The prime suspect's former neighbor made some revelations that sound horrifying. The search at the plot has ended but details haven't been revealed yet.
Kate and Gerry McCann, parents of Madeleine "Maddie" McCann, may have renewed hope since the investigation in the disappearance of their daughter has found a new lease on life. Their daughter Maddie was only three, a few days shy of four, when she was disappeared from their vacation rental in Portugal in 2007. German prosecutors believe that a man serving a sentence for drug trafficking in their country is the prime suspect in Maddie's case.
The prosecutors had previously said that the toddler was likely killed soon after she was taken. They are certain that she's dead but are unwilling to reveal why they think so. They have also claimed that Christian Brückner, 43, who is believed to be a pedophile, is the prime suspect.
More recently, the German police started searching through an allotment plot used by the prime suspect. The continued investigation of the 43-year-old was in relation to the disappearance of Madeleine McCann.
During their search, they reportedly found a cellar once believed to have belonged to a garden house that was torn down at the end of 2007. It is not known why the house was torn down, as per The Guardian.
The search started on July 27 and was expected to go on until July 29. Two small excavators were being used to dig up the plot, which is on the outskirts of the north German city of Hanover. It is in the rural region between Hanover Ahlem and Seelze-Letter, about 40 miles from Braunschweig.
The authorities had taped black screens on the windows and made it a no-fly zone, so reporters didn't get a clear view of the scene. However, a spokeswoman for state prosecutors in Braunschweig confirmed that the search was part of the investigation to unearth what happened to Madeleine in Portugal in 2007.
The forensic probe of the plot was ended on Wednesday, the Sun UK reported. The cellar on the plot had remained intact even though the building above was torn down. A friend of the prime suspect claimed that while living in Germany in 2013 had wanted to turn the cellar of his rented home into a "Fritzl cell".
"He had a cellar and he said he wanted to line it with heavy plates, like the guy in Austria," the source added. Fritzl is a reference to Austrian criminal Josef Fritzl who committed many heinous crimes against his own children and had locked up his daughter in a cell for 24 years.
Brückner's neighbor told BBC that the plot that was searched had been rented by the suspect for a few months in 2007, the year Maddie went missing. The 43-year-old sex offender had arrived there in the spring or summer of 2007 and told his neighbor about his plans to insulate a small shack, which was on top of a concrete base in the garden.
There was a small cellar under the base. The neighbor had gone off on a holiday in July 2007 and when he returned a month later, the shack no longer stood. He also didn't see Brückner again.
The investigation had also taken the police to an abandoned factory in Saxony-Anhalt, where Brückner is also believed to have lived. They found thousands of images on videotapes and USB sticks buried at the property. The data included images of child sexual abuse, as per The Guardian.
The Portuguese police and divers also searched three wells in the Algarve, where Maddie was with her parents. They found no evidence there, they said. It is confirmed that the prime suspect had been living in that area in 2007 when the child went missing.
The German, British, and Portuguese police have been working together to unearth what happened to Maddie in 2007. Her parents still hold hope that their child will be returned to them but the lead prosecutor in Germany Hans Christian Wolters has not been able to give her parents that assurance.
References:
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/12246614/madeleine-mccann-news-latest-live/
