Christian Brueckner: To be or not to be

Helge B date unknown

Thanks for that onehand, I had seen the photo with the eyes covered.
This one is a good one in the Sun newspaper. I was curious to see what he looked like when he was hanging about with CB.

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/12638463/witness-mccann-guilty-christian-b/


Something I read in one of the statements in the PJ files got me pondering.

Just seen the one from Silentscope ^^  thanks, thats the one in the Sun September 2020.

the one from the sun must be well after 2017, on that picture in the paper from greece he had a younger appearance , less fat typical male beer fat on his belly.  this one is from his more recent stay on corsica. they used the same elsewhere but as a cut out of only helge b, on a alien background as illustration. 

there must be an article with pictures of helge b, all of his face without bars taken after 2017 from his then still active facebook account, i will look tomorrow if i can find back a working link. 

earlier it was even easier to find pictures and stories about hb back, by using elge b. or elge busching, the italian news outlets also used the wrong spelling in their text, but the correct one down under his picture. 

google is also far more eager to only give links in english, and i always have to change a lot of settings if i want something different, at the moment google is willing to give me links in dutch, german and english, some days even some french ones, the rest you need a whip and a lot of patience. google.nl is just not so easy to handle as google.com was, but we cannot use that one anymore. 

helge b. is said to have lived also for years in france, but also transient, such people do not often build up much history other when they caught for crimes. 
just stealing some solar panels is not business to get a lot of money. the reselling of weed is also small money. 

all the grapevine has about helge b. in later years was that he was living on corsica, supposedly married to a woman with a child, or even his child. but only the two stories ms told about before his conviction for human trafficking looks to be real. 

not only the vw t3 camper van of cb, features a lot around, and lady p. told herself in the docu of jutta in germany, that that vw camper van was from the family p. not owned by cb, but lent to him to live in after he left jail in portugal. her son has used it too at a unknown time. 

but there is also an old blue bedford used as camper van, said to be taken on hold by the police and they let it get destroyed, and cb was associated with that bedford, but than there is the story helge b. also had a old blue bedford camper van, and that was destroyed at the cheyenne scrapyard with the video's and the camera from cb by their musings in it. you know the one they supposed to have search the banks of loch do arade.

as usual a lot is going around, but hard to find out if it is for real or not. 

guys like these usually are not leaving their homecountry for some extra hours of sun, most have a good reason, like criminal offences, or very behind in paying taxes. for most living by the day is okay when they are young, but getting older, or less able because of alcohol and drugs abuse, it is not uncommon to see them use talking, about what they 'know' about others, is simply sold against getting a clean crime sheet and as a bonus benefits too, often even a roof over their heads again, medical care, so yes for all there can be a lot to score from talking, you never know how much really is true. that prize together is far more than just a large pocket full of money and some bottles on the go. 

the crimes they did in later years means also they are very safe in germany, the country that does not extradite germans. 

both the hb and ms already have been accepted as witnesses in the 2005 rape case, so why not use them again. 

these guys are living in lies, and always won by pleasing others if they got something they need of them, and you can just train then to say what you want. i can not think i ever will believe such guys as long as they can take profit from something anything to go with it. 

i think verdi put last week a bit of video up from ms in the netflix saga, look what happened when he was asked a question differently to what he expected. so did helge told ms about the same stories in the links i earlier gave, or had he just like us read the same pieces of text? ms his version does not have more or other details than the articles in press did give. if ms had them from helge b,. you would ast least some difference of opinions about what had happened.

use the same tactic on all the versions of the break in in 2006 in the little finca by praia da luz were cb was living before he got arrested. they end all a bit different, sometimes he tells he sees more, other times he say he turned his head to not look at the video. for me ms is a typical trained monkey witness, helge b. i still know far to little about, hb likes to play the gorilla but still wants you to think he is not the bad guy. 

when the gang left portugal, the crime rates must have made a run down. shame there always got fresh replacements in a hurry.

Jon Clarke - Eat your heart out.  Beat this load of media rubbish.

By Jack Walters
Published: 06/06/2023 - 19:54

https://www.gbnews.com/news/madeleine-mccann-update-portugal-reservoir-soil-samples

Madeleine McCann update as police compare findings to samples from suspect's van

Police are comparing soil from a reservoir in Portugal to samples found in main suspect Christian Brueckner’s camper van, reports have claimed.

Investigators believe Brueckner visited Barragem do Arade reservoir just days after Madeleine’s disappearance.

