For discussion...Christian Brueckner's farmhouse

Hello! I've been away for a hell of a long time and I've completely lost track. Short on time so can't read everything.

Could you please show me to any discussion about these thoughts?:

1. In years gone by, two of the T9 were said to have visited a barn. (With the Aztec towel or otherwise?) Has it been ruled out as not to have been part of the land on latest suspect''s rented farmhouse? 

2. The description of Christian B's farmhouse says it was  above PDL on a footpath  (words of that effect.)
Did it refer to K & G's running route?

(2's enough for now!)

Anyone?

Lance De Boils wrote:Hello! I've been away for a hell of a long time and I've completely lost track. Short on time so can't read everything.

Could you please show me to any discussion about these thoughts?:

1. In years gone by, two of the T9 were said to have visited a barn. (With the Aztec towel or otherwise?) Has it been ruled out as not to have been part of the land on latest suspect''s rented farmhouse? 

2. The description of Christian B's farmhouse says it was  above PDL on a footpath  (words of that effect.)
Did it refer to K & G's running route?

(2's enough for now!)

Anyone?

Welcome back to the fold, Lance. We all appear to be crawling out of the woodwork, with these latest developments. I have been gone for a few years, too. I wasn't very good navigating the forum when I was here the last time, so I am not holding out any hope that things have improved for me.

Since this story broke, around the beginning of June?  I too, have been going over old ground and the farm has intrigued me. While snouting around in the archives of the McCann case, I came across this article. I will post the link, and you can look at it yourself. It will be interesting to know your thoughts. Was this the route that the McCanns jogged to, a few days after Madeleine "was abducted"? I, like so many other parents and grandparents, couldn't get my head around anyone running just after their child had disappeared. Normal people don't do such things. 

Opps. It would be easier to view the link if I post it: https://h42a.wordpress.com/2017/03/03/russell-obrien-in-aljezur/

Yep, they are definitely running towards the area where the farm has been identified. How many miles was it said the farm in question was from the resort?  2 miles or 4 kilometres?

Hi Both

Welcome back Lance.

Whilst Sallypelt was posting I was nicking her post from another thread.

Blood on towel may be from Madeleine

Sunday Express
By Matt Drake in Praia da Luz and James Murray
2 December 2007

THE hunt for Madeleine McCann was last night centred on a disused barn near Praia da Luz, where police found a towel possibly stained with the fouryear-old's blood.

Fibres found on the towel allegedly match fibres from the hire car rented by Maddie's parents, Kate and Gerry McCann.

Portuguese detectives discussed the breakthrough when they met police and a Crown Prosecution Service official last week in Leicester.

Today, for the first time, the Sunday Express can shed light on the new avenue police are pursuing in the hope of a breakthrough in the baffling case.

Based on fresh information from a mobile phone surveillance, police began a search of an area in the south east of the resort.

They came across a towel, with an Aztec design, by a disused barn in a remote area near Praia da Luz.

Portuguese sources say forensic scientists used a substance called luminol to look for blood deposits and found three sites on the edges of the towel.

From the sites they tested the blood deposits to see if there was a match with Madeleine McCann's DNA.

Although the samples were not good quality the scientists were able to do what is called low copy analysis which showed there was "moderate" support to suggest the deposits matched Madeleine's blood.

The results were not conclusive and are not regarded as being strong enough to be presented as evidence in any court case.

But close analysis of the towel revealed fibres which were not made of the towel material.

Portuguese police sources say there was "strong support" that the fibres found on the towel matched fibres from the boot of the car.

One possibility being considered by the Portuguese detectives was that the towel had at some point been in the boot of the Renault Scenic car, which would explain how fibres had got on it.

Meanwhile, a close friend of Kate and Gerry McCann who was holidaying with them when Madeleine vanished will be questioned by Portuguese police this week over a "mystery' phone call.

Dr Russell O'Brien, 36, has come under investigation after a team of telephone surveillance officers highlighted a mobile call made to the missing four-year-old's father more than a month after she disappeared.

Portuguese detectives are now working on the theory that a call made between Gerry McCann, 39, and Dr O'Brien is the missing link that could help them find Madeleine's body.

Investigators are focussing their inquiry on the exact whereabouts of Dr O'Brien when the call was made on June 10.

Gerry McCann said the call was made within four kilometres of the Mark Warner resort.

But technicians have now dismissed his claim after examining data records taken from specified areas near to where the child went missing.

It is understood key words aroused police suspicions.

• disused barn near Praia da Luz
  

• Fibres found on the towel allegedly match fibres from the hire car rented by Maddie's parents, Kate and Gerry McCann.
  
