An appeals court in Portugal has overturned the libel conviction of a former Portuguese detective who published a book alleging the parents of Madeleine McCann were involved in their daughter's disappearance, their lawyer said.
Lisbon lawyer Isabel Duarte said she was notified of the court's decision to uphold Goncalo Amaral's appeal against the order to pay Kate and Gerry McCann 500,000 euro (£395,000) in compensation.
That ruling was handed down by a lower court in Lisbon a year ago, prompting Mr Amaral to appeal.
Ms Duarte said she intended to fight the decision at the Supreme Court.
Mr Amaral was part of the police investigation into Madeleine's disappearance from a holiday home in Portugal's Algarve region in May 2007, days before her fourth birthday.
In 2008 he published his book about the case called The Truth Of The Lie.
The McCanns sought 1.2 million euro (£948,000) in damages from Mr Amaral, saying they were "totally destroyed" and "depressed" by his allegations and felt "ashamed" that they might appear to have been to blame for their daughter's disappearance.
Mr Amaral had argued in his defence that his claims stemmed from the police investigation and that Portuguese media had already reported the possibility that the parents might have played a role in Madeleine's disappearance.
The appeals court "decided that (Mr Amaral) had the right to do what he did. It said he can write what he wants", Ms Duarte said. "It absolved him, said he didn't have to pay anything."
She said the McCanns took the reversal in their stride after a long time battling in Portuguese courts.
"They're used to it," Ms Duarte said.
Portuguese police closed the case in 2008 because authorities had detected no crime, but British police are still looking into it.
Madeleine would turn 13 next month.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article