Jack Armstrong: Rapist or Just a Guy who "Got Lucky"?

I am about to get another round of angry women bashing me for what I am about to say. And I am willing to stick my neck out again because I am so sick and tired of this injustice happening over and over again; men being accused of rape without evidence of any such thing happening. Again, I remind you, I am not saying women are never date raped, that there aren't quite a few men committing this criminal act; I am simply saying, let's stop condemning men without proof. A charge of rape can destroy a man's life just as an actual rape can destroy a woman's, maybe even more so because while she is seen forever as a victim, he is seen forever as a psychopathic criminal sex predator.

Jack Armstrong's name is now mud. He has had the label "rapist" attached to his name in hundreds of news articles like this one from the Los Angeles Times. Essentially, the story says that in 2010, Armstrong met the woman outside of a Beverly Hills bar, they went in and he bought her a few beers, and next thing she knew, she woke up in a hotel room with her pants off and with soreness in her private parts. She felt nauseous.

Based on her story, it is being insinuated that Armstrong roofied the woman's beer and from that moment on, she was unconscious on her feet (and off of it) and he raped her while she was dead to the world.

 Only, if you read this far better article from CBS Los Angeles, maybe not:

Police say he used his celebrity status to attract his victim.
“He met the victim at a bar in West Hollywood,” Beverly Hills police Sgt. Max Subin said. Armstrong took the victim to a hotel and she reported the rape the next day, March 5, 2010, he said.
The attack could have been drug-induced, Subin said.
“She woke up, didn’t feel right and realized she was assaulted,” he said.

So, there is no proof of any date rape drug being used. Either she never got tested for it or the test came back negative. Just because the woman didn't feel right when she woke up, doesn't mean she was given GHB or Rohypnol  - who feels great in the morning after they drank excessively the night before?  We don't know what alcohol she consumed before she had the three beers nor do we know if she also had drugs in her system that she put there her herself.

So, if no rape drug was used, then what do we have? If the woman was so drunk she didn't know Armstrong was having sex with her, maybe she was so drunk she didn't remember she had sex with him! If she can be so drunk not to remember what she was doing since she was in the bar (and obviously walked to the car and into the hotel room), why should we believe she couldn't have had consensual sex in that same state with Armstrong being totally unaware that she was unconscious on her feet? For that matter, if the woman can be so drunk as to not know what she is physically doing, why can't Armstrong be equally as drunk and unknowledgeable? And, while we are at it, how do we know she herself didn't rape Armstrong while he was flat on his back unconscious? It can happen. Please read this study about the repeated claims women make about being roofied not  being proven to be true, that most of the time, binge drinking is really behind the condition of women who can't remember what happened the evening they went out partying. Men do ply women with alcohol because they know it makes them stupid and willing to have sex with them (hence, that Joe Nichols' country song about tequila making her clothes fall off).

To make matters worse, now the police are reaching out to the other women who might have been raped by this rich guy. Don't you think a few psycho women might be motivated to get attention and money from  making such claims?

What I see here is an irresponsible police department and irresponsible media. Unless they actually have a confession from Armstrong, there would appear to be zero evidence to convict this man, but the damage will have already been done to him. I don't know this guy; he may be a sweetie or a total tool. He might brag about his wealth and celebrity status to get women to sleep with him (which is no a crime as the police seem to suggest) or women might throw themselves at him because they love money and fame. What I do know is that if the police don't have proof that Jack Armstrong put a date rape drug in this woman's beer which it appears they do not, all we have is a woman who drank too much, went willingly with a guy to his hotel room, and had buyer's remorse in the morning or saw an opportunity to get attention by filing a false police report. That is NOT rape and it is an insult to women who have been raped to say it is and it is wrong to charge men with rape just because they "got lucky" and after the fact, their luck changed.

PS. All "Shame on you, Pat Brown, for blaming the victim!" comments will be removed for being obtuse and not reading my blog properly. I am not blaming true victims of rape for the crime of rape. The rapist is 100% responsible for the crime. However, in terms of date rape, there are more responsible behaviors women can make that will keep them out of the hands of such criminals, like not getting trash drunk and going to hotel rooms with strangers because you think he wants to just have tea and explore your brilliant mind.

Criminal Profiler Pat Brown

November 28, 2013

               

How to Save your Daughter's Life by Pat Brown at Amazon or Barnes and Noble and bookstores near you.

Included in this book, a ton of information about

The Early Years

Partying, Drinking, Drugging, Casual Sex (Hooking Up), and Gangs

Date Rape

The Dangers of Social Networking and the Internet

Risky Relationships

Stalkers

Child Predators, Serial Rapists, and Serial Killers

The Sex Trade and Sex Trafficking

Profile of the Publishing and Publicity Industry for Aspiring Authors

My new book is out; The Truth about Book Publishing and Book Publicity. It is short, not-so-sweet, and just $2.99 on Amazon. Some who read it may wonder why I let so many cats-out-of-the-bag. Are not some of my admissions of not so successful book sales something I should keep secret to keep up appearances? They have a point which is exactly why I wrote this book. So many authors and television and radio people will pretend they are making big bucks, getting huge deals, being ever so popular....when, in reality, they are floundering and struggling, trying to make ends meet. But they don't want anyone to know that because they have to keep up their image; they hope that just around the corner is the offer they have been waiting for. If nothing else, they want to keep their egos well-supported by having their fans think they are always at the top of their game.

Sadly, all this pretense keeps people from knowing what they should do themselves if they want to be an author, sell their books, get into television or radio. They fall for scams and promotional tools that cost them lots of money, all with the hope that they will then "make it big." They put out a lot of cash and energy and often get no where at all. They wonder what they are doing wrong when others clearly have been so successful doing the same things or so they think. What they don't realize is that in some fields, almost no one makes out well and those who do have rather won the lottery. I am not saying those who are very successful authors and television and radio personalities haven't worked hard; they likely have unless they got some freaky break. I am not saying they are not talented. What I am saying is that there is a multitude of equally talented, hardworking people who should never think of quitting their day job.

I, myself, have wasted a lot of time, money, and hours myself trying to promote my work. I do not regret all of my efforts (I have still achieved a lot in my field and have had a wonderful life in the process) but I do regret a good many of them! If I knew then, what I know now.....hence, the reason I wrote this book.

