Maddie suspect’s ex: He was obsessed by pre-pubescent girls
THE prime suspect in Madeleine McCann’s disappearance was obsessed by women with bodies like pre-pubescent girls, his exgirlfriend has revealed.
Nicole Fehlinger had denied any romantic involvement with serial sex offender Christian Brueckner since he was linked two years ago to the abduction of Madeleine in Portugal.
But in this, her first interview, the 44-year-old dramatically admitted she was dating Brueckner at the time three-year-old Madeleine vanished from her family’s holiday apartment in the Algarve resort of Praia da Luz.
Speaking out to reject lurid social media claims linking her to Madeleine’s disappearance on May 3, 2007, the ex-care worker said: ‘I have nothing to do with the disappearance and am not involved in the case. I was his lover, not his accomplice.’
Ms Fehlinger, a German who moved to the Algarve in 2001, met Brueckner in December 2006 at a friend’s Christmas party.
Her fellow countryman would often visit her home from where she ran a care service helping to rehabilitate troubled German teenagers.
‘He was nice and polite, but then our friendship became something more. I was alone at my house and Christian used to come around,’ she said.
Ms Fehlinger, who has been interviewed at least three times by the BKA, Germany’s FBI, said Brueckner’s politeness masked a desire for violent sex and his fascination with young females.
‘He said he liked small bodies of women and he liked the bodies of girls before they reached puberty,’ she said.
Ms Fehlinger recalls Brueckner ringing to say he would be driving his Winnebago campervan from the town of Tomas, 200 miles from the Algarve, to her home in Foral, 38 miles east of Praia da Luz, on the night Madeleine went missing,
While the most direct route would not have taken him through Praia da Luz, Ms Fehlinger does not recall him arriving at her house that night.
‘I don’t know if he came late that night and parked his vehicle outside and slept in there, and left that morning again, or he did not turn up,’ she said.
A month before Madeleine vanished, Ms Fehlinger’s father, Dieter, visited Foral and met Brueckner outside the house.
In an interview two years ago with The Mail on Sunday, he recalled peering inside the large campervan and Brueckner joking that a child or cannabis could be easily hidden inside.
In the days after Madeleine vanished, Ms Fehlinger said Brueckner voiced his theories about what had happened. ‘Christian said she might have been taken by the underworld and the police will never find her,’ she said. ‘Looking back, his behaviour did not change and he did not look suspicious after Maddie disappeared – but he is a person who was good at hiding his feelings.’
The couple drifted apart towards the end of 2007 and Ms Fehlinger has not seen him since 2011.
Brueckner, 44, who denies involvement in Madeleine’s disappearance, is serving a seven-year sentence for the rape of an American pensioner. He is expected to be charged soon with the rape in 2004 of Irishwoman Hazel Behan in the Algarve.