Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - 20,000 Images, Child Porn Discovered in Maddie McCann Kidnap

Episode Date: September 8, 2021

Madeleine McCann disappeared during a family vacation from an apartment in Praia da Luz, Portugal. Her parents left the 3-year-old and her two brothers sleeping, as they had dinner at a nearby restaurant. The main suspect in her disappearance is 44-year-old Christian Brueckner. He's currently in a prison for the rape of a tourist. Brueckner has also been arrested for pornography and abuse of a minor. Investigators found thousands of images of child porn at a property owned by him. They also found that Brueckner had been in the area at the time of McCann's disappearance.Joining Nancy Grace Today: Wendy Patrick - California prosecutor, author “Red Flags” www.wendypatrickphd.com 'Today with Dr. Wendy' on KCBQ in San Diego Dr. Angela Arnold - Psychiatrist, Atlanta GA www.angelaarnoldmd.com, Expert in the Treatment of Pregnant/Postpartum Women, Former Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, Obstetrics and Gynecology: Emory University, Former Medical Director of The Psychiatric Ob-Gyn Clinic at Grady Memorial Hospital  Joe Scott Morgan - Professor of Forensics Jacksonville State University, Author, "Blood Beneath My Feet", Featured on "The Piketon Massacre: Return to Pike County" on iHeartRadio Jon Clarke - Investigative Journalist, Owner The Olive Press Newspaper in Spain, Author: "My Search for Madeleine" (available on Amazon), Website: TheOlivePress.es TIPLINE: Metropolitan Police Operation Grange ([phone] or [e-mail] Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. Does the name Christian Bruckner ring a bell? Probably not, but I believe it will. All of you legal eagles who, like me, have been on the search for little Maddie McCann for so long. Do we finally have answers in the form of a guy now doing jail time for the parents ostensibly are still searching for Maddie under the belief that she is alive. What does Brookner know? First of all, take a listen to our friend Ben Avery-Niney's. city of Hanover, German police begin a secret investigation into one of the world's most infamous unsolved crimes. Large screens shield much of their operation from public view, but there have been some revealing glimpses. An excavator turning over the soil, police holding

rakes, others with sniffer dogs, and amongst it all, a child's slide. The location is more than 2,000 kilometres from the Portugal resort where Madeleine McCann disappeared but it's very close to a previous address of a prime suspect in the case, German man Christian Bruckner. The 43-year-old is a convicted pedophile and it's alleged his mobile phone was used near the mccann's resort at prior deluge on the night maddie vanished in 2007 we are still on the search for maddie mccann but now more answers to questions as they relate to a 44 year old man christian brickner with me an all-star panel to make sense of it all, California prosecutor Wendy Patrick, author of Red Flags and the host of Today with Dr. Wendy KCBQ. You can find her

at WendyPatrickPhD.com. Dr. Angela Arnold, renowned psychiatrist joining us out of the Atlanta jurisdiction. You can find her at AngelaArnoldMD.com. Professor of Forensics at Jacksonville State University, author of Blood Beneath My Feet on Amazon, and also the star of a brand new hit series, The Piketon Massacre on iHeartRadio, Joseph Scott Morgan, Death Investigator. He's been on over 10,000 death scenes. And joining me right now, a very special guest with a brand new book out just this week. It's John Clark, investigative journalist.

He is the author of My Search for Madeline. Of course, he's talking about Maddie McCann, My Search for Madeline. John Clark is joining us right now. But first, to Justice Scott Morgan, professor of forensics, Jacksonville State University. Justice Scott, it's really hard for me to believe that even now we have still not found Maddie McCann's body, which leads to speculation. This child is still alive. Yeah, we hold out hope that she is Nancy, but this is a long, long, long time for her to have survived. And so it looks rather bleak, I have to admit. And just vast, vast distances that we're talking about. She was last seen in Portugal, Nancy.

