Madeleine McCann news – latest: Prime suspect’s friend claims Scotland Yard ‘ignored crucial information’
A former friend of Christian Brueckner, the prime suspect in the ongoing Madeleine McCann case, has claimed that he revealed crucial information to Scotland Yard in 2008 but was ignored.
In his first public interview, Helge Busching claimed that the jailed paedophile had told him “She didn’t scream” during a conversation about the missing three-year-old.
He told German outlet Bild that he had contacted the special hotline to report Brueckner’s comments but failed to receive a response. After leaving prison in 2017 and hearing about the 10th anniversary of her disappearance, he made a second call.
Brueckner, who is currently serving a prison sentence for raping a pensioner, was named as a prime suspect in 2020.
Last month, a reservoir in Portugal was searched by police after sources claimed that Brueckner had described it as a “little slice of paradise” while living near the Praia de Luz resort.
Scotland Yard has been contacted for comment.
Key Points
Detectives analyse soil from suspect’s camper van
Kate and Gerry forced to wait ‘weeks’ for reservoir search results
‘The world believes I killed Maddie, I didn’t’
‘Relevant clue’ found in search of reservoir
How the search was completed
Key suspect Christian Brueckner visited reservoir ‘days after disappearance’
Portugal police give update as search of reservoir closes to an end
Suspect’s friend in explosive interview
Friday 30 June 2023 08:02 , Holly Evans
A key witness who alerted authorities to Madeleine McCann prime suspect Christian Brueckner has claimed that he let slip that she “didn’t scream” when she was kidnapped.
In his first public interview, Helge Busching explained that his former acquaintance appeared to incriminate himself in the disappearance of the three-year-old girl.
Helge said that he learned of Brueckner’s true nature before the disappearance of McCann after he stole some videotapes and a gun from his house.
Read more below:
Madeleine McCann suspect ‘said she didn’t scream’ when kidnapped, friend claims
Brueckner ‘had videotapes of sexual abuse at his home’
Thursday 29 June 2023 18:00 , Sam Rkaina
Busching also claimed that he realised Brueckner’s true nature before Madeleine’s disappearance after stealing some videotapes and a gun from his house.
The clips purportedly showed Brueckner sexually abusing a teenage girl and an elderly woman in Portugal.
After a victim protested, he allegedly responded: “Shut up”.
“That’s when I knew what kind of guy Brueckner was,” Busching said.
Brueckner is currently imprisoned in Germany for the rape of a 72-year-old American pensioner in the Algarve region; he is scheduled for release in 2025.
He has a number of previous convictions for child sexual abuse and drug trafficking.
Suspect friend claims ‘she didn’t scream’ when kidnapped
Thursday 29 June 2023 17:44 , Holly Evans
In an interview with German outlet Bild, a key witness in alerting the authorities to Christian Brueckner claimed that the prime suspect let slip that she “didn’t scream” when kidnapped.
Helge Busching said that he had been acquainted with Brueckner while they were both carrying out petty crime in the Algarve resort area of Portugal.
He crossed paths with the jailed paedophile again in 2008 at a music festival in Spain, which is where he made the alleged comment about the missing three-year-old.
“He asked me, ‘don’t you go to Portugal anymore and do business there?’, Helge said.
“I said, ‘no, since the girl disappeared there, there have been too many police checks for me and I don’t need that at all.’
“[The topic of Madeleine’s disappearance] came up and I said: ‘Anyway, I don’t understand how the little one could have disappeared without a trace.’
“Christian had drunk two or three beers, and he said: ‘She didn’t scream.’
“I thought: He knows that. He has something to do with it. But he also checked that I understood that and then left at night.
“At 3 or 4 o’clock in the morning he left a packed festival with his mobile home. I looked for him the next morning, but his neighbours said he had left.”
Timeline of missing Madeleine’s disappearance
Friday 9 June 2023 08:00 , Sam Rkaina
The mystery began when the McCanns – affluent doctors Kate and Gerry, their three-year-old daughter Madeleine and her two-year-old twin siblings – joined a group of seven family friends and their five children on holiday at the Ocean Club in the village of Praia da Luz on the southwestern tip of Portugal on 28 April 2007.
