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Posted by Fate Jsin on Friday, 11 May 2007 06:46 in News - Other |
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Below were the mistakes (pointed out) that Portuguese polices made: - Officers failed to cordon off the holiday apartment where Maddy was snatched as soon as they arrived. Amazingly, other tourists were allowed to stroll around the crime scene up to 24 hours later - potentially destroying clues and contaminating forensic evidence.
- Police did not "lock down" the Mark Warner resort where the youngster was staying with parents Kate and Gerry, both 38, and their two-year-old twins Sean and Amelie. They refused to believe Maddy had been kidnapped and insisted she probably wandered off.
- Border officials were not alerted until 12 hours after the snatch, meaning the kidnapper could have fled to Spain - only an hour's drive away from the holiday complex at Praia da Luz on the Algarve.
- Coastal patrols had to wait 14 hours to be told of last Thursday's snatch.
- Instead of amassing a huge force of officers to hunt for Maddy, just 150 were involved in the initial, badly organised searches. The scouring of 500 apartments did not begin until Sunday.
- No direct appeal was made to the kidnapper in the hours after the crime. It was left to Maddy's distraught parents to publicly plea for help.
- There were no officials posters of the missing child printed. Locals and Mark Warner staff produced their own. Police even refused to distribute pictures of Maddy until yesterday.
- A complete list of guests at the resort was not gathered until Sunday, by which point many of them - potential witnesses - had left.
- Police have still not identified any suspects, despite having the e-fit of a man with long hair which they showed only to locals. One restaurant worker said his wife saw a man fitting the description hanging around suspiciously outside their bar just 100 metres from the resort.
- A detailed description of what Maddy was wearing when snatched was not issued. In fact, Portuguese police have maintained a wall of silence, claiming privacy laws stop them from revealing many details about their investigation.
You can read the full story from Mirror.co.uk. For me, I would have sued the department for such blunders that slows down investigation, which might be fatal to the lost child.
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Last Updated on Friday, 11 May 2007 10:52 |