Is Maddie McCann kidnapping saga finally near the end?
Author of the article:Brad Hunter
Publishing date:Apr 30, 2022 • 22 hours ago • 4 minute read • Join the conversation
Madeleine McCann was three years old when she vanished from a Portuguese resort in 2007.
Madeleine McCann was three years old when she vanished from a Portuguese resort in 2007. PHOTO BY HANDOUT /METROPOLITAN POLICE
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She would be almost 19 years old now.
What Madeleine McCann’s life would have been like today is anyone’s guess. The smiling little girl never had the opportunity to fill in the years.
Tuesday marks the 15th anniversary of Maddie’s shocking disappearance from a resort in Portugal. She was never to be seen again.
And now, all these years later, cops say they believe they know who is responsible. Any charges, of course, will need to be tested in court.
“I can’t imagine what they are experiencing, probably pain without measure,” Chief Insp. Olegario Sousa told reporters in 2007, referring to Maddie’s parents, Kate and Gerry McCann.
Her parents, Kate and Gerry McCann, have endured 15 years of hell.
Her parents, Kate and Gerry McCann, have endured 15 years of hell. PHOTO BY HANDOUT /METROPOLITAN POLICE
THE SCENE
Like a lot of British families, the McCanns found the Algarve coast in Portugal a cheap and cheerful vacation. On the evening of May 3, 2007, Madeleine McCann, three years old at the time, was tucked into bed with her two-year-old twin siblings.
Her parents were having dinner in a resto with friends just 55 metres away. Every half hour they took turns checking on their children, then would return to their dinner.
At 10 p.m., Kate McCann returned to the ground-floor unit and discovered that Maddie was missing.
AN EXPLOSIVE STORY. DAILY MIRROR
AN EXPLOSIVE STORY. DAILY MIRROR
THE CRIME
The investigation stumbled out of the gate. Initially, local detectives believed that Maddie had accidentally died in the vacation villa and that her parents covered it up. Five months later, the heartbroken couple was named as suspects in the child’s disappearance.
“Despite there being so much we wish to say, we are unable to do so, except to say this: we have played no part in the disappearance of our lovely daughter Madeleine,” Gerry McCann told reporters when he arrived back in the United Kingdom.
But for a time, local police and the British press zeroed in on the McCanns, literally breaking them.
Maddie McCann was just 3 when she disappeared.
Maddie McCann was just 3 when she disappeared. PHOTO BY METROPOLITAN POLICE
“I’ve been a detective at the most senior level for 30 years and have never seen such a witch-hunt, or one based on such flimsy evidence,” former Metropolitan Police Chief Lord Stevens said.
Scotland Yard took up the case in 2011. British detectives never believed the McCanns had anything to do with Maddie’s disappearance — and suspected murder.
Investigators believed that a pedophile had been watching the little girl and the McCanns waiting for an opportunity to pounce. Two years later, cops released e-fit images of suspicious men they hoped to find.
One was of a man spotted carrying a child to the beach on the night Maddie disappeared. Portuguese police were now shamed into reopening the probe.
What Madeleine McCann may look like now. (Facebook photo)
What Madeleine McCann may look like now. (Facebook photo)
RED HERRINGS
The Maddie McCann case was the “most reported kidnapping in history,” according to the Daily Telegraph in London. This led to a tsunami of rumour, innuendo and conspiracy theories.
One was that the little girl had been kidnapped by an international pedophile sex ring, another was that she had wandered out of her unit and fell down a hole. Each theory was reported breathlessly by the U.K. tabloids.
Detectives also looked at a wide array of pedos across Europe whose M.O. matched the Maddie case, and by 2015, the case was considered a homicide investigation.
Christian Brueckner is the prime suspect in the 2007 disappearance of British toddler Madeleine McCann.
Christian Brueckner is the prime suspect in the 2007 disappearance of British toddler Madeleine McCann. PHOTO BY HANDOUT /GERMAN FEDERAL POLICE
THE SUSPECT
The McCanns, the Tapas Seven (their friends), and scores of other possible suspects had been eyed during the endless probe but were all cleared without reservation.
By the summer of 2020, years of tears, heartache, and agony had dragged by. Missed birthdays, graduations, Christmases, and other holidays.
But on June 20, German detectives and prosecutors announced they had a prime suspect in the disappearance — and murder — of wee Maddie McCann.
He is a German drifter, convicted rapist, and pedophile, named Christian Brueckner, currently serving a sentence for raping an American tourist.
Brueckner, 44, matched the e-fit perfectly, was living nearby at the time of Maddie’s disappearance and phone records put him at the resort at the time she vanished.
Cops say the suspect in the Madeleine McCann case lived in this camper van.
Cops say the suspect in the Madeleine McCann case lived in this camper van. PHOTO BY HANDOUT /METROPOLITAN POLICE
And then there is the separate investigation in his native country: He is a suspect in the disappearance of a German girl, Inga Gehricke, who was just five when she vanished in May 2015, along with other missing children in France and Belgium.
Christian Brueckner, the suspect in the murder of Tristan Blotch and Maddie McCann.
SUSPECTED MADDIE McCANN KILLER: 'I know what happened'
A cameraman films the apartment where three-year-old Madeleine McCann disappeared in 2007, in Praia da Luz, Portugal, June 4, 2020.
Portuguese prosecutors identify suspect in Madeleine McCann case
A handout picture made available to Reuters on July 16, 2020 from the Carabinieri military police shows a man identified as Christian Brueckner, at the time when he was arrested in 2018, under an international warrant for drug trafficking and other crimes.
Madeleine McCann suspect taunts police over lack of evidence
Former friend Michael Tatschi told the Daily Mail Brueckner boasted about “selling kids” and suggested Maddie had been sold into sexual slavery.
“He was always bragging about money and making money. He even talked about selling kids, maybe to Morocco,” Tatschi said. “I think he probably sold Maddie to someone. Maybe a sex ring. I was living with him at the time. He was my best friend. I know he did it.”
He has now officially been named a suspect in Maddie’s case. This is typically a precursor to charges.
Until then, he is rotting in a German prison.
bhunter@postmedia.com
@HunterTOSun
Tuesday marks the 15th anniversary of toddler Maddie McCanns shocking disappearance from a resort in Portugal never to be seen again.
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