If you are a writer who would like to sell books, get a publisher or a publicist, or if you are already an author who is wondering why your books aren't doing well, or if you are someone who is just really curious about how the whole industry works and what I went through, read the book. You will learn a lot about an publishing and publicity which is kept well under wraps and you will have a few laughs along the way... at my expense.... but that is okay with me.

Criminal Profiler Pat Brown

November 26, 2012

Available now at Amazon for $2.99!

Finally, a self-help book for aspiring authors that will save them money rather than scam them out of it. Criminal Profiler Pat Brown, author of seven books, takes writers on a sometimes funny, often surprising, but always honest journey through the world of publishing books, both traditional and self-published, and the confusing world of literary agents and book publicists. Always straightforward and blunt, this no-bull book is the kind of information writers need to navigate through the tricky waters of getting one's book published and publicized, what to do and what not to do and, most of all, how not to lose your mind, money, and self-worth in the process.

Norma Esparza: Long Suffering Victim or Master Manipulator?

One has to wonder why the prosecution is so bent on taking an 18-year-old cold  case to court, accusing a 39-year-old married psychology professor with a darling four-year-old daughter of being involved in a gruesome killing of a young man, not by her hand, but by her boyfriend after she told him that she had been raped by the murder victim. What is it that the media is not telling us that the police have gotten from her interviews and the other four involved in the crime that make them feel the need to pursue her conviction after almost two decades? What do that have that would be worth taking this woman in front of a jury that will likely feel sorry for her?

For The Daily Mail is this story of what the prosecution says happened:

Prosecutors are calling the murder of Gonzalo Ramirez a 'revenge killing.'
They allege that on 15 April, 1995, a 20-year-old Esparza was at a bar with a gourp of friends, including former boyfriend Gianni Van, when she pointed out Ramirez, claiming he had raped her in her dorm room at Pomona College a few months earlier.
According to the prosecution, Esparza, Van, Kody Tran, Diane Tran and Shannon Gries followed Ramirez when he left the bar in the early hours of the following morning.


They intentionally rear-ended his vehicle, say prosecutors, forcing him to get out of the car to inspect the damage.
He was then kidnapped. His body was found on the side of Sand Canyon Road in Santa Ana hours later.
Esparza says she was forced by the aggressive Van to identify Ramirez and then coerced to keep the secret of his murder for almost two decades.
Diane Tran, Shannon Gries and Gianni Van have also been charged. All have pleaded not guilty.
Kody Tran died after shooting himself in a  standoff with police last year.
According to the Los Angeles Times, Esparza says she met Ramirez in a Santa Ana nightclub. The next morning he asked her to breakfast and offered to drive her and some friends back to Pomona College.

Once in her dorm room, he raped Esparza, who went to a school nurse and was given the morning-after pill.

She was too ashamed to report the rape to authorities and the nurse did not advise her to do so.
'I don't think I was thinking at that time,' she said. 'I felt ashamed. I felt guilty. I didn't want to come forward because I didn't want my family to know.'
Julie Ann Rojas, who was Gries then-girlfriend, testified that she was with Van and Esparza the night Ramirez died.
She said Van, Gries and Kody Tran attacked Ramirez while she and Esparza went to a bar. After about an hour Roja and Esparza went to the transmission shop owned by Kody Tran where Esparza said she saw Ramirez tied and hanging from the ceiling.

After Ramirez's death, Esparza began dating Van again and the two were married.
Esparza's current husband Jorge R. Mancillas told reporters that Esparza was pressured into marrying Van so that she would not be bound to testify against him.

Cold case: When investigators learned Esparza and Van were divorced, they re-opened the murder case of Gonzalo Ramirez

He said that his wife was told that Ramirez was 'roughed up' and was unaware of the murder until weeks later when she was questioned by police.
Esparza, who says she suffered years of sexual abuse by her father as a child, said at a news conference Wednesday that she lived in fear of Van for years after the attack.

'All I knew is that I wanted to survive,' she said.
'All I knew was that these people were dangerous and I just needed to stay quiet and withdraw and come out of that night alive.'

Okay, this is a terribly sad story, but is it believable? Maybe, but is maybe good enough?

What I see here is a woman who indeed seems to make choices which always go in the wrong direction. Is she just foolish, suffering from PTSD, or does she have a narcissistic personality disorder, possibly Munchausen's? Does she cower before men or does she manipulate them with her sob stories and push them into proving their love for her? Or was this whole crime about something else and she and her boyfriend just made up that story about the rape to have a sympathetic motive?

The problem I find with her story is that she alleges this and that without proof of these accusations being true. Her behaviors, always accusing others for her plight and her statement as to why she refused the pleas agreement, that she was not responsible for what happened is concerning to me. 

She is certainly responsible for what happened. She went drinking at a bar and chose to bring a man back to her dorm room. If he raped her, I would say this is the only choice she didn't make. She claims she went to the nurse the next day to get the morning-after-pill but the nurse did not advise her to go to the police. So she chose not to file charges.

She claims her boyfriend forced her to point out the guy who raped her - she clearly chose to tell him her story and she chose to identify the man to her boyfriend, but not the police. Then her boyfriend and a bunch of other kidnapped and brutally kill this man (all of them were willing to do this over her claim she was date raped?) and she viewed the man hanging and beaten but she chose not to go to the police with that crime either.   Then she chooses to date the killer and she chooses to marry him because, she claims, she was scared of him and wanted to be "safe" from retaliation (he supposedly didn't want her to testify against him). Marrying a violent killer doesn't seem like a safe idea to me. Especially since she claims she was sexually abused by her father growing up, so home is not really a very safe place to be with a violent and controlling man.

I know some will respond that all of Esparza's behaviors are very possible for a woman who grew up abused, that she relates differently to situations than someone who has never suffered from PTSD or lifelong fear of abusive men. I, on the other hand, find it a bit hard to swallow that Norma Esparza wasn't more culpable in this crime and I believe that is why the prosecution is so doggedly pursing her to court. I think there is something else behind the murder of this man, something that will will likely never learn considering the media is slandering him right and left calling him a rapist when there is not a shred of proof he raped Esparza. Maybe the whole thing was about drugs; maybe he spurned Esparza and she told a story to her new boyfriend to pay him back. I don't know. What I do know is she has a lot of finger pointing going on and she holds herself not at all responsible for any of her own actions like bringing home a strange man to her dorm room (who knows what happened after that, whether they had consensual sex or it was a rape), not reporting the rape to authorities to  get justice and prevent him from raping other women, hooking up with a violent boyfriend, telling him about the alleged rape and pointing out the alleged rapist/victim to him when she knew that doing so might escalate some violent action from said boyfriend, not going to the police, obviously lying to the police, marrying the killer, continuing to not go to the police for almost two decades, and now she doesn't think she has the slightest responsibility for the horrific death of this young man. Now, maybe if he did rape her, she thinks he got what he deserved, but she is still responsible in some fashion for the murder of this man, regardless of the reason he was tortured and killed.

