The wrong Smith............

chirpyinsect wrote:Can anyone explain why The Mccanns sent the efits to the PJ and Leicester Polivce in 2009 having sat on them since 2008 yet the PJ case had been shelved for over a year by then? The Times was sued over the claim they made that the efits had been withheld for 5 years. Why did they not counterclaim that they had been withheld for a year? They may have had a rap on the knuckles but it would still have looked bad on the Macs.

Settling out of court is cheaper, whether The Times wrote the truth or not.

The only time the McCanns have got to court they haven't exactly proved themselves to be expert witnesses.

wlbts wrote:

chirpyinsect wrote:Can anyone explain why The Mccanns sent the efits to the PJ and Leicester Polivce in 2009 having sat on them since 2008 yet the PJ case had been shelved for over a year by then? The Times was sued over the claim they made that the efits had been withheld for 5 years. Why did they not counterclaim that they had been withheld for a year? They may have had a rap on the knuckles but it would still have looked bad on the Macs.

Settling out of court is cheaper, whether The Times wrote the truth or not.

Yep I get that but they could have still made their apology by stating that they were mistaken in saying the Macs had withheld the statements for 5 years, and said something like, "what we should have said is they were not handed over to the police for x months." The Macs could hardly complain at that as this was true by their own admittance.
Do you reckon therefore this was a stunt by Murdoch?

wlbts wrote:

Me wrote:The Times article to do with the withheld e-fits printed in November 2013 says this:

Smith has since stressed that he does not believe the man he saw was Gerry, and Scotland Yard do not consider this a possibility

This is the article the McCann's sued over.

But where did the Times get that information from?  Without a verifiable source it just reads as waffle.

Smith is quoted as saying "Apart from that from our point of view everything else remains the same in relation to what we said to the police and the media at the time."  Surely that trumps what the Times has written.

Is this not just a case of believing the Mirror cause it suits us better?

Who wrote the article?  If it was David Smith - he gets 'briefed' by Gerry.

O, and Mr. Smith  did sue papers who misquoted him. I believe the Drogheda press paid the costs and it was the Evening Standard iirc.

Hongkong Phooey wrote:

wlbts wrote:

Me wrote:The Times article to do with the withheld e-fits printed in November 2013 says this:

Smith has since stressed that he does not believe the man he saw was Gerry, and Scotland Yard do not consider this a possibility

This is the article the McCann's sued over.

But where did the Times get that information from?  Without a verifiable source it just reads as waffle.

Smith is quoted as saying "Apart from that from our point of view everything else remains the same in relation to what we said to the police and the media at the time."  Surely that trumps what the Times has written.

Is this not just a case of believing the Mirror cause it suits us better?

The Times does not give a direct quote but the Mirror does. Not that I trust any of them.

Tigger wrote:Who wrote the article?  If it was David Smith - he gets 'briefed' by Gerry.

O, and Mr. Smith  did sue papers who misquoted him. I believe the Drogheda press paid the costs and it was the Evening Standard iirc.

Any idea of what these misquotes were?

wlbts wrote:

Me wrote:The Times article to do with the withheld e-fits printed in November 2013 says this:

Smith has since stressed that he does not believe the man he saw was Gerry, and Scotland Yard do not consider this a possibility

This is the article the McCann's sued over.

But where did the Times get that information from?  Without a verifiable source it just reads as waffle.

Smith is quoted as saying "Apart from that from our point of view everything else remains the same in relation to what we said to the police and the media at the time."  Surely that trumps what the Times has written.

I've just had a glum thought. What if Martin Smith, when he says in the Mirror "...everything else remains the same in relation to what we said to the police and the media at the time." ...is referring to the retraction and not the original statements. Having said that, there is no statement of retraction in the files.

Tigger wrote:Who wrote the article?  If it was David Smith - he gets 'briefed' by Gerry.

O, and Mr. Smith  did sue papers who misquoted him. I believe the Drogheda press paid the costs and it was the Evening Standard iirc.

It was the Sunday Times investigative team - The Insight Team - Heidi Blake and Jonathan Calvert

https://twitter.com/insightst

But if the journalists on the Times were getting info from the McCanns why would they then sue that newspaper.

It struck me that the mention of smith identifying Gerry and subsequently saying he'd withdrawn that identification struck me as being a rather forced comment.

Dee Coy wrote:[ [...] Having said that, there is no statement of retraction in the files.

***
Exactly.

IMO, deep down MS knew who he saw that night, that would be the reason why this respected grandfather had a shock watching GM come off the plane, sleepless nights and couldn't eat. When I read his statement in Sept07, I can actually feel and tell that he had to do this, for Madeleine, it's what any decent person would do and it wouldn't have been easy, the father of the child! I also think he's been counting on the police to follow this through, but GA was taken off? or resigned? not sure, and the new investigator didn't follow through.
All IMO though.

Me wrote:But if the journalists on the Times were getting info from the McCann's why would they then sue that newspaper.

It struck me that the mention of smith identifying Gerry and subsequently saying he'd withdrawn that identification struck me as being a rather forced comment.

David James Smith wrote an article titled "beyond the smears" for the Sunday Times magazine on iirc 16th December 2007.
It may as well have been written by Gerry himself.
Can't provide a link on my phone.
I was living in Spain at the time and this was the only english version of the story available to me at the time.
I have to say I believed every word and thought the McCanns were not involved.
Needless to say my faith in the press has been lost for ever given what we now know.