Detectives hope comparing the samples can prove the 45-year-old was in the area at the time the toddler vanished.

An insider told The Daily Mirror that police can “close the net” around Brueckner if the soil samples reveal a “positive match”.

One well-placed source said: “Photos led German police investigating Maddie’s disappearance to the reservoir.

“One of their focuses now is to close the net around Brueckner by showing through soil sample analysis that his van was there.

“A positive match of the soil they already have from the vehicle with the earth they removed during the search last week will be another important piece of evidence against him.

“It will be a slight setback if the forensics people don’t get a match but at this stage investigators remain hopeful.

“The search that took place last week would never have been requested and authorised if the motive for it hadn’t been well supported.”

Brueckner, who is serving his sentence for raping an American pensioner in Portugal in 2005, has not yet been charged over Madeleine’s disappearance.

Experts have voiced concern about how easy it will be to analyse “traditional” evidence 16 years after Madeleine vanished.

However, German prosecutors first linked Brueckner to the remote beauty spot through photos that have not been made public.

German and Portuguese search teams spent three days at Barragem do Arade last month.

British investigators conducted a separate search on waste ground in Praia da Luz in June 2014.

The reservoir is around 40 minutes away from the Praia da Luz

Helge Busching needs looking at, he's a convicted people smuggler, he's the one who helped to get CB convicted of rape and he's determined to do all in his power to keep him in jail.

If there be any truth in press/media reports, Brueckner and Buscher were good friends until they fell out over a bit of in-house double dealing - then the vendetta began. It's not only Buscher, Manfred Seyferth plays a hug part in this web of deception.

Honour amongst thieves?

Whatever they have or haven't done, I think it can be reasonably concluded they are in no way involved in nor connected to the disappearance of Madeleine McCann.

Then again, I've yet to see any official documentation to confirm even one of the stories propagated by the press and media. As far as I'm concerned, the press and media are at the heart of the entire fiasco.

They can't even get their facts right, how are they to influence the reader - unless swept away by hyperbole.

GermanBrückner's lawyer Friedrich Fülscher tells the "Bild" newspaper:

 "First of all, it must be established whether such a conversation took place at all. Other witnesses have given differing statements, namely that such a conversation never took place."

In Busching’s Statement to OG he explains that Brückner was a friend of a friend, not HIS friend.

“I was never friends with Christian. He was a Friend of an Accomplice of mine, a Michael Tatscl’

He claims to have met now and again with the Group and travelled Europe together between 2001/2002.

He sat out his Prison time in Crete, and was released on 12 April 2017, but remained on Conditions  until 2021.

PeterMac wrote:Even if the soil is a 100% match - which makes absolutely no sense in forensic science terms -
it will show that the VEHICLE - - - MAY - - have been in the area covered by that type of soil. Very possible hundreds of hectares
and will say nothing about the time or date of the alleged visit.

My exact thoughts when reading the Independent's daily update.

Today..

Madeleine McCann news – latest: Soil from reservoir compared to samples from prime suspect’s van

Detectives comparing soil believe they have a good chance of putting main suspect at reservoir days after Maddy vanished

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/madeleine-mccann-news-update-latest-b2353687.html

How is that scientifically possible - does the composition of soil change daily, thus enabling forensics to establish a specific time and date of an event?

Madeleine McCann: Are We Any Closer To The Truth? | This Morning



This Morning

07:47 minutes

7th June 2023

Described as the ‘most heavily reported missing-person case in modern history’, the 2007 disappearance of 3-year old Madeleine McCann remains unsolved. But in a major new development, the story hit headlines once again last week as police scoured a remote reservoir on the Algarve in a bid to close the net around the prime suspect in the case, ‘Christian B’. But, 16 years since her disappearance and £13 million already spent by the Home Office, are we any closer to the truth? Criminologist David Wilson joins us in the studio to update us on this latest phase of the investigation.

No criminologist David Wilson,  'we' don't 'know' Brueckner frequented the reservoir or was in the vicinity of the Ocean Club the alleged time Madeleine McCann disappeared or changed his car number plates after Madeleine disappeared. You think the Germans are withholding information about their investigation but if you pay attention and follow the lead, it becomes clear that the entire charade is based on the words of known felons and other unreliable witnesses with a story to tell - at a price I've no doubt.

He even interprets the reservoir search incorrectly, after having said he has read and watched the entire procedure.