After a pleasant spring break by the sea, the adults in the party went out for dinner at the resort’s open-air tapas bar on 3 May, gathering at 8.30pm. The children were left behind sleeping in their respective apartments with the doors unlocked and a rota system in place among the parents to ensure that someone returned every half-hour to check on them.
When Kate McCann took her turn and returned to her apartment at 10pm, she raced back to the restaurant screaming “Madeleine’s gone! Someone’s taken her!” The police were quickly called and 60 staff and fellow guests searched the complex, calling out the girl’s name in vain until daybreak the following morning.
Border police and airport staff were put on alert and hundreds of volunteers joined the efforts to find the missing girl over the coming days, the case fast becoming a sensation.
Click here for the latest timeline on the little girl’s mysterious disappearance.
‘Traditional’ evidence from reservoir search ‘could be microscopic’
Friday 9 June 2023 07:21 , Sam Rkaina
Forensics expert Dan Matthews has warned “traditional” evidence might be difficult to find now 16 years have passed since Madeleine’s disappearance.
The Forensic Science Senior Lecturer at the University of Lincoln suggested investigators would be searching the remote reservoir for “things that could’ve stood the test of time and not been destroyed by its passage”, such as clothing fragments, plastic items or jewellry.
“If they’re looking for body remains, then the only things remaining will be skeletal,” he added.
Police will be hoping to have found something that links back to Madeleine’s case, but Mr Matthews says how long it will take to get the results of the search is “very difficult to say”.
Clothing, for example, should not take long to analyse, he explained - but any fragment could be microscopic and could have significantly deteriorated over such a long period of time.
“The analysis can be quite an arduous process,” he said. “Especially when you’ve got samples that are not in pristine condition.
“You could potentially be looking at things that are not visible to the naked eye and using something like a microscope takes time.”
Click here for the full story.
Who is Christian Brueckner? Madeleine McCann suspect and the accusations against him
Thursday 8 June 2023 09:00 , Sam Rkaina
Madeleine McCann’s disappearance has puzzled detectives for more than 15 years – but in 2020 a new potential suspect emerged. Now, police are searching a remote reservoir in Portugal’s the Algarve that he used to visit in a renewed effort to shed further light on the case.
German prisoner Christian Brueckner was first named in connection with the unsolved mystery that summer, and officially named as a suspect last year. His yellow and white VW T3 Westfalia campervan was reportedly identified as having been near to the Praia da Luz resort in Portugal where the young girl went missing on May 3, 2007.
But who is he? Lucy Skoulding reports:
All we know about Madeleine McCann suspect Brueckner and the accusations against him
ICYMI: How much has the Madeleine McCann investigation cost?
Thursday 8 June 2023 08:47 , Matt Mathers
Sixteen years after Madeleine McCann vanished from the Algarve holiday apartment where she was sleeping next to her infant twin siblings, police have launched a major new search for evidence.
After laying dormant for several years since David Cameron kickstarted an ultimately fruitless Metropolitan Police inquiry in 2011, the case of the missing three-year-old was revived once more in 2020 when German prosecutors revealed a new suspect.
Here, Andy Gregory takes a look at how much the investigation has cost:
How much has the Madeleine McCann investigation cost?
ICYMI: Items seized in Madeleine McCann search ‘cannot yet be linked’ to disappearance
Wednesday 7 June 2023 10:20 , Matt Mathers
German prosecutors have said items seized as part of fresh searches for evidence in the Madeleine McCann case cannot yet be linked with the investigation into her disappearance.
A large section of the Barragem do Arade reservoir in Portugal was cordoned off last week, about 30 miles from where three-year-old Madeleine went missing in 2007.
Josh Payne reports:
Items seized in Madeleine McCann search ‘cannot yet be linked’ to disappearance
How Madeleine McCann search at reservoir unfolded – and what police found
Tuesday 6 June 2023 21:42 , Sam Rkaina
The long-running hunt for missing Madeleine McCann returned to the headlines last month during a three-day search of a Portuguese reservoir.
