Mark Souster and the complete mystery of the DM's and the now deleted twitter account

I'd like to think that this is another mainstream journo getting in on the act, but my gut instinct tells me that this may well be yet another stitch-up job.  I hope Jill is being very, very careful.

there are a couple of other Maddie related tweets on his account.

https://mobile.twitter.com/sousterrugby

can't believe he's doing this without permission from above so something is going on.

Of course he isn't.  Journalists who are employed by papers get told what to write, they don't get to put their own pet projects in the paper.  This is bullcrap.  I can't believe that people are being taken in by this nonsense yet again.

Also can't believe this would be handed down to a rugby correspondent. Investigative journalist maybe IF something was about to break but this guy? Seriously! Watch your step Jill.

So a rank and file member is approached by the TV and everyone is up in arms. Jill is approached by a decidedly dodgey journalist and it's wonderful

I find the phrase "I'm a McC sceptic" to be rather outspoken considering we've never seen anything like that from MSM journos before.
seems a strange thing to say, if they turn out to be innocent he would have a bit of explaining to do.

If a journalist employed on a large newspaper was sceptical about this case, I would expect them to do their own research and go to primary sources. In this case they are: the police (UK and Portuguese); Goncalo Amaral; the McCanns themselves, plus anyone else in and around the resort at the time of Madeleine's disappearance.

It seems to me that a journalist on a national newspaper is far more likely to regard online forum contributors as the primary source for a different kind of article: one about online forum contributors.

I'd then ask myself how it would benefit one of Rupert Murdoch's (or any other) newspapers to run an article that would demonstrate that the press had repeatedly promoted the McCanns' story and their fundraising if there was reason to question that story. And this despite large numbers of ordinary members of the public having grave reservations about the case and expressing them online.

Surely it reflects very poorly on the press if those forumites had it right while they had it wrong? What would be the point of newspapers and news channels? How welcome would Murdoch find an article casting suspicions on the McCanns' innocence be, when SKY News put one such doubter on rolling news, declaring her a troll (despite her complete lack of contact with any of the McCanns) until her suicide 48 hours later? If it then turned out that Brenda Leyland's views were well founded, how bad would it look if it turned out that the journalist - instead of listening and investigating those concerns - turned up at her house with a camera crew essentially shouting "Troll! Troll! Troll!" on rolling news until she killed herself?

I have to say, that kind of investigation from a Murdoch journalist doesn't seem at all likely to me.

Popcorn. You are famous over the way.

I see you've been honoured by being verbatim quoted by TB

things have ramped up at bit at NI since Becky returned but there doesn't appear to be any real journalism going on so far.
a journo motivated by sincerity surely wouldnt tweet his intentions before doing the investigating? JH has hardly been in hiding for the last 8 years so he could have contacted her directly, maybe by discreetly asking for a driving lesson

In Textusa comments she says something like if it is real good,if it exposes fools good or if it exposes the press for what they are good......so win,win,win then!

He's not even a journalist.

https://uk.linkedin.com/pub/mark-souster/32/29/54a

well if he isn't employed by NI I suppose there's always the chance that one brave journo (or non journo) has finally decided to stick his neck out and make a name for himself, but experience tells us to be suspicious until we see where it's going

http://www.anorak.co.uk/192828/madeleine-mccann/madeleine-mccann-brian-kennedy-is-talking-balls-with-mark-souster.html/

October 2008:

Mark Souster investigates…

   There is no doubt that Brian Kennedy is a driven man. He has built a business empire with a turnover of more than £400million, as owner he has transformed Sale Sharks into one of the leading rugby clubs in Britain, who face Munster tomorrow in the second round of the Heineken Cup, and fathered five children. Kennedy has been heavily involved in supporting Gerry and Kate McCann in the search for Madeleine, their missing daughter. Kennedy 48, is reluctant to talk about his role or the reasons why he chose to put a chunk of his fortune, estimated at more than £250million, at their disposal.

Well, well, well. What a coincidence.

