The Mystery of Ben Needham

Mo wrote:Copied:

Her voice was shaking and Dad could tell from her face she was serious. He leapt up and sent Danny one way, asked Michaelis to help him check the outbuildings, and told Mum to look again at the road in case he’d made it that far.

I don't remember Eddie mentioning Michaelis in the documentary or checking outbuildings only going through the fields. I've looked at the photo from 1991 but can't see any outbuildings.

I read or maybe heard on a video checking 'outbuildings' was mentioned. Goat houses, chicken sheds? Just can't remember who mentioned them, Kerry I think. I thought they meant belonging to neighbours as the building they were renovating looked uninhabitable. Sorry not much help am I, will try to find the ref.

Michaelis doesn't get hardly a mention at all back in 1991.

Plenty of mention in the book though that got released just after he passed away.

I did ask a few weeks ago why did the dog not bark?

Andrew wrote:Out of interest what ever happened to the little dog?

Yes - years later we are told the T-shirt was white with a green motif. It also had buttons. They went missing along with his 2 toy cars and green shorts and the sandals he was wearing. That's it as far as I know.

1991 - his T-shirt was green. He was also wearing white socks. Eddie didn't know about the 2 toy cars and Christine only had her memory jogged of them as Eddie practically tripped up over one in the doc.

All so weird

Kerry pulled Ben's shorts on and Ben tore his socks off. Kerry tried to put the socks on again, but admitted defeat. And Ben wore his sandals without socks.

Also:

After breakfast Mum washed Ben and got him dressed in the clothes Kerry had brought. Kerry had pulled out little shorts, brown sandals and a white shirt with a hint of a green pattern.


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No mention of socks. And he already wore sandals, so why did she bring another pair?
I can understand change of T-shirt because of egg all over it, perhaps even the shorts. But sandals?

Could be just artistic licence.

Hope wrote:            I did ask a few weeks ago why did the dog not bark?

That is one of the mysteries. Either it was a person known to Ben the dog, or Ben was away from the farmhouse or something else happened.

Some dogs don't bark at strangers though.

dogs don't lie wrote:Some dogs don't bark at strangers though.

***
ALL dogs bark in a situation they don't trust, especially small breeds. But even my Irish Wolfhounds would; e.g. once when there were burglars at an empty house lower down the hill.
There's just one dog, who doesn't [cannot] bark: the Basenji.

I think Kerry dressed Ben in whatever was at hand, ,they had breakfast with Chris, boiled egg with toast soldiers for him that day, got messy as a child that age would, Chris prob cleaned him everyday after bfast and dressed him for the day.
We have to be careful with ghost written books and artistic licence.

The dog was a corgi, they can be vicious with strangers, I was bitten by two.

Châtelaine wrote:

dogs don't lie wrote:Some dogs don't bark at strangers though.

***
ALL dogs bark in a situation they don't trust, especially small breeds. But even my Irish Wolfhounds would; e.g. once when there were burglars at an empty house lower down the hill.
There's just one dog, who doesn't [cannot] bark: the Basenji.

OMG you've Irish wolfhounds
My last little dog I got because I heard burglars, thinking he'd let me know, anytime he seen a stranger, he wagged his tail!

Artistic license or just plain anomalies that don't make sense.

Maybe the dog was having a siesta. After all it was extremely quiet at the time Ben vanished according to them.

Although according to SYP it would've been extremely noisy with Dino's digger going back and forth past the building. So close in fact they had to demolish some of it and check underneath.

If SYP really believe that Dino could have buried Ben in the founds of the extension, when do they think he put him there? Surely work would not have continued after the police arrived. The site would be shut down for some time. So where would Ben's body have been until work resumed?
Suppose for a second that Dino did accidentally kill Ben. Would he really have put him somewhere, then risked moving him again maybe weeks later, putting him back in the very location that would be the focus of any possible future exploration?

I remember an episode of Columbo where a murderer planned to hide the body in a place that had already been searched, thinking it never would be again!

Not that I think it happened here. This story is getting sillier by the minute.

OT, sorry, but thank you Freedom for reminding me of Columbo. I'll see if I can find some episodes on youtube. It's a holiday again here in France [Allsaints], so no one's working [and as for that matter in 10 days' time neither: end of WW1 ...], so it's perfect day for "do you remember" in terms of watching popular old series

canada12 wrote:I think it was mentioned on here before about the unlikelihood of an abductor taking the time to collect Ben's shorts from wherever they were hanging. This is what makes me think that there's a reason why the green shorts seem to be important. Did something happen that involved the green shorts and it's important that they NOT be found?

I just don't think an opportunistic abductor, with or without a white car, would risk being seen a moment longer than necessary. And getting out of the car to retrieve the shorts, which may or may not be hanging within sight of the people in the house, would seem to me to be unnecessarily risky.

Which takes me back to my original thought. The reason, many believe, Madeleine's body had to be "disappeared" is because of what an autopsy might have uncovered.

Might there be similar reasons for Ben's body not to be recovered? And especially the green shorts?

I'm thinking that at the time perhaps one of the Grandparents was in the dark (could still well be) but certainly back in 1991 and that's why the shorts stuff is all very odd. Bit like the Toys - both didn't really know much about it or at least pretend to. Eddie again didn't know 10 years later whether Ben had an accident and wet himself or it was caused by the water from the hose. Again all very odd.

Anyway for example - say if something happened to Ben and Eddie wanted to cover it up then I'm certain he would've fully dressed Ben before a burial. Take the shorts from the tree and put them on him.

Now if Christine wasn't aware of anything at the time then the only explanation for the missing shorts off a tree would be that whoever took Ben took them as well. As Ben wouldn't of been able to reach them and wander off.

