Maddy’s parents face up to worst but cling to hope

THE parents of Madeleine McCann are facing up to the possibility that she is dead — but cling to the hope that their next phone call will tell them she has been found alive, their spokesman said yesterday.

Clarence Mitchell spoke of Gerry and Kate McCann’s “turmoil” at losing their four-year-old daughter, which he said had been made many times worse by their being made official suspects in her disappearance.

Speaking at a media conference in their home village of Rothley, Leicestershire, he said: “They are a family facing possible bereavement. They hope desperately that the next phone call is, ‘We have found her and she’s OK.’.