The Portuguese police announced that they had put an end to the excavations carried out since Tuesday near a lake in southern Portugal, at the request of the German authorities, as part of the investigation into the disappearance of little Madeleine McCann in 2007. .
READ ALSO > Maddie case timeline
The judicial police said in a press release that “The material collected will be handed over to the German authorities”who have claimed since 2020 to be convinced that the British girl is dead and suspect a German multi-repeat sex offender already imprisoned in his country for a rape in Portugal.
• A place already excavated in 2008
Shortly before celebrating her fourth birthday, Madeleine McCann disappeared on May 3, 2007 from the room of a hotel complex in Praia da Luz, a small seaside resort in the Algarve where she was vacationing with her family, while her parents dined. with friends at a nearby restaurant.
The disappearance of the British girl has given rise to an exceptional international campaign led by Kate and Gerry McCann to try to find her, and remains one of the great criminal enigmas of recent years.
The region of the Arade dam, located about fifty kilometers from the site of the disappearance of « Maddie », had already been raked in 2008, including by divers who had found only animal remains. According to local media, the German suspect used to go there regularly and described the place as his “little paradise”.
This man, who is serving a prison sentence in Germany for the 2005 rape of a 72-year-old American woman in Portugal, was identified in 2020 by German investigators as Christian Brueckner, a repeat pedophile now aged 46. years old and having lived several years in the Algarve.
• Excavations relaunched after testimony
According to the Portuguese weekly “Expresso”, this is the testimony of an informant “considered very credible” by the German investigators which led them to take an interest again in this place.
• No details on the elements collected
The police did not give any details on the items collected or on the purpose of the operation carried out with the participation of German and British investigators, near the banks of a water reservoir located in Silves, a municipality in the tourist region of the Algarve.
Between Tuesday and Thursday, investigators surveyed the excavation area using dogs, a drone and a tracked brushcutter. Some portions of the land were combed through using probes, shovels and rakes.
According to local media, investigators have collected since the beginning of the excavations samples of soil and gathered several shreds of fabric found on the spot. Also according to the local press, the police were looking for a pink blanket or the pajamas Maddie was wearing the night she disappeared.
Source : Nouvelobs
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