Police combed the remote Barragem do Arade in response to what was vaguely described as “certain tips” about an area the prime suspect in the case, Christian Brueckner, regularly frequented between 2000 and 2017.
Although police are remaining tight-lipped about the details, they said they recovered “a number of items” from the scene, which will now be evaluated in the coming days in the hope of shedding light on the ongoing mystery surrounding Madeleine’s disappearance from an Algarve holiday resort on 3 May 2007.
Hans Christian Wolters, prosecutor for the city of Braunschweig, said last week: “Whether some of the items actually relate to the Madeleine McCann case cannot yet be confirmed.”
Click here for the full story.
Police who searched reservoir were looking for a gun and camcorder
Monday 5 June 2023 14:05 , Matt Mathers
Detectives in the Madeleine McCann case who searched a reservoir in Portugal were looking for Christian B’s gun and camcorder, it has been reported.
Officers scoured the emote reservoir after "certain tips" were given to German prosecutors about the case, according to the Daily Mail.
The paper said German police were tipped off by a criminal informer who said the items had been stolen from Christian B’s house.
ICYMI: Madeleine McCann police confirm ‘number of items’ recovered from Algarve reservoir search
Monday 5 June 2023 10:55 , Matt Mathers
Police investigating the disappearance of Madeleine McCann say they have recovered a number of items from their recent search of a reservoir in Portugal.
German authorities last week helped Portuguese crews comb a remote area inland from the Algarve coastal resort where Madeleine went missing from her bedroom during a family holiday in 2007.
Full report:
Madeleine McCann police confirm ‘number of items’ recovered from reservoir search
ICYMI: Madeleine McCann police shouldn’t just focus on prime suspect, forensics expert warns
Monday 5 June 2023 10:30 , Matt Mathers
Forensics experts have warned investigators in the Madeleine McCann case cannot focus purely on their prime suspect and that, 16 years after she disappeared, “traditional” evidence may not have survived.
German authorities last week helped Portuguese crews comb a remote reservoir inland from the Algarve coastal resort in Portugal where the then-three-year-old Madeleine went missing from her bedroom on a family holiday in 2007.
Tara Cobham reports:
Madeleine McCann police shouldn’t just focus on prime suspect, forensics expert warns
Sixteen years and countless heartbreaks: Where are Madeleine McCann’s family now?
Monday 5 June 2023 10:00 , Matt Mathers
Parents refuse to give up hope and have spoken movingly about ‘new normality’ of raising twins without their missing daughter, Joe Sommerlad reports.
Read the full story here:
Sixteen years and countless heartbreaks as Madeleine McCann’s family wait for answers
Recap: Timeline of Madeleine’s disappearance
Monday 5 June 2023 09:33 , Matt Mathers
Madeleine McCann, a three-year-old girl from Rothley, Leicestershire, went missing from the Portuguese holiday resort of Praia da Luz on the Algarve on 3 May 2007, a case still unsolved and still the subject of intense interest among the public and press.
Her parents, Kate and Gerry McCann, posted a statement on the Find Madeleine website on 3 May 2023 marking the latest anniversary of their daughter’s disappearance, reiterating their hopes of being reunited with her one day and posting a poem, “The Contradiction” by Clare Pollard, to express their feelings.
“Today marks the 16th anniversary of Madeleine’s abduction. Still missing... still very much missed,” they wrote.
“The police investigation continues, and we await a breakthrough. Thank you to everyone for your support- it really helps.”
Here is a reminder of the events of the case:
What happened to Madeleine McCann?
Christian B ‘claims five chilling words made him prime Madeleine McCann suspect’
Monday 5 June 2023 09:06 , Matt Mathers
The prime suspect in the Madeleine McCann case has claimed he became the focus of the investigation after a former friend alleged he made a chilling comment about the case, according to reports.
German prisoner Christian Brueckner was first named in connection with the unsolved mystery in the summer of 2020, and officially named as a suspect last year.
His yellow and white VW T3 Westfalia campervan was reportedly identified as having been near to the Praia da Luz resort in Portugal where the young girl went missing on May 3, 2007.
