GERRY MCCANN AND FIONA PAYNE 4 MAY 2007 ACCURATE TRANSLATIONS BY INES ON 3aS

Processos Vol IPages 35 – 39Witness StatementGerald Patrick McCannDate: 2007/05/04Time 11.15He comes to the process as a participant and offended party, as the girl’s father. Being of British nationality he does not speak Portuguese and is assisted by the interpreter Natália de Almeida.When asked he says that he had been in Portugal previously in 1994, staying in an apartment near to Albufeira. This is the first time he has returned to Portugal.His desire to know Portugal in 1994 was due to the fact of playing golf, as our country is known for the excellent conditions for practising this sport. On this occasion, the trip was proposed by one of his friends who accompanied him, David Payne, who upon searching in Internet, made a reservation at the OC, P da L, Lagos, for the witness, his wife and the rest of the group, a total of nine adults and 8 children, including his daughter Madeleine, this group consists of people he has known for 5 or 6 years.In this way they travelled in two separate groups, one of the groups being the witness, his wife Kate and three children and other group consisting of David with his wife, mother in law and two children. The witness left from the local airport (Leicestershire) and the other group left from London and consisted of four adults and three children.The meeting point was in Portugal, at the OC, where his group arrived at about 14.30 on 28th April 2007, arriving from Faro airport in a small minibus provided by the airport services. The other group also arrived on the same day at about 13.00, also by means of a minibus.After checking in, the witness and his family were accommodated in apartment G5 A, the family nucleus consisting of the witness, his wife Kate, his daughter Madeleine and a couple of twins aged two, Sean and Amelie. The apartment consisted of two beds in one bedroom, another two beds in another bedroom and two cots provided by the resort, as well as a WC and kitchen.The witness and his wife slept in one of the bedrooms and the three children in the other, the twins in the cots and Madeleine in a bed, leaving the remaining bed empty.Between the 28th April, the day they arrived and the time the disappearance was discovered, he says that nothing unusual happened, only referring to an episode on the morning of the 3rd May, when Madeleine asked the witness the reason why they had not gone to her room when the twins were crying. As he did not hear anything, the witness did not go to the bedroom, however he finds his daughter’s comment to be strange, maybe because it was the first time that she had made it.As regards routines, he says that on Sunday they had breakfast between 07.30 and 08.30 at the OC Bar at a few metres distance from the apartment. During the following days, because of the fact that the bar was quite far away, they began to buy food at a supermarket situated in the same street as the apartment, he cannot remember the name of the supermarket and they would have breakfast in the apartment. After breakfast the children would stay in the resort crèche, called the Kid Club, doing various activities such as painting and collage, etc, until about 12.30, they were always supervised by various members of staff, in a ratio of one member of staff to every three children. At this time – 12.30 – the parents would collect the children and have lunch in the apartment, which had a kitchen. When lunch was finished, at about 13.30, the children would stay at the Club pool, supervised by the parents, for about 45 minutes, where they would relax and put on sun screen, etc. Afterwards, they would take the children back to the Kid Club until about 17.00, when the children would have dinner at the bar, under the attentive eye of their parents. After dinner at 17.00, they would bath the children and get them ready for the night and play with them for a few moments in the recreation area near the tennis courts, always supervised by the parents. At about 19.30 – 20.00 the children were put to bed until the following morning when the routine described would begin.Whilst the children were at the Kids Club, the witness would play tennis with his wife, go for walks, read and go jogging.Yesterday, after their daily routine, Madeleine and the twins went to their bedroom and were placed in their respective beds and their blankets were placed, at about 19.30. The witness and his wife, between this time and 20.30 stayed in the apartment relaxing and drinking a glass of wine. After 20.30, the witness and his wife, after looking at the children, went to the Tapas Bar, about 50 metres away, where they had dinner. As usual, every half hour and as the restaurant was near, the witness or his wife, would check whether the children were all right. In this way, at about 21.05 the witness came to the Club, entered the room using his respective key, the door being locked, went to his children’s bedroom and checked that the twins were fine, as was Madeleine. He them went to the WC where he remained for a few moments, left, and bumped into a person he had played tennis with and who had a child’s push chair, he was also British, he had a short conversation with him, before immediately returning to the restaurant. At about 21.30 his friend Matt (member of the group) went to the apartment, where his children were and on his way went to the witness’s apartment, entering by means of a glass sliding door that was always unlocked and was located laterally to the building. He entered the bedroom, he observed the twins and he does not remember whether Madeleine was there as everything was calm, the shutters were closed and the door to the bedroom was ajar as usual. Matt immediately returned to the restaurant.At about 22.00 it was his wife Kate who went to check on the children. She entered the apartment by the door using the key and saw immediately that the door to the children’s bedroom was completely open, the window was also open, the blinds were raised and the curtains were drawn open.The side door leading to the living room was closed, which as previously stated, was never left locked. Faced with this troubling situation, Kate checked that the twins were in their beds, unlike Madeleine, who had disappeared. After checking the apartment thoroughly, his wife, quite shocked and upset, went to the restaurant, alerting the witness and the others about the disappearance. Immediately the group rapidly went to the club, searched all the installations, swimming pool, tennis courts, etc. and the apartment, with the help of staff at the same time as contacting the authorities who would arrive later.It is emphasised that one of the members of the group, Jane, at about 21.10 – 21.15 when she was going to her apartment to check on her children, when looking behind, at a distance of about 50 metres, on the road leading to the club, she saw an individual carrying a child, wearing pyjamas, Jane will be able to clarify this situation.With regard to Madeleine, he describes