It will be interesting to see what will come out at trial. I think she should have taken the plea deal of three years which I think was a heck of a nice offer from the prosecutors for all the trouble she has caused.

Criminal Profiler Pat Brown
11/22/2013

Fantastical Theories and the Disappearance of Madeleine McCann

One of the interesting occurrences after a mystery goes so long unsolved is the cropping up of many fantastical theories about what might have happened, in this case, what might have happened to Madeleine McCann. Complicated theories usually result from two issues: one, the disbelief that the mystery could still be unsolved if it weren't some diabolical plan and two, some pieces of evidence are missing, unexplained, or confusing which leads people to create scenarios based on supposition. I want to say that fantastical theories have cropped up on both sides of the McCann divide and have led to a lot of out-there discussion and sometimes unnecessary suspects. The theories have been promoted by the public, the media, professionals of varying sorts, and the police. Mind you, I am not saying you should not consider these theories, even if slightly farfetched because doing so could inspire other avenues of investigation which have not been considered, but if one is going to conclude that something is likely to have happened, that conclusion should be based on good evidence, not on things that "could be" or "seems like it could be." In the end, one should play Devil's Advocate and knock down all theories that have a lack of evidence to support them and one should focus on the theory that does have strong enough evidence to consider it a strong likelihood of being the scenario which actually happened..

Let me present firstly what I think should be the  reasonable scenario for the McCanns' involvement and the most reasonable without the McCanns' involvement.

With) The children were left alone so that the McCanns could enjoy their evening out. Because of the problem of the children crying for them the previous night and Maddie being so agitated over this, the children were given medication to quiet them. The McCanns put the children to bed, thought they were out for the evening (as in asleep) and went to have a drink on the veranda and then they went out for the next couple of hours. They did not check on the children again until Gerry came back to the flat at 9:15. Either before or after they left the apartment, Maddie came out, climbed on the sofa, and fell behind it. Because there is a question of timing as to how long a body must remain in a place for cadaver smell to develop that is good enough for the dogs, I cannot say when this accident would have exactly occurred. (the timing seems to be narrowing with further scientific experiments in the matter from one and a half hours to far less than that. At around 9:15, Gerry finds Maddie missing from bed, searches for her, and finds her behind the sofa. Then Kate returns and all hell breaks loose. Gerry takes Maddie away, Kate raises the alarm, some amount of staging is done, but very little as everyone is in a panic.

Without) Some local creep has noted that the McCanns have three little kids and that they are leaving them in the flat alone every night. He notes the McCanns going out again that night and waits until he thinks he has an opportunity to slip in through an open door or pull up an unlocked window. He sees Maddie, puts a hand over her mouth and rushes from the flat. He realizes she isn't reacting at all to being abducted (because she has been medicated) and he carries the quiet child off easily. He would have taken Maddie to his home, raped and murdered her and buried her body on the property or out in the brush somewhere. I want to point out, there is no evidence at all to support this scenario, but if Maddie were actually abducted this would have likely been what happened.

Now, time has gone on and so the scenarios get crazier Because the pedophile abduction scenario does indeed seem a bit too lucky, now we have kidnapping masterminds enter the picture; sex rings or baby selling rings, professionals who plotted this whole crime out with incredible brilliance; hence, the reason no evidence was left and they got away with Maddie into the night without being discovered and why they and what happened to Maddie has remained undiscovered for six years.

Likewise for the scenarios in which the McCanns are involved. People can't understand how the cover-up of an accident was accomplished in so short a time and why the Tapas 9 have never broken and why the body has never been found. In other words, it is hard to believe they got away with a cover-up if it was so haphazard to have had to be done in a moment's notice. Therefore, there are theories that Maddie was never in Portugal, that she was given away days earlier, or that she died the previous night or at least that afternoon and that the children were never neglected and the whole dinner was staged and that Gerry was running about with his younger child to make it look like an abductor had taken his child.

I admit two things; it IS amazing that the McCanns could have gotten away with such a mess of a cover-up and it would be an incredibly lucky abductor who managed to get so lucky to have an easy way in, a sedated child, not to have left a bit of evidence, and never been caught.

Yes, both are rather incredible but one of them happened because Maddie is missing. Which brings me to which scenario is supported by evidence. The abduction scenario has zero evidence of having occurred and the neglect/accident/cover-up has much evidence in its corner.

And it is here I would like to shoot down those fantastical scenarios put out about how the McCanns gave away or killed Maddie (even if accidentally) long before the Tapas dinner that evening. There are four good reasons why the simplest scenario is the likely one. Other than Occam's Razor being taken into account, these four bits of evidence support the theory I gave above: the body (assuming you believe the cadaver evidence which I do) behind the sofa, the window showing no signs of tampering, a man being seen carrying off Maddie towards the beach, and the mass confusion that evening. Let's look at them.

1) The body behind the sofa. If the dog evidence is accurate, Maddie fell behind the sofa. No one hides a body behind a sofa, so why is it there? The odd location indicates to me that Maddie fell there, she died there, and she lay there until her body was discovered. This adds up to an accident while no one was around or at least while no one was paying attention.

PS. If you didn't think the dog evidence behind the sofa was strong enough, one could gather that Maddie died in her bed of an overdose or some other accident. What is most interesting is that Gerry does give a statement that he used his key to come in the front door to check. Now, I thoroughly believe this indicates the flat was locked up while they were out which makes sense if you are leaving your place unattended. This locking of the door requires then the next statement, that the window had to have been opened by an abductor).

2)  The window not being tampered with. If you have enough time to plan a complicated scenario, you have enough time to put a few tool marks on the window. It takes but a minute or two to stage the window being used to break into the flat. The McCanns appear to have been in a frenzy when they told relatives the flat had been broken into, that the window had been "jimmied;" this is what people say when they are panicked and trying to cover themselves in a hurry.

