Blacksmiths Blogs.

This is worth a look.

http://blacksmithbureau.blogspot.co.uk/

I think Tanner has long been mooted to be the weak link. It was rumoured, early on, that O'Brien had had some sort of mental breakdown in the months following the event and she has long been separated from him.
My opinion is that they were among those 'in the know' on that night and have had difficulty living with the knowledge.
Hopefully she has spilled the beans, though proving a case may be beyond OG.

Travers wrote:I think Tanner has long been mooted to be the weak link.  It was rumoured, early on, that O'Brien had had some sort of mental breakdown in the months following the event and she has long been separated from him.
My opinion is that they were among those 'in the know' on that night and have had difficulty living with the knowledge.
Hopefully she has spilled the beans, though proving a case may be beyond OG.

I remember early on that there was a rumour of one of them spilling the beans and they were quashed on to keep quiet.

Thanks Blacksmith for that blog.

You should not rule out the possibility the T7 were "innocent dupes" as you might say.
It is easy enough to write a credible argument in favour of that.

Thank you Global Moderator.  I’m not posting very much but my absence from here is partly due to my loss of the link to your site – until I saw it on another site the other day. Advertising works!

I made it clear some time ago that all I have to offer now is the occasional flat assertion. No reasoned claims, no evidence and definitely no imputation of guilt against anybody.  People can choose to take them or leave them, just as they did when I wasted hours putting forth the  evidence. None of them involve or imply inside knowledge.

AJS wrote:Thank you Global Moderator.  I’m not posting very much but my absence from here is partly due to my loss of the link to your site – until I saw it on another site the other day. Advertising works!

I made it clear some time ago that all I have to offer now is the occasional flat assertion. No reasoned claims, no evidence and definitely no imputation of guilt against anybody.  People can choose to take them or leave them, just as they did when I wasted hours putting forth the  evidence. None of them involve or imply inside knowledge.

What is interesting in all of it now,is that it only seems to be the pro justice forum and the abduction pro posters who are the more vociferous,even cmomm is quiet,interest has waned not surprising as its gone on for so long,somebody somewhere will be busy sharpening a pencil ready to apply for continued funding in following up some important new leads come March.

enyam wrote:

AJS wrote:Thank you Global Moderator.  I’m not posting very much but my absence from here is partly due to my loss of the link to your site – until I saw it on another site the other day. Advertising works!

I made it clear some time ago that all I have to offer now is the occasional flat assertion. No reasoned claims, no evidence and definitely no imputation of guilt against anybody.  People can choose to take them or leave them, just as they did when I wasted hours putting forth the  evidence. None of them involve or imply inside knowledge.

What is interesting in all of it now,is that it only seems to be the pro justice forum and the abduction pro posters who are the more vociferous,even cmomm is quiet,interest has waned not surprising as its gone on for so long,somebody somewhere will be busy sharpening a pencil ready to apply for continued funding in following up some important new leads come March.

What may be more significant is that the "hum of the factory" is now almost inaudible.

Ayfive wrote:

enyam wrote:

AJS wrote:Thank you Global Moderator.  I’m not posting very much but my absence from here is partly due to my loss of the link to your site – until I saw it on another site the other day. Advertising works!

I made it clear some time ago that all I have to offer now is the occasional flat assertion. No reasoned claims, no evidence and definitely no imputation of guilt against anybody.  People can choose to take them or leave them, just as they did when I wasted hours putting forth the  evidence. None of them involve or imply inside knowledge.

What is interesting in all of it now,is that it only seems to be the pro justice forum and the abduction pro posters who are the more vociferous,even cmomm is quiet,interest has waned not surprising as its gone on for so long,somebody somewhere will be busy sharpening a pencil ready to apply for continued funding in following up some important new leads come March.

What may be more significant is that the "hum of the factory" is now almost inaudible.

Does that include the white noise by some members of the cultists ?

Hello. I haven't lost interest in the case but I think that commenting - except on a relatively neutral forum like this - offers no gain but considerable loss.

Leaving aside my unpopular assertion that the case is in good hands  we also have a curious situation that has crept up on us: the Affair is now at a mirror image stage compared with 2008-2012.

Those four years, from the release of the case files to the publication of "Madeleine" were  of extraordinary and definitive success for the sceptic case. The  files themselves, the Amaral book, the  breakthrough in the Lisbon Court in 2009/10 (we owe Sky a debt for Jon de Canio), the Portuguese Appeal Court judgement, the self-revealing nature of "Madeleine" - all these and others revealed that everything that had been claimed by the parents was either a lie or had simply never existed, from A for Abduction, through R for "rogue cop" to Z-list celebrity author KM and her "I wrote this book to tell the truth".

Everything. I had never dreamed that all the evidence would be so unambiguous and can still hardly believe it to this day.

Now, it doesn't matter even if there are bent cops at the bottom of every  garden, the facts once established can never be extinguished and are beyond anyone's control. Forget bent police squads, the German state swore silence,  burnt and ground the bones of their victims to dust, razed the killing installations  and ploughed the powder  deep into the ground. It made no difference at all to the truth becoming known over the next thirty years. Facts have a life of their own; justice is a different matter.  

It is that success for our cause that guaranteed that eventually the case would be re-opened, whatever people believe about Rebekah Brooks's  "powers". The Portuguese police, it turns out,  had never closed the case and, as the court records show, went on adding to the files and then, without the temptation of  glimpsing M/S Brook's persuasive miniskirts, established a new CID squad in Porto long before Grange.