So, is it going to take weeks or months to find some form of tangible evidence, like skeletal remains, an item of clothing a toy or is it going to take weeks or months to analyse said items - if indeed any such evidence was found?  Or is it bags of soil that will take weeks or months to analyse?

A popular spot for campers and tourists, what did the suspect do with a corpse?  Take a dinghy out to the middle of the reservoir and dump it over the side?  Wade out to deeper waters with bag of swag to deposit in the still waters of the reservoir?  Dump in the shallow?  Hide it in the shrubbery?  All executed without being noticed?

Did the abducted one have a toy to be disposed of along with the corpse, wouldn't the suspect have kept that as a trophy?  It wasn't cuddlecat because Kate McCann claimed that as her own trophy.

Utter nonsense.  I truly wish these hangers-on would do their homework before presenting their opinions and/or theories before the cameras to be seen by thousands, if not millions, of viewers.

Whist you at it, drop the dramatics - it doesn't impress.

This is about the disappearance of Madeleine McCann, a little three year old child who has almost certainly been taken from the world of the living.

Remember that!

He's rubbish, this man. It can't take much to qualify as a criminologist, if he's an example of such.

I've never heard of him.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Wilson_(criminologist)

Connections with Northern Ireland and Cherie Blair?
Interesting…

Another hired ‘talking head’..?

Silentscope wrote:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Wilson_(criminologist)

Connections with Northern Ireland and Cherie Blair?
Interesting…

Another hired ‘talking head’..?

OH no, not the Cherie Blair, Catherine Meyer, PACT, Missing People, McCann connection again.

Exactly Sharoni, along with another connection.

Verdi wrote:If there be any truth in press/media reports, Brueckner and Buscher were good friends until they fell out over a bit of in-house double dealing - then the vendetta began.  It's not only Buscher, Manfred Seyferth plays a hug part in this web of deception.

Honour amongst thieves?

Whatever they have or haven't done, I think it can be reasonably concluded they are in no way involved in nor connected to the disappearance of Madeleine McCann.

Then again, I've yet to see any official documentation to confirm even one of the stories propagated by the press and media.  As far as I'm concerned, the press and media are at the heart of the entire fiasco.

They can't even get their facts right, how are they to influence the reader - unless swept away by hyperbole.

Whatever the truth about the relationship between CB, Helge B and Manfred S is, one thing is for sure: Helge B and Manfred S really don't like Cb  for whatever reason. Considering how in his statements Helge B  goes out of his way to say what a bad and evil person CB is, it's obvious that he really hates him and wants revenge on him, which also makes it obvious why he tries to frame him in the Madeleine case - to take revenge on him. Because let's be honest - all those witnesses that claim CB might be (and "might be" is not "is") involved in the McCann case are more or less dubious and unreliable themselves - they almost all are criminals that all have come into contact with law and police and have all spent time in jail, thus knowing the rules of law and police framing, and taking revenge on fellow criminals you have fallen out of with by framing them for something certainly isn't unusual among such people.

PeterMac wrote:Even if the soil is a 100% match - which makes absolutely no sense in forensic science terms -
it will show that the VEHICLE - - - MAY - -  have been in the area covered by that type of soil. Very possible hundreds of hectares
and will say nothing about the time or date of the alleged visit.

Was it ever in doubt that he visited, along with tens of thousands of other people making stone circles and arrows and cairns
and leaving knickers and bras in the undergrowth ?
It tells us nothing about 
Burglary
Abduction
Murder
and /or Brückner's involvement in any of the supposed above.

So true. Even if they find a match in some form, what is that gonna prove? That CB was at the lake at some point? Isn't that already proven by the photos and videos of him at the lake which German police claim to have? What is that gonna prove anyhow about anything, especially his claimed involvement in the Madeleine case?

Madeleine McCann case: Timeline of the missing child’s disappearance

Kate and Gerry McCann’s eldest daughter vanished from Portuguese holiday resort 16 years ago but emergence of new suspect has brought fresh hope of answers and closure

Joe Sommerlad
1 hour ago

Madeleine McCann, a three-year-old girl from Rothley, Leicestershire, was reported 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.

The story 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.

The Portuguese authorities would later attract criticism over their conduct in the crucial earliest hours of the investigation when the trail might still have been warm, accused of making rudimentary mistakes like failing to conduct a house-by-house search of every local residence or interview all of the other guests at the resort, acting slowly to erect roadblocks and potentially compromising forensic evidence at the crime scene.