3) If Gerry was seen carrying a child off towards the beach, I guarantee you that this was not on purpose. Staging an abduction by pretending to BE the abductor is foolhardy. First of all, the face of the man was not covered. He could have been identified. Then, once he got down toward the beach, he has to come back with the child....to what...to be seen again bringing her back? No, if that man was Gerry the Smiths saw, then what we have is a desperate man carrying off his deceased child to dump her body some place. Now, he could have put the body closer to the flat, but it makes sense that he wants the body hidden at least long enough for a predator to have had time to rape and kill his daughter and dump her body. It wouldn't do to have the body found five minutes into searching for her, just behind the flat in the bushes, would it? And, if the death of Madeleine happened a day or so ago, there is far more time to carefully plan the removal of her body in such a way as to not have been seen doing it.

4) The mass confusion that evening. Some folks think that the McCanns staged the neglect so there would be an opportunity for an abductor to take Madeleine. I do not buy this line of thinking at all. This is not the way humans make up lies. They don't make up a lie that makes them look bad unless it is one of lesser bad behavior that people already know about. This is then is an attempt to appear contrite and honest. Like the guy who gets caught drunk driving and admits to having a couple. He KNOWS the officer can tell he has been drinking so he admits to doing so but the lesser of the evils..just a couple rather than the twelve drinks he actually had.

A husband gets caught in an affair might confess to oral sex but not intercourse because he thinks his wife might buy that and it is the lesser of the two that she might be able to forgive him for. BUT, a guy doesn't get caught kissing a woman and then tell his wife, "Hey, that's not ALL we've done!"

Likewise with the McCanns. If something happened to Maddie and they had to get rid of her body, they don't then set up a scenario making themselves neglectful parents because no one has accused them of committing any kind of criminal behavior at that point. And there are so much simpler ways to stage the crime and still look like a decent parent which keeps you from getting investigated.

How about getting rid of her body, doing some damage to the window, and pulling it open (with gloves on) or. hey, just having it be open for a nice breeze, and then just say "We decided to stay in that evening and we were on the veranda having drinks while the kids slept. We told Maddie we would be right on the other side of the sliding door and we left the sliding door open an inch so we could hear if anything had gone wrong inside. We must have just sat out there for an hour or so and when we came back in and opened the door to the children's bedroom, we found  Maddie gone! We never considered that someone would open the window and slip in while we were just outside (or just slip through the window if left open for that healthful breeze)."





A simple alternative to this is to have Madeleine disappear while all are sleeping. That someone came in through the window and took her in the night. It happened to Elizabeth Smart, so it could happen to Maddie.

I think that is a plausible story and considering the parents are well-off doctors, I don't know whether I would have questioned the story as long as nothing else stood out.

But, admitting to leaving the children unattended for five nights in a row? That is a bloody stupid story to make up if it isn't true. The problem the McCanns were dealing with was they couldn't make themselves look like better parents because they weren't. But they could try to play down neglect which is a whole lot better than admitting to medicating your kid and having her die behind the sofa while you were off drinking.

The simplest thing is indeed likely to be what happened. Selfish parents neglected their children thinking nothing would really happen. They medicated their kids because they saw no harm in giving them a little something to quiet them. The unthinkable then happened and in a panic they staged a simple crime: they removed the evidence of their child's death from the apartment and they claimed the window had been jimmied so an abduction scenario could be believed. Then they added a man seen by a friend carrying off the child and they hoped they would get away with it. And things were going quite well until they became arguidos. After that occurred, they made another desperate decision; to bolt Portugal and hope they would never be extradited back should the case remain open. All in all, I believe Amaral was on the right track even if there was a question over certain physical evidence. The lie about the window told by the McCanns and the refusal to acknowledge the Smith sighting along with the likely locked flat and the inconsistent and concerning statements and behaviors, all of these things made the McCanns arguidos and is why they should still be arguidos six years later.

 Sometimes people DO get away with crime. The proof of this is the many unsolved, cold cases in every country in the world. Criminals are not often brilliant, so it is not a complicated scenario that kept them from getting arrested and convicted. It is simply the nature of crime that it is usually occurs without witnesses and often the physical evidence isn't strong enough to convince a jury. I know of a lot of criminals who are living contented lives today having gotten away with horrible crimes. If the McCanns are guilty and never convicted in a court of law it isn't necessarily because they are innocent nor is it because they planned a brilliant oover-up, it is because they got lucky, they got rich (off the fund which enable them to Carter-Ruck any troublemakers and hire PIs to do whatever they really did), and they got help from people in high places.


Criminal Profiler Pat Brown

November 7, 2013



Profile of the Disappearance of Madeleine McCann available at Smashwords and Barnes and Noble.


 

By Pat Brown
Rating:
(5.00 based on 5 reviews)

Published: July 27, 2011

What really happened to Madeleine Beth McCann in Praia da Luz, Portugal in 2007? Was she abducted as the Gerry and Kate have claimed or did something happen to Madeleine on May 3 in the vacation apartment and the incident covered up? Criminal Profiler Pat Brown analyzes the evidence and takes the readers through the steps of profiling, developing a theory that is intriguing and controversial.

Who Should be the Top Suspect in the Disappearance of Madeleine McCann?

The so-called newspapers have been going wild about the new "suspect" in the missing Madeleine McCann case. The poor man - a dead man - has now had his name and face broadcast worldwide, branded as the top suspect in what would clearly be the murder of Maddie McCann. His family is furious, as they should be, that their relative is having his reputation destroyed in the media without -and here is the point - without a shred of evidence linking him to any such crime.

The important word in my last sentence is the word "link." THAT and only THAT makes a person a suspect. Links can be physical, geographical, verbal, or behavioral but they should be meaningful in the sense that the link is logical in the sense of the crime. Also, depending of the strength of each link, one link might suffice (like the victim's body buried in someone's basement) or the links added together create a picture of someone likely to have been involved in the crime. Euclides Monteiro, the dead black suspect in question - does not have anything near what I would call a reasonably strong link to the crime. It is clear the media is trying to paint a picture of someone with numerous concerning traits (drug user, burglar, angry -ex-employee) plus one near-link (phone ping in vicinity of Praia da Luz on that day/evening/night) to vault him to a suspect position.

