Taking the piss that is.
Tucked on to the end of this article, and seemingly unnoticed, this below.
Meanwhile a new private investigation into Madeleine’s disappearance has begun in Portugal.
It is being run by three British former police officers: Nigel Brown, who was named Investigator of the Year after securing the rescue of a kidnapped oil company executive, Dave Carter, who worked in Northern Ireland, and Ray Cooper, who investigated war crimes in Bosnia and gang murders in Trinidad and Tobago.
This revelation I didn't see anywhere else on the net, just the one unsurprising source though; go on, have a guess.
Just something I suppose, that Paul Dacre must have picked up from his weekly audience with Saint Gerald of Rothley. Not unsurprisingly though, this little snippet did not carry an "exclusive" tag, I know such a tag is normally reserved for the World's Greatest Newspaper, but it's so unlike Dacre and the Mail not to crow a little given the chance. Maybe a bit of cop on doing the rounds.
So what are we to make then of this latest bunch? I'm not going to go there today, but the first thing that jumped out at me was, another bugger with a Northern Ireland connection.
Thinking about it a little more, the NI connection wasn't the first thing off the page. The moment I read the thing it was "Big Boys" big boys, big boys. This latest bunch, are they big boys, or are they big big boys? The only reason I ask, is that we have already had the big boys, so is it natural progression and a fair assumption that this latest lot of super crime fighters must be worthy of the latter tag?
You remember the Big Boys don't you; no? Let me refresh your memory a tad with just part of a previous post.
"These are the big boys" - Clarence Mitchell
A private detective whose company was paid up to £500,000 from publicly donated funds to find Madeleine McCann has been charged with fraud.
The McCanns had previously hired Barcelona-based detective agency Metodo 3 on a reported £50,000 a month. But the company lost credibility with the couple when its head of operations claimed he knew who had kidnapped Madeleine and hoped to have her home by Christmas.
After Halligen, the McCanns hired two former British detectives, David Edgar and Arthur Cowley. In August, Mr Edgar appealed for sightings of an Australian 'Victoria Beckham lookalike'. But a Mail on Sunday investigation revealed the detectives had failed to make the most basic of inquiries in Barcelona where the woman was seen.
The McCanns' spokesman, Clarence Mitchell, insisted the fund had not been duped. More The Mail November 2009
Here's a direct link (same as above) to the rest of the article, but if you went via this route you could treat yourself to a comment from the article that is no longer available. Written in a style I might add, that seems a tad familiar.
Now let us step back to a time fifteen months earlier and have a look at who said what.
Again from the same pretentious arsewipe, Paul Dacre's Daily McMail with quotes from that ubiquitous "McCann friend" and of course Clarence Mitchell. (Shurely shome mishtake?)
Reading what is writ, you could be forgiven if you came to the conclusion that these were an entirely different bunch of super crime fighters to those that we have just read about.
But as you read, never forget the source, with his manifestly odious personality, Clarence the Coffin Mitchell, nor the outlet for all this merde, the effect clearly reflected here, Paul Dacre's Daily Mail.
And for a change I think I shall indulge myself and offer a few highlights.
McCanns hire crack team of ex-FBI agents to find Madeleine
Kate and Gerry McCann have hired a team of crack U.S detectives to lead the hunt for their missing daughter Madeleine, it has emerged.
The unnamed US firm is said to have been offered a £500,000 six-month contract by the Find Madeleine Fun (sic) to help spearhead the search.
A friend of the McCanns said: 'The hunt for Madeleine is becoming more and more international and it was felt that a truly international firm was now needed to lead the inquiry.
"These really are the big boys. They are absolutely the best, but they are extremely secretive and cloak-and-dagger about what they do.
'Since their appointment, Metodo has very much taken a back seat and they are now concentrating primarily in Portugal and Spain and across the Straits of Gibraltar into north Africa, where they have their main contacts.
'The American agency is pretty much handling everything else.'
The secretive firm is said to employ ex-FBI, CIA and U.S special forces, according to the Daily Mirror.
The McCanns' spokesman Clarence Mitchell, said: 'Kate and Gerry made it clear from the outset they would leave no stone unturned in finding Madeleine and that means employing the very best people in any given field.
'It is correct that an international firm of investigators have been appointed.
'But I am unable to say anything at all about them because of the covert nature of their work and the need for secrecy, not only in looking for Madeleine, but also in relation to previous operations.' blah
You just couldn't make it up could you, English Journalism, as the man said: Once a whore, always a whore. (Bottom of the page.)
Are we now to assume Mister Dave, imprisoned in a hellish lair, Edgar, he of, snatched by someone who wanted a child to love, fame, is now a recipient of the long overdue order of the boot?
So what might we expect from this select set of super sleuths? I really don't know. But one thing I do know, they are going to have to keep her lit if they want to upstage all the previous clowns that have been in the McCann's employ. I have put together a small collection at the post below this.
Update. h/t Anonymous
Nigel Brown: New McCann PI Has Links To Israel, Russian Exiles and the Death of Stephen Curtis
The McCanns clearly haven't learned much when it comes to recruitment. The last man they hired that was involved in securing the safe return of an oil tycoon was Kevin Halligen, now wanted by the FBI in realtion to money laundering charges. Now they have employed former Met Officer, Nigel Brown, former owner of GSS Global who had been advising on security in Israel. More The Sargeants Inn
And when you have read it, you might join me in thinking, what an earth is going on, because somehow I just can't see this geezer looking for Madeleine. Not that he was ever going to.
"his manifestly odious personality" Borrowed from this recently featured article.
Mitchell inflames people, we think, both because of what he is - his manifestly odious personality - and, more important, the related matter of what he does. Of all the actors in this drama Mitchell is the one with the fewest excuses, the one who, above all others, chose to involve himself in the affair – and people sense it.
Clarence Mitchell is different: he sought out the opportunities offered by the shit-filled tank and chose to enter it up to his neck, finding, perhaps for the first time in his life, a place where he was comfortable and fitted in. h/t Blacksmith Bureau