Me wrote:But if the journalists on the Times were getting info from the McCann's why would they then sue that newspaper.

It struck me that the mention of smith identifying Gerry and subsequently saying he'd withdrawn that identification struck me as being a rather forced comment.

The Insight Team, it seems, just got information from `the McCann fund source`

"There was also an uncomfortable complication with Smith’s account. He had originally told the police that he had “recognised something” about the way Gerry McCann carried one of his children which reminded him of the man he had seen in Praia da Luz.

Smith has since stressed that he does not believe the man he saw was Gerry, and Scotland Yard do not consider this a possibility. Last week the McCanns were told officially by the Portuguese authorities that they are not suspects.

The McCanns were also understandably wary of Oakley after allegations that the chairman, Kevin Halligen, failed to pass on money paid by the fund to Exton’s team. Halligen denies this. He was later convicted of fraud in an unrelated case in the US.

The McCann fund source said the Oakley report was passed on to new private investigators after the contract ended, but that the firm’s work was considered “contaminated” by the financial dispute.

He said the fund wanted to continue to pursue information about the man seen by Tanner, and it would have been too expensive to investigate both sightings in full — so the Smith E-Fits were not publicised. It was also considered necessary to threaten legal action against the authors.

“[The report] was hypercritical of the people involved . . . It just wouldn’t be conducive to the investigation to have that report publicly declared because . . . the newspapers would have been all over it. And it would have been completely distracting,” said the source.

A statement released by the Find Madeleine fund said that “all information privately gathered during the search for Madeleine has been fully acted upon where necessary” and had been passed to Scotland Yard.

It continued: “Throughout the investigation, the Find Madeleine fund’s sole priority has been, and remains, to find Madeleine and bring her home as swiftly as possible.”

Insight: Heidi Blake and Jonathan Calvert "



Didn`t they sue the Sunday Times for saying that they held onto the e-fits, when they deny they did?

I think it's more likely that they contacted Clarence after they'd got the story ready to advise him that they were going to run a story about the e-fits and asked for a comment.

There's no way they'd have got a story from them only to be sued by them.

But don't forget the overarching presence of Murdoch in all this. was the article and subsequent suing a means to an end?

If we knew the true reason behind Brooks' insistence at the re-opening of the case then the reasons for some of these apparent inconsistencies would be a lot clearer, in my opinion.

Me - when the investigators say `the fund source` couldn`t it be one of the directors of the fund? And perhaps the fund source wasn`t privvy to the whole article before he had his say.

DeeCoy - Murdoch means to an end - yes could be.  

But Brooks could merely have wanted the case reopened to guarantee a continued long stretch of good media coverage. Just a thought though.

Hongkong Phooey wrote:

wlbts wrote:

Me wrote:The Times article to do with the withheld e-fits printed in November 2013 says this:

Smith has since stressed that he does not believe the man he saw was Gerry, and Scotland Yard do not consider this a possibility

This is the article the McCann's sued over.

But where did the Times get that information from?  Without a verifiable source it just reads as waffle.

Smith is quoted as saying "Apart from that from our point of view everything else remains the same in relation to what we said to the police and the media at the time."  Surely that trumps what the Times has written.

Is this not just a case of believing the Mirror cause it suits us better?

No, one of them directly quotes Mr Smith and the other doesn't, and doesn't mention the source of the information.

Is the opposite not just a case of disbelieving something because it suits us better?

Dee Coy wrote:But don't forget the overarching presence of Murdoch in all this. was the article and subsequent suing a means to an end?

If we knew the true reason behind Brooks' insistence at the re-opening of the case then the reasons for some of these apparent inconsistencies would be a lot clearer, in my opinion.

I agree,and at the very least Cameron,Brooks and the MET police had a Horse as a common denominator.

wlbts wrote:

Hongkong Phooey wrote:

wlbts wrote:

Me wrote:The Times article to do with the withheld e-fits printed in November 2013 says this:

Smith has since stressed that he does not believe the man he saw was Gerry, and Scotland Yard do not consider this a possibility

This is the article the McCann's sued over.

But where did the Times get that information from?  Without a verifiable source it just reads as waffle.

Smith is quoted as saying "Apart from that from our point of view everything else remains the same in relation to what we said to the police and the media at the time."  Surely that trumps what the Times has written.

Is this not just a case of believing the Mirror cause it suits us better?

No, one of them directly quotes Mr Smith and the other doesn't, and doesn't mention the source of the information.

Is the opposite not just a case of disbelieving something because it suits us better?

I agree the reverse can be just as true.

What was reported as quoted by Mr Smith was not contentious and could be read in different ways and even if it wasn't completely accurate I wouldn't have thought it would cause him too much angst. I personally believe the Smiths are 100% genuine.

Mimi wrote:Me - when the investigators say `the fund source` couldn`t it be one of the directors of the fund?  And perhaps the fund source wasn`t privvy to the whole article before he had his say.

DeeCoy - Murdoch means to an end - yes could be.  

But Brooks could merely have wanted the case reopened to guarantee a continued long stretch of good media coverage. Just a thought though.

No, any statement either on or off the record comes from Clarence.

He's doing his famous "talking with two heads" stunt that he pulls quite regularly.

The stuff he doesn't want on the record gets quoted as a "fund source".

The official stuff comes from him via a statement from the family or the fund.

It's still him though saying but doing it under two different guises.

Always has been and always will be him providing the info to the papers the odious cretin.