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R/£ McCann friends win case against two tabloids
October 17, 2008 Edition 4
London - A group of British doctors who were dining out with Kate and Gerry McCann when their daughter Madeleine disappeared from a holiday apartment in Portugal have been granted £375 000 (R6,9-million) in libel damages by tabloid newspapers in Britain.
The group, known as the "Tapas Seven", won the substantial damages in a High Court ruling published yesterday by the Express Newspaper Group, which printed front-page apologies on two of their tabloids, the Daily Express and the Daily Star.
Madeleine, then aged 3, vanished from an apartment in Praia da Luz on the Algarve on May 3 2007, and no trace of her has been found.
In March, Express Newspapers paid out £550 000 in damages to the McCanns after alleging in a series of articles that the couple were responsible for the death of their daughter.
In July, four newspaper groups agreed a libel settlement worth at least £800 000 with Robert Murat, a British man who had - like the McCanns - been named an official suspect in the case.
"In a statement, the friends said outside the court that they felt "strongly" that the "defamatory stories were detrimental to the search for Madeleine". - Sapa-dpa
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