Who are the McCann tapas seven?
What is known about the so-called “Tapas 7”, the people who were key witnesses in the disappearance of Madeleine McCann? The seven friends who dined with Kate and Gerry McCann on the night of Madeleine’s disappearance were central witnesses in the case. Their evidence was pored over by the police, and their backgrounds closely scrutinised by journalists and bloggers alike. None of the seven were ever a formal suspect or “arguido”, and all co-operated willingly and voluntarily with the investigation. Bound by judicial secrecy laws while the case was still being investigated by Portuguese police, most made no public comment about what they saw. They have now received a 375,000 libel payout from Express Newspapers after untrue allegations about their conduct appeared in three publications. Their friendship goes back a long way. Four of the group – Matthew Oldfield, Russell O’Brien, David Payne and Fiona Payne – studied medicine together at Leicester University in the early 1990s – the Pay