• Based on fresh information from a mobile phone surveillance, police began a search of an area in the south east of the resort.
  

• The fibre fragments were microscopically examined against fibres found in the boot of the Renault Scenic car hired by the McCanns 25 days after Maddie vanished.
  
• Portuguese police sources say there was "strong support" that the fibres found on the towel matched fibres from the boot of the car.
  
• Meanwhile, a close friend of Kate and Gerry McCann who was holidaying with them when Madeleine vanished will be questioned by Portuguese police this week over a "mystery' phone call.
  
• Portuguese detectives are now working on the theory that a call made between Gerry McCann, 39, and Dr O'Brien is the missing link that could help them find Madeleine's body.
  

I'm sure Ben won't mind me posting the article here as he's also come back.


Russell O’Brien in Aljezur?

March 3, 2017 Ben Salmon

With the news of human remains being found in Aljezur, I was reminded of this topic. I had previously intended to write about it, but got sidetracked with developments.
Firstly, as these remains go, my first inclination was to think that the remains may relate to the young German boy Renè Hasèe, who disappeared from an Aljezur beach in 1996. If not him then likely an adult, the remains being older. According to Google Earth there are several ruined farmhouses in the Forno do Cal area (thank you to Isabelle McFadden for helping me isolate the specific area). These buildings were all ruins in the oldest afforded images (2004).
UPDATE: The bones have been identified as ‘belonging to a woman’.
 



 
Certainly, it has not crossed my mind that they are related to Madeleine. This is because there are no solid links with Aljezur in the case whatsoever. All we have are;

• The Russell O’Brien ping on which this blog will expand
  
• An impossible (errant) ping from Fiona Payne’s phone:
  

  There follow records made at 10:49:57 and 10:50:11 on the repeater installed in the [parish] of Aljezur, municipal area of Aljezur, district of Faro.
  Given the existing records before these last [two], in Aljezur, there seems to have occurred an error in the records remitted by the operator Optimus, considering that, according to the computer program Microsoft AutoRoute 2007, Lagos is a distance, in a straight line, of about 26 km from Aljezur, and closer to 34 km by road. To cover this distance in about two and a half minutes one would have to travel at a speed of 816 km/h, which is impossible to be achieved in any terrestrial vehicle produced up to this time.
  The listing of activations of mobile phone (44)779-627-2586 end with the last record in Aljezur.
   

  Source
  
• A phone contact of Robert Murat’s who owns ruins in Aljezur (‘Paul A’) Source
  
• A ‘sighting’ in an Aljezur garden which turned out to be the child of the owners. Source
  

 
So, to Russell’s Aljezur ping. The files have this to say on the trip:

…only at 14:07:44 on 7th does one
observe a record outside that locality. That record occurs on the antenna
installed in the [parish] of Aljezur, municipal area of Aljezur, district of
Faro.
The records return to the antennae of Luz at 14:24:00.
Curiously, on this day only Russell and Matthew activate other antennae outside
Luz. The first activates the antenna referred to before, while the second
activates “Budens 1”. If on the one hand the movement of Matthew to Budens is
acceptable, then the trip of Russell to Aljezur in these first days so soon after
the disappearance is somewhat strange, it not being that, once more to the
picture of Fiona Payne on 12 July, there exists an error in the data that the
operator Optimus remitted to the Police. There is an hypothesis of him having
made that journey, there being sufficient time for him to cover the distance that separates Luz from Aljezur (68 km.) at an average [speed] of 130 km/h.
Despite there being no other records from the mobile phones of the other members
of the group outside the antennae of Luz, there exist gaps in the times [of the
records] that make it possible for one of them to have accompanied him.
Therefore, accepting that Russell was effectively in the coverage area of that
antenna, then on this date the members of the group would already have had
access to a motor vehicle.

Source
The above qualifications by the PJ assume direct transit between the two villages. That is to say, the direct route between Praia da Luz and Aljezur, which is presently (according to google maps) 35.5km each way, which is approximately 33 mins each way, assuming the speed limit. The PJ have above hypothesised that the distance could be covered if he travelled at 130km/h. It should be noted, the speed limit on motorways (which the A22 is not) is 120km/h. Trunk roads, the limit is 100km/h.
Consider also that this is an a to b to a calculation. It does not accomodate time spent in Aljezur.
Importantly, the report has specified that Aljezur PARISH was pinged.
Thus, the PJ have not included their calculations so as to say ‘this explains the ping’, they have simply included an accurate calculation on how literal transit to Aljezur and back would be possible. What we need to do, when looking deeper, is locate the requisite towers, their coverage areas, and the real distance required to ‘ping Aljezur Parish’, rather than ‘be in Aljezur’. I have done so in the following image:

