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Home / World

Madeline McCann: German officials say they have 'evidence' girl is dead

NZ Herald
8 Jun, 2020 08:54 PM3 mins to read

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A senior German official has revealed that they have evidence that indicates that missing British girl Madeleine McCann is dead. Photo / AP

A senior German official has revealed that they have evidence that indicates that missing British girl Madeleine McCann is dead. Photo / AP

A senior German official has revealed that they have evidence that indicates that missing British girl Madeleine McCann is dead.

Speaking to Sky News, prosecutor Hans Christian Wolters said: "After all the information we got, the girl is dead. We have no information that she is alive.

"All indication we have got that I can't tell you points in the direction that Madeleine is dead.

READ MORE:
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• Madeleine McCann's disappearance likened to victims of Covid-19

"We got things we cannot communicate that speak for the theory that Madeleine is dead, even if I have to admit that we don't have the body."

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Last week, German prosecutors announced that a 43-year-old man, who is a convicted paedophile was being investigated on suspicion of murdering the 3-year-old.

McCann vanished without a trace while on holiday with her family in Praia da Luz, Portugal.

Wolters said at this stage police need more information on where the suspect, Christian Brückner, has lived previously so they can search for her body.

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"At the moment we also don't have enough proof for a trial at court, but we have some evidence that the suspect has done the deed," he told Sky News

The new Madeleine McCann suspect has been on the police radar for more than 20 years.
The new Madeleine McCann suspect has been on the police radar for more than 20 years.

"That's why we need more information from people, especially places he has lived so we can target these places especially and search there for Madeleine."

Wolters plea comes as reports reveal that Christian Brückner told friends "the child is now dead" when missing Madeleine McCann came up in conversation in 2014.

Former colleagues of Brückner said he "completely freaked out" when a group started discussing the case, the Telegraph UK reports.

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Brückner responded by saying it was possible to "make a body disappear quickly" while telling them how to dispose of human remains, the former acquaintances claimed.

Lenta Johlitz, 34, who worked with Brückner at a kiosk he ran in Braunschweig, north Germany, seven years after Madeleine vanished, told Bild newspaper: "Once he was completely freaked out when we were … talking about the Maddie case.

"He wanted us to stop.

"He cried, 'The child is now dead and now that's a good thing!' And, 'You can make a body disappear quickly! Pigs also eat human flesh!'"

A senior German official has revealed that they have evidence that indicates that missing British girl Madeleine McCann is dead. Photo / AP
A senior German official has revealed that they have evidence that indicates that missing British girl Madeleine McCann is dead. Photo / AP

Since the development, details of Brückner's criminal past and troubled upbringing have emerged. Growing up in Würzburg, Bavaria, he was adopted at a young age and reportedly sent to a home for troubled children because his adoptive family could not cope with his unruly behaviour.

Yesterday a neighbour, a woman in her late 50s, said Brückner was one of three boys fostered by the Brückner family and described him as "trouble".

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A former classmate who went to school with him in Würzburg said he would cause problems frequently. Alexander Walter said: "He made small break-ins here and there – got into sports halls, broke in."

- additional reporting Telegraph UK

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