I will be the first to say if I were investigating this crime, I would definitely look at Monteiro because he was someone in the area and he had a criminal record. These would be the only reasons since there was no evidence of a break-in, there was no evidence of a burglary, and there was no attempt at a ransom. I would keep Monteiro's name around but I certainly wouldn't call him a suspect nor would I make a big deal of it.

Let's look at how someone should become a suspect. Take Bobby Joe Leonard. He was an African-American convicted of the rape and attempted murder of a 14-year-old African-American girl. So how long did it take for him to become a suspect? Well, about a New York minute since he didn't strangle the girl well enough and she woke up and told the police it was Bobby Joe Leonard. But, let's suppose Bobby wasn't a poor excuse for a murderer and he did the job properly. The young teen would have been found in the closet of an empty apartment building. The police would have gone back to the last person who was known to have seen her. Guess who that was? Yes, Bobby Joe Leonard. The teen (a runaway) came to live with Bobby and his girlfriend when her druggie boyfriend got himself jailed. Very good Link One. The abandoned building the girl was found in was one of those that she was working in with Bobby to clean and get ready for residents to move into. Very good Link Two. The victim couldn't have gotten to the building on her own and the nature of the crime would lead investigators to believe it was someone she knew. Bobby was in the habit of driving the girl to work. Very good Link Three. And let's not ignore very good Link Four. Bobby Joe Leonard is a lifetime felon with a rape on his record.

Okay, now let's look at another rape that was committed across town in a townhouse. A fifty-two-year-old Caucasian woman was found half-naked and strangled in her bedroom closet. Her car was stolen along with money and jewelry. Should Bobby Joe Leonard become a suspect in that crime? Let's look at possible links.

Liink One: Victim was strangled and found in a closet. Same MO as Bobby's other crime.
Link Two: She was raped. Same MO as Bobby's other crime.
Link Three: She was robbed of money and jewelry which are crimes of which Bobby has been convicted.
Link Four: The car was found four blocks from Bobby's mother's house in an African-American section of town.
Link Five: Bobby did not have a car at the time and was possibly at the courthouse down the street from the victim on the day of the crime
Link Six: The clutch was destroyed. Bobby can't drive a standard transmission car.
Link Seven: Bobby worked on the apartment property three weeks prior to the victim's murder.
Link Eight: Bobby was actually IN the woman's bedroom three weeks prior when she gave an old computer to him and he took the computer from her bedroom.

Would you say Bobby is a good suspect? Maybe should be the TOP suspect? I would think so. He was never actually convicted of that crime due to the police overfocusing on the woman's fiancé  in the beginning and the evidence, therefore, disappearing to the point where there was not enough to take Bobby to court, but I would say that the fiancé is not anywhere near as good a suspect as Bobby Joe Leonard.

Now, back to Madeleine McCann. Let''s look at two possible suspects: Monteiro and the McCanns and see who fits the crime better.

Link One: Had access to the victim. - McCanns
Link Two: No evidence of a burglary - McCanns
Link Thee: Blood and cadaver evidence of death in the holiday flat - McCanns
Link Four: Caucasian male seen carrying off child toward beach - McCanns
Link Five: Motive for removing a dead child from the flat - McCanns

Suspect Rating: Mccanns 5 Monteiro 0

I think the numbers speak for themselves as to who is the better suspect, don't you?

Criminal Profiler Pat Brown

November 5, 2013


Profile of the Disappearance of Madeleine McCann available at Smashwords and Barnes and Noble.


 

By Pat Brown
Rating:
(5.00 based on 5 reviews)

Published: July 27, 2011

What really happened to Madeleine Beth McCann in Praia da Luz, Portugal in 2007? Was she abducted as the Gerry and Kate have claimed or did something happen to Madeleine on May 3 in the vacation apartment and the incident covered up? Criminal Profiler Pat Brown analyzes the evidence and takes the readers through the steps of profiling, developing a theory that is intriguing and controversial.

It's a Bird, It's a Plane......It's SuperSuspect!

The unfolding of the details put out by the media this week on the newest top suspect in the disappearance of Madeleine McCann has elicited groans from a good many following this case, myself included. Bit  by bit we are privvy to questionable information as to why the new suspect is being purportedly investigated by the Judicia Police (PJ) who have also purportedly reopened the case based on the abduction theory because they had new evidence making it worthy of the effort.

Based on not-at-all-purportedly bad media reporting from the UK, Portugal, and the US, the new top suspect in the case is the reason for the case being reopened, for the abduction theory to be focused upon again, and for there to be hope of finally solving the case and putting it to rest.

Having worked many a cold case, I would like to share how I view the new top suspect, a black immigrant to Portugal from Cape Verde, Euclides Monteiro, supposed heroin junkie, thief, and burglar who worked for the Ocean Club and died four years ago in a tractor accident.

I want to examine three issues in reference to this suspect:

1) Is there strong enough evidence with this man to reopen the case and reconstitute the abduction theory?

2) Is there strong enough evidence to make this man a top suspect?

3) Is there strong enough evidence to make this man a great scapegoat?

I would say issues 1 and 2, absolutely not. Issue 3, no question. Let me go share why.

1) Is there strong enough evidence with this man to reopen the case and reconstitute the abduction theory?

First off, there should be enough evidence to build an abduction theory, a theory that has stronger evidence or at least as strong evidence as we have pointing to the McCanns, at least something credible enough  for an alternate possibility to be considered. We have a great deal to support the McCanns' involvement, yet we still have zero proof of an abduction, not a shred of physical or behavioral evidence pointing to this scenario. We have no witness seeing a stranger coming out the front door of the flat with Maddie in hand, we have no witness sighting a man running from the parking lot with a screaming child, we have no witness sighting of someone handing a child out the flat window to another man who shoveled her into a waiting vehicle. We have no fingerprints or DNA of a stranger in the flat, we have no evidence a stranger broke in through a window or door, no evidence a stranger touched a thing in that vacation apartment. We have no body, no photo of Maddie in a sex ring, nothing. We have had no evidence of a stranger abduction at the time of the crime and no evidence today that such an abduction ever occurred.

So what would cause the PJ to reopen the case based on a druggie who happen to be driving in the area of Praia da Luz purportedly on the evening of the crime? It makes no sense, because I can guarantee you, every town has some druggie or two or three or a dozen in the area when any major crime goes down and none of them necessarily have a thing to do with it. That Monteiro was in the area is just one of the facts, but certainly not proof that he is an abductor of a missing child or that any abduction took place.