Maryam Zakir-Hussain reports:
Christian B ‘claims five chilling words made him prime Madeleine McCann suspect’
Recap: How Madeleine McCann search at reservoir unfolded – and what police found
Monday 5 June 2023 09:01 , Matt Mathers
The long-running hunt for missing Madeleine McCann returned to the headlines last month during a three-day search of a Portuguese reservoir.
Police combed the remote Barragem do Arade in response to what was vaguely described as “certain tips” about an area the prime suspect in the case, Christian Brueckner, regularly frequented between 2000 and 2017.
Jane Dalton and Joe Sommerlad report:
How Madeleine McCann search at reservoir unfolded and what police found
Detectives compare soil from reservoir to main suspect’s camper van
Monday 5 June 2023 08:58 , Matt Mathers
Soil from a reservoir in Portugal searched by police last month is being compared with samples from Christian Brueckner’s camper van, it has been reported.
Detectives believe Brueckner visited the remote Barragem do Arade reservoir in the Algarve days after Madeleine disappeared.
Officials now believe they have a good chance of proving that Brueckner’s van was in the area at the time of Madeleine’s abduction, sources told The Daily Mirror.
The insider claims that if the soil sample analysis reveals a “positive match”, police may be able to further “close the net” around Brueckner, 45, who has not yet been charged.
Monday 5 June 2023 08:52 , Matt Mathers
Good morning and welcome to The Independent’s rolling coverage of the Madeleine McCann case.
Investigators are still looking into German national Christian Brueckner, who is the main suspect.
We’ll bring you updates on this story throughout the day.
Blog closed
Friday 2 June 2023 23:00 , Joe Middleton
The blog is now closed. For the latest news on Madeleine McCann’s disappearance click here.
Who is Christian Brueckner? Madeleine McCann suspect and the accusations against him
Friday 2 June 2023 22:00 , Joe Middleton
Madeleine McCann’s disappearance has puzzled detectives for more than 15 years – but in 2020 a new potential suspect emerged. Now, police are searching a remote reservoir in Portugal’s the Algarve that he used to visit in a renewed effort to shed further light on the case.
German prisoner Christian Brueckner was first named in connection with the unsolved mystery that summer, and officially named as a suspect last year. His yellow and white VW T3 Westfalia campervan was reportedly identified as having been near to the Praia da Luz resort in Portugal where the young girl went missing on May 3, 2007.
All we know about Madeleine McCann suspect Brueckner and the accusations against him
Read Madeleine McCann suspect Christian Brueckner’s bombshell prison letters for the first time
Friday 2 June 2023 21:00 , Joe Middleton
Letters written by the prime suspect in the Madeleine McCann case, in which he protests his innocence and tries to claim he had nothing to do with her disappearance, have been revealed for the first time.
Christian Brueckner, who is in jail for rape, penned a series of letters from his prison cell, attempting to distance himself from the unsolved case of the then-three-year-old, who vanished while on a family holiday from Praia da Luz, Portugal, in 2007.
“You can never imagine how it is when the whole world believes you are a child murderer, and you are not,” he wrote in the string of neatly written letters unveiled by MailOnline.
Read Madeleine McCann suspect Christian Brueckner’s bombshell prison letters
Madeleine McCann case: Timeline of the missing child’s disappearance
Friday 2 June 2023 20:00 , Joe Middleton
Madeleine McCann, a three-year-old girl from Rothley, Leicestershire, went missing from the Portuguese holiday resort of Praia da Luz on the Algarve on 3 May 2007, a case still unsolved and still the subject of intense interest among the public and press.
Her parents, Kate and Gerry McCann, posted a statement on the Find Madeleine website on 3 May 2023 marking the latest anniversary of their daughter’s disappearance, reiterating their hopes of being reunited with her one day and posting a poem, “The Contradiction” by Clare Pollard, to express their feelings.
What happened to Madeleine McCann?
How Madeleine McCann search at reservoir unfolded – and what police found
Friday 2 June 2023 19:00 , Joe Middleton
The long-running hunt for missing Madeleine McCann returned to the headlines last week during a three-day search of a Portuguese reservoir.
