Madeleine McCann suspect Christian Brueckner charged with five new counts of rape and sexual abuse
Berlin – A German public prosecutor has announced new charges against Christian Brueckner, the man suspected of kidnapping and killing British toddler Madeleine McCann in 2007. The public prosecutor's office in Braunschweig, central Germany, said Tuesday that Brueckner would be put on trial on three counts of rape and two counts of child sexual abuse, all unrelated to the still-unsolved McCann case.
"The Braunschweig public prosecutor's office today brought charges against a 45-year-old German man before the Braunschweig Regional Court for several sexual offenses he is alleged to have committed in Portugal between Dec. 28, 2000, and June 11, 2017," public prosecutor Hans-Christian Wolters announced. "The accused is the same person who is being investigated on suspicion of murder in connection with the disappearance of the then 3-year-old British girl Madeleine Beth McCann from an apartment complex in Praia da Luz in Portugal on May 3, 2007."
The prosecution has accused Brueckner of raping three women, including an Irish national identified as Hazel B. who was 20 in when she was attacked in her apartment in Portugal's Praia da Rocha in 2004.
According to investigators, the perpetrator in that attack acted very similarly to the man who attacked and raped a 72-year-old woman known as Diana M. in her home in nearby Praia da Luz in 2005. Brueckner was sentenced in 2019 to seven years in prison for that crime and is currently serving the sentence at a prison in Oldenburg.
Hazel B. became aware of Brueckner when new reports surfaced about evidence linking him to McCann's disappearance.
"My mind was blown when I read how he had attacked a woman in 2005, both the tactics and the methods he used, the tools he had with him, how well he had planned it out," she told The Guardian newspaper in 2020. "I puked, to be honest with you, as reading about it took me right back to my experience."
The identities of the other two rape victims behind the new charges have not been revealed.
The prosecution has relied heavily on the testimony of witnesses Manfred S. and Helge B., who stole a video camera and tapes from Brueckner's house in southern Portugal in 2006. The tapes included images of Brueckner molesting two other women, according to prosecutors.
"At an unspecified time between Dec. 28, 2000, and April 8, 2006," Brueckner "surprised (...) and raped an unknown approximately 70-80-year-old woman in her bedroom at her vacation home in Portugal," the prosecution said.
The third victim was an "unknown German-speaking girl aged at least 14 years" whom the suspect "tied naked to a wooden pole in the living room" in the house where he lived in Praia da Luz, Portugal, beat her with a whip and forced her to perform oral sex.
The videotapes depicting these acts have since disappeared, according to the prosecutors.
Brueckner is also facing two new counts of child sexual abuse. On April 7, 2007, he allegedly accosted a 10-year-old girl from Germany as she played on a Portuguese beach. The prosecution said the German man, wearing only shoes, grabbed the child "by the wrist and began to perform masturbation movements" before releasing her.
Ten years later, on June 11, 2017, Brueckner is accused of exposing himself to a girl, 11, and masturbating at a playground in Portugal. The girl ran to her father, and Brueckner was arrested.
The clues that led to the new charges against Brueckner came largely from the investigation into the McCann case.
The prosecution remains convinced that Brueckner abducted and killed the British girl, but her body has never been found, and there's no indication that a murder charge is imminent.
"The investigation into the disappearance of Madeleine McCann continues regardless of the indictment," Wolters, the prosecutor, said Tuesday, declining to offer any further information on the case.
Brueckner's trial on the new charges could begin as soon as the spring.