13 years oF torment
I WILL never forget the moment that I first stood outside that white-washed holiday apartment in 2007.
It was a dazzling, hot Algarve afternoon and, just a few hours earlier, a three-year-old British girl on holiday with her parents and twin siblings had vanished into thin air.
But when I arrived in pretty Praia da Luz to join the rapidly growing press pack I still thought – and prayed – there was a chance she might be found.
Perhaps she had just wandered off and got lost... fallen asleep somewhere? Surely the police and local search parties would find her at any moment?
Madeleine McCann’s face was gazing out from a makeshift poster on the door of the neighbouring supermarket.
That beautiful, cheeky smile, the neat blonde bob and those big wide eyes with the quirky “flash” over her right iris. Poor Missing Maddie.
Soon that image was being flashed around the world, sparking dread and sympathy in every parent... what the hell must her mum and dad be going through?
I witnessed that myself just a few hours later.
As darkness fell, Kate and Gerry McCann emerged from Apartment 5A of the Ocean Club resort to make their first public appeal.
And the sight of Kate, head bowed in anguish, clutching Madeleine’s beloved “Cuddle Cat” toy to her face – breathing in her scent – was utterly heartbreaking.
The following day, after attending a police press conference, I wrote the first of many articles about the youngster.
“Kidnapped toddler Maddie McCann was believed to be ALIVE last night – but in the clutches of a child sex pervert.”
The police said that there was still hope, even though the survival scenario was too awful to contemplate.
But as each hour, then day, then week went by I felt a growing sense of frustration and even guilt.
The police investigation had been bungled from the outset with crucial clues lost, forensic evidence trampled over and valuable hours of searching wasted.
So the McCanns felt obliged to call in PR advisers and harness media attention. And we wanted to do all we could to help them find their daughter.
She had rapidly become the most famous child in the world, so wouldn’t her abductor – be they a sick sex monster or crazed childless woman – simply realise that she was too dangerous to keep alive?
My gut instinct told me Madeleine was probably dead within days of her disappearance
But, as the world’s press descended on the resort, named after its “Beach of Light”, I wondered if we might actually be snuffing out any hope of finding Madeleine alive.
and we would never find out who took her. But, oh, how I hoped to be proved wrong.
Now, it seems, there is a chink of light.
German police are seeking to build a credible case against an already jailed suspect.
And it is the first time in 13 years that I have genuinely felt the mystery could be solved.
I spent weeks in Praia da Luz, following up each new twist, lead, rumour or development as colleagues travelled to Spain, Morocco and anywhere else a fair-haired child was spotted in “unusual” circumstances.
And I watched the McCanns struggling to hold themselves together for the sake of their twins, Sean and Amelie, despite the toll it was taking.
In June 2007, on Father’s Day, I interviewed Gerry with colleagues from other newspapers. Two days earlier police had searched an area of wasteland nine miles away after a letter sent to a Dutch newspaper claimed Madeleine was buried there.
We were expecting an emotional , tearful encounter but instead he talked about the police investigation and new initiatives, drawing flow charts on a white board.
“I know it’s Father’s Day but I haven’t thought about it,” he said. “I can’t think about last year and how we spent it. I can’t really think about anything other than how we can try to get Madeleine back.”
I realised this was Gerry’s coping strategy. He was a heart surgeon and used to operating under enormous stress. But others found it “weird” and “cold”. So when a dodgy detective decided to turn on t h e McCanns and accuse them of being involved in their daughter’s disappearance, they were all too eager to believe it. I never did. It was blatant nonsense. Nor did I blame them for their error of judgment in leaving their children asleep in the apartment while they had dinner at a tapas restaurant.
They have to live with the consequences of that decision every day. And I never believed that suspect Robert Murat – who I got to know – was implicated either.
While the Portuguese police gave Murat “aguido” or suspect status early in the investigation, that was formally lifted in 2008.
Ithought the whole case was hopeless – that the truth had been buried for ever along with a pitiful little body in pyjamas. And I began to dread going back to Praia da Luz, for the first anniversary, then the fifth, then the 10th.
It felt like picking at a wound. Painful and pointless.
Of course, I understood that the McCanns could never stop searching for Madeleine.
Their determination has been remarkable and their dignity in the face of endless, brutal trolling and slurs is truly incredible. But I did start to question the amount of public money being spent on the Scotland Yard investigation. And in 2016 I wrote that perhaps it was time to stop.
But I never stopped thinking, or dreaming, about Madeleine.
Like several colleagues who worked on the case I have had dreams in which I find her, still a child, and take her home.
And the feeling of elation really isn’t about landing the journalistic scoop of the century. It’s because that cheeky smile, blonde bob and those big wide eyes are seared into our collective subconscious.
We all want to know what happened to Missing Maddie, so I pray that we are getting close to the truth.
To end her parents’ ongoing nightmare and help them to find peace.