Further extracts from that Times article, Andrew

He (BK) has said before that he simply felt compelled to step in. “I have chosen to keep a low profile on this,” Kennedy said yesterday. “It is not about me. It is about Madeleine. I don’t want to comment personally on this except to say there is a big job still to do and we are focusing on getting it done.”
Seventeen months after her disappearance in Portugal, Kennedy remains as committed as ever to discovering what happened to Madeleine and helping the family to end their torment. Kennedy has become friends with the McCanns and Gerry has been his guest at Sale. “He is a keen rugby man and really likes his sport”…There are a lot of people helping by putting in a lot of time. But as I have said, it is not about me, them, Kate or Gerry. It is about a poor little kid who might be out there needing to be found. So therefore we need to move mountains to find her.”

chirpyinsect wrote:I have always had a sneaky suspicion this case is not as straightforward as we think. Cover up is maybe the wrong word but there is something that is keeping these two from jail.
The suggestion that they were caught up in a bigger operation in PDL is quite possible. In other words when something happened to Madeleine, parties were alerted that swooped in to prevent disclosure of ( insert x) TPTB needed to assist with the clean up and came up with an abduction rather than a murder/accidental death scenario.
Why does this not work for me? Because IF this had the slightest chance of mucking up a huge sting, we would never have heard of the McCanns in Portugal. The body would have been repatriated and little M would have been reported as dying at home of natural causes. No fuss, no press etc.
I also can't buy into the government climbing on board to save face after falling for the ruse. What Prime Minister would back a situation in a friendly foreign country, in a situation where, 9 times out of 10, the last person to see the victim, is the person who committed the crime? Without at least waiting for a report from the police, we are to believe T Blair thought it a good idea to protect 2 ordinary doctors who may have offed their own child. Nah!
So my money is on the belief that they were all in on it from the start. There is plenty to suggest pre-planning imo. The Macs insurance policy is they were acting out a part. Something went badly wrong. Phone calls were made. Death was unexpected so a new scene was quickly written. Not all played their part. Result-chaos.

We would have heard IMO because they quickly broadcast it to the press before TPTB could cover it up. An extremely clever bit of thinking by TM. It cannot be covered up (by anyone) once it`s out in the press. The Mcs could have got involved in something underhand, there was an accident with MBM, they asked for help saying they would blab if not, MBM`s body was therefore snitched by TPTB so they had each other by the short and curlies, hence they involved the press so it could not be covered up. It`s one of my theories anyway

MS still seems to have been a fan of BK as recently as Feb 2013

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/sport/rugbyunion/article3689947.ece

I doubt he would have announced to the world that he was a "McC sceptic" then. So is he still mates with BK or not? Or ... (even more interestingly) is BK still onside himself?

Andrew wrote:He's not even a journalist.

https://uk.linkedin.com/pub/mark-souster/32/29/54a

Apparently he was a sports journalist but now he's back working for the sunday times as a journalist.

Hellsbells wrote:things have ramped up at bit at NI since Becky returned but there doesn't appear to be any real journalism going on so far.
a journo motivated by sincerity surely wouldnt tweet his intentions before doing the investigating? JH has hardly been in hiding for the last 8 years so he could have contacted her directly, maybe by discreetly asking for a driving lesson

Exactly. Broadcasting his so called intentions like that would soon have him flattened by TM.

Now there's a well known pair of middle distance runners I know. Amateurs of course,wonder if he knows them!

I'm trying to find out when Brian Kennedy last confirmed his support, maybe someone out there can remember. 2008 the latest I can find at the moment

Laura wrote:

Andrew wrote:He's not even a journalist.

https://uk.linkedin.com/pub/mark-souster/32/29/54a

Apparently he was a sports journalist but now he's back working for the sunday times as a journalist.

Yeah he's back writing Rugby articles...

http://journalisted.com/mark-souster?allarticles=yes

Hellsbells wrote:I'm trying to find out when Brian Kennedy last confirmed his support, maybe someone out there can remember. 2008 the latest I can find at the moment

Maybe Brian Kennedy has got a matey journalist ready to write an article on how 2 conniving Doctors hoodwinked him into bankrolling them in the early days.

An interesting thought ...