 
It should also be noted that Gerry called Russell at 22:34 the same day he made this journey. This seems like an oddity given they were only a few doors away, though it is not isolated (there was a 58 second call from Russ to Gerry on the 5th, and several calls involving David Payne early on).
However if we are taking this Aljezur drive/ping as suspicious, things like this call become more important. Unfortunately Russell’s phone records are not itemised in the files, outside the 2nd-4th (also records from the start of the holiday exist in Anexo 37 but this was not released). The intimation, though, would be that either Russell was scouting the area he drove in, or was disposing of something.
Remember, though it took months to come out in any detail, Russell admits to washing sheets on the night of May 3rd (claiming his daughter had vomitted on them). The detail of this is inconsistent, as is the tale of what time he and Matt got up/came back.
By one timeline, for instance, Russ gets up with Matt just ten minutes after Jane returns from her check, with Matt and himself saying they would check on the McCann children, but both decide to check their own apartments first, despite passing the McCann apartment on the way, and despite the fact Russ’s child was only checked 10 minutes prior. Jane comments in her rogatory that on her check both her daughters were ‘quiet’, but apparently in 10 minutes she has vomitted and sheets need washing (as Russ said – they had a washing machine, ‘it wasnt a third world country’). Possible, of course, but questionable.
Russ does, however, place himself inside the McCann apartment checking on indeterminate previous night(s).

‘I listened at the MC CANN’S apartment and believe that this was around 23:00hours, on all occasions the children were ok. During the week I checked on some occasions and listened at others.’

Source
This would appear to be a retrofit, but why? Any forensic trace of him could’ve been explained away as contamination when people were going in and out after the alarm was raised. Is it possible he was washing soiled sheets from 5A? If he was in possession of an item like that, getting rid of it would be a necessary move.
Looking at the crossover coverage areas, Bensafrim is covered, as well as Odiaxere and the Barragem da  Bravura (including the main road up to it).

 
We know that later on the Arade (around 30km from Bravura) was searched, but under suspicious circumstances (many doubted the search and the odd fact that the animal bones recovered were handed to Metodo 3 rather than the PJ for identification).
Interestingly, Bravura was topically searched – on the 8th of May:

45. Given the number of days that had passed since the disappearance of Madeleine McCann it was considered appropriate to request help from the Lagos Voluntary Firemen who took part in the operations, and on this day carried out searches as the Bravura dam, situated to the north of Odeaxere, using their aquatic equipment, considering that a body that has fallen or been thrown into water tends to surface after 72 hours, this team searched all the branches of the dam using an outboard motor and found nothing suspicious.

Source
This was the day after Russell’s Aljezur ping.
In Bensafrim, an ‘Alisuper bag’ was handed in by a British lady on June 16th, containing;

…various items of clothing, namely one (01) checkered shirt, two (02) pairs of trousers and three (03) empty and torn bin bags.

And in Funchal (small village East of Luz) a bag was found (undated). Source (both)
Note that if you were to take the A22 to Aljezur, you would pass through both Funchal and Bensafrim. Could either of these bags have been deposited by Russ? While it seems unlikely he would be driving and effectively ‘littering’, the possibility remains. If, as the PJ asserted when the process was shelved, there was an obfuscation of Madeleine’s body, it makes sense that physical evidence would remain, and said evidence would need to be disposed of.
While trash would seem more logical (Gerry McCann and Michael Wright were known, for instance, to use at least 4 different refuse sites in a radius around the villa, including the bins outside cemetery), this assumes that it would not be of benefit for any evidence to be found. Evidence in an obscure rural location would actually strengthen the narrative of an abductor.
To this end I want to finish by revisiting the De Telegraaf saga. A letter to a Dutch newspaper led to a search at Arao – North of Odiaxere – on June 13th. This was barely a month after Russell pinged in the area, and was just 7 days after the McCanns were in Amsterdam. Gerry maintained contact with old colleagues at vUMC Amsterdam (Beek and Nijdveldt), especially on those dates.

This search was called off after just 3-4 hours, and it was publically dismissed by the lead detectives involved. Nevertheless there is the well known photo of an ‘Aztec rug’ being removed, and press reports circulated at the time saying that Madeleine’s dna had been found there. If nothing else, it fit the narrative.

Vestiges Collected
1 blanket in a poor state of conservation, pink on one side and orange on the other.
Observations: From indications written to a Dutch newspaper.
Signed
Irene Trovao

Source
The press reports came far too early to be taken seriously, so the truth about this blanket remains unknown to us. Despite being doctors, the findings in 5A and the Scenic prove that nothing is perfectly, clinically washed away, even by the most able. If an item was left to be found, and still held partial traces of Madeleine, it follows that someone else’s dna would likely be present too. This could perhaps, then, be another candidate for the piece of ‘stand alone evidence’ referred to by Paulo Rebelo (along with evidence of decomposition or sedation in hairs, cctv and so on).

