The main suspect in the disappearance of the British toddler Madeleine McCann has been found not guilty of all charges in a separate rape and sexual abuse case.
Christian Brückner was acquitted by the district court in Braunschweig, northern Germany, of three charges of aggravated rape and two of sexual abuse of children in Portugal between 2000 and 2017. The 47-year-old could “not be convicted of the acts he is accused of”, the presiding judge, Uta Engemann, said.
The decision could prove crucial to further investigations in the case of McCann, who went missing 17 years ago.
A convicted rapist and paedophile, Brückner was named in June 2020 as the main suspect in the 2007 disappearance of McCann from the resort of Praia da Luz on the Algarve where she was on holiday with her parents. No charges have been brought and he denies any involvement.
Braunschweig’s chief prosecutor, Hans Christian Wolters, has repeatedly stated investigators’ belief in Brückner’s involvement in that case and his responsibility for her death. However, despite citing supposed “concrete evidence”, prosecutors have yet to state what that evidence is.
Brückner’s connection to the McCann investigation was touched on repeatedly throughout the trial, which concluded on Tuesday. His lawyer, Friedrich Fülscher, said the McCann case had “hung like a fog” over the trial.
Brückner had been accused of raping Hazel Behan, an Irish administrator, in her Praia da Rocha apartment in 2004, and was also charged with the alleged rape of a teenage girl in his home in the same city and raping an elderly woman in her holiday apartment. He was also accused of exposing himself in front of a 10-year-old German girl on a beach and to an 11-year-old Portuguese girl at a playground.
Prosecutors had argued for the German national to be handed a 15-year sentence.
Fülscher said on Monday he should be acquitted, questioning the veracity of witness statements and telling the court: “The trial should never have taken place.”
He is behind bars, serving a sentence for raping a 72-year-old US tourist in 2005 in Praia da Luz – the same Portuguese seaside resort where McCann went missing two years later.
His rape sentence runs until September 2025.