The police initially stated that they believed Madeleine was still alive and had been abducted from the room by a stranger as the parents described their “anguish and despair” over her vanishing, a worst fear realised for any parent.

On 26 May, police issued a description of a suspicious man seen on the night of the girl’s disappearance. The individual in question was spotted by Jane Tanner, one of the McCanns’ dining companions, who said she had seen a Mediterranean man with dark hair and beige trousers carrying a child close to the apartment when she went to check in on her own children. Scotland Yard would later come to dismiss the sighting as a red herring.

The search continued as the summer progressed amid a wild media circus and with huge fundraising activities underway, the McCanns setting up Madeleine’s Fund on 15 May to raise cash to support further investigation and keep the profile of the case high, attracting generous donations from celebrities like Richard Branson, Simon Cowell, JK Rowling and Coleen Rooney. By 30 May, the case was such a cause celebre that they were being flown out to meet the Pope at the Vatican in Sir Phillip Green’s Learjet.

A local man, Robert Murat, subsequently became its first suspect and had his house and car searched, his swimming pool drained and his electronic devices confiscated but no evidence was found to link him to Madeleine and the matter was soon dropped.

By June, the Portuguese police admitted that they had failed to protect potentially useful evidence at the scene as frustration with the lack of developments grew and the media began to question whether the McCanns themselves had been involved in the matter.

Lurid tabloid allegations suggested the couple and their friends might have been swingers and that the McCanns, as physicians, might have been in the habit of sedating their children, while others claimed inconsistencies in their version of events.

The intensity of the hostility towards the parents would later be described by Roy Greenslade of The Guardian as “no journalistic accident, but a sustained campaign of vitriol against a grief-stricken family”, singling out The Daily Express and Daily Star for particular condemnation.

In July, assistance offered by former South African police officer Danie Krugel – who claimed his handheld “matter orientation system” could help to find Madeleine – was rubbished, while British police sent over two springer spaniel sniffer dogs to search for DNA.

Relations with the local authorities would ultimately sour as the latter came to resent British intrusion into a Portuguese inquiry, according to Anthony Summers and Robbyn Swan’s book Looking for Madeleine (2014).

By August, Madeleine has been missing for 100 days and police admitted for the first time that she may never be found. They also told the McCanns that they were no longer considering the matter an abduction case but, rather, a murder inquiry.

The McCanns themselves were interviewed as “arguidos” (suspects) by Portuguese police in September, with the parents told that the dogs had discovered DNA evidence from the missing girl in the boot of their holiday rental car, lines of inquiry that had already been leaked to the British press. They vehemently denied having any part in her disappearance.

Despite being listed as suspects (a designation that would linger until the following July), the McCanns were allowed to return to Britain on 9 September. A day later, chief inspector Tavares de Almeida of the Policia Judiciaria in Portimao signed a nine-page report concluding that Madeleine McCann had died in their apartment as a result of an accident, that the tapas dinner and rota checks on the McCann children 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 the body and then faked an abduction. A public prosecutor subsequently applied for the confiscation of Kate McCann’s diary and Gerry McCann’s laptop plus the group’s phone records.

On 2 October, chief inspector Goncalo Amaral was removed from the case and transferred after alleging that the British police were only interested in pursuing leads favourable to the McCanns. He would later publish a book, Maddie: The Truth of the Lie, the following summer, resulting in a lengthy libel battle with the McCanns that would run back and forth through the courts until March 2017.

Back in Britain, Gerry McCann issued a video that November in which he speculated that his family had been watched by a “predator” during their stay at Praia da Luz. His wife had come to believe that a potential perpetrator could have seen a note in the resort’s guest book visible to all in reception noting their dining arrangements on the evening of Madeleine’s disappearance. The couple followed up on 20 January 2008 by releasing a sketch of a “creepy man” they said other holidaymakers had said they had seen loitering at the Ocean Club.

In April, a month before the one-year anniversary of the fateful night, Portuguese police travelled to Leicestershire to conduct further interviews with the McCanns’ friends.

Then, on 21 July, Portugal’s attorney general, Fernando Jose Pinto Monteiro, announced that there was no evidence to link either the McCanns or Robert Murat to the disappearance and closed the case, unsolved.