But the result, as I said, is a mirror image. All the critical areas of the case that matter to us (the sceptical public) have now been resealed since 2012 as a result of the re-investigations. We have, in fact, less to go on now than in 2007 because at least then we had the leaks and counter leaks from the PJ and the Team to suggest which way the wind was blowing. Now it's like a mummy's tomb.

How much have the dogs' indications been systematically followed up? We don't know. Have there been new forensics? Ditto. What exactly have the wireless tracks achieved? That's right.  How goes the Smithman investigation that Redwood said was a critical line? Nope.  What do the police tell us about questioning the Nine? Complete, sometimes stoic, sometimes (di Carmo) flustered,  denial & refusal. And so on.

The McCanns and their few supporters have always coped with the situation by their own refusal  - to accept, or even acknowledge, that any of the 2008-2012 revelations exist. The subsequent five years have worked 100% in their favour publically since the vacuum surrounding what is really going on has been filled with Cesspit-type theories. These are manna for McCanna, their strongest card in fact, because they are laughably easy to ridicule, let alone refute. But only in the short term, only if you believe that policemen in two countries can't read the facts as well as we can.

Meanwhile the supporters have now reached a level of bitter, at times psychopathic, abuse which contaminates those who attempt to counter them, as twitter demonstrates. Trying to engage with people  whose critical judgement is so poor that they fell  for a fairy story and can now no longer comprehend what is happening, is  a recipe for continuous toxic  hate, hate, hate. I'm told that the latter is no good for karma.  We can never win that one.

ETA, just a reminder that police squads may misbehave but the UK Crown Prosecution Service, the people who both analyse the case files and take the prosecution decisions, are career civil servants, independent in theory and in practice from the government. Ask Keir Starmer.

AJS wrote:Hello. I haven't lost interest in the case but I think that commenting - except on a relatively neutral forum like this - offers no gain but considerable loss.

Leaving aside my unpopular assertion that the case is in good hands  we also have a curious situation that has crept up on us: the Affair is now at a mirror image stage compared with 2008-2012.

Those four years, from the release of the case files to the publication of "Madeleine" were  of extraordinary and definitive success for the sceptic case. The  files themselves, the Amaral book, the  breakthrough in the Lisbon Court in 2009/10 (we owe Sky a debt for Jon de Canio), the Portuguese Appeal Court judgement, the self-revealing nature of "Madeleine" - all these and others revealed that everything that had been claimed by the parents was either a lie or had simply never existed, from A for Abduction, through R for "rogue cop" to Z-list celebrity author KM and her "I wrote this book to tell the truth".

Everything. I had never dreamed that all the evidence would be so unambiguous and can still hardly believe it to this day.

Now, it doesn't matter even if there are bent cops at the bottom of every  garden, the facts once established can never be extinguished and are beyond anyone's control. Forget bent police squads, the German state swore silence,  burnt and ground the bones of their victims to dust, razed the killing installations  and ploughed the powder  deep into the ground. It made no difference at all to the truth becoming known over the next thirty years. Facts have a life of their own; justice is a different matter.  

It is that success for our cause that guaranteed that eventually the case would be re-opened, whatever people believe about Rebekah Brooks's  "powers". The Portuguese police, it turns out,  had never closed the case and, as the court records show, went on adding to the files and then, without the temptation of  glimpsing M/S Brook's persuasive miniskirts, established a new CID squad in Porto long before Grange.

But the result, as I said, is a mirror image. All the critical areas of the case that matter to us (the sceptical public) have now been resealed since 2012 as a result of the re-investigations. We have, in fact, less to go on now than in 2007 because at least then we had the leaks and counter leaks from the PJ and the Team to suggest which way the wind was blowing. Now it's like a mummy's tomb.

How much have the dogs' indications been systematically followed up? We don't know. Have there been new forensics? Ditto. What exactly have the wireless tracks achieved? That's right.  How goes the Smithman investigation that Redwood said was a critical line? Nope.  What do the police tell us about questioning the Nine? Complete, sometimes stoic, sometimes (di Carmo) flustered,  denial & refusal. And so on.

The McCanns and their few supporters have always coped with the situation by their own refusal  - to accept, or even acknowledge, that any of the 2008-2012 revelations exist. The subsequent five years have worked 100% in their favour publically since the vacuum surrounding what is really going on has been filled with Cesspit-type theories. These are manna for McCanna, their strongest card in fact, because they are laughably easy to ridicule, let alone refute. But only in the short term, only if you believe that policemen in two countries can't read the facts as well as we can.

Meanwhile the supporters have now reached a level of bitter, at times psychopathic, abuse which contaminates those who attempt to counter them, as twitter demonstrates. Trying to engage with people  whose critical judgement is so poor that they fell  for a fairy story and can now no longer comprehend what is happening, is  a recipe for continuous toxic  hate, hate, hate. I'm told that the latter is no good for karma.  We can never win that one.

ETA, just a reminder that police squads may misbehave but the UK Crown Prosecution Service, the people who both analyse the case files and take the prosecution decisions, are career civil servants, independent in theory and in practice from the government. Ask Keir Starmer.

Thank you for that post AJS.

I agree with the bulk of your post, and whilst I do not share your enthusiasm for the police investigations, I would be more than pleased to be provced wrong.