COGNITIVE DISSONANCE AND THE FRAUDULENT FUND

I read this excellent post elsewhere, and it is deserving of a wider audience:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/1529443800612966/permalink/1728808427343168/


Cass Sidebotham
10 hrs · Edited
COGNITIVE DISSONANCE AND THE FRAUDULENT FUND
Gwen James “Some folk really have a problem with the fund for their missing daughter”

This is certainly true. Daily, calls of impropriety, fraud, theft, getting rich of the back of Madeleine, paying their mortgage, going on holidays and recently, money laundering, are made on these forums.

The meme (below, in comments so it cannot easily be seen) from which our splendid ‘Big Hands’ series was based, was posted with exasperating frequency on HiDeHo Debates, back when there was some life in that forum. It is one of the sicker McCann memes, and Sky Newsworthy it certainly is.

Indeed the accusation that the McCanns are profiting out of Madeleine’s death is almost more despicable, and hurtful, and abusive than suggesting they killed her and covered it up.

As with the latter accusations, there is nothing at all to substantiate the claims. On the contrary, there is evidence that the fund is all above board, audited, accounts produced, monies accounted for.

The accounts of the fund from 2008-20014 run to 70+ pages. They include:
# details of all the directors
# when they joined, and when they left
# details of auditors
# a registered address
# bankers and solicitors’ details
# a narrative summary of the year as a whole
# income and expenditure
# balance sheets,
# assets
# capital
# reserves…

The fund runs as any ltd company does, the McCanns get no special treatment, they are scrutinised by auditors and signed off each year. No impropriety has ever been noted. The McCanns, in fact had no obligation to set up a ltd company which is subject to regulation and scrutiny. They have gone further than they needed to in a bid to be open and clear.

And yet the anti-message is bold, this fund is ‘the scam of the century’, Kate and Gerry McCann are stealing the public’s money. Their outrage is palpable and is witnessed on all the forums every day. We have tried to convince them of the error of their judgement, but some just will not listen. So fine, they think the McCann fund is a scam, despite the accounts, and the fact that no evidence of any kind of fraud have ever been produced, even in the face of (Enid O’) doubters analysing the accounts and fund activity with a microscope… they scream for transparency, demanding to know inane details of the organisation, such as which bank account the publishers of Kate’s book pay the royalties in and with what frequency. They demonstrate daily how much they detest the idea of someone collecting money and not being completely candid about exactly what the money was spent on.

The McCanns would have been quite within the rights to ask for people to pay money into an account like PJGA, with a similar lack of transparency. Below we have the published financial statement of the illusive PJGA fund, 2009-2015, which run to considerably less than 70 pages, and contain no details what sums of money have been paid out, and to whom they have been paid. This is the fund headed by shadowy ‘Astro’, of which the signatories of the money include a Portuguese person and a mystery someone from the UK. Aside from the bank account details of where to give them your money, this is about all we know…

…Is it just me?

No, it isn't just Ms Sidebotham.

There hasn't been anything resembling a balance sheet from the Gonzo fund in the SIX YEARS since it was first launched.

We do know that whatever was being collected in Portugal, it wasn't going on his legal fees, as he sacked his last New Lawyer, the 'police super-lawyer' without paying him, as Santos de Oliveira lamented in the media.

Well, isn't this all a bit rich?   There is nothing there that relates to money other than three lines.

What about the audit?  

It doesn't seem right somehow.   What are they hiding?