With the trail cold and no closure in sight, the McCanns continued to publicise their cause, issuing computer-generated images of how Madeleine might look now that she had aged on 3 November 2009 and condemning the release of previously unseen Portuguese police files – detailing possible sightings of their daughter – to British newspapers in March 2010.

The McCanns published a book of their own about their ordeal in May 2011, entitled simply Madeleine, which was serialised in The Sun as the newspaper led a campaign calling on British prime minister David Cameron to launch a new inquiry. He did so.

Commenced by then-home secretary Theresa May, the Metropolitan Police’s Operation Grange would be led by commander Simon Foy and comprise a team of three detective inspectors, five detective sergeants, 19 detective constables and six civilian staff.

It began to yield results in 2013, with Scotland Yard formally announcing a new investigation in July and saying in October it had identified 41 potential suspects. That same month, BBC Crimewatch released an e-fit image of a man of particular interest who had been seen in Praia da Luz with a child matching Madeleine’s description in May 2007.

Detectives arrived in Portugal in January 2014 promising new arrests and finally searched the village in June, interviewing four people the following month but without unearthing new information. The quartet would be definitively ruled out in April 2017, before the UK government said it would continue to fund the investigation until 2020, having already admitted it had cost £10m in its first four years of operation.

That investment had enabled detectives to have tens of thousands of documents translated, investigate over 8,000 potential sightings, take 1,338 statements, collect 1,027 exhibits and investigate 650 sex offenders and 60 persons of interest, all without definitively establishing the truth.

The Madeline McCann case lay dormant before suddenly exploding into life in June 2020 when German media revealed that Christian Brueckner, a 43-year-old prisoner with a track record of child abuse and drug trafficking, had been identified as a new suspect by the public prosecutor of the German city of Braunschweig.

He had reportedly been living in a Volkswagen camper van in the Algarve at the time of Madeleine’s disappearance and one woman has since come forward to suggest she saw a girl that might have been Madeleine speaking German in a supermarket in Portugal in 2017.

German investigators classified their probe into his movements as a murder inquiry, saying they were working on the assumption that Madeleine is dead and reporting in July 2021 that they had found an abandoned cellar beneath his former allotment near Hanover where she could, theoretically, have been held captive.

Hans Christian Wolters, the prosecutor leading the investigation into Brueckner, has said he was “very confident” the inmate is responsible for kidnapping her.

“If you knew the evidence we had you would come to the same conclusion as I do but I can’t give you details because we don’t want the accused to know what we have on him – these are tactical considerations,” he told the BBC.

It was subsequently revealed that Madeleine’s Fund still had £773,629 to spend as of 31 March 2020, meaning the McCanns can continue to bankroll a private investigation to find their daughter long after the police hunt is finally drawn to a close, should they choose to.

Brueckner was formally made a “arguido” in relation to the case on 21 April 2022.

On 19 September, the McCanns lost their libel case against Mr Amaral, the former chief inspector who had investigated the disappearance, before the European Court of Human Rights.

The couple had attempted to argue that Mr Amaral was responsible for damaging their reputation and breaching their rights to respect for their private life and to be presumed innocent after taking exception to his book and associated media appearances in which he had repeatedly suggested they were responsible for the vanishing.

Their complaint also argued that Portugal’s Supreme Court had failed to allow them proper redress over the alleged libel by Mr Amaral after judges threw out their earlier claim in 2017.

The verdict left the McCanns with three months to appeal against the decision.

In February 2023, a Polish woman called Julia Faustyna made headlines by claiming she was Madeleine, using the Instagram name @iammadeleinemccann.

Ms Faustyna, 21, did not provide any supporting evidence but sought DNA tests to prove her origins. The results ultimately revealed that she was entirely of Polish origin, with no British heritage, disproving her claims for good.

In April 2023, a court in Braunschweig dropped a rape charge against Brueckner, unrelated to the Madeleine McCann case, concluding it did not have jurisdiction.

Police in Germany continue to claim they have “concrete evidence” that Madeleine is dead but this has still not been confirmed and their investigation is ongoing, with Brueckner still not charged in the McCann case.

Like her parents, Madeleine’s sister Amelie, now 18, observed the 16th anniversary of her disappearance in May 2023.

Speaking publicly for the first time at a prayer meeting in Rothley, she said: “It’s nice that everyone is here together but it’s a sad occasion.”