The original article in the Express, centre pages IIRC, made reference to the fact that Gerry and Russells' mobiles were traced to a dis-used farm property and that there were wells and an old mineshaft nearby, both of which were deemed to dangerous to gain access to at the time.

Jumping back in before I finish reading: the farmhouse CB rented had an English owner. Do we know their identity (if potentially relevant?

Sorry, no idea.

Does anyone remember reading about a man and a woman in a vehicle at the roadside at night as if they was getting rid of something over a fence/hedge?  Did the woman resemble Kate the witness said? Where was this supposed to have happened.

sammyc wrote:Does anyone remember reading about a man and a woman in a vehicle at the roadside at night as if they was getting rid of something over a fence/hedge?  Did the woman resemble Kate the witness said? Where was this supposed to have happened.

This rings a bell, very vaguely though.  Was it near the marina?

Are you sure it wasn't Michaela Walczuch?

There was an article about this in the Olive Press, TBH I would ignore it, that newspaper is only good for wrapping your fish and chips in.

Three location photos for the villa/farmhouse just outside PdL, brought over from the 'new evidence' thread as requested.

The villa/farmhouse is just below the pink dot in the middle of the one below.

It's on the back of the hillside they used to run up, but the other side of the golf course, so I think the answer is 'not really'. I'll pull another one off which will show the obelisk to put it all into context.





Baptista supermarket with OC pool just above it is the blue dot, bottom left. The obelisk at the top of the hill is the "Marco Geodesico, blue dot bottom right. The villa/farmhouse is just below and to the left of the pink 'Apartments to Rent', top right.

This photo shows clearly, how close the farm is to PdL

Could someone cleverer than me (with a few spare minutes, show on a pretty clear map, K & G's running path up the hill, then how someone on that route could potentially run further to the farmhouse? I'm just curious.

The four questions I posed further up, would be potentially interesting. What's the property's actual address?

sharonl wrote:

sammyc wrote:Does anyone remember reading about a man and a woman in a vehicle at the roadside at night as if they was getting rid of something over a fence/hedge?  Did the woman resemble Kate the witness said? Where was this supposed to have happened.

This rings a bell, very vaguely though.  Was it near the marina?

Are you sure it wasn't Michaela Walczuch?  

There was an article about this in the Olive Press, TBH I would ignore it, that newspaper is only good for wrapping your fish and chips in.

Iirc, someone drove passes an "arguing' couple on the road to the marina. Then they ducked off into a side street or alleyway. Not sure of my memory here.

Trying to summarise my 4 questions. I'm on and off radar. 

How far have we got? 

1. Is the dilapidated barn, the same as visited by 2 of T9 and/or the scientific persons on the land by CB's farmhouse?

2.  Can the farmhouse be reached from up on the hill that K & G ran up frequently? 

3. Who was the Brit owner of the farmhouse?

4. While I'm at it - The farmhouse has yellow window and door frames. To me they look very familiar but I'm probably mistaken.

Do we know whether there is an old mineshaft near this farmhouse?

The easiest way of concealing anything is in a soakaway drainage system. 

Do golf courses gave those?

https://joana-morais.blogspot.com/2007/12/missing-bag-belonging-to-maddies-father.html

http://www.vertidrain.org/vertical-drainage/golf-course-drainage.htm

Liz Eagles wrote:The easiest way of concealing anything is in a soakaway drainage system. 

Do golf courses gave those?

They have lakes and ponds.  I think one of the major golf courses had a huge drop into the sea below, it has been mentioned a lot on the forum, I can't remember any more than that off the top of my head.

I am not speaking of bunker drainage. I am speaking about soakaway drainage/sewage system (I had one) which is a lot larger, comes with an inspection chamber, and is generally used in areas that are not connected to main drainage.

sammyc wrote:Does anyone remember reading about a man and a woman in a vehicle at the roadside at night as if they was getting rid of something over a fence/hedge?  Did the woman resemble Kate the witness said? Where was this supposed to have happened.

Yes!!! I remember that witness statement. The person giving the statement actually referred the similarity to that of a famous women and I can't think of who it was she said....but I do remember googling the name and was shocked to see why it could well have been Kate McCann. So alike!

I'm struggling with so much here.

This is all guesswork and what-ifs.

This is a bunch of intelligent people. Before the "main event" occurred- their phones' pings might be right. But afterwards, their phones would be where they wanted the police and others think they were. So I'd trust nothing after. Opinion.