Kate and Gerry McCann attend a service to mark the 11th anniversary of the disappearance of their daughter Madeleine from a holiday flat in Portugal, near her home in Rothley, Britain May 3, 2018. - REUTERSPIX: The European Court of Human Rights ruled on Tuesday against the parents of missing British toddler Madeleine McCann, saying that Portugal had given them a fair hearing in their libel battle against a former Portuguese policeman.
They sued Amaral for libel. In 2015, a Portuguese court ruled in their favour, ordering Amaral to pay them damages. Two years later the ruling was reversed by Portugal’s highest court. The ECHR ruling said the Portuguese judiciary had not failed in its duty to protect the rights of Gerry McCann and Kate Healy and that their arguments concerning presumption of innocence were ill-founded.
Madeleine McCann was three-years-old when she vanished in May 2007 from her bedroom in the Algarve apartment her family were staying in. Early investigations by Portuguese police produced no major leads and for a while detectives focused attention on the parents.