Amelie McCann reportedly joined in with chants including “Never never give up”, “leave no stone unturned”, “don’t forget about me” and “still missing, still missed”.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/madeleine-mccann-disappearance-timeline-b2354451.html
-------------------------------------------------------
From: Peter MacLeod 
To: joe.sommerlad@independent.co.uk 
Sent: Fri, 9 Jun 2023 9:50
Subject: Your ARTICLE INDEPENDENT, Timeline of the missing child’s disappearance


https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/madeleine-mccann-disappearance-timeline-b2354451.html


Dear Mr Sommerlad,

If you begin any article with the words
"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,"

instead of the more accurate 
""Madeleine McCann, a three-year-old girl from Rothley, Leicestershire, WAS REPORTED missing from the Portuguese holiday resort of Praia da Luz on the Algarve on 3 May 2007,"

it is unlikely that the whole truth will ever be revealed.

In brief, the Parents reported her missing around 10pm Thursday 3^rd May.
No one else can confirm having seen her that day, nor, on close inspection of the statements, creche sheets and other sources, can anyone conclusively state she was alive and well after Sunday 28^th April,
the day incidentally that the infamous Pool Photo MUST, and can only have been taken, despite the McCanns' insisting it was taken on Thursday 3/5/7.
The witness supposed to have checked the children during the evening was very quick to deny having actually seen Madeleine, as this would have placed him in the position of the 
"Last person to see her alive'.  Not a good place to be in a major crime investigation, as I am sure you are aware
There are no other photos or video of Madeleine, nor indeed of her siblings taken after that, through the entire week. 
The alerts by the British Human blood and Human cadaverine detecting dogs showed interest in 17 places linked with the McCanns, and to no other places.

If you are genuinely interested in this case I can supply and refer you to a wealth of detail and meticulous research which casts doubt on the 'official story'

I am a retired Police Superintendent who has had an interest in this case from the second day.  I have visited the scene, am on film moving the shutters, and much more
I post under the name PeterMac on the investigative forum https://jillhavern.forumotion.net/
And have written many Chapters about individual aspects of the case in an e-book / blog to be found at  https://whatreallyhappenedtomadeleinemccann.blogspot.com/

Sincerely
Peter MacLeod
BSC, LLB, MA
retired Police Superintendent
Nottingham 1972-2000 

REF:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IeuMzyaCnnY

PM Raising shutters Raising the shutters of 5A bedroom window. www.youtube.com

Sixteen years and countless heartbreaks: Where are Madeleine McCann’s family now?

Parents refuse to give up hope and have spoken movingly about ‘new normality’ of raising twins without their missing daughter,

Joe Sommerlad reports

4 hours ago

The case of Madeleine McCann, the British toddler who disappeared from a Portuguese holiday resort 16 years ago, unexpectedly lurched back into life this month when investigators launched a major search operation at a reservoir in the Algarve.

The initiative was instigated by German prosecutor Hans Christian Wolters, who said officials were acting on “certain tips” from Christian Brueckner, an incarcerated sex offender who lived in the area between 2000 and 2017. Mr Wolters has said he is “very confident” the 45 year-old holds the key to Madeleine’s disappearance.

Follow The Independent’s live coverage for the latest updates

With help from Portuguese police and with Scotland Yard detectives watching on, German investigators carried out a thorough search of the Barragem do Arade beauty spot in Silves.

They combed the shoreline and surrounding grasslands with sniffer dogs, rakes, spades and pickaxes, and inspected the water in a rigid-hull inflatable boat. A no-fly zone in place in the skies overhead allowed police drones to survey the region undisturbed.

The site is located approximately 48km (30 miles) northeast of the Ocean Club holiday resort at Praia da Luz in Lagos from which Madeleine vanished on 3 May 2007, sparking a huge investigation that attracted media attention and public interest across the world but which has so far still not yielded any definite answers.

The girl’s parents, Gerry and Kate McCann, have refused to give up hope, recently posting a poem remembering their lost daughter on their Find Madeleine website, reminding readers that she is “still missing... still very much missed”.

“The police investigation continues, and we await a breakthrough. Thank you to everyone for your support – it really helps,” they added.

Here’s a look at the family, whose lives have been defined by the mystery.
Parents Kate and Gerry McCann

Madeline’s mother was born Kate Marie Healy in Huyton near Liverpool in 1968.

After attending All Saints School in Anfield and Notre Dame High School in Everton Valley, she took a degree in medicine from the University of Dundee and graduated in 1992. Beginning her career by specialising in obstetrics, gynaecology and anaesthetics, she subsequently became a GP.

