $22m since its launch in 2011.
In a rare media briefing
about Operation Grange in 2017, the now retired London Met Assistant
Commissioner Mark Rowley was asked if Madeleine’s parents had ever
been questioned under caution or considered suspects. "The involvement of
the parents was dealt with at the time by the original
investigation by the Portuguese," Rowley replied.
"We had a look at
all the material and we are happy that was all dealt with and there
is no reason whatsoever to reopen that or start rumours that was a
line of investigation." During questioning, he
fended off criticism Operation Grange and its investigative remit of
a potential abduction appeared to have a “closed mind” to the
possibility of the involvement of someone known to the family, an
accident or the girl walking out of the apartment. "The McCanns are
parents of a missing girl," Rowley said.
"However she left
that apartment, she has been abducted. "
Since 2007, the McCanns
have strenuously denied any involvement in the disappearance of their
daughter.
Nine.com.au does not suggest any involvement on their part.
Nine.com.au are currently
investigating the McCann case in a new true crime podcast called
Maddie. The multi-episode investigation rapidly hit number one in
Australia and New Zealand, and has risen to number two in the UK
iTunes podcast charts.
In the opening episode of
Maddie, Sutton detailed why some of the case evidence and events in
the 12 years that have elapsed since Maddie vanished are a "wholly
exceptional set of circumstances" which sometimes appear
fantastical.
Quand on ne comprend rien à un événenement et qu'on est un policier, est-il de bon ton d'invoquer le fantastique ?
Madeleine McCann is the one case everybody knows about, a case where there is hardened public opinion, Sutton told, if you go into any pub, club, cinema or public place and ask someone what they think about the Madeleine McCann case and they will probably have an opinion. Some of those opinions are extreme, at both ends of the spectrum.
The Home Office is
expected to announce their decision on the Operation Grange funding
request later this month.
I have got no problem with Operation Grange continuing ... if it is doing the right things and going in the right direction, Sutton said.
