Date of Interview: 09.04.08
Time Commenced: 1612 hours
Time Concluded: 1631 hours
1578 “Okay, the time is four twelve pm and that’s on Wednesday the ninth of April, two thousand and eight. We’re at the Leicestershire Police Force Headquarters in an interview room. I’m Detective Constable 1578 Andrew GIERC from the Leicestershire Major Crime Unit. Would you give me your full name and date of birth please”?
Reply “Rachael Mariamma Jean MAMPILLY, eleventh of the eleventh, seventy”.
1578 “Thank you. This is the third interview of today Rachael, you’re here voluntarily as a significant witness, assisting the Portuguese Authorities in the investigation of the disappearance of Madeleine McCANN, which is as you know was on the evening of Thursday the third of May, two thousand and seven. At the end of the last interview, you indicated that you would like to talk about the conversation Jane had with you in respect of her sighting”.
Reply “Mmm erm”.
1578 “Would you like to run through that with us please, tell us precisely, as accurately as possible what Jane told you, firstly when she told you”?
Reply “Mmm mmm”.
1578 “Where you were when she told you and then run through as accurately as possible the conversation”?
Reply “Okay, erm basically after Matt and I had checked on Grace, erm Matt went off to search and I went across to Jane’s apartment cos she was there with Evie, erm and just told her that Madeleine had gone missing, erm and I must have known at that point that the window was open and the shutter was up, erm cos basically when I told her that and this was in the courtyard, the sort of, well outside Jane’s apartment in that sort of courtyard-y area between our two apartments, erm Jane looked sort of quite horrified and then said that when she’d walked up to check on Ella and Evie at sort of ten past nine, erm when she’d passed Gerry and Jez who were talking in the street, she’d seen a man carrying a child walking across the top of the road and she said you know at the time, she thought it was a bit odd, erm but sort of didn’t, didn’t really think twice about it because you know the, it was the sort of place where parents carry children around at night because they might have had them in the crèche, erm while they went off to have dinner and then we’d you know pick up the kids and they could well be asleep and be carrying them home to bed, so she said she did think it was a bit odd but you know, obviously with hindsight, of course she’d kind of gone after them but erm, erm and she, so she told me that and we just, you know, our conversation, we were just batting back and forth well you know, surely it couldn’t have been Madeleine, cos Jane said she’d past Gerry and Jez in the street as she was walking up, so she’d literally gone passed Gerry and this man was walking across the top of the road, erm so it was like, well how could it be Madeleine because you know, Gerry would have just you know left the apartment a couple of minutes ago after checking on them, erm and, and then, so but we came to the same conclusion that it was significant and that she’d have to tell, you know, she would tell the Police when they arrived, erm and I think I asked her what he was wear, what this person was wearing, erm and she said he had like a dark jacket on, sort of like a windcheater type thing, erm and sort of brownish coloured trousers, erm and shoes, I mean they weren’t trainers and they weren’t sort of proper shoes, you know but it, they were sort of something, I don’t know, like I don’t know, Hush Puppies, that type of thing, erm and she said that his hair was sort of fairly long, long at the back, erm not long as in, as in length but in sort of volume and we talked about, you know she said it, you know he looked sort of Mediterranean, he, or Portuguese just because you know the Europeans tend to wear their hair sort of you know, longer at the back, whereas you know most British men have it all sort of cut in and short. So she said he, no he didn’t really, that’s why she, I think you know, she thought it was a bit odd because he didn’t really look like a holidaymaker, erm cos most of the people wandering about, erm you know were all wearing shorts or, you could kind of tell they were Brits on holiday, erm so he didn’t really fit that mould and erm, she’d thought, the other thing that had kind of made her suspicious I suppose, was that the child you know wasn’t covered with a blanket or anything like that, was just in pyjamas, you know with bare legs and feet hanging down, erm so the child was being carried like that, you know the sort of head there and body and legs hanging down, erm and you know it was cold at night, I mean you know we all had lots of layers on, erm so she thought that was a bit odd you know, erm that the child just had pyjamas on and nothing else, erm and the person carrying her had a, oh you know had a jacket and, and long trousers, erm, erm so we sort of ummed and arred about that and you know decided that well you know, it just seemed too much of a coincidence that you know it couldn’t be insignificant, erm so you know Jane said she’d tell the Police as soon as they arrived, which she did, erm and erm she didn’t describe the pyjamas to me then, erm it was only really, I think it was the next day or perhaps even the day after that, that Jane, Fiona and I had a conversation about the pyjamas that the child was wearing, erm and Jane had said that they were sort of white with sort of pink flowers or something on and they had a bit of a, like a trim around the bottom, erm and Fiona said she’d asked Kate erm about the pyjamas, you know, what sort of pyjamas Madeleine was wearing, erm and sort of later that day I think you know, Fi came back and said basically Jane had described the pyjamas that Madeleine was wearing, so you know, that absolutely convinced us that this person walking away was carrying Madeleine, erm you know Jane, I mean none of us knew, I mean I suppose I, I might have known what bed clothes, erm what pyjamas Evie and Ella wore but that was only cos quite often they came to read stories in our apartment, or you know if Grace went there, but otherwise you know, we didn’t ever seen any of the other children at bed time, erm you know, I know Jane hadn’t seen the twins or Madeleine at bed time, so she would have no idea what pyjamas, or you know, or what Madeleine wore to bed, whether they were pyjamas or a nightie whatever, so erm, so it was you know sort of like the two, I think it must have been on the Saturday, erm that the pyjamas, Jane described the pyjamas to Fiona and Fiona found out from Kate, erm what Madeleine’s pyjamas were like and they were the same as the ones that Jane had described”.
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Filed under: Documents, Madeleine McCann, Enderby, Leicestershire Police, Maddie, Madeleine McCann, Major Crime Unit, PJ, Rachael Mampilly
Duarte Levy.. 