She met her future husband Gerald Patrick McCann in 1993 and they married in 1998. Madeleine, their eldest child, was born in 2003 and the couple had twins, Amelia and Sean, in 2005.

Mr McCann was born in Glasgow in 1968 and attended Holyrood RC Secondary School before graduating from the University of Glasgow with a bachelor of science degree in physiology and sports science in 1989.

He obtained his medical doctorate from the same institution in 2002 and has worked as a consultant cardiologist at Glenfield Hospital, Leicester, since 2005, with the family setting up home in Rothley, Leicestershire.

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.

The McCanns refused to give up, issuing computer-generated images of how their daughter might look with the advancing years, publishing their own book, entitled simply Madeleine (2011), and endorsing a successful campaign to pressure then-prime minister David Cameron into reopening the case. He did so.

The result was Operation Grange, which saw officers return to Portugal in 2014 and investigate tens of thousands of documents at great expense, without definitively establishing the truth, causing the case to lie dormant for several years until Brueckner emerged as a new suspect in 2020.

Writing in Madeleine, Kate McCann discussed the toll the ordeal had taken on her devout Roman Catholic faith, stating: “There have been many times when I’ve felt God has deserted me or that He has let Madeleine down. I’ve occasionally doubted His existence altogether. And yes, I’ve been angry with Him.

“For now, though, at least, my anger towards God seems to have subsided. I believe in Him and I still feel His presence.”

Siblings Amelia and Sean McCann

Out of respect for their privacy, especially given their ages, Madeleine’s younger siblings have largely been shielded from the glare of the spotlight.

However, Amelie McCann, now 18, did join her parents in remembering her missing sister on the 16th anniversary of her disappearance on 7 May 2023.

Speaking publicly for the first time at a prayer meeting in Rothley, she said: “It’s nice that everyone is here together but it’s a sad occasion.”

Ms McCann reportedly joined in with chants including “Never never give up”, “leave no stone unturned”, “don’t forget about me” and “still missing, still missed”.

Her parents were among the 70-strong crowd in attendance but her brother Sean was not, preferring to remain off stage.

Rob Gladstone, leading prayers at the event, told his audience: “We are here this evening to show our loving concern for Madeleine and for all young children who have been taken away from their families against their will.

“We are also here to encourage one another to keep up hope and pray for a renewal of strength even after this long time.”

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.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/madeleine-mccann-family-now-b2354450.html#comments-area

Little do they realise how badly these reports reflect on the McCanns.

Laid bare, it shows how weak the McCanns defence to be, it's only the window dressing over the years that's managed to conceal the rotten core from the less discerning reader.

The relentless attack against the Portuguese authorities is beyond the pale, the British police are in a less than comfortable position at the moment - casting a bad light on Portugal will not improve their untenable position on home soil.

Beware what you wish for, when push comes to shove there are certain individuals within the British establishment in danger of scrutiny.

Professor David Wilson is a seasoned criminologist who has worked extensively with UK prisons and prison reform, stretching his attributes far and wide to include many other areas of work.

Of course he will have met with thousands of people during the course of his work across the broad spectrum, from prisoner to prime minister.

He was invited to talk on 'This Morning' for his observations on the most recent developments in the case against Brueckner.

My comments related to his apparent lack of knowledge on the case of Madeleine McCann in general - not an attempt to implicate him in any alleged cover-up of the truth. In my view, he is akin to the likes of Mark Williams-Thomas, Colin Sutton or whoever else of a professional capacity who have found an entrance to capitalize on the fate of a young child, even if only to advertise their wares in the public domain.

You truly think Tony Blair shaking hands with a Pope to have sinister connotations?

'Everything we have points to her being dead': Prosecutor investigating Madeleine McCann's disappearance says there is 'nothing' suggesting she is still alive, but admits there is no 'smoking gun' evidence on prime suspect Christian Brueckner

Authorities have nothing concrete to bring charges against Christian Brueckner
The paedophile, 43, is still main suspect in British youngster's disappearance
Recent reports that Brueckner had an accomplice have also been rubbished

By Gerard Couzens for MailOnline

Published: 00:59, 19 September 2020 | Updated: 01:14, 19 September 2020

German authorities say there are 'many pieces' of the Madeleine McCann 'puzzle' pointing towards suspect Christian Brueckner.

Prosecutor Hans Christian Wolters admitted there still was no 'smoking gun' evidence enabling charges to be brought against the 43-year-old paedophile over the British youngster's disappearance.

