The prime suspect in the Madeleine McCann case is set to go to trial for a string of unrelaxed sex offences this week.
Christian Brueckner will appear in court in Braunschweig, Lower Saxony in Germany on February 16. The German national, who is already serving a rape sentence, is accused of five more sex offences that allegedly took place between 2000 and 2017 in Portugal.
Bruekner is also the prime suspect in the disappearance of Madeleine McCann in Portugal in 2007 but he continues to deny any involvement and he has never been charged with her disappearance.
McCann was three years old when she went missing while on holiday with her family at the Portuguese holiday resort, Praia da Luz on May 3, 2007.
Despite her case garnering mass global attention and being subject to multiple police investigations, the little girl has never been found.
In 2020, German police confirmed they were investigating Bruekner, who was already in prison at the time, based on the string of sexual offences he allegedly committed in Portugal around the same time and area McCann went missing.
These charges include the rape and sexual abuse of children.
He is currently serving a seven-year sentence in Germany over the rape of a pensioner in Praia da Luz.
The upcoming trial will hear from former friend to Brueckner, Helge Busching, who told Journalist Jutta Rabe that the Brueckner confessed to him McCann didn’t scream.
“He said ‘she didn’t scream’, ‘she didn’t scream’, that is what Brueckner said and then I looked at Mr Brueckner and thought ‘what are you telling me now?’” Mr Busching said, in audio that aired on 60 Minutes.
“And, then his reaction to that, that is, ‘Huh? What did you just say? She didn’t scream? How can you know?’ … In this moment, he realised, ‘he knows it. He, he has been there. He took her out’,” Ms Rabe told 60 Minutes.
The trial will take place February 16 2024.
