Refugee
09-08-2007, 05:44 AM
It wasn't supposed to to turn out this way.
For months, the mystery of what happened to tiny blond Madeleine McCann gripped Europe.
Headlines from Lisbon to London detailed her parents' desperate global campaign to find the tot, who vanished in May from her bed in a Portuguese holiday resort.
Attractive, well-heeled British doctors Kate and Gerry McCann traveled to Rome to meet with Pope Benedict, who promised to pray for Madeleine.
Soccer superstar David Beckham filmed a TV appeal. "Harry Potter" author J.K. Rowling put up a $3 million reward. Sightings in Belgium and Malta sparked frenzies. Ordinary people donated $2 million for the search.
As the months dragged on, hopes faded for a happy ending to the world's most famous missing child case.
Few foresaw yesterday's bombshell twist, when Portuguese police told first Kate McCann and then, several hours later, her husband that they were suspects, the couple's attorney said.
Investigators suspect Kate McCann killed her daughter by accidentally giving her a sedative overdose, then hid the body with Gerry's help - and staged all those public pleas as part of a massive coverup.
"They made a series of ridiculous allegations," family spokeswoman Justine McGuiness said.
Portuguese police grilled Kate McCann for 16 hours over two days while her husband was questioned separately for seven hours yesterday.
Neither was charged.
Cops said traces of Madeleine's blood were found in the trunk of a Renault the McCanns rented 25 days after the girl vanished, suggesting they used it to move her body, McGuiness said.
Kate McCann, 39, who was jeered by a crowd outside the police station when she arrived yesterday clutching "Cuddle Cat," her daughter's favorite pink stuffed animal.
Police did not comment, but her family said they offered her a deal: just two years in prison in exchange for a confession. She refused, insisting on her innocence.
"The suggestion that Kate is involved in Madeleine's disappearance is ludicrous," Gerry McCann, also 39, wrote in his blog before he too was labeled a suspect.
"We will fight this all the way and we will not stop looking for Madeleine," he vowed.
The McCanns' supporters said Portuguese police were trying to divert attention from an investigation widely viewed as badly bungled from day one.
McCann's brother, John, said, "My wee niece is missing and it's not Gerry and Kate that are involved in this."
A vivacious 3-year-old with blue-green eyes, Madeleine vanished May 3 from her bed in a resort apartment during a family vacation to the Portuguese village of Praia da Luz.
She had been sleeping in a ground-floor room with her little brother and sister, 2-year-old twins Sean and Amelie, while her parents ate tapas with friends 100 yards away.
The McCanns said they left the kids unattended in an unlocked apartment, but took turns checking on them.
They told police that at about 9p.m., Kate McCann found a closed bedroom window had been opened and Madeleine's bed was empty.
Police failed to properly search or seal off the villa, search neighboring apartments, quiz neighbors or alert border guards to a possible kidnapping.
A new round of tests - conducted, ironically, by a British lab - returned results this week and dramatically changed the direction of the case.
Portuguese media quoted police sources saying the new test results showed traces of blood, saliva and hair matching Madeleine were found in the apartment, suggesting she was killed there and not abducted.
British cadaver-sniffing dogs detected signs of the past presence of a body in the apartment.
Traces of Madeleine's blood were reportedly found in the trunk of a Renault Scenic rented by the McCanns in late May and one Portuguese newspaper said the dogs also detected "the strong scent of a corpse" on the car's keys.
For months, the mystery of what happened to tiny blond Madeleine McCann gripped Europe.
Headlines from Lisbon to London detailed her parents' desperate global campaign to find the tot, who vanished in May from her bed in a Portuguese holiday resort.
Attractive, well-heeled British doctors Kate and Gerry McCann traveled to Rome to meet with Pope Benedict, who promised to pray for Madeleine.
Soccer superstar David Beckham filmed a TV appeal. "Harry Potter" author J.K. Rowling put up a $3 million reward. Sightings in Belgium and Malta sparked frenzies. Ordinary people donated $2 million for the search.
As the months dragged on, hopes faded for a happy ending to the world's most famous missing child case.
Few foresaw yesterday's bombshell twist, when Portuguese police told first Kate McCann and then, several hours later, her husband that they were suspects, the couple's attorney said.
Investigators suspect Kate McCann killed her daughter by accidentally giving her a sedative overdose, then hid the body with Gerry's help - and staged all those public pleas as part of a massive coverup.
"They made a series of ridiculous allegations," family spokeswoman Justine McGuiness said.
Portuguese police grilled Kate McCann for 16 hours over two days while her husband was questioned separately for seven hours yesterday.
Neither was charged.
Cops said traces of Madeleine's blood were found in the trunk of a Renault the McCanns rented 25 days after the girl vanished, suggesting they used it to move her body, McGuiness said.
Kate McCann, 39, who was jeered by a crowd outside the police station when she arrived yesterday clutching "Cuddle Cat," her daughter's favorite pink stuffed animal.
Police did not comment, but her family said they offered her a deal: just two years in prison in exchange for a confession. She refused, insisting on her innocence.
"The suggestion that Kate is involved in Madeleine's disappearance is ludicrous," Gerry McCann, also 39, wrote in his blog before he too was labeled a suspect.
"We will fight this all the way and we will not stop looking for Madeleine," he vowed.
The McCanns' supporters said Portuguese police were trying to divert attention from an investigation widely viewed as badly bungled from day one.
McCann's brother, John, said, "My wee niece is missing and it's not Gerry and Kate that are involved in this."
A vivacious 3-year-old with blue-green eyes, Madeleine vanished May 3 from her bed in a resort apartment during a family vacation to the Portuguese village of Praia da Luz.
She had been sleeping in a ground-floor room with her little brother and sister, 2-year-old twins Sean and Amelie, while her parents ate tapas with friends 100 yards away.
The McCanns said they left the kids unattended in an unlocked apartment, but took turns checking on them.
They told police that at about 9p.m., Kate McCann found a closed bedroom window had been opened and Madeleine's bed was empty.
Police failed to properly search or seal off the villa, search neighboring apartments, quiz neighbors or alert border guards to a possible kidnapping.
A new round of tests - conducted, ironically, by a British lab - returned results this week and dramatically changed the direction of the case.
Portuguese media quoted police sources saying the new test results showed traces of blood, saliva and hair matching Madeleine were found in the apartment, suggesting she was killed there and not abducted.
British cadaver-sniffing dogs detected signs of the past presence of a body in the apartment.
Traces of Madeleine's blood were reportedly found in the trunk of a Renault Scenic rented by the McCanns in late May and one Portuguese newspaper said the dogs also detected "the strong scent of a corpse" on the car's keys.