Enemies of Reason Poundshop potshots at the media moral maze.

It’s the Maddie hokey-cokey II

Metodo 3, the pisspoor detective agency who said Madeleine McCann would be back home by Christmas, are convinced that there's still legs in their Dave Hill/George Harrison lookalike sketch of a 'creepy man' seen in Praia de Luz.

I mentioned yesterday that the real police had already ruled out one man believed to be the suspect, but I was surprised that Clarence Mitchell, Metodo 3 and the gang hadn't thought that a positive step.

Seems they're happy to smear someone else for the 'kidnapping' now - a 'drifter'. Look at the following sentences from today's Hate Mail.

Joaquim Agostinho was seen in Altura last week after two British tourists complained they had been followed by a prowler who looked "identical" to a sketch of the alleged kidnapper.

They said the prowler had also targeted children.

One of the most important reasons why the Mail is a disgusting sewer-pipe of shit journalism is the way in which it writes things which are completely misleading on first glance but, if you read them again, are just about on the ragged edge of being legally all right. (Not that I imagine they think this 'drifter' would have the time to write a stern letter to the PCC or start a libel action anyway, but still.)

You can't help but read that and think the man has been targeting children, but it's written in such a clever way that it makes you think that without actually saying it. I imagine they get taught how to do this at Daily Mail school - how to imply one thing without actually saying it, so you can't get done for it afterwards.

And besides, is it actually true anyway? Let's have a look.

Officers were called to the resort, near Portugal's open border with Spain, after British tourists complained a man was following them and apparently targeting children.

Classic Daily Mail - had to get in a dig about the 'open' border, didn't they? They couldn't fucking resist it! So British tourists had complained a man was following them and 'apparently' targeting children. And are these 'real' officers or Metodo 3 pretend police? It's very easy to get confused in these Maddie stories, isn't it? And it's not a confusion that the Mail hacks like to clear up, either.

But:

Two women told their tour operator the man who followed them was "identical" to the McCann sketch. A third British woman said she saw the same man talking to two children on the beach in the quiet family resort and said one boy seemed upset. Witness Pauline Douglas-73, of Manchester, said she did not believe the man who followed her was Mr Agostinho.

Q1. Was the man who followed these tourists first two tourists Agostinho?

"Oh, can't be bothered with asking that question, it might blow the story."

The only 'witness' we have named doesn't even think it was him anyway. But that's quickly glossed over. Better not have too many quotes from her because that'll make it clear that this whole concoction is yet more bullshit to take attention away from the McCanns and put new 'suspects' into the public domain.

A source close to Metodo 3, the McCanns private detectives, said: "We are going to be talking to this man as a priority, to establish if he is the man in question, who Mrs Cooper saw."

Oh are you. Then why the fuck haven't you? Because this isn't about finding the truth; this is about flogging a few red-top papers. This story has come from Brits in Portugal who've phoned the number I mentioned back in 'Face of a Monster' and not got through to the police, but some bloody News of the World hack instead. Who, instead of passing on this urgent new lead to the real police, has got onto Metodo 3 and done a hatchet-job on some poor tramp bastard who, as far as I understand it (because you can bet your life they'd have mentioned it if he had), has never committed a crime in his life.

And here's the biggest irony of the lot:

The former cocklepicker, 42, who ekes out a living delivering newspapers, said: "I did not kill Madeleine and I've never been to Praia da Luz."

Ekes out a living - delivering newspapers. The same lies and shit that have smeared his name for a week, just to flog a few more copies of the News of the Screws and Daily Mail.

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Related posts:

1. The Maddie hokey-cokey
2. Maddie: The patsy
3. When will this fucking Maddie madness ever end?