And what a wild, circuitous route that this alleged perpetrator has gone on over these years. And speaking of Portugal, I cannot ignore the fact that this convicted rapist. Now, you may think that a rapist that attacks a 72-year-old American woman would not be the same perp that attacks a three-year-old, also a vacationer, little girl, Maddie McCann. But think about it. Dr. Angela Arnold, in both cases, it's a sex attack, an attack of a female, an attack of our most vulnerable, a tiny child and an elderly lady, someone that can't fight back under similar attack circumstances. They're both at a vacation spot. I mean, actually, the similarities are quite profound. Right. And you know, Nancy, a predator is a predator is a predator. And whether this was whether one or the other was some sort of crime of opportunity or whether it was planned by him, this man is a predator. He is a sexual predator. But let's don't forget, in addition to attacking the 72-year-old American woman,

he is also a pedophile, which fits in with the attack on Maddie McCann, the kidnap of Maddie McCann. Guys, let's go to the source, the oracle, so to speak. Joining me, special guest John Clark,

investigative journalist and the author of a brand new book that has just hit the stands, My Search for Madeline on Amazon. John Clark, I get a bad taste in my mouth. I really think about it. It's almost physical when I say the is of, I guess, since I'm not there in Europe to see the people, I guess is of the prosecutor leading the investigation into Maddie's disappearance. It looks like jurors falling over, I guess, asleep in the jury box. And then behind a petition, there is a psychic, a fortune teller, and the prosecutor's offering the fortune teller money

for the fortune teller to create more evidence against Christian Bruckner. So this pedophile that preys on little children that raped an elderly American woman is now mocking the justice system. Well, he can go to and burn in hell for all I care. But

what connects him to Maddie? I can tell you that there's an enormous amount of evidence against Christian Bruckner. And the police have been probing this since 2017. In fact, whoa, Jackie, isn't 2021? 17, 18, 19, 20, 21. That's five years. That's right now.

I mean, we know a few things for certain. We know that his mobile phone number was used in the vicinity of Madeleine's apartment on the night she went missing. We know that he lived less than a kilometer from Pradeluge, where she was snatched. And we also know that the woman that was raped, in fact, a Stanford graduate, a very wonderful woman, actually, who was a journalist herself, who was raped, a 72-year-old woman, an American woman who was raped, lived also within a kilometer of where he'd lived for seven years. And he had, I traced his crime career, 19 convictions in total, including further rapes, sex assaults, child abuse, starting from the age of 14. And he was living there pretty much scot-free for seven years in Portugal. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. John Clark is joining me from Spain right now.

He's just come up with a brand new book. It's really fascinating. My Search for Madeline on Amazon. 19 convictions going back to age 14. What in the H-E-double-L was he doing walking around free the night Maddie is kidnapped? I mean, honestly, the mind boggles, but I can tell you that the German police are not just looking into him for prosecution in the Madeleine McCann case. He's been probed in at least five other cases that I've looked into, and at least two or three more that involve children.

And, you know, it's pretty certain that he was in 2017, was the man that exposed himself to four children. I mean, this is 10 years after Madeleine McCann was back in Portugal at a fiesta at two o'clock in the morning, exposing himself to four young children in a play park in a place called Messines. Okay, wait a minute. John Clark, I know that you are the investigative journalist, but I think we need to shrink and we need it right now.

Dr. Angie Arnold, Dr. Angela Arnold, Dr. What is that thrill an adult gets from exposing themselves to a child? Well, it's not just any adult, first of all. These people are deaf. A pedophile is a person who is sexually attracted to children. And I've actually had to take care of pedophiles in my past. And they have explained to me how they think and how they pray and wait. Oftentimes they will try to make a relationship with the child.

But of course, this was not the case initially, it sounds like. But unfortunately, Nancy, they're very sick individuals. Time has shown that they really aren't treatable. You know, I said that a million times as a prosecutor in inner city Atlanta. A child molester cannot be rehabbed. And statistics show that. They get out and they do it again and again. And the reality is, Wendy Patrick, California prosecutor, author of Red Flags, hosts today with Dr. Wendy, KCBQ. I could go on and on. Wendy, the reality is every time a child molester is caught, he has molested dozens of times before then. Dozens. Yeah, it's one of those things that you wouldn't know unless you were in the system and actually worked with them,

as Dr. Arnold was saying. You know, I used to prosecute all the sexually violent predator cases, the ones that did actually take the stand in these civil commitment proceedings and admit how many times they had done it in the past. With cases like this where you have. Oh, please stop it, Wendy. Wendy, please stop it. That's like Jackie over there telling me she just turned 21 again. She's admitting she turned 21. She's turned 21, what, 10 times already, Jackie?