But he insisted in an interview on Portuguese state broadcaster RTP, referring to Brueckner only by his first name and initial of his surname: 'All I can say is this is like a puzzle and there are many pieces that lead us to believe Christian B is responsible.

'One of the pieces is the signal from the mobile phone he was using at the time Madeleine McCann disappeared and has been shown to have been in the area of the Ocean Club resort where she was staying.'

Making his strongest assertion yet to justify the German decision to treat her disappearance as a murder case and not a missing persons' inquiry, Mr Wolters added: 'The result of our investigation does not point in any way to the possibility the suspect might have kept Madeleine alive.

'We have nothing to indicate she could be alive.

'Everything we have points to her being dead. We have no margin of manoeuvre.'

He also rubbished reports earlier this week that German police believed the chief Madeleine McCann suspect had an accomplice, and addressed earlier accusations made on Portuguese TV Brueckner's 'ex' girlfriend Nicole Fehlinger was involved in an Algarve burglary he was linked to.

The Braunschweig-based prosecutor said: 'Naturally we investigate everyone known to us to see if they had something to do with Madeleine's disappearance.

'This woman was the suspect's ex-girlfriend and she is classed as a witness but we don't have any reason to believe she is linked to this crime.

'She is not a suspect for us. We are only investigating Christian B, nobody else.

'At this stage we believe he acted alone in this case.'

He also rebutted claims made by disgraced former police officer Goncalo Amaral, who met with Brueckner's defence lawyer Friedrich Fulscher last week in Portugal, that the German was being 'scapegoated.'

The controversial ex-cop, who was removed from the initial Madeleine McCann investigation for criticising British police, is involved in an ongoing legal battle with her parents Kate and Gerry over his insistence she died by accident in their apartment and they covered it up.

He told the RTP channel's Sexta as 9 show: 'I know this former inspector speaks a lot and comments on our work.

'We're not going to get into a war of words. All I will say is that we have carried out a very serious investigation and there is no indication whatsoever Madeleine McCann's parents are linked to her disappearance.

'On the other hand we have a lot of evidence pointing to Christian B killing her.

'Goncalo Amaral knows how he reaches his conclusions and that's not up to us to judge.'

His comments came as Brueckner's lawyer dramatically declined an opportunity to rule out his client's involvement in Madeleine McCann's disappearance, and appeared to accept he had funded his nomadic Algarve lifestyle through house break-ins.

Mr Fulscher has always insisted Brueckner was not involved in Madeleine McCann's disappearance and claimed prosecutors are basing their case on information from dubious witnesses.

But asked on Friday night by investigative reporter and Sexta as 9 presenter Sandra Felgueiras if Brueckner had told him he had 'nothing' to do with the May 3 2007 disappearance, he paused for several seconds before responding: 'Everything that's said between a client and his lawyer is protected by confidentiality and therefore I cannot say what he tells me.

'But you can be sure that doesn't mean he has something to hide.'

Quizzed about reports Breuckner used to live off the proceeds of burglaries he committed on the Algarve, he admitted: 'It's not something that surprises me.

'As his lawyer it wouldn't surprise me if he was convicted for these burglaries.'

Mr Wolters revealed earlier this month German authorities had asked Portuguese police to investigate 'more sexual abuse and rapes' they believe Brueckner could have carried out on the Algarve.

He has already been linked to a sex offence on a beach near Praia da Luz a month before Madeleine vanished and has been confirmed as an 'official suspect' in the 2004 rape of Irish tour rep Hazel Behan.

Ms Behan waived her right to anonymity in June to say she believed the masked man who targeted her in her Algarve apartment could have been Brueckner.

His lawyer has insisted he has nothing to do with the horrific sex attack.

Brueckner is currently in Germany's Kiel Prison for drugs offences and is due to start a seven-year sentence for the 2005 rape in Praia da Luz of an American OAP.

He was convicted of the horrific sex crime late last year in Germany.

A former girlfriend spoke out last month to reveal he had sexually assaulted her five-year-old daughter and would also launch violent attacks against her during their nine-month relationship in the northern Germany city of Braunschweig.

The crimes, which sparked a European Arrest Warrant and his 2017 extradition to Portugal, ended up with him receiving a 15-month prison sentence.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8749531/Prosecutor-investigating-Madeleine-McCanns-disappearance-says-suggests-alive.html