Reward grows for return of missing British girl

Sun May 13, 2007 8:04AM EDT

By Peter Griffiths

LONDON (Reuters) - British celebrities and business leaders have put up a 1.5 million British pound ($2.97 million) reward to help find Madeleine McCann, a four-year-old who disappeared from a Portuguese holiday resort 10 days ago.

Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling, Virgin boss Richard Branson and Topshop chief Philip Green are among a host of public figures to have offered money.

"We are praying for Madeleine's safe return," Green said in a statement released by the News of the World, which itself offered 250,000 pounds.

Madeleine, who turned four on Saturday, is feared kidnapped after she vanished from her bed in the Praia da Luz holiday resort on the Algarve on May 3.

The new pledges brought the total to $2.6 million offered in reward to find Madeleine after Scottish health spa owner Stephen Winyard put up one million pounds and a family friend offered 100,000 pounds after her disappearance.

At a church service on Saturday, Madeleine's father said her disappearance had unleashed a "tidal wave" of devastation on the family.

"Today we should be celebrating the fourth birthday of our daughter Madeleine," he said. "Instead we have had to remember what a normal, beautiful, vivacious, funny, courageous and loving little girl that we are missing today."

Prayers for Missing Madeleine

Video

Paedophile abducted Madeleine police say

Note: Maddy comes from the village of Rothley, in Leicestershire, which is situated about five miles from where I live. Please spare a thought or, if like me you are that way inclined, a prayer for this little girl.

Police in the UK know that when a child goes missing, if that child is not found within 24 hours, the chances of that child being found alive are slim. And when a child does go missing, it usually means only one thing: that that child has caught the attention of a paedophile and, as the only witness to the crime, the child usually ends up dead.

Last Fall, I followed with keen interest Patty Wetterling’s efforts to get elected to the House of Representatives for Minnesota’s Sixth District for the Democrat-Farmer-Labor Party. As the mother of a missing child, I felt she would work hard to get other mothers’ sons and daughters home from Iraq. Sadly she failed.

Following her son's abduction, she founded the Jacob Wetterling Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to education about child safety.