Someone posted:
(More in an edit).I've never heard that anyone has ever accused McCann of murder.
Mark Harrison wrote this:
Making plain, I think that he was instructed, by Amaral's boss, at the time (the mow late Encarnadcadio) to investigate that Madeleine had been murdered.This report considers solely the possibility that Madeleine McCann has been murdered and her body is concealed within the areas previously searched by Police in Zone 1 around Praia Da Luz. Other scenarios or possibilities may on request be considered and be subject of a further report.
Harrison even offered to consider other possibilities or scenarios (than murder!) but strictly on request, clearly indicating that he investigated strictly what he was told to investigate.
Indeed, if Harrison's own, tentative, conclusion that Madeleine's remains were thrown into the sea turns out right, Madeleine was murdered.
Sceptics get hot under the collar about this for two reasons.
First, Amaral either lied in an interview to a Spanish magazine that (sic) we talked about death by others, not murder, or simply didn't understand the nature of the investigation he (nominally) 'led'.
Second, the sceptics are keen to discredit Kate's perfectly truthful account in her book about the 'deal', put to her and Gerry; if Kate admits to finding and concealing 'a body', she will get a few years, and Gerry will be let off scot-free; OR the pair will face murder charges.
Of course, should Harrison's (tentative) conclusion that IF Madeleine is dead, her remains were thrown into the sea turn out right, the crime is murder.
ETA
A third reason sceptics get hot under the collar is that Amaral falsely and libellously, both of Harrison and the McCanns, depict Harrison as the person who turned the whole investigation into one aimed directly AT the McCanns as prime suspects in their daughter's disappearance.
Mark Harrison did no such thing.
From The book of many lies Chapter 16
Harrison did consult data bases, but only to rule out his own, hypthetical, musings that rocks on the beach might have been used to conceal the body of a small child.After a week of intense work, Harrison presents the results of his study to my coordinating group. Even if we were expecting it, his conclusions confirm our worst fears. The most plausible scenario is the following: there is no doubt that Madeleine is dead, and her body is hidden somewhere in the area around Praia da Luz. He praises the quality of the work carried out by the Portuguese authorities in trying to find the little girl alive. According to him, the time has come to redirect the searches in order to find, this time, a body hidden in the surrounding area.
AMAZING STATISTICS
Great Britain has at its disposal the world's biggest data bank on homicide of children under five years old. Since 1960, the count is 1528. Harrison is well acquainted with its contents. He often draws information from there which helps him to resolve similar cases. Valuable information can be found there on on various criminal modus operandi, places where bodies are hidden, techniques used to get rid of a body. He relates that on one occasion, thanks to the data, he was able to deduce the maximum distance a body might be found in relation to where the crime had been committed.
The figures quoted in the report he hands over give us the shivers. The crimes, including those of a sexual nature, are committed by the parents in 84% of cases; 96% are perpetrated by friends and relatives. In only 4% of them is the murderer or abductor a total stranger to the victim. In this roundabout way, Mark Harrison points out that the guilty party may be a person close to Madeleine, and even her own parents. From now on, we have to explore this track, especially as the others have proved fruitless.
Harrison also suggests that we use the skills of two totally remarkable dogs: the first an EVRD (Enhanced Victim Recovery Dog), achieves outstanding performance in the detection of human cadaver odour; the second, a CSI dog (Crime Scene Investigation) is capable of smelling the tiniest trace of blood, knowing how to recognise its human origin. To convince us of their capability and the extraordinary work carried out by these very special detectives in the course of over 200 investigations, he screens a video for us, showing their training and their intervention on the ground.
What Mark Harrison said about data bases
Homicide Disposal Datasets
A limited search has been conducted of datasets that contain body disposal
data in homicide cases (CATCHEM, SCAS, FBI). Although this search was
limited due to the time constraints placed on this reports delivery an inference
can be gained from both the data sets and the authors own case work
experience. I have also consulted with NPIA and FBI colleagues to benefit
from their experiences.
The conclusion inferred is that beach burial is extremely rare. This should not
surprise us as to dig on a beach is a high risk activity requiring expending time
and energy when a more 'least effort" disposal is readily available, that is
directly into the sea. Of those limited cases that were found to be a beach
disposal the overwhelming majority were surface depositions with only one
recorded concealment using rocks on top of a 2 year old child (CATCHEM
Database)