Police have limited time left to find concrete evidence in Praia da Luz connecting suspect Christian Brueckner with Madeleine’s disappearance
Police are now in a race against the clock to find forensic evidence in the disappearance of Madeleine McCann, who vanished from a holiday home in Portugal 18 years ago.
German investigators have been given until Friday to search an area between Praia da Luz and the cottage where he lived at the time of the toddler’s disappearance in 2007, but it is understood that they will end their hunt at the end of Thursday if they fail to find anything significant.
Christian Brueckner, a suspect in case, is due to be released from prison within months.
A neighbour who lived near Brueckner around the time of Madeleine’s disappearance described him as “quite angry”, and said she would hear him having rows with his girlfriend.
Police investigating the disappearance of Madeleine McCann ramped up their hunt of scrubland and abandoned buildings on Wednesday with heavy machinery, including JCB and ground-penetrating radar.
Madeleine was three when she disappeared, sparking a Europe-wide police investigation.
German national Brueckner, who was formally identified as a suspect in 2022, has denied any involvement.
Watch live: Search for clues in disappearance of Madeleine McCann continues
Full report: Search intensifies with police using hi-tech radar close to suspect’s former home
Police have turned to specialist ground penetrating radar as searches intensified in the desperate hunt to finally solve the mystery of the disappearance of Madeleine McCann.
The hi-tech equipment, which can map underground terrain up to 10 feet deep, arrived at a remote area along with a JCB digger on the second day of renewed searches for the missing toddler on Wednesday.
Our crime correspondent Amy-Clare Martin reports from Praia da Luz:
Search for Madeleine McCann escalates with hi-tech radar used close to suspect’s home
Police searching up to 21 derelict buildings near suspect’s former home
Investigators are scouring a string of derelict farmhouses and outbuildings in a remote stretch of scrubland just over a mile from the resort of Praia da Luz, where the British toddler vanished in 2007.
The 120-acre area, off a dramatic clifftop path along the coast between Atalaia and Lagos, is said to have once been populated by a farming community, but has long-been abandoned because it is so arid.
Now up to 21 of these derelict structures are understood to be the focus of a fresh searches initiated by German investigators 18 years after Madeleine disappeared as they face a race against time to bring charges against their only suspect, Christian Brueckner.
Video report: Police continue search for Madeleine McCann
Watch: Inside an abandoned farm building in search area for Madeleine McCann
Amy-Clare Martin reports from on the ground:
Journalists were able to enter one of the abandoned structures after police spent the morning clearing rubble and debris inside.
The small stone farm building in the remote area of scrubland is strewn with graffiti and there is evidence of old campfires outside.
It appeared police had cleared the floor inside the outbuilding. It is not known if they will return to carry out further searches at the site.
Reports had suggested ground radar will be brought in but crews have so far been using shovels, chainsaws and a digger to remove rubble as they clear multiple sites across the vast stretch of scrubland.
Christian Brueckner says he will ‘disappear’ following release from prison
Speaking to German broadcaster RTL, Christian Brueckner said he planned to disappear after his release from prison.
He is due to be released in September as his seven-year term for the rape of a 72-year-old American woman in Praia da Luz in 2005 comes to an end.
The 48-year-old said: “The fact is that I have been in prison for many years for something that I cannot have committed and that therefore, through the participation of the media, half the world considers me a cruel rapist.”
Search expected to end on Thursday if no significant evidence found
The fresh search for evidence in Atalaia is expected to be entering its final day on Thursday.
Portuguese police haven’t been told what intelligence German investigators are acting on, but unless they uncover anything significant by the end of Thursday they will pack up and head home, it is understood.
Madeleine’s parents not commenting on police investigation, campaign group says
Kate and Gerry McCann, who last month marked the 18th anniversary of their daughter Madeleine’s disappearance, are not commenting during the “active police investigation”, the Find Madeleine Campaign said.
Brueckner’s former neighbour calls for him to be ‘locked away for rest of his life’
Now knowing the full extent of the allegations against him, a former neighbour of Christian Brueckner’s in Atalaia called for him be locked away for the rest of his life “because of what he has done”.
Brueckner, who denies any involvement in Madeleine’s disappearance, is due to be released from prison in September as his seven-year term for the rape of a 72-year-old American woman in Praia da Luz in 2005 comes to an end.
The former neighbour told The Telegraph that “what’s been uncovered about him is quite despicable”.
Brueckner was also cleared by a German court last year of unrelated sexual offences, alleged to have taken place in Portugal between 2000 and 2017.
Atalaia resident says it is first time area has been searched for evidence
A British local, who has lived in Atalaia since the 1980s and used to be a neighbour of Christian Brueckner, said she believes it is the first time police have searched the area.
The resident, who used to ride her horse around the 120-acre remote area being searched by police, said the farmhouses and outbuildings on the site have been derelict since at least the 80s.
“It is the first time I’ve heard of Atalaia being searched,” she said. “I know the properties because I used go the up there all the time with my horse. I know exactly where they are. Whether he’d been up there or done anything, no clue.”
