CB - opinion
Regarding CB, to my knowledge the following pieces of open source information give me the strong impression that he’s responsible.
Location
• At least 2 eye witness sightings of a blond haired male with a distinctive badly pockedmarked face lurking around the OC that week.
• A sighting of a blond haired male ‘testing the gate’ of 5a on the afternoon of the 3rd May.
• CB’s phone used in the area on the evening of the 3rd of May.
• CB telling his ex GF that he was near the apartment that night
• His ‘fling’ that he was seeing that week being unable to account for his whereabouts on the 3rd May.
• A criminal history of burglary. Burglaries at the OC around the time. Notably with shutters raised & windows opened - same MO in 5a.
• Reportedly familiar with the OC because he’d work there as a pool cleaner previously.
• A fourfold increase in the number of burglaries in the area appears to be tandem with his release from prison in Nov 06.
• SY stated that his van was seen in the area on the days leading up to 3rd May.
Offence
• History of sexually assaulting women, including young girls.
• History of premeditated sexual crime & opportunistic sexual crime.
• Talked in a Skype chat about abducting, assaulting & killing a little girl. When talking about a method of death, he was asked “has this happened with you before”, in which he replied “ok, such messages are really dangerous”. If the answer is no, then his answer is no.
• Wrote stories abducting, assaulting & killing a little girl. A girl in one of his stories was named MaidAnellie. IMO, not too dissimilar to the name Madeleine.
• In Orgiva 2008, the subject of how MM went missing without a trace, he replied “well she didn’t scream”. He reportedly took off in the middle of night (after making that comment).
• Thousands of pictures & videos of child sexual assault
• 75 children’s swimsuits
• Further charges of assaulting a little girl.
Aftermath
• Re-registered his car the next day
• Left Portugal in 2007, his home of 12 years & went back to the country he fled from in the first place (Germany)
• Reportedly became agitated & verbal, when the subject of MM came up in a kiosk he was working in.
• In 2013, when sent a letter to come in for a witness interview in the MM case, he reportedly went into panic mode & post interview he said something along the lines of “don’t worry they have nothing on me”.
• Remained off grid
German, English, Portuguese investigations into CB
• Still ongoing, none of them have pulled out.
• Germans state they have “concrete evidence” that he is responsible & that what they have is “material evidence” but not forensic evidence. Non-forensic material evidence is either or a combination of video, pictures, audio, written.
• When asked whether they have pictures or videos the spokesperson for the Prosecution said “if we had a video of the act or a picture with the accused on camera, then we wouldn’t need to make the appeal” - quite specific - and imo indicates they have a picture or video of MM deceased without CB on frame.
• They’ve yet to find the caller
Factoring in all that’s above, why haven’t charged!!? It’s not always simple to convict.
• a picture of a deceased MM amongst 20000 other pictures or videos of child assault - a defence may argue “you can’t prove he wasn’t just sent that or downloaded that, like he had with thousands of other images”
• CB at the scene - “you can’t prove it was actually him holding his phone” & “the witnesses are biased because of the media coverage or high profile nature of the crime” (this argument worked in the previous court case)
• The type of evidence they have being successfully made inadmissible (by the defence). Example - if a USB is chalked off the evidence file, it collapses the case.
• Losing the previous trial, therefore making it impossible to use those convictions as part of the case against MM. Anything made inadmissible in that trial could be the same in the next one.
• Keeps him out of preventative attention, meaning they can’t work him from the inside - e.g better prison deal
Currently - imo they can’t charge
• lost previous trial - lowers confidence in success + admissibility risk.
• with current evidence, they won’t be able to charge unless they win their appeal & secure convictions in a retrial.
• if they lose appeal, they’ll need forensic evidence to make charges.
If the Germans don’t move forward the UK may make a move. There appears to be a difference between SY believing there could be a route to extraditing & what AI has to say about it…
My simple theory
He went in the rob the apartment, the motive changed inside 5a. He took Madeleine, carried her to where he’d parked his Jaguar (to the south-west of PDL). The crime was over within a couple of hours.
There’ll be 2 areas where forensic evidence is, or once was. 1 area for remains & the other for clothing & any tools used. IMO 1 of those areas is the Arade Dam, the other area is closer to PDL, likely within a few miles & no further away than Boca do Rio.
IMO with cases/crimes that highly publicised, unsolved & with investigations that are ongoing, concrete details that are publicly known would be about 1% of the story. I think the BKA knows about 70% of the story. But knowing & having it ironclad enough for court are 2 different things.
I think the evidence they have that MM is dead is irrefutable. They just don’t have a solid enough case to convict CB for the murder that their evidence shows. For the reasons listed.
My opinion. Be good to hear other thoughts.