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Witness
Statement
Gerald Patrick McCann
Date: 2007/05/04
Time 11.15
He comes to the process as a participant and offended party, as
the girl's father. Being of British nationality he does not
speak Portuguese and is assisted by the interpreter Natalia de
Almeida.
When asked he says that he had been in Portugal previously in
1994, staying in an apartment near to Albufeira. This is the
first time he has returned to Portugal.
His desire to know Portugal in 1994 was due to the fact of
playing golf, as our country is known for the excellent
conditions for practising this sport. On this occasion, the trip
was proposed by one of his friends who accompanied him, David
Payne, who upon searching in Internet, made a reservation at the
OC, P da L, Lagos, for the witness, his wife and the rest of the
group, a total of nine adults and 8 children, including his
daughter Madeleine, this group consists of people he has known
for 5 or 6 years.
In this way they travelled in two separate groups, one of the
groups being the witness, his wife Kate and three children and
other group consisting of David with his wife, mother in law and
two children. The witness left from the local airport
(Leicestershire) and the other group left from London and
consisted of four adults and three children.
The meeting point was in Portugal, at the OC, where his group
arrived at about 14.30 on 28th April 2007, arriving from Faro
airport in a small minibus provided by the airport services. The
other group also arrived on the same day at about 13.00, also by
means of a minibus.
After checking in, the witness and his family were accommodated
in apartment G5 A, the family nucleus consisting of the witness,
his wife Kate, his daughter Madeleine and a couple of twins aged
two, Sean and Amelie. The apartment consisted of two beds in one
bedroom, another two beds in another bedroom and two cots
provided by the resort, as well as a WC and kitchen.
The witness and his wife slept in one of the bedrooms and the
three children in the other, the twins in the cots and Madeleine
in a bed, leaving the remaining bed empty.
Between the 28th April, the day they arrived and the time the
disappearance was discovered, he says that nothing unusual
happened, only referring to an episode on the morning of the 3rd
May, when Madeleine asked the witness the reason why they had
not gone to her room when the twins were crying. As he did not
hear anything, the witness did not go to the bedroom, however he
finds his daughter's comment to be strange, maybe because it was
the first time that she had made it.
As regards routines, he says that on Sunday they had breakfast
between 07.30 and 08.30 at the OC Bar at a few metres distance
from the apartment. During the following days, because of the
fact that the bar was quite far away, they began to buy food at
a supermarket situated in the same street as the apartment, he
cannot remember the name of the supermarket and they would have
breakfast in the apartment. After breakfast the children would
stay in the resort crèche, called the Kid Club, doing various
activities such as painting and collage, etc, until about 12.30,
they were always supervised by various members of staff, in a
ratio of one member of staff to every three children. At this
time - 12.30 - the parents would collect the children and have
lunch in the apartment, which had a kitchen. When lunch was
finished, at about 13.30, the children would stay at the Club
pool, supervised by the parents, for about 45 minutes, where
they would relax and put on sun screen, etc. Afterwards, they
would take the children back to the Kid Club until about 17.00,
when the children would have dinner at the bar, under the
attentive eye of their parents. After dinner at 17.00, they
would bath the children and get them ready for the night and
play with them for a few moments in the recreation area near the
tennis courts, always supervised by the parents. At about 19.30
- 20.00 the children were put to bed until the following morning
when the routine described would begin.
Whilst the children were at the Kids Club, the witness would
play tennis with his wife, go for walks, read and go jogging.
Yesterday, after their daily routine, Madeleine and the twins
went to their bedroom
"and were
placed in their respective beds and he stresses they were placed
together [i.e. in the same bedroom], at about 19.30."
The witness and his wife,
between this time and 20.30 stayed in the apartment relaxing and
drinking a glass of wine. After 20.30, the witness and his wife,
after looking at the children, went to the Tapas Bar, about 50
metres away, where they had dinner. As usual, every half hour
and as the restaurant was near, the witness or his wife, would
check whether the children were all right. In this way, at about
21.05 the witness came to the Club, entered the room using his
respective key, the door being locked, went to his children's
bedroom and
checked that the twins
were fine, as was Madeleine.
