Detectives probing into the background of the new prime suspect in the Madeleine McCann investigation are attempting to track down his former partner – described by one person who had met her as an ‘underage Kosovan girl’.
Officers are hoping to trace the woman, who is believed to have stayed with suspect Christian Brueckner in a house near Praia da Luz, Portugal, prior to the then three-year-old’s disappearance.
The Algarve farm house is 25 minutes’ walk from the hotel where Madeleine went missing in May 2007.
The woman is thought to have left the area prior to Madeleine’s disappearance, while Brueckner is said to have left Praia da Luz shortly after.
Police are hoping to the track down the woman as they hope to find out more about the movements of Brueckner around the Portuguese tourist hotspot.
It is part of their investigation into Brueckner, the paedophile prime suspect who has 17 convictions and who is serving seven years in Kiel jail in northern Germany for rape.
It comes as a former acquaintance of Brueckner told a German television news channel how he was once threatened by the 43-year-old in Braunschweig, Germany.
This is Christian Brueckner, the new key suspect in the Madeleine McCann case, whose identity is protected in Germany despite being in jail for raping a US tourist in Praia da Luz in the months before Maddie vanished. Here he is pictured in a bar in Hanover, Germany
Officers are hoping to trace the woman, who is believed to have stayed with suspect Christian Brueckner (pictured) in a house in Praia da Luz, Portugal, prior to then three-year-old Maddie’s disappearance
Madeleine McCann who vanished from the resort of Praia da Luz in Portugal in May 2007, while on holiday with her family
The man, whose name was changed by RTL to Norbert M, said he had lived in an apartment which was previously run by Brueckner as a kiosk and knew he had a ‘minor girlfriend from Kosovo’.
Mr M told RTL: ‘He became more and more aggressive.
‘I heard that he left the kiosk and then went to Portugal or Spain with a girl. He then left dogs in his kiosk for weeks.’
He added: ‘I can imagine that he is behind the disappearance of Maddie.’
The comments came as yesterday prosecutors in Germany labelled Brueckner a ‘multiple sexual predator’.
It was also claimed Brueckner had been convicted of a child sex offence in his native Germany when aged just 17.
Yet the drifter, who reportedly has as many as 17 criminal convictions, was apparently overlooked by Portuguese police.
It also emerged yesterday that he had been convicted of raping a 72-year-old US widow in her Algarve home 18 months before Madeleine disappeared.
Brueckner is now the focus of the 13-year investigation into the disappearance of the three-year-old from the Algarve.
Yesterday a spokesman for her parents Kate and Gerry McCann hailed the ‘significant’ breakthrough.
But they faced renewed anguish as German prosecutors stated they believed their daughter was dead and also suggested officers knew how she died.
Brueckner is behind bars in Germany.
But it was claimed that he could walk free within days, as he will become eligible for parole on Sunday.
The suspect is said to have lived at this property named Escola Vehla – meaning ‘old school’ – during his time in Portugal
The house is situated between the resort of Praia da Luz and the larger town of Lagos four miles away
Madeleine vanished from this holiday apartment in the popular Portuguese holiday resort of Praia da Luz – Apartment 5a – while her parents were with friends nearby and regularly checking on their three sleeping children
The German suspect had lived in a warehouse outside Praia da Luz for several years but moved into a campervan just before Maddie vanished
On the most dramatic day in the case since Madeleine vanished on May 3, 2007:
- Brueckner emerged as a ‘person of interest’ for British police in the early stages of a major Scotland Yard review started in 2011;
- German prosecutor Hans Christian Wolters said: ‘We think that Madeleine McCann is dead and are appealing for witnesses’;
- German magazine Der Spiegel said Brueckner was convicted of sexually abusing a child in his native Bavaria in 1994;
- Police faced questions on why it took 13 years for the suspect to come to light.
Brueckner is in jail in Kiel, northern Germany.
But one German media report yesterday suggested he was on the verge of getting parole, having served two thirds of his sentence.
According to a German newspaper, he becomes eligible for freedom from Sunday, if the Federal Court of Justice in Germany decides to grant him parole.
On Wednesday, Scotland Yard, which has been carrying out a £12million review of the Madeleine case, dropped the bombshell revelation there was a new suspect, as German police launched an appeal via that country’s equivalent of CrimeWatch.
The suspect, who is in prison in Germany for rape, has been linked to an early 1980s camper van – with a white upper body and yellow skirting, registered in Portugal – which is seen here on the Algarve in 2007. Police believe it may have been used in the crime but they have not found the DNA evidence needed to charge him
He has also been linked to a 1993 Jaguar XJR6 with a German number plate seen in Praia da Luz and the surrounding areas in 2006 and 2007 including just days before Maddie’s disappearance. It has been seized by police.
Yesterday Mr Wolters said: ‘We think that Madeleine McCann is dead and are appealing for witnesses.
The 43-year-old is a multiple sexual predator already convicted of crimes against little girls.’
He suggested police had determined the method used to kill the three-year-old and said others would have ‘concrete knowledge’ of how she died and where her body was hidden.
Scotland Yard still insists that it is a missing person inquiry and the McCanns say they have never given up hope she will be found alive. Madeleine disappeared while her parents, from Rothley in Leicestershire, were having a meal with friends at a tapas bar close to their apartment.
