Girl snatched from tranquil home recalls tragic McCann case

YOU could hardly imagine a more homely or tranquil scene: a young couple take time out to do a spot of gardening while their toddler plays happily nearby.

But, then, the unthinkable happened. One moment two-year-old Aisling Symes was playing with her dolls, at her home near Auckland, New Zealand. The next, she had vanished without a trace.

Her sudden disappearance and the absence of any serious leads by police has a ring of familiarity about it. It was two years ago last May when little Madeleine McCann disappeared from her family’s holiday apartment in Praia da Luz in Portugal. Madeleine, then aged three, was left in her hotel room with her two-year-old twin siblings while her parents went to eat at a restaurant. During that time, someone got into the room through a window and took her.