Police combed the remote Barragem do Arade in response to what was vaguely described as “certain tips” about an area the prime suspect in the case, Christian Brueckner, regularly frequented between 2000 and 2017.
Although police are remaining tight-lipped about the details, they said they recovered “a number of items” from the scene, which will now be evaluated in the coming days in the hope of shedding light on the ongoing mystery surrounding Madeleine’s disappearance from an Algarve holiday resort on 3 May 2007.
How Madeleine McCann search at reservoir unfolded and what police found
Allegations Kate and Gerry faced at time of daughter’s disappearance
Friday 2 June 2023 18:00 , Martha Mchardy
After Madeleine’s disappearance from the family’s rented apartment complex – while her parents and a group of friends ate dinner at an open-air tapas restaurant, a member of the party checking on the otherwise-unattended children every half-hour – the McCanns led the public appeals for information and became fixtures on newspaper front pages and television screens.
They were also subjected to lurid tabloid allegations suggesting that they and their friends might be swingers or, as physicians, might have been in the habit of sedating their children. Others claimed to have spotted inconsistencies in their account of the night’s events, insinuating that they might have been involved in their daughter’s disappearance.
The intensity of the hostility towards the McCanns would later be described by Roy Greenslade of The Guardian as “no journalistic accident” and “a sustained campaign of vitriol against a grief-stricken family”.
The couple were interviewed as “arguidos” (suspects) by the Portuguese authorities in September 2007, with the parents told that police dogs had discovered DNA evidence from the missing girl in the boot of their holiday rental car. They vehemently denied the accusations against them and subsequently launched a libel action against one of the detectives who had gone on to write a book about the case.
After the family returned to England, chief inspector Tavares de Almeida of the Policia Judiciaria in Portimao signed a nine-page report alleging that Madeleine had died in the holiday apartment as a result of an accident (rather than been abducted by a stranger), that the tapas dinner and rota checks had been part of a planned cover-up, that the family’s friends had helped to mislead the police and that the McCanns had concealed her body and then faked a kidnapping.
That official suspicion lingered until July 2008 when Portugal’s attorney general, Fernando Jose Pinto Monteiro, announced that there was no evidence to link either the McCanns or another suspect, local man Robert Murat, to the disappearance after all and closed the case unsolved.
Joe Sommerlad reports:
Sixteen years and countless heartbreaks as Madeleine McCann’s family wait for answers
McCann family’s ‘new normality’ living without daughter
Friday 2 June 2023 17:00 , Martha Mchardy
Reflecting on the importance of the twins in keeping their family unit together in a 2017 interview with the BBC’s Fiona Bruce, Gerry McCann said the ordeal had forced them to face “a new normality” in living without their daughter.
Kate McCann added: “What people do say is that you don’t realise how strong you are until you have no option.
“And I think that’s very true. Obviously massive events like this cause a lot of reaction, a lot of trauma and upset.
“But ultimately you have to keep going – and especially when you have got other children involved.
“Some of that is subconscious I think – your mind and body just take over to a certain extent. But if you can’t change something immediately, you have to go with it and do the best that you can.”
The couple also addressed the online abuse they have received, commenting: “I’m sure it is a very small minority of people who spend their time doing it, but it has totally inhibited what we do.
“Personally, we don’t use social media, although we have used it in Madeleine’s campaign.
“But for our twins who are growing up in an era where mobile technology is used all the time, we don’t want them not to be able to use it in the same way that their peers do.”
Ms McCann described the actions of some online commentators as shocking but said she preferred to focus on the support many more members of the public had offered the family.
‘The world believes I killed Maddie, I didn’t,’ says Madeleine McCann suspect Christian Brueckner
Friday 2 June 2023 16:00 , Martha Mchardy
A suspect in the Madeleine McCann case has claimed he “didn’t” abduct and murder the girl, MailOnline has reported.
In a series of letters, Christian Brueckner – a convicted German rapist – is reportedly saying “I am not a monster” and claiming that he had nothing to do with the abduction or murder of then three-year-old Madeleine McCann.
