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Madeleine inquiry 'proved little'
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Portuguese prosecutors ruled that the massive Madeleine McCann police investigation uncovered "very little" conclusive evidence about the child's fate, newly-released files revealed.
In their final report, the prosecutors noted that detectives had failed even to prove whether the little girl was dead or still alive.
The document - dated July 21, the day the case was officially shelved - was made public as part of the massive dossier of evidence assembled over more than 14 months.
The Portuguese authorities released the police files on Monday after lifting the period of judicial secrecy in the case. Journalists were handed DVDs containing copies of thousands of pages of evidence from the inquiry outside the courthouse in the Algarve town of Portimao.
The 17th and final volume of the files contains the final 58-page report written by public prosecutors Jose de Magalhaes e Menezes and Joao Melchior Gomes.
They said Madeleine's parents, Kate and Gerry McCann, did not "act with intent" in leaving their children alone in their holiday apartment on the night the child went missing.
"They could not predict that in the resort they chose to spend their holidays they could place the life of any of their children in danger," they wrote.
The prosecutors also noted that the McCanns were "already serving a heavy sentence" - Madeleine's disappearance - for going out for dinner without their children.
Portuguese detectives were unable to achieve any proof which would allow "the formulation of any lucid, sensible, serious and honest conclusion" about the circumstances of the child going missing, the report said.
It went on: "This includes, the most dramatic thing, ascertaining whether she is still alive or dead - which seems the most probable."