Yes. So when you tell me a child molester admits they molested X number of times, BS. Well, no, not in sexually bothered predator cases because they have to admit it in those cases because they're seeking to prove that they've been rehabilitated. So it's that honesty. But initially, when you're looking at whether or not somebody has it's ever been the first time that they say on television, you have to assume that it isn't. And that's why we look at patterns make the predator. If somebody gets caught once, we worry how many times they have done it before. And when you have something like indecent exposure,

there has to be this element of wanting to achieve sexual arousal. It can't be an accident. Most adults would be horrified to have other people catching them with their pants down. It has to have that requisite amount of intent. That's important when you're looking at somebody that has also been accused of sexual predator. Back to you, John Clark, investigative journalist and author of My Search for Madeline that has just hit Amazon. Let's follow up on what Wendy Patrick, Joe Scott, and Dr. Angie have just said, the pattern makes the predator. That's what Wendy said. And I can't help but notice,

John Clark, that wherever Christian Bruckner goes, children go missing. Yeah, well, this is absolutely fascinating. And I'd like to just add to the point that we just made. But at the first time he was convicted, it was for a nine year old and a six year old child. And he's going back to the age of 14 and I believe possibly 13. And on both occasions, the child was grabbed and snatched while he aroused himself. And they only released the child when the child's scream made so much noise that he had to let the child go. Now, if you go forward 10 years, he's caught again in Germany grabbing a child and taking pictures holding that child with his penis in his hand. And basically, those explicit pictures were used to prosecute him and to give him a prison sentence in Germany, from which, of course, he fled and had to be extradited. Now, you go back to Madeleine McCann in 2007, just three weeks before Madeleine McCann went missing on a beach right next to Prada Luz.

We're talking about a five-kilometer drive. There was another girl who was grabbed by a german guy with blue eyes who spoke in english and then in german who basically masturbated by her on the beach and when she screamed and her brother came over and the parents came to save her this guy ran away up the hill and they got a very very good look at him it It's broad daylight. He was naked. He ran off back to his van, the other side of Trace where he ran to. And the parents, two days later, went to report this guy and what happened to their poor daughter, who was 10 years old. And I can tell you now that the following day, that case was shelved by the local police. They didn't feel there was any need to even go out to look at the place that happened or indeed the track that he'd visited.

Now, I'm pretty sure that the McCanns themselves and the parents are horrified and they will be horrified to read this in my book. I'm sure they're aware of some of this. But this girl, three weeks before Maddie went missing, could have been. I mean, that was a great opportunity to catch this guy. And he lived very close by. He was described as six foot tall which he was exactly six foot tall blonde hair he had blonde hair blue eyes he had blue eyes he had four teeth they said that were wonky he had four teeth that were wonky now that to me is a guy that's done it for years and years and got away with it and got bolder and bolder and bolder and has eventually just thought i'm going to snatch a girl from an apartment easy as easy peasy grab her and take her away and i think that's what the german police are assuming and as you say nancy it's

happened there have been a few cases as you know the inger the german maddie as they call her vanished into thin air just around the time that Bruckner happened to be parked 20 miles away, happened to be in a car accident. They know he was there the day before in the same area that she went missing. They know he drove a blue van. A blue van was seen driving away from the scene. The girl was never seen again. One more case, Joanna, seven miles from Pradeluge where Maddy went missing two years earlier, vanished, never seen again. No idea what happened to her, but was living there at the time, seven miles away. So you're right to ask those questions.

And those are the questions the police are looking at. How old was Joanne? Joanna was eight. And how old is Inga? Inga was eight. And then you've got Matty, three. How far away was Inga's incident from Praia da Luz? Praia da Luz? No, it's in Germany.

So Inga is in Germany, so near to where he'd been living at the time in Hanover. And the Joanna case is about seven miles inland from Pradeluge. So very, very close. And as you may or may not know, the police that were involved in the investigation, the detectives from the PJ in Portimao, Amaral, who's written a book about this case, was found, was basically accused and then later convicted of covering up in the case of Joanna. And four members of his own force went to prison. He got an 18-month prison sentence for covering up a beating

into a confession of this woman. Now, his deputy, a guy called Christopher Pereira, he has just gone to prison for seven years for corruption, for basically running a gang that robbed, kidnapped wealthy people around Lisbon and broke into homes. Now, this guy left the PJ department in Portimao, went to work, and this is where it gets incredible, became the head of the Missing Children's Bureau in Portugal for one entire year, where I could find nothing he did in that entire year. Then he went to become president of Sporting Lisbon, which was a football team,

twice convicted of fraud while there, now in prison for seven years for running a crime gang. Now, that's the head of the operation investigator and his deputy. What does that say about this police department? Well, what it says to me at this precise moment is that nothing was done to apprehend Christian Bruckner during the time that they were in charge. They were too busy in their own misdeeds.

Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. We're talking about the very latest in the search for this beautiful little girl, Maddie McCann, with a shocking development that has occurred. Take a listen to our Cut 16, Ben Avery at 9 News. Police have confirmed that this search is linked to the disappearance of Madeline McCann. But what they won't say is what information has brought them here and exactly what it is they're looking for. German prosecutors have repeatedly said they believe Madeleine is dead and that Bruckner is their man. The suspect is being held in a prison for unrelated crimes around 200 kilometers from the search site. It recently applied for early release, but in the past 24 hours, that bid was withdrawn. We're talking about a search

that was done that has yielded very, very disturbing evidence. Take a listen to Our Cut 17, Martin and Brunt, Sky News. On the third day of digging, police were said to have uncovered a hidden cellar. They hoped it would provide the crucial evidence they need. Sniffer dogs joined the search

in the garden of a secluded holiday chalet where the suspect once lived. Police were hunting for clues to the disappearance of Madeleine McCann. Officers sifted piles of soil dug from a hole 15 meters wide. They also used ground penetrating radar and later brought in a drone.

Three skips were removed, not all of them full. Straight back out to John Clark, investigative journalist and author of a brand new book, My Search for Madeline. John, tell me about The Search. Well, actually, it's great to hear Martin Brunt, actually, who's the very, very well-known crime correspondent at Sky News, been there for 20 years.

And actually, I spoke to him a lot during the course of my book. And he and I have covered this case for many years. And he has also, I believe, been to the famous box factory, New Wiedersleben, in Germany, where they found all Christian Bruckner's memory sticks and USB sticks buried in a little supermarket bag underneath the dead body of a dog that, according to detectives, had been buried underground with its head out the ground. Now, I can't verify that, but that's been reported. And that, to me, sounds like a fairly

sick individual. Now, when the police found that stash of evidence, they tell me, was up to 20,000 videos and photos, including over 100 of Christian Bruckner himself in them. Now, a lot of these, we assume, must be rape cases, potentially child abuse. Now, I spoke to another journalist in Germany yesterday who said she'd seen a couple of these videos and they were pretty sick and pretty horrendous and saw christian in them now police have been digging as you know in allotments around germany they've done it twice to my knowledge now and that they're looking for further evidence like this uh to try and pin down how many cases this man could have been involved in how many horrendous rapes and cases has this guy been involved in? And that's really what I think they'll be doing.

And take this from me, in the next few weeks, they will be continuing searches in Portugal and a few more in Germany to establish other potential burial sites of Christian Brookmans. John, when you say they are searching in other allotments, what do you mean by allotment? Yeah, that's something we have in England, allotments. They also have it in Germany, where people will have like a country house almost in a small space with a little bit of garden, and they might grow potatoes and vegetables, runner beans and tomatoes. And he loved these little allotment plots where he could go at the weekend and take young girls and allegedly he dug a cellar at one of these as you've already reported on and I think at the other one he also reported also allegedly dug a cellar now the woman who owns that Sabine Saleg

has said a number of times please come and dig up my house, see what you can find, because she's worried that she might be sleeping above something rather sinister. So an allotment is either a country house or it is a patch of land on which you can plant? Yeah, it's kind of, how would I describe it? It's quite a sort of socialist system that we have around Europe. I know you guys in America think that's a dirty word, but you know, it's the idea is that you get a patch of land, a town hall or council leases out to people. And it could be as small as a sort of, you know, it's a kind of a quarter of a football pitch or something, a small pot,

even smaller than that. And I have a little shacks on them, like little kind of cottages. They're not country houses. They're more like cottages or huts. And some of them you can sleep in. Some of them, you just keep your tools, you know, for gardening. But in Germany, they love it. And you'll see them all over Germany. Every town has a series of allotments just on the outskirts of the city. You rent them very cheaply.