“The world believes I killed Maddie, I didn’t”, he wrote in the neatly written letters, according to MailOnline.
ICYMI: Madeleine McCann suspect Christian Brueckner’s bombshell prison letters revealed
Friday 2 June 2023 15:00 , Martha Mchardy
Letters written by the prime suspect in the Madeleine McCann case, in which he protests his innocence and tries to claim he had nothing to do with her disappearance, have been revealed for the first time.
“You can never imagine how it is when the whole world believes you are a child murderer, and you are not,” he wrote in the string of neatly written letters unveiled by MailOnline.
According to MailOnline, he goes on to say there is no evidence linking him to the case.
“I got told a long time ago that the prosecuter’s office was closing the Maddie case because there is not even the smallest evidence. There will never be a trial,” he wrote.
“The prosecutors are not saying anything to the public because they must give the files to my lawyers - and they contain many (sic) material which confirms my innocence.”
In another one of his letters, written from jail in Germany, he reportedly sketched a long, dark corridor of a prison wing and claimed police and prosecuters are “attempting to create a monster”.
Brueckner then writes about the psychological toll of the case. “The torture I’m going through is the best evidence I can have,” he reportedly wrote.
In his latest letter, he signed off saying: “I’m writing this without self-pity and my self-confidence and self-control was never at a higher level. What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. Chin up! Better days are coming.”
Tara Cobham reports:
Read Madeleine McCann suspect Christian Brueckner’s bombshell prison letters
How Madeleine McCann search at reservoir unfolded – and what police found
Friday 2 June 2023 14:00 , Martha Mchardy
The long-running hunt for missing Madeleine McCann returned to the headlines last week during a three-day search of a Portuguese reservoir.
Police combed the remote Barragem do Arade in response to what was vaguely described as “certain tips” about an area the prime suspect in the case, Christian Brueckner, regularly frequented between 2000 and 2017.
Although police are remaining tight-lipped about the details, they said they recovered “a number of items” from the scene, which will now be evaluated in the coming days in the hope of shedding light on the ongoing mystery surrounding Madeleine’s disappearance from an Algarve holiday resort on 3 May 2007.
Hans Christian Wolters, prosecutor for the city of Braunschweig, said: “Whether some of the items actually relate to the Madeleine McCann case cannot yet be confirmed.”
Earlier this week, officers said “materials collected” during the search had already been sent on to Germany for analysis.
Jane Dalton and Joe Sommerlad report:
How Madeleine McCann search at reservoir unfolded and what police found
ICYMI: Police issue update on Madeleine McCann search
Friday 2 June 2023 13:00 , Martha Mchardy
Police investigating the disappearance of Madeleine McCann say they have recovered a number of items from their recent search of a reservoir in Portugal.
German authorities last week helped Portuguese crews comb a remote area inland from the Algarve coastal resort where Madeleine went missing from her bedroom during a family holiday in 2007.
Prosecutor for the city of Braunschweig, Christian Wolters, said the individual items seized as part of searches would be evaluated over the coming days and weeks.
“Whether some of the items actually relate to the Madeleine McCann case cannot yet be confirmed,” the prosecutor’s statement read.
Maryam Zakir-Hussain reports:
Madeleine McCann police confirm ‘number of items’ recovered from reservoir search
ICYMI: Read the statement Madeleine McCann’s parents issued 16 years after her disappearance
Friday 2 June 2023 12:00 , Martha Mchardy
In May, in a short statement on the official Find Madeleine Campaign website, Kate and Gerry McCann said: “Today marks the 16th anniversary of Madeleine’s abduction. Still missing… still very much missed.
“It is hard to find the words to convey how we feel.
“The police investigation continues, and we await a breakthrough. Thank you to everyone for your support – it really helps.”
Matthew Cooper reports:
Madeleine McCann’s parents issue statement 16 years after her disappearance
ICYMI: Madeleine Mccann Campaign Shares Video On 16th Anniversary Of Child Going Missing
Friday 2 June 2023 11:00 , Martha Mchardy