"He then
went to the WC" where he remained for a
few moments, left, and bumped into a person he had played tennis
with and who had a child's push chair, he was also British, he
had a short conversation with him,
"returning after that to the restaurant."
At about 21.30 his friend Matt (member of the group) went to the
apartment, where his children were and on his way went to the
witness' apartment, entering by means of a glass sliding door
that was always unlocked and was located laterally
to the building. He entered the bedroom, he observed the twins
and he
did not even notice whether Madeleine was there"
[Notes on
the three crucial words in this last sentence: "nem sequer
reparou"
- "nem sequer" means "not even";
- Verb "reparar" (in this context): to notice, to observe, to
see, to take notice of, to pay attention to, to mind, to look
out] as everything was calm, the shutters were closed and the door to
the bedroom was ajar as usual.
"After that Matt returned to the restaurant."
At about 22.00 it was his wife Kate who went to check on the
children. She entered the apartment by the door using the key
and saw immediately that the door to the children's bedroom was
completely open, the window was also open, the blinds were
raised and the curtains were drawn open.
The side door leading to the living room was closed, which as
previously stated, was never left locked. Faced with this
troubling situation, Kate checked that the twins were in their
beds, unlike Madeleine, who had disappeared. After checking the
apartment thoroughly, his wife, quite shocked and upset, went to
the restaurant, alerting the witness and the others about
the disappearance.
Immediately the group rapidly went to the club,
"searched
all the accommodations/lodgings,
swimming pool, tennis courts,
etc. and the apartment, with the help of staff
"at
the same time that they contacted the authorities who would come
to put in an appearance."
It is emphasised that one of the members of the group, Jane, at
about 21.10 - 21.15 when she was going to her apartment to check
on her children,
she saw
from the back, at a distance of about 50 metres, on the road
bordering the club, an individual
[Notes on
the three crucial words in this last sentence: "visualizou pela
rectaguarda"
- Verb "visualizar": to visualise (also used in the sense of 'to
see')
- "pela" is the contraction or "por" + "a": 'by + the' or 'from
+ the'
- "rectguarda" (more correctly spelled as "retaguarda"): rear,
back, tail, end; (military: rearguard);] carrying a child, wearing pyjamas, Jane will be able to clarify
this situation.
With regard to Madeleine, he describes her as being of Caucasian
race, with quite white skin, four years old (12-05-2003), almost
90 cm in height.
She has a slim build
dark blond hair which is
straight and shoulder length. Her left eye is blue and green and
her right eye is green with a brown mark in the pupil. She has a
small brown birthmark ,on
the knee of her left leg
he does not remember any others.
She did not have any scars. At the time of her
disappearance she was
wearing pyjamas, the trousers were white with a floral pattern,
and the short-sleeved top was predominantly pink
and there was a blue and grey figure of a donkey on the front,
with the inscription "Eeyore".
As regards personality, the child was extrovert, very active,
talkative, alert with an easy relationship with other children.
He also says that she would never go with a stranger.
He has no suspects to point out, he cannot find any motive for
such an act, as neither he nor his wife has any enemies.
He adds that his daughter is not suffering from any illness or
take any medication.
When asked, he says that he authorises a
reading of the recorded data
of his mobile phone no. 00***7869***88.
Apart from the Kid Club and the apartment they only went to the
beach with Madeleine and the other children once and for a short
time as the weather conditions were unstable. At the beach they
just ate an ice cream and then returned to the apartment. In
addition to what he has described, on the Wednesday or Thursday,
Madeleine and the other children went sailing along the beach,
five
minutes on foot away from the Club
for an hour, organised by the
resort, an activity that
has an available chart. The supervision and organisation of this
activity is the responsibility of the Club, which is why neither
the witness nor his wife were present.
He never saw any strange behaviour during these.
days nor anything that had led him to such a conclusion."
When he was shown a list of the Club's guests he says he only
recognises the names of the members of the group.
He never detected that any object had disappeared.
He has no other elements to bring to the process, desiring the
appropriate criminal procedure and (the person) caught for the
act he was a victim of.
No more is said. Reads, ratifies, signs.
(Note:
several mentions are made to "club" in the text, in some cases I
understand them to mean "apartment" but have left them as
described in PT text). |
