Iain Dale is absolutely right to question the media coverage of the questioning of Robert Murat. The most worrying part of this is the sense that a growing part of the press pack are beginning to see themselves as the investigators rather than the police.
VFTN has seen comments carried today by at least one normally respectable news gatherer from a neighbour of Murat's estranged wife in Norfolk suggesting the missing girl and Murat's daughter look so alike they could be twins. The only purpose of publishing such comments is to encourage the reader to come to conclusions about Mr Murat which are unsupported by any evidence.
When Portuguese police came in for heavy criticism at the start of the investigation VFTN suspected that this was largely as a result of the police's refusal to feed the 24/7 media machine by holding daily press conferences rather than because of some clear evidence they were not doing their jobs properly.
Everyone wants this story to have a happy ending and if it does not for the people responsible to be brought to justice. What is happening at the moment is literally trial by media.
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