So, according to what we know so far, if the PJ have officially reopened the case, it would appear this man could not be the reason, the reopening of the case would have to be for political reasons unless the PJ have a much better abduction suspect or they are going to be refocusing on the McCanns.

2) Is there strong enough evidence to make this man a top suspect?

Absolutely not. Quite frankly, he is quite a pitiful suspect. First of all, let's look at the ludicrous revenge theory. He has been reported as being fired from the Ocean Club "the previous year." Is this fellow who since had gotten another job really holding such a massive grudge that he smolders for twelve months before taking any action? Hardly. And instead of going postal like a typical angry ex-employee he decides to abduct a little child? Unlikely.

So, let's look at his drug problem. He is reported to be a heroin addict who robs flats to get money for drugs. This is possible. But he wasn't working for the Ocean Club at the time Maddie was "taken" and we don't even know if he was robbing anything at the time Maddie went missing. Even if he was robbing flats, why would he have picked the McCanns at that moment and why did he waste time in an obvious children's bedroom? Why didn't he toss the McCann's bedroom or the living room for things to steal and sell? And, how is stealing a child going to get him quick drug money? It's a lot of hard work, kidnapping and trying to get ransom. It is a very rare crime especially for heroin users needing a quick fix.

Could Monteiro have grabbed Maddie because he was interrupted by a screaming child? Sure but isn't it far easier just to run? How good is a three-year-old at identifying anyone anyway outside of saying the man was black? And whiile blacks seem to bit in the minority in the area, I am sure Monteiro wasn't the only black guy around. If the child did wake up screaming, why do we not have a guy shoveling a screaming child into his car (no one saw a black man walking around with a kid and he lived fifteen minutes away by vehicle). If he subdued the child by suffocating her, I guess he could have decided to remove her body so as not to leave behind his DNA, but that is pretty far-fetched and I am thinking back a long ways to try to remember a druggie who stole nothing from his target location except a child, dead or alive.

Now, some burglars are really sex predators because they like breaking into people's houses more to invade their territory than to steal things of worth. There are numerous cases of burglars also have a  sex offense history as well, but Monterio is not one of those kinds. He is a situational burglar in that he would steal not for the thrill of the offense but to support a drug habit, so his burglaries (if they actually exist at all) would be of this type.

We have no proof Monteiro was abducting any child in revenge or even breaking into apartments at the Ocean Club to steal stuff and we especially have no evidence anyone even broke into the McCanns' holiday flat and we certainly have zero evidence Monteiro did any such thing.

So why was he in Praia da Luz that evening? Who says he was? All we know from the media is that phone records were checked and cell phone triangulation put him in the area. The AREA - not outside the McCanns' apartment. Cell phone triangulation for a small town like Praia da Luz is not going to be that accurate. All cell phones mayhave pinged that come within three miles of the place. Monteiro may simply have been driving home to Lagos on the highway when he cell phone registered in the area. For that matter, when Maddie went missing, all vacationers, residents, and people driving by would have their cell phones triangulating in the area. Are they all suspects? Or just one black, immigrant, with a drug problem and a minor criminal background? And when did Monteiro's cell phone make itself known? Have you noticed we don't actually have a time yet? Was it at 9:15? Was it at 10 pm? Or was it at 6 pm or was it near midnight? The media has kindly left that information out, either because they have no clue or because it doesn't support making Monteiro look like Maddie's abductor.

There is no evidence at all linking Montiero to any abduction of Maddie. Not a shred. All we know is that Monteiro was one of the many people in the area at the time and he had a drug problem and he might be a bit of a thief. If I were investigating this case, I am not saying I wouldn't be following up on Monteiro, but he would just be one of the many leads I would be looking at to do due diligence, not because I expected it would lead to anything. I would follow-up "just in case" there was something in it and because I hadn't enough proof to take anyone to trial at this point.


3) Is there strong enough evidence to make this man a great scapegoat?

You betcha! Now, here is where we hit the jackpot! What's not to like? First and best of all, he is an immigrant. If he is the bad guy, the Portuguese people and the folks of Praia da Luz can say, "See? It was not one of us!" Secondly, he is black, a great fall guy like the Roma - he is a minority in that area and, therefore, again, easier to feel comfortable with blaming because, for most people there, "He is not one of us." And, for the world over, nothing like a poor black man to be the bad guy as history has proven.

But, there are those who could feel sorry for the poor black guy if he were getting blamed for the crime of abducting a little white girl without sufficient evidence. Isn't it lucky then that this man can also be a useless druggie, a user of the evil drug heroin, a thief, and a burglar, yeah, and he even may have been creepy with children, so now we can not feel so awful for him? He is a lowlife, so, oh well, he probably did it, don't ya think?

Best of all, the guy is dead. He can't fight back, he can't complain, and, the sad truth is, we have a hard time emotionally connecting to dead people which is why sometimes people feel sorrier for the defendant than the person he murdered; they can still connect with the killer because he is alive.

 Euclides Monteiro is indeed a super fall guy, someone who can makes this whole annoying case go away. If enough "evidence" can be found to make people think he really might have taken Maddie, panicked, smothered her accidentally (remember I wrote previously that if Maddie could have been smothered while attempting to quiet her in the abduction that would make the McCanns sleep better at night  because it would have been quick and so Maddie would not have had to been raped for years and years) and disposed of her somewhere at sea (so we can't find her body), the case can be closed administratively. The McCanns will finally have closure in a way that wasn't to horrible for Maddie, they will be "proven" innocent, the new PJ will have done the job right and made Scotland Yard look like asses for touting on Crimewatch the white guy the Smiths saw proving they are all wet. Monteiro is the perfect patsy.

Is this what is going to happen? God, I hope not. I still hold out the small hope that this is all media crapola and the PJ is really not reconstituting the abduction theory, that this is all a smoke screen and an elimination of all other possible suspects to leave just the McCanns again in the cross hairs. History doesn't support my hope very well, but sometimes the only way to get through the day is to believe that sometimes people surprise you and truth and justice will triumph..

Criminal Profiler Pat Brown

November 4, 2013

Profile of the Disappearance of Madeleine McCann available at Smashwords and Barnes and Noble.