The news today has given hope to comes as a shot in the arm to her parents Kate and Gerry McCann (pictured in 2017), who have never given up hope in the search for their daughter
Scotland Yard is launching a ‘major’ joint appeal with the German and Portuguese forces, just over 13 years after she vanished. Pictured: DCI Mark Cranwell
Portuguese police were facing serious questions yesterday about why Brueckner was not identified earlier as a suspect given he had child sex abuse convictions dating back to 1994.
He lived two miles from the resort where she vanished and phone data indicates he was in the area on the night.
If Portuguese officers had done basic checks of known sex offenders his name could have emerged within months.
The ex-lead Portuguese investigator on the case, Goncalo Amaral, has claimed the suspect had been ruled out of the inquiry in 2008.
But he allegedly came back into the frame after a conversation in an internet chatroom about Madeleine and her abduction.
Yesterday it emerged Brueckner only became a suspect for Scotland Yard in 2017 when he is said to have told a friend at a bar he ‘knew all about’ what had happened to Madeleine.
According to Sky News, Brueckner was prompted to make the comment when her face flashed up on a TV screen in a German pub during a report on a UK appeal for information on the tenth anniversary of her disappearance.
A spokesman for the McCanns said: ‘This would appear to be the most significant lead they are trying to close down in 13 years.’
German police said their phones ‘rang hot’ after the appeal went live.
Detective Chief Inspector Mark Cranwell, leading the Met Police investigation, said more than 270 calls and emails had been received.
Today more details revealed about the remote farmhouse which gave Christian Brueckner unrivalled views of Praia da Luz.
The convicted child sex offender is now a key suspect in the disappearance of Madeleine McCann in May 2007.
When Brueckner lived in the farmhouse above Praia da Luz, he seldom mixed with his neighbours and allowed the property to fall into disrepair.
Last night one neighbour told the Daily Mail: ‘I immediately recognised him from the pictures in the media. He kept to himself and lived with a girlfriend for some of the time.’
When Brueckner lived in the farmhouse above Praia da Luz (pictured), he seldom mixed with his neighbours and allowed the property to fall into disrepair
Brueckner, now 43, is understood to have lived in the farmhouse from 1999 to 2006 and may have been living in a distinctive campervan at the time Madeleine disappeared
The farmhouse is a 25-minute walk to the Ocean Club complex where Madeleine was on holiday with her parents and her twin siblings Sean and Amelie
Brueckner, now 43, is understood to have lived in the farmhouse from 1999 to 2006 and may have been living in a distinctive campervan at the time Madeleine disappeared.
The single-storey property is surrounded by disused water wells and sits on a hillside which leads on to a footpath to the beach where the little girl played. It also sits close to where Madeleine’s parents Gerry and Kate used to jog along the clifftop in search of solace during the aftermath of her disappearance.
The farmhouse is a 25-minute walk to the Ocean Club complex where Madeleine was on holiday with her parents and her twin siblings Sean and Amelie.
In 2014 police sealed off an area of scrubland close to the farmhouse and used ground-penetrating radar to detect whether the soil had been disturbed.
Another neighbour said of Brueckner last night: ‘He moved in in the mid-Nineties with a German girlfriend who left around a year and a half later. They seemed to have a tempestuous relationship. I would hear them arguing. I knew very little about his life but he seemed to me to be a choleric man.’
Another added: ‘He had a fall-out with another German he sub-let the place to for around six months. He treated him very badly.
‘But I never for one moment suspected he could have had anything to do with Madeleine McCann’s disappearance. It’s something that never even crossed my mind. His life was pretty much of a mystery to people round here. His girlfriend left a long time ago and she hasn’t been seen around here since.’
A third neighbour said: ‘This is an idyllic spot and we are all proud of our houses and look after them. But this guy let his place go to ruin. He left it looking a right mess and it took the owner some time to make it right.’
The owner of the property is a British man who rented it to the German suspect and his girlfriend. The homeowner, who asked to remain anonymous, said both UK and Portuguese police have asked for his help relating to background information on Brueckner.
He said: ‘In 2006 my neighbour contacted me in the UK to say that the house had been left ramshackle and abandoned with no sign of occupancy.
‘We returned to Portugal and reported the disappearance to the Portuguese police and later discovered that he may have been arrested.
This was the last we heard from him until about a year ago when we were contacted by the UK and Portuguese police requesting what information we had as they were following a new line of inquiry relating to this person.’
Speaking to Sky News, he added: ‘My wife and I moved back to the UK in 1992. The house was let out to friends and friends of friends to maintain occupancy, look after the land and pay the bills.
‘The house was occupied for a period of time by what seemed like an ordinary young couple trying to get by in Portugal.
‘Living in England, we had relatively little interaction besides talk of the house, the land and any maintenance issues.
‘We met in person when passing through on family holidays to the Algarve.
‘At a later date we discovered that the man’s girlfriend had parted company and returned to Germany.’
Police are now trying to trace Brueckner’s ex-girlfriend to establish a full picture of the suspect’s movements on the Algarve. She is thought to have left Praia before Madeleine’s disappearance.
Brueckner, a known drifter, also spent time dog-sitting for German friends at a house in Monte Judeu, a few miles from the seaside.