Madeleine McCann: police want private diary

Sep 13 2007 Liverpool Daily Post

Kate McCann, mother of missing four-year-old Madeleine, leaves her home with two-year-old twins Sean and Amelie. Picture: Andrew Stenning/PA Wire _320

PROSECUTORS in the Madeleine McCann case want to examine her mother’s diary for clues, sources close to the investigation said yesterday.

Police passed their 4,000-page dossier of evidence against Liverpool born GP Kate McCann and her husband Gerry to Algarve-based public prosecutor Jose Cunha de Magalhaes e Meneses.

He immediately ordered the files should go before a criminal instructional judge, understood to be Pedro Daniel dos Anjos Frias.

The prosecutor has made a several requests of the judge, among them that he approve the seizure of Mrs McCann’s personal diary, sources told Portuguese journalists.

The diary will help police “understand the couple’s habits” and supply clues to the investigation, the Jornal de Noticias reported.

Police also intend to seize some of Madeleine’s toys for forensic analysis, according to another Portuguese newspaper.

Among them will be Cuddle Cat, a pink stuffed animal which Mrs McCann has been seen clutching almost contin-uously since the young girl went missing, the Diario de Noticias said.

Mr McCann’s sister, Philomena McCann, said the possibility that police might seize the toy was a “disgrace”, adding: “Why didn’t they think of this before? Everything with the Portuguese police is an afterthought.”

The prosecutor also wants to seize Mr McCann’s white lap-top computer, which he used to write his internet blog on the findmadeleine.com website, sources close to the investi-gation told journalists.

Meanwhile, the McCanns’ hire car, a silver Renault Scenic, is being kept in a “safe place” in Portugal while they look into having their own forensic tests carried out on it, a family friend said.

Senior sources linked to the investigation told Portuguese journalists that they discovered “bodily fluids” – not blood – with an 88% match to Madeleine’s genetic profile in the car’s boot.

Police also found so much of the girl’s hair in the car that it could not have been transferred from clothes, and must have come directly from her body, one of the sources said

Gerry’s brother John McCann said last night: “Gerry keeps telling me that they (the Portuguese police) have gone up a cul-de-sac and have lost track of what they should really be doing.”

Detectives appear to be working on a theory that Kate McCann killed her daughter by accident and covered up the death by claiming she was abducted.