By Pat Brown
Rating:
(5.00 based on 5 reviews)

Published: July 27, 2011

What really happened to Madeleine Beth McCann in Praia da Luz, Portugal in 2007? Was she abducted as the Gerry and Kate have claimed or did something happen to Madeleine on May 3 in the vacation apartment and the incident covered up? Criminal Profiler Pat Brown analyzes the evidence and takes the readers through the steps of profiling, developing a theory that is intriguing and controversial.

Why do so many People seem to Hate Kate and Gerry McCann?

Someone just asked me this question in the comments section of the post I did yesterday and I realized the length of my answer would require a full post, so here it is.

"Why," he asked, "do so many people have such vitriol toward the McCanns? Couldn't it be the reason for their behaviors is that they are protecting each other and their family out of love?" (I condense and paraphrase here to make his point).

This commenter ask an excellent question and there are many in the world, including the media, who think that those people who openly despise the McCanns are trolls and haters and cruel people who are treating parents of a missing child in the most despicable manner possible. I am included in that group; a lot of pretty nasty attacks are leveled at me because I am termed a McCann hater. I am considered even a worse human being than the others because I am a professional with a fairly public profile which they feel makes me like the leader of a witch hunt or lynch mob (or more of a threat) out to destroy two lovely innocent people and the hunt for a missing child.

So is there enough justification for such utter dislike of this couple, innocent or guilty,whether they be parents of an abducted child or frightened parents responsible for an accident and a cover-up? As a profiler who has dealt with many parents of crime victims and studied many cases of missing children, I can say hands down, yes, in defense of those who cannot seem to stomach the McCanns.

Here is a list of the reasons:

1) They left their three toddler children alone for five evenings so they could go out and party. The reason this so irks people is how unnecessary and selfish this behavior was. We are not talking about a poor mother desperate to go to work to earn money to feed her kids, a woman with no nearby relatives and no money for a babysitter, a woman who leaves her seven-year-old in charge of her five- and three-year-old siblings in an apartment building where that seven-year-old can call her if there is a problem or run next door to the neighbors she knows. We are talking about a set of educated parents with enough money to go to another country for a not-so-cheap holiday at in a beach town; they could have paid for a babysitter. They could have taking turns watching the children on alternate nights, one of the group could have watched all the children one night a week, or they could have taken the children to the hotel creche for caring. They could have simply stayed home with the kids. But, they wanted their "alone" time at the expense of their children's well-being so they left three toddlers in a strange flat, toddlers who could not run next door and find someone if they were scared, toddlers who could not make a phone call in an emergency, toddlers who could not save themselves from fire, or injury, or an intruder. Along with leaving them alone, the McCanns also claim they left the door unlocked, leaving them vulnerable to any stranger who just could walk in off the street and hurt them. Who DOES this, some ask? Very narcissistic people, I can answer, and this very self-centered behavior on the part of the McCanns really puts people off.

2) They left the children alone AFTER they cried the night before. As if leaving them alone wasn't bad enough, they then left their frightened and unhappy children alone even after they had been told by Maddie that all had not gone well the night before, that they were crying out for their parents for a very long time and they never came to them. People see this as awful cold and callous behavior on the part of the parents, extremely selfish, unconscionable behavior that any parent would choose to continue leaving the children alone upon hearing of their distress.

3) Dressing fashionably with well-groomed hair, make-up, and jewelry, going running and writing a blog after your child goes missing; oh, and leaving your twins behind so you can go run off and see the Pope. The McCanns have a lot of defenders who will say the running and writing were stress relief and going to see the Pope a religious need any parent of a missing child might seek. I can tell you from seeing the behaviors of many missing parents,these are abnormal behaviors, especially so early after a child goes missing. The inside of the brain of someone who has a child kidnapped is a horrifying hurricane of hell. There is a continuous roaring of fear, anger, horror, confusion, panic, hate, grief, pain, hysteria, all of these feeling and thoughts swirling about in almost a physical way that pretty much shuts down coherent behavior. I never forgot one well-depicted scene in a movie made about Adam Walsh, the son of America's Most Wanted's host, John Walsh who, after being told the police found his little son's head thrown next to the highway, John was portrayed as going crazy in grief by running headlong into the space between the mattresses on his bed over and over and over. It is a scene that sticks in one's mind and I still get teary thinking about it while writing of it here.

There are things parents just simply are unable to do for a long time because they cannot compose themselves enough to go through the motions while their child is missing, to do any normal thing while their child may be calling out for Mommy and Daddy in terror day in and day out, maybe being raped and tortured in some predator's dungeon somewhere, maybe lying mangled in a shallow grave. You don't think those images run constantly through the head of a parent who child is missing? You bet, and that is why parents of missing and murdered children often need medication to get up in the morning and more medication to try to sleep at night, this is why they can't go to work anymore, this is why they neglect their other children, this is why they fight with their mates and end up divorced, this is why they look like shit most of the time, and this is why they can't watch a movie, take a swim, even bathe, because their child can't do that, can she?

That is why the McCanns looking so put together every day, going running, writing blogs, taking trips....just doesn't register right with folks; they don't seem normal for parents of missing children. Maybe parents of a child dead by accident whose narcissism allows them to focus entirely on themselves since they can't help their daughter any more, maybe that, but not the parents of a child abducted by a sex predator which is who would likely have taken a three-year-old little girl out of her bed.

3) Kate said she could sleep through the night within days of Maddie's disappearance. Within days.This particular statement threw me for a loop. It only took a few days to be able to get a good night's sleep? Really? Even when you know your child might still be in a predator's hands being raped and tortured, chained in some basement, while you are lying in a comfy bed?  How do you do that? People don't sleep well for days after their dog gets run over by a car, but you are soundly sleeping while your daughter is being molested by a pervert; I can't wrap my head around that.

4) THE FUND. I would venture to say the fund is what really gets people's goat. It is one thing to accidentally off your child and then, in a panic, hide the body somewhere and tell the police someone kidnapped her, but to then set up a way to get a ton of money from people - not a charity to help all missing children - but a private fund with money you can use for any of your personal needs including suing people you wish to shut up, a fund which has shown no kind of investigative progress at all - a fund, for that matter, that you never tell people how that money is being used, what is being discovered - a fund that just seems to be raking in millions for your own personal use, that just doesn't sit well with people.

5) Carter-Ruck. The McCanns not only disparage those who feel they might be involved in the death of their child and subsequent cover-up, but then sue them to make them shut up. I have seen grieving parents deal with people not believing them but I have never seen this. It hurts when people question your innocence but it doesn't hold a candle to what happened to your child and isn't worth wasting energy over. Many people think the McCanns have spent more time getting back at their detractors than searching for their Maddie; that just doesn't seem normal to them and it's not.

