Newspapers pay, apologize in McCann case

LONDON, Oct. 16 (UPI) -- The friends who were eating with the McCanns when their daughter was abducted in Portugal received a courtroom apology Thursday from a British news company.

Express Newspapers, which owns the Daily Express and Daily Star, also paid $645,250 in damages, The Guardian reported. The plaintiffs say they plan to donate the money to the Find Madeleine Fund.

Madeleine McCann, 4, disappeared while her parents, Kate and Gerry McCann, ate at a restaurant across from their vacation apartment at a beach resort in Portugal. They said that they left the girl and her two siblings asleep in one bedroom.

Six of the people from the restaurant were in the courtroom to receive the apology. Fiona Payne made a statement on behalf of the group after the hearing.

"The defamatory stories written about us were not only extremely damaging on a personal level but we strongly feel were detrimental to the search for Madeleine," Payne said. "This aspect has been particularly heartbreaking."

Express Newspapers paid damages to the McCanns in March, while Robert Murat, who was named as a suspect by Portuguese police, received a payment from 11 newspapers.