Madeleine McCann suspect’s emails ‘hyperlink him to case’: investigators

German police have discovered an email account linking Christian Brueckner to the disappearance of Madeleine McCann, investigators have claimed.

Titus Stampa, a senior detective, told a court in Germany that investigators had discovered emails on a Hotmail account used by Brueckner that linked him directly to the case.

The shock revelation is the first time an official working on the case has claimed to have evidence connecting Brueckner to the disappearance.

But Stampa said he was unable to share details of the evidence as it was ‘related to the killing’ of young Madeleine, he claimed.

Brueckner, the prime suspect in the 2007 disappearance, is currently on trial in Germany for unrelated sex crimes. He denies involvement in Madeleine’s 2007 disappearance.

Christian Brueckner, the prime suspect in the Madeleine McCann case, sits next to his lawyer Friedrich Fuelscher (R) at court for a session in his trial of an unrelated case, on June 5

Christian Brueckner appears in court to stand trial in an unrelated case on June 4, 2024

Undated handout file photo of Madeleine McCann

Speaking at the Braunschweig regional court in Germany, Stampa referred to the ‘murder’ account allegedly possessed by Brueckner.

He declined to say whether emails recovered included photos or videos implicating the suspect.

Stampa claimed that police had found a second account where Brueckner – a convicted paedophile – had shared media of child abuse with other abusers.

Brueckner allegedly deleted all emails from that account in early 2007, when Madeleine disappeared from a hotel resort in Praia da Luz, Portugal, Stampa said.

“I can remember that things were ‘massively’ deleted in the inbox. There was nothing in there from January 2007,’ he told the court.

He is suspected of having taken young Madeleine from a bedroom in the family’s holiday apartment at the Ocean Club resort on May 3, 2007.

German officials named Brueckner as their chief suspect in 2020, and international authorities have continued to investigate the disappearance in the years since.

Prosecutors received access to a secret email account containing images of abuse after an appeal to Microsoft in 2019.

The account was said to have been opened in January 2007, months before Madeleine’s disapperance. 

Now, a court in Germany has heard how Brueckner allegedly attempted to delete ‘many emails’ showing filmed abuse of children as young as ‘three or four’.

Stampa described an email he claimed was written by Brueckner detailing a fantasy ‘about a five-year-old girl and her mother who are kidnapped and taken away in a van’ before being ‘abused sexually’.

“It was about violence and brutality and them being abused sexually – one is raped in front of the other, he claimed.

A copy of the fantasy story was also found in Portugal in 2017 on a laptop also used by Brueckner, the court heard.

Brueckner was officially named as a suspect in April 2022 after his yellow and white VW T3 Westfalia campervan was reportedly spotted near the Praia da Luz resort in Portugal where Madeleine vanished. 

Brueckner has denied he was in the area at the time and distanced himself from the allegations against him.

German prosecutors say phone logs show he received a call on May 3 2007 near the Ocean Club.

He has claimed he was miles away with a young woman at the time.

Brueckner also faces allegations he called his ex-girlfriend on May 3, 2007 to say he had been in Tomar, a spot where he regularly parked his camper vans.

Madeleine McCann disappeared from the Ocean Club resort in Praia da Luz in May 2007

Brueckner is currently on trial accused of raping three women and assaulting children between 2000 and 2017 in the Algarve. 

He was jailed in 2019 for seven years after being convicted of raping an elderly woman in the Algarve in 2005.

His current trial started in February and has heard from witnesses who say they saw Brueckner in harrowing sex tapes which showed the rape of an elderly woman and a young girl.

Brueckner’s defence have tried several times to have witnesses ruled out saying the case is unfair and prejudiced against their client because of the link to Madeleine but all attempts have so far failed.

The trial continues.