The parents of Madeleine McCann are bracing this week as the prime suspect in their daughter’s disappearance, Christian Brueckner, faces the verdict in his trial on separate sex crimes charges.
Brueckner, 47, arrived in court for the closing stages of his trial this morning, with the judge expected to deliver a verdict tomorrow.
Warmly greeting his three-man legal team, Brueckner – dressed in the same pale blue jacket and open-necked shirt he has worn since the start of proceedings eight months ago – sat down to listen intently as his main lawyer Friedrich Fulscher opened his closing argument at the courthouse in Braunschweig.
Convicted rapist and paedophile Brueckner was sensationally named as the prime suspect in the 2007 disappearance of Madeleine in June 2020 by German police but since then no charges have been brought.
He is currently on trial accused of three rapes and two child sex abuse cases between 2000 and 2017 in Portugal close to the resort of Praia da Luz on the Algarve, from where Madeleine vanished while on holiday with parents Kate and Gerry McCann.
Last week prosecutor Ute Lindemann argued he should be jailed for 15 years – labelling him a ‘sadistic psychopath’.
In July the prosecution was dealt a significant blow after the current trial judge ruled that evidence against him in the current trial was ‘insufficient’, which has been widely interpreted as meaning he could be acquitted.
Mr Fulscher opened his argument by saying the ‘trial should never have taken place’ and went on to question the reliability of the witnesses involved.
He added: ‘We are here to decide about the freedom and fate of a person, Christian Brueckner.
‘He is accused of five offences, but what really happened does not match what is claimed.
‘This is why it is when the prosecution loses emotional distance from the case. This trial should never have taken place.
‘If it was any other person, then on the basis of this evidence the trial would never have come to trial.’
Sources close to Brueckner’s legal team have told they expect a verdict as early as Tuesday in the case.
If he is cleared it means he could be released next year from the seven-year prison sentence he was given in 2019 for raping an elderly American woman in the Algarve.
That would have huge consequences on German prosecutors who want to pin Madeleine’s disappearance on him – they also claim to have ‘concrete evidence’ that she has died but have so far not disclosed any details.
It is possible that prosecutors could apply for Brueckner to be held in ‘preventative custody’ if he is cleared of the current charges which will give them time to gather more proof in the Madeleine case.
During the current trial, Brueckner’s former cellmate Laurentiu Codin told the court that he had ‘confessed’ to him he had once abducted a child in Portugal.
Codin told the hearing:’ He was looking for money. He said he didn’t find any money but found a kid and took the child.
‘He said that two hours later, there were police and dogs all over the place, so he then went away, out of the area.
‘He said that he took the child in Portugal in his car, and in the time when the police and dogs were at the house, he drove away and he was gone.
‘He asked me if the DNA from a child can be taken from bones under the ground.’
Also key to the current case – and that of Madeleine’s disappearance – are two super witnesses Helge Busching and Manfred Seyferth, former partners in crime with Brueckner.
They claim to have found a video in Brueckner’s home in Portugal showing him masked and raping two women although the clip has never been discovered and defence lawyers have questioned its existence.
Busching also claims that Brueckner told him at a festival in Spain a year after Madeleine vanished that it was ‘strange she didn’t scream’ which investigators also claim is vital to the case and he even told Scotland Yard about it in 2018.
Met officer Mark Draycott testified to the court in May how Busching had contacted them and he had been quizzed in great secrecy in Athens about his claims after he was released from a Greek prison for people trafficking.
But again his defence team have poured scorn onto the claims suggesting Busching made up the account.