# The Tanner Sighting (ca. 21.15)

The so called Tanner Sighting came first into the case with the Tapas-9 timeline. Jane Tanner testified she had seen a suspect carrying a child away as she passed Gerry McCann and Jez Wilkins who were in a small talk at the time around 21:15.

It was since then another miracle in the Case. Neither Gerry McCann nor Jez Wilkins, who where both close to the alleged sighting, could confirm this seeing. Jez Wilkins testified that he must have seen the suspected person if there were one. But he didn't. Also it is a marvel that the child's father Gerry should not have mentioned his daughter being abducted just some meters away in his proximate viewing angle. Also the men couldn't even confirm seeing Jane Tanner passing them.

Besides the Smith's Sighting the Tanner Sighting, if indeed being real, was the only of several alleged sightings of suspects, which where spatiotemporal close enough for an immediate suspect. Meanwhile but Scotland Yard could identify the possible sighting as an innocent british holidaymaker, who indeed carried his child at this time and place back to his apartment in the eastern parts of the Ocean Club resort.

See also article regarding →Tanners allegations against Robert James Queriol Eveleigh Murat.

Despite the clearing done by Scotland Yard, there are but still some miracles left about the Tanner Sighting. See e.g. →McCannFiles.

See also the english →Wikipedia:

(extracted from en.wikipedia.org, 29-Nov-2013)

“One of the McCanns' travelling companions, Jane Tanner, left the restaurant at 21:15 to check on her own daughter. She passed Madeleine's father on Rua Dr Francisco Gentil Martins on his way back to the restaurant from his 21:05 check. He had stopped to chat to a British holidaymaker, Jes Wilkins. Neither man saw Tanner. This became an issue that puzzled the Portuguese police, given how narrow the street was, and led them to accuse Tanner of having invented the sighting.[32] At that point Tanner noticed a man with a young child cross the junction with Rua Dr Agostinho da Silva just ahead of her, heading east away from the Ocean Club.[33] She said he was carrying the child, who was barefoot and wearing light-coloured pink pyjamas with a floral pattern and cuffs on the legs, a description that matched the pyjamas Madeleine had been wearing. She described the man as white, dark-haired, 5 ft 7 in (1.70 m) tall, of southern European or Mediterranean appearance, 35–40 years old, wearing gold or beige trousers and a dark jacket, and said he did not look like a tourist. Tanner gave the information to the Portuguese police, but they did not pass it to the media until 25 May.[34] Madeleine's Fund arranged for a forensic artist to create an image of the man (right), which was released to the public in October 2007.[31] Although Tanner had not seen the man's face, the sighting became important because it offered investigators a time frame for the abduction, but Scotland Yard eventually came to view it as a red herring.[35] In October 2013 they said a British holidaymaker had stepped forward to say he believed he was the man Tanner had seen, and that he had been returning to his apartment after picking up his own daughter from the Ocean Club night creche.[36] Scotland Yard took photographs of the man wearing the same or similar clothes to the ones he was wearing on the night, and standing in a pose similar to the one Tanner reported. The pyjamas his daughter had been wearing also matched Tanner's report. The detective in charge of the Scotland Yard inquiry said that as a result his officers were “almost certain” that this sighting was not related to the abduction.[37]”

It is important to note that if the Tanner sighting was indeed of a man taking his daughter from the Creche (situated at the main reception) to his holiday apartment he would have walked in a different direction as to what Jane Tanner stated.