her as being of Caucasian race, with quite white skin, four years old (12-05-2003), almost 90 cm in height. She has a slim face, dark blond hair which is straight and shoulder length. Her left eye is blue and green and her right eye is green with a brown mark in the pupil. She has a small brown birthmark on the knee of her right leg, he does not remember any others. She did not have any scars. At the time of her disappearance she was wearing pyjamas, the trousers were white with a floral pattern, and the short-sleeved top was predominantly pink and there was a blue and white figure on the front, with the inscription “Eeyore”.As regards personality, the child was extrovert, very active, talkative, alert with an easy relationship with other children. He also says that she would never go with a stranger.He has no suspects to point out, he cannot find any motive for such an act, as neither he nor his wife has any enemies. He adds that his daughter is not suffering from any illness or take any medication.When asked, he says that he authorises a reading of the constant data of his mobile phone nº 00447786986188.Apart from the Kid Club and the apartment they only went to the beach with Madeleine and the other children once and for a short time as the weather conditions were unstable. At the beach they just ate an ice cream and then returned to the apartment. In addition to what he has described, on the Wednesday or Thursday, Madeleine and the other children went sailing along the beach, five minutes away from the Club, for an hour, organised by the resort, an activity that has an available chart. The supervision and organisation of this activity is the responsibility of the Club, which is why neither the witness nor his wife were present.He never saw any strange behaviour during these days not anything to be suspicious of.When he was shown a list of the Club’s guests he says he only recognises the names of the members of the group.He never detected that any object had disappeared.He has no other elements to bring to the process, desiring the appropriate criminal procedure and (the person) caught for the act he was a victim of.No more is said. Reads, ratifies, signs.(Note: several mentions are made to “club” in the text, in some cases I understand them to mean “apartment” but have left them as described in PT text)._________________ines753@etb.net.co

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Ines
Post subject: Re: 4th May Statements translated from PT files
Posted: Mon Jul 13, 2009 11:30 pm
On ParoleJoined: Fri Mar 07, 2008 8:09 pmPosts: 1097
Processos Vol IPages 69 – 72Witness StatementFiona Elaine PayneDate: 2007.05.04Time: 19H20She comes to the process as a witness, and as part of the group that travelled to Portugal with the parents of Madeleine. She is married to David, who also travelled to Portugal.She has known the girl’s parents, Gerard (sic) and Kate, for about seven years. She got to know them through Kate when they worked together. It was also at this time that she got to know her [Kate’s] husband in social settings. She knows that the couple has three children, twins who are two years of age and Madeleine, who was almost four years old. The witness has two children, of the female sex, who are two and one years old respectively. The idea of travelling to Portugal came from her husband David who had already been to Portugal about 11 years ago, before she got to know him.She arrived in Portugal on the 28th April, at around 12H00, leaving from Leicestershire, and arriving at Faro and then on to Praia da Luz. From Faro, she arrived at the Ocean Club via mini bus taken from the airport. After check-in she was lodged in apartment G5H with her family (husband, mother and two daughters).As regards the next days, she says that in the morning, after breakfast, which the family would eat in the club bar around 08H15/08H30 they would then put their children in the club crèche, in different areas. During this time, the witness and her husband would go swimming and practice other sports on the beach, which was around 8 minutes distance on foot. Around 12H30/13H00 they would go to get the children from the crèche and would have lunch in the apartment, at times with other children. Immediately afterwards her children would take a nap, whilst the witness and her husband stayed in the apartment. Around 15H30/16H00 the children would wake up from their nap and all of them would head towards the pool zone or the tennis court where they would stay until around 18H00/19H00. They would then return to the apartment, would bathe the children, put them to sleep and would go and meet with the rest of the group, to have dinner. All the adults would meet in the Tapas restaurant located close to the club. During dinner, as they were in a possession of a “baby monitor”, they did not go to the apartment to check on their children and would only do so if they heard any strange noises or crying. On the day before yesterday, they slightly altered their routine—they went to the beach with the children and her mother Dianne. They arrived there around 15H45 and left at 18H15, and headed towards the tennis court until about 19H00. Immediately afterwards, the witness headed towards the apartment with her children, and her mother. Ten minutes later her husband David appeared. In the apartment her mother, helped by her husband David, bathed the children whilst the witness went jogging on the beach until around 20H00. Afterwards, she returned to the apartment and got ready. She left around 20H45, accompanied by David and her mother, in order to meet the rest of the group in the Tapas restaurant.During dinner, amongst other friends present was the McCann couple—Madeleine’s parents. When questioned she says that she did not go to the club, neither did her husband, to check on the children as she possessed a baby monitor, as previously mentioned. However, she states that Gerald and Kate went with regularity, as did the other couples to ensure that their children were well. On one of these occasions, upon returning, Kate, very scared and nervous, in a panic, told them in the restaurant that Madeleine had gone missing, screaming and frightened. Immediately, they organised search groups, either in the apartment thinking that she could be hidden, or outside, which resulted in nothing, even with the help of the employees.Due to Kate’s highly anxious state, she decided to stay with her, giving her all support she needed. She was never in Madeleine’s family apartment.She knew Madeleine well and describes her as very intelligent and she would not go with stranger without screaming or protesting unless she was very tired or sleeping.As regards the episode with Jane—she [Jane] only told her that she had seen an individual with a child in his arms, not knowing that it was Madeleine.During this holiday period she never noticed anything strange or relevant to the facts in question. She has no other elements to offer the investigation.No more was said.Reads, ratifies, signs.