And that's how the missing shorts from the tree tale was born. As one of them didn't know at the time what the other one did.

Just a few thoughts and all IMO etc etc etc.

Hope wrote:            I did ask a few weeks ago why did the dog not bark?

It probably died on the way there in that heat (104 degrees) at mid-day, 40 mins walk away, uphill.

Sorry to be facetious, but how wicked/ignorant to take an animal and a child out in that heat in the middle of the day - I wonder if there was a sun shade on the pushchair?

Shorts

Is it Canada12/seahorse/hope who think the green shorts are relevant - I do too. Apparently Christine got Ben dressed in the clothes that Kerry had brought for him (which I assume means he arrived at the caravan in his pyjamas). What puzzles me is - did she not bring underpants or a nappy to go under the green shorts? Or perhaps they just let him wee his pants all the time as it was so hot.

In the video, I doubt whether Eddie and Christine`s conversations were spontaneous - it would have been decided beforehand to talk about the wet shorts and to `whoops, find a car in the field` - it would all have been staged.

Supposedly - according to Kerry anyway - it was a journey that had been undertaken many times before. If it really was the first time, I don't know how any of them survived it.

The lack of spare clothing and nappies is very odd. It's unlikely that a 21-month-old would be fully toilet trained and, as he had wet his shorts, he clearly wasn't in that category and there would also be the problem of worse things than water to deal with!

This has probably been posted already, it isn't recent but interesting nevertheless.  I don't really understand how Kerry and her family conducted themselves after Ben went missing can be relevant to what happened though, except in newspaper sales !   Also this article speaks of a "possible" sighting of a blonde haired man with bottle green eyes
, but Ben had blue eyes didn't he?


https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2013/apr/28/ben-needham-kerry-needham-interview

The hunt for Ben Needham and the family that won't give up searching
British toddler Ben Needham vanished in 1991 on the Greek island of Kos. Now his mother has written a memoir and here she talks to the writer who has followed the case since the mid-90s and come to know the family well

I saw Kerry in December 1996. She hadn't come to Greece to make the film but agreed to be interviewed in Sheffield. She had increasingly retreated from the media glare. It was evident at a glance when she arrived at her parents' house that something was very wrong. Her daughter Leighanna, born in February 1994, was living with Chris and Eddie. The change in Kerry was astonishing, the atmosphere tense, a vivid anger coming off her like static. The dress she planned to wear for the film was disco chic – a minimal stretch of grey PVC with a jagged hem. Her mother insisted Kerry wear a frock. Kerry yelled at her: "You want me to look like little fucking Mary on the little fucking prairie."

The relationship between Kerry and her parents was in freefall and they were barely exchanging civilities. Kerry was in search of oblivion, working in a bar, her nights a blaze of amphetamine and ecstasy, taking refuge from states of mind few can fully imagine. I sympathised with Kerry but understood her parents' fury and alarm. Kerry couldn't articulate what was happening to her then. She told me three years ago what she had been going through at the time. When Leighanna reached the age Ben was when he vanished, Kerry felt at breaking point. Something had to give.

I think it has been posted before but it doesn't matter as it's always worth a reread.

Snipped:

A few minutes later Chris realised Ben had gone silent. They looked everywhere – up and down the track, across the fields. Nothing. No sign of him. He had vanished. All around was silent, apart from the wind and the creaking of the cicadas in the overgrown fields.

I wonder what Melanie McFadyean really thinks and what her thoughts are on the 'digger theory'....

Snipped from today's Mirror article:

Ben Needham's sister has revealed the heartbreaking moment she and her family were told the youngster was likely to be dead.

And Leighanna Needham, 22, admitted she, mum Kerry and grandmother Christine, had thought police were about to tell them the little boy had been found.

The three had a private meeting with police from Operation Ben two months before they travelled to the island of Kos to dig for the youngster's remains.

Leighanna said when officers came to the door they knew it was something serious.

I wonder where Eddie was then when this private meeting took place?

Whose door did they come to anyway? I thought Kerry lived in Turkey, Leighanna lived in Sheffield and no idea where Christine lives?

Christine lives in Lincolnshire.

Andrew - have you come to any conclusions or thoughts about what may have happened to Ben..and who may have been involved?
I think a family member may have been involved but I do not think Kerry was aware of this - but may be now...

When that article by their lawyer said that the family were now 'reflecting' - I think that some family members have been given time to come to terms with something pretty big.

Also, reading Textusa, (which I obviously do) she is hinting at something (but I just cant quite get it...) ..
I feel confused.. I just dont get it!

Helenmeg wrote:Christine lives in Lincolnshire.

Andrew - have you come to any conclusions or thoughts about what may have happened to Ben..and who may have been involved?
I think a family member may have been involved but I do not think Kerry was aware of this - but may be now...

When that article by their lawyer said that the family were now 'reflecting'  - I think that some family members have been given time to come to terms with something pretty big.

Also, reading Textusa, (which I obviously do) she is hinting at something (but I just cant quite get it...) ..
I feel confused.. I just dont get it!  

I consider that a very reasonable conclusion to reach.

Perhaps police hope that this pressure will lead to a confession.

I mentioned weeks ago about lack of nappies and was he toilet trained. Mimi I would not take how hot it was too seriously.I hear that people over here will always be exaggerating the exact temperature once it goes over 30 ish.

I have just been looking at the aerial maps on Textusa's blog again (can't copy over). There is one that shows where the farm is, the flat, caravan and where Kerry worked, the other shows where the 2nd dig took place. Just wondering if the second dig is near to the flat? RD Hall has made another DVD and on it he says Stephen's bike had some damage on it, just thinking.......