6) Speaking of their detractors, the McCanns do not seem to have a clue as to why people have issues with them. They don't seem to get that they don't like them because they neglected their children, because they never confessed they were wrong for leaving their children (outside of saying they regret feeling that the place was safe and making that decision due to their naivete), that people don't like them for all the reasons stated here. Instead, they call those people psychologically disturbed human beings, which I guess includes me. I am not saying that some haters, on both sides of the McCann issue aren't psychopathic nutjobs - some indeed are - but I am talking about those who truly are bothered by the McCanns' behaviors and honestly believe they have involvement. Most parents of missing children get why people might suspect them, especially if their behavior is a bit odd. All the McCanns needed to do to handle this problem is admit they were selfish in leaving their children alone and that they understand they come off as guilty of a crime to some folks and, perhaps, unlikeable as well. They get it and they don't hold it against people, and while they wish people didn't promote theories of their guilt, they can understand why they do. And they are going to look for Maddie and not waste time being upset over these folks' opinions because their daughter is far more important than their hurt feelings.

7) The McCanns never took a polygraph, Kate refused to answer the 48 questions and they ran the country. Again, this seems to show that the McCanns place their personal well-being above finding their missing child. It is almost true across the board that parents of missing parents will subject themselves to just about anything to convince the police they are innocent of any wrongdoing so that the police will hurry up and focus on finding whoever it is that abducted their child. They suffer immensely during this process but they answer questions over and over again, day after day, weeping and begging during the process for the police to find their child. They take polygraphs even if they fear that they will have a guilty or inconclusive result if something goes wrong with the process because doing the poly will bring them one step closer to getting the police off their backs and in the right direction. Parents of missing children are terrified of pissing off the police because if they do, they might stop looking for their child. Such parents usually are afraid to call the police too often, grovel in any way possible, put up with police silence because they are afraid to anger them in any way. The McCann's actually had the whole investigation shelved for years because they didn't like the way they were being treated

8) Their arrogance. There are so many times the McCanns just come off terribly badly on television, appearing to be snide, flippant, rude, self-absorbed...I have never understood why the person managing their publicity hasn't gotten this through their heads.

9) Kate's book. I have read a lot of books by parents' of murder victims and Kate's book just doesn't come off right to me and many others. It seems more like a memoir about Kate and her troubles than about finding a missing child. There are a number of statements in the book that made people cringe.

I could go on and on, but I think that is enough to make the point as to why many people can't stomach the McCanns. I don't agree with a lot of the nastiness out there making fun of them, I don't think that this is necessary to push the issue of what really happened to Madeleine McCann. I don't think we need to comment on people's looks or make mockery of everything, but I do think people have a right to speak up as to why they think the McCanns are involved in the disappearance of their daughter and why they think the police should keep them on as suspects.

Oh, let me not forget to address this part of the original question; couldn't these be people who just love each other very much who are scared of the penalties of being truthful, who are covering up to save each other and their kids? Sure, they could be and if they had simply just run off and hid Maddie's body in a bush and come back and pretended that she had been abducted, never pointing fingers at anyone in particular (like Murat) or setting up a fund to bilk people out of their money, if they hadn't sued the crap out of everyone, sure, I could buy that. I don't think I had too much of a problem with baby Lisa Bradley's parents until they showed up on Dr. Phil and then I rather lost my sympathy for them; it is one thing to lie to save your ass, it is another to go on a huge national broadcast and proclaim your innocence and rile people up to send money and spend hours searching for the missing child you disposed of. (I add here that this is only a theory that the Bradleys also are responsible for the accidental death of their daughter - well, at least Deborah Bradley - and the disposal of her body).  It is one thing to do something in a panic to save one's butt; it is another to make money off of it and waste massive money and manpower pushing a lie to such an extreme.

The narcissism displayed by the McCanns makes me think that it is not love that is fueling them to continue with what appears to be a massive farce. I think their behaviors make it clear that Kate and Gerry each have their own personal agendas supported by their own very selfish personalities - Gerry wants to be a big man, Kate wants to be a respected woman - and the twins, well, yeah, this will all help them, too. The incoming money and fame is a plus as well.

I am sure in the comments area people will add a dozen other reasons why the McCanns have made themselves the target of dislike. I do ask that people keep the comments factual and not full of nasty jibes and snarkiness.

I once wrote an open letter to Kate McCann explaining why she had become such a target of hatred and how she could change that but, in the long run, I don't think she took much of it to heart, which is sad if she and Gerry are really innocent in the disappearance of their daughter. They could have left a lot more stones unturned if they had toned down the "distractions" with a few simple, self-effacing statements. Like not releasing those e-fits five years ago because doing so might also be a "distraction," they might have had a lot more help finding Maddie, the thing they claim is most important to them, if they hadn't pushed so many people away. As I once said to them, I would have worked on their case for free and gone public with a change of my view toward them if they could help me see they were innocent, and I am sure a number of other profilers, PIs and retired police would have done the same, but they took no one's help that they could not control one hundred percent with a paycheck and Carter-Ruck. One more reason people probably don't like or trust the McCanns.

Finally,  I have a personal reason. What bothers me the most about the McCanns is the damage they will do to missing children investigations in the long term. With funds so tight in any law enforcement agency, we need those funds to meet the needs of ALL missing children, not just one, and we need those funds to be spent properly. We need the police to be able to understand how children go missing, who to believe, and how to find those children with the least money and manpower to be used per case. Any fraud or untruth b perpetrated by the McCanns will, not may, do long term damage to the search for missing children and this, for me, is the Number One reason I have negative feelings toward Kate and Gerry McCann.

Criminal Profiler Pat Brown

November 3, 2013

Profile of the Disappearance of Madeleine McCann available at Smashwords and Barnes and Noble.

By Pat Brown
Rating:
(5.00 based on 5 reviews)

Published: July 27, 2011

What really happened to Madeleine Beth McCann in Praia da Luz, Portugal in 2007? Was she abducted as the Gerry and Kate have claimed or did something happen to Madeleine on May 3 in the vacation apartment and the incident covered up? Criminal Profiler Pat Brown analyzes the evidence and takes the readers through the steps of profiling, developing a theory that is intriguing and controversial.