They're subsidized. And you can sort of go there and you can take things with you at the weekend and pretty much kind of hide out, if you like like at the weekend with these little plots amazing that instead of planting fruits or vegetables on his plot he digs a cellar um i'm very curious about the usb drives you're telling me between seven and eight were found on one of these allotments underneath the body of a dead dog partially buried in a supermarket plastic bag. Do you believe, John Clark, that at first I thought no, but now I'm thinking possibly yes, that Maddie McCann is pictured on any of these USB devices. And when we say USB, we're talking like a memory stick is what I'm imagining it's going to be.

The reason I first said no is in my thinking, and panel jump in, if they have Matty McCann being raped or mistreated on a USB stick, traced back to him, and she's missing, then there's evidence and motive for murder. And so if they had that, why wouldn't they go ahead and formally charge him with her murder? On the other hand, right after they find the seven to eight USB drives, they do state Maddie McCann is dead. And that is very, very probative in my mind. What about that, John Clark? Do you think Maddie's on one of these drives? I think, again, I've asked the prosecutor a number of times and understand

that he won't be drawn on it and I think it for a number of reasons one that maybe it's something that's circumstantial maybe you can see something of her on one of these pictures but you don't know it's linked to Christian potentially there's a video that he may or may not be in

maybe there's some background or some evidence of her clothing in one of them. Also, let's not forget that they found a series of swimming costumes and clothes at this box factory. This is not an allotment,

by the way, the box factory in New Bersgleben. This is an enormous two hectare plot. It's a Second World War box factory that made boxes for all sorts of different things. And in this huge place where he allegedly wanted to keep cars and want to have some sort of sculpture garden, he kept,

and probably I believe, and I went around it. And if you look at photographs that are in my book, I believe he took people there to mistreat. And I think horrible things happened. I find it very sinister actually going around it. It was quite scary. So John Clark, he owned the old box factory. He had bought it for 36,000 euros. I think that's about $40,000. And people have often questioned where he got the money to buy it. I've also questioned where he got the money to buy a 30,000 or 25,000 Winnebago, a Tiffin Allegro. So, you know, there's a lot of questions about, you know,

both those were found at the box factory. And, you know, his best friend, who I spoke to, Michael Tatchell, who he was in prison with for eight months in Portugal, told me, I'm sure he took Maddie. I'm sure he snatched her and sold her. That's what he told me, I'm sure he took Maddie. I'm sure he snatched her and sold her. That's what he told me. And, you know, I published that, and it's been in plenty of newspapers around the world. And I see no reason for him to lie.

You know, he's a pretty okay guy, this Michael Tatchell. He's pretty decent, actually, and I think he's made his ways. And many other friends of Bruckner say the same. They're convinced that he snatched her and did it, sold her. Nancy, I got to jump in and dovetail in with what John was just saying relative to his source of monies. You know, I know that we're talking about Maddie here, but I have to say she's not going to be the only child on these data sticks. I'm from I firmly believe that this fellow is part of a network more than likely. And this data is sold, is traded.

I think that that could potentially just vanished off of the face of the planet. And no one knows where they originated from. No one knows what happened to them. And there's a whole underground network of these people that deal in human flesh like this. And that's what is really ominous about this. I think that Maddie may very well just be the tip of the iceberg in this case. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. John Clark joining me, author of My Search for Madeline. John, you're telling me then that the USB drives were found not buried at an allotment,

but at the old box factory that he, Bruckner, owns? No, I mean, they were all found at this box factory, at least the ones that the police have announced. They were all found at this box factory at least the ones that the police have announced they were all found there uh but it may have they were looking for more usb and memory sticks when they dug up another allotment to different allotments so i understand one one thing that just confirming what your other guests just said then is that he's absolutely right i think there's a lot of trading of of eastern european girls he did travel a lot into I think there's a lot of trading of Eastern European girls. He did travel a lot into Eastern Europe. He had a lot of Eastern European girlfriends.

We know from various people, he spent a lot of time in the dark net and dark web, which is a very sinister area to buy and sell goods for drug dealers, but also for child pornographers. It's a very, very lucrative industry. I just find that really difficult to believe. Wendy Patrick, California prosecutor and author, Wendy, that we can't find any firm connection

between he, Christian Bruckner, and the slaver, so to speak, the modern day slaver to whom he would sell these young girls, children, anyone. I mean, by now, I would think there would be a connection via cell phone, via P.O.

box, via email, something connecting him to make the drop or the exchange child for money. There probably is. But those investigations, as you know, are marathons, not sprints. They probably do have connections, but maybe there's an argument that they're unclear. They're inconclusive. They need corroboration. They want to rule out alternate explanations. So it may be that this is a development of all those connections behind the scenes in

order to present that airtight case at the end that maybe they already believe they have but aren't able to shore up as well as they can, especially now that we're learning that maybe this man has been using those allotments not to plant but to hide evidence. What else might be there, which would, of course, account for these digs that are now occurring with more frequency. I want to circle back for those just joining us. We're talking about a development in a search for a beautiful young three-year-old girl, Maddie McCann, who was kidnapped while on vacation with her family.

Back to you, John Clark. Describe for those just joining us when Maddie's parents first realized she was gone. Well, that's right. It was in 2007 on the 5th of May night and 5th of May at about 9.30 or quarter past nine when they'd been looking after their kids every half an hour, checking in on their kids as they ate dinner

in the restaurant just outside their apartment. Wait, wait, wait. Right there. I was told the restaurant was about a football field length away. I think it's about less than 100 meters. It's within eyesight of most of the parents apartments, pretty close, okay, within the complex. But once you visited it, you realize that this complex wasn't very secure. There was no CCTV. There were openings in very easily for anyone to

go in. And I think crucially, it's now been established that somebody had written in the diary, in the book, the reservations book for the restaurant, that at the top of the page, the parent, the families, and there were seven adults, I think there were three families or four families, they were all going to eat in the restaurant together while their children slept in their apartments. And that was written very clearly in the reservations book. Then the children were asleep? Yeah, the children were sleeping while they ate. And I think somebody saw that and either told somebody, these children are there or they're not in their

apartments tip them off now everybody said that christian brooklyn was a fantastic burglar uh robber climber um now could he have been tipped off to to potentially go into these apartments and uh and rob them and maybe while he was there he he had an opportunity arose. Or maybe that was his immediate goal. So when one of the parents who were, I understand, taking turns going back to check on the children, they find out that Maddie is missing. Now, you're telling me that at the time Maddie goes missing, Christian Brückner lived just a few miles away from the resort.

No, half a mile, half a mile. Wow, that's even closer than I thought. Only a half a mile away. Had he ever been sighted at the resort? Had he ever been spotted there, John Clark? He was a regular in the resort. He was a regular. He used to be seen regularly in pubs and bars.

He had girlfriends in the resort. He won the stage. He beat the living daylights out of one girlfriend in front of plenty of witnesses in a bar. He then went back to her apartment and hid under the bed to see if she would bring a boyfriend back, I think.

That's the supposition. And the girlfriend, in fact, told, I think, the Daily Mirror that had she come back with a boyfriend that night, she believes that he would have attacked the boyfriend and her very badly. As it was, she came into the apartment, found the apartment, felt a bit strange, didn't really understand it. Something had changed. The loose seat was up. She wondered what was going on. And then she just looked under the bed and there he was.

I mean, can you imagine? It's the stuff with horrorophones, isn't it? You know, and I'm also wondering why, if there are nearly 20,000 images on these USB drives that have been traced back to Christian Bruckner, where are all those victims? Are those cases being prosecuted, not just Maddie's? What about that, John Clark? You need, like I have, to go to the Halle Police Department. There's 16

different federal regions in Germany. It's like America with all the different regions and different states. And you have to go to Halle Police and ask the question, because I got a lot of no comments from them. I think I filed 10 questions. I got three back. Seven were no comments.

Who are in all these other videos? Do they know who these kids are? Do they know who these people are? You're absolutely right. I believe they are investigating an enormous amount of stuff. They need to bring in backup. Obviously, they're not getting anywhere on their investigation. How did Christian Bruckner get on, end up on police radar to start with, John? Can they bring in Jodie Foster, do you think?

Can she come in and do a bit of investigation? I wish. So how did they get on to Brückner? Why did they first red flag him? Well, again, in my book, if you read the interview with Boulter, the prosecutor, he said it comes from what he describes

as good, solid German policing. And he said that the English really didn't know and the Portuguese didn't know. But of course, they managed to get the list of all the phone numbers that were linking in to the transmitter that covers the Ocean Club where Maddy went missing that night. And in the exact words, by amazing fortune,

Portuguese police had kept all the phone numbers that were linked to the transmitter that was right outside the Ocean Club. So they knew that on the night Maddy went missing, there were, let's say, a thousand phone calls between seven and let's say 10 that night. