How the McCanns’ hunt for justice could play out
The emergence of Christian Bruckner, 43, as a suspect in the Madeleine McCann case follows a joint operation by police in Britain, Portugal and Germany. Where is Bruckner?
In jail in Kiel, northern Germany, serving 21 months for dealing drugs on the holiday island of Sylt. The sentence, handed down in 2011, was initially suspended, but in 2016 he was convicted of sexual offences involving a child and the following year of grievous bodily harm and so was then obliged to serve the drug sentence.
Last December he was given a further seven years after he was convicted by a court in Brunswick, Lower Saxony, of raping a 72-year-old American widow at her beachside home in Praia da Luz in September 2005, about 20 months before Madeleine McCann’s disappearance. It was his 17th conviction. The woman, who returned to America, has not been named.
Bruckner has appealed to Germany’s Federal Criminal Court against the rape verdict, which is therefore not yet legally binding. The matter has been passed to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.
He was extradited to Germany from Italy, to which he had fled in 2018, under a European arrest warrant.
With two-thirds of his drug sentence served, Bruckner is eligible for parole. This is not automatic. German legal experts have said that it is extremely unlikely that someone suspected of murder would be released early.
When could he be charged? Bruckner was revealed to be a suspect on last week’s edition of Aktenzeichen XY Ungelost (File XY Unsolved), the German equivalent of Crimewatch – even though his name was not given. In fact Bruckner appears to have become a suspect in the case as long ago as 2013 after British detectives appeared on the same German television programme. According to Der Spiegel ,a viewer then gave a tip to police in Brunswick, where Bruckner was at the time running a kiosk. Police had passed the tip on to the Federal Office of Criminal Investigation but ‘‘it was apparently not acted upon’’, the magazine claimed.
Seven years on, Bruckner has yet to be charged over Madeleine’s murder, apparently because there is insufficient evidence – which explains the decision to go on the programme again. ‘‘It is not enough for an arrest warrant or an indictment,’’ admitted Hans Wolters, from the public prosecutors office in Brunswick. Police have released photographs of the suspect and of the exterior and interior of his former home in Portugal. Under German law, prosecutors are free to question Bruckner about the McCann case, but it is thought that they have not yet done so.
Legal experts were surprised that Christian Hoppe, of the Federal Criminal Police Office, who appeared on the programme, explicitly described the case as murder rather than as a missing person inquiry, as it has hitherto been treated by Scotland Yard. ‘‘That is very unusual,’’ said Arndt Kempgens, a German criminal lawyer who is following the case. ‘‘That can only mean they have found something else that they haven’t made public. Otherwise they would have spoken about a missing person.’’ It is thought that this something else could be photographs or information from other prisoners.
Where could he go on trial? Under German law citizens may be tried either in the country where they allegedly committed a crime or in the country in which they were arrested, namely Germany. The German and Portuguese authorities would decide between them.
If it were agreed to hold proceedings in Germany, the trial would be in a Schwurgericht (court of assizes), before three judges, assisted by two lay judges.
Madeleine’s parents, Gerry and Kate McCann, along with other people who were in Praia da Luz at the time of her disappearance, would be witnesses. The couple would probably want to take advantage of a provision in German law allowing them to be Nebenklager (co-plaintiffs) alongside the state. This would allow them to put questions to the defendant themselves, heightening the courtroom drama.