IT’S TIME TO NAIL MADDIE PRIME SUSPECT
Sex beast linked to missing girl
A GERMAN drifter in jail for a sex crime last night emerged as the prime suspect in the disappearance of Madeleine Mccann.
Police have linked the man to the area she was in an hour before she vanished.
A GERMAN drifter in a camper van who is now in jail for a sex crime was last night suspected of snatching Madeleine Mccann.
Police claimed they had made a “significant” breakthrough in the case 13 years after the three-year-old vanished on a family holiday in Portugal.
They said the prime suspect is a 43-year-old German who is serving a prison sentence for a sex crime and has two previous convictions for “sexual contact with girls”.
British police said they are now working with their counterparts in Portugal and Germany in a bid to crack a case that had been “etched in our memories”.
Madeleine’s parents Kate and Gerry last night said they hoped the breakthrough would help them find “peace”.
They said: “We would like to thank the police forces involved for their continued efforts in the search for Madeleine.
All we have ever wanted is to find her, uncover the truth and bring those responsible to justice.”
Detectives said when Madeleine vanished from a holiday apartment in Praia da Luz on May 3, 2007, a mobile phone used by the man placed him in the Algarve resort.
They said the suspect, described as white, 6ft, slim with blond hair and 30 years old, had been touring the coast in a rusting yellow and white VW camper van which he slept in.
At 7.32pm on May 3 he received a call to his Portuguese mobile which cell site analysis showed put him near the Mccanns’ apartment.
The next day the suspect transferred ownership of a maroon 1993 Jaguar XJR-6 – which he had also been driving in Portugal – to someone in Germany.
German police have seized both the camper and the Jag for forensic tests. Police want Brits who were on holiday in Praia da Luz at the time to try to recall if they saw the vehicles or captured them by accident in photos or videos.
Det Chief Insp Mark Cranwell, leading the Metropolitan Police’s Operation Grange inquiry into Madeleine’s disappearance, said: “Some people will know the man we are describing today. Now is the time to come forward.’’
Christian Hoppe, from Germany’s federal investigation bureau, said authorities have not ruled out a sexual motive in Madeleine’s disappearance.
Police said they were not naming the man for “operational reasons”.
The suspect used to live at a ramshackle old farm building two miles from where Madeleine vanished.
A former neighbour said: “He was always a bit angry, driving fast up and down the lane, and then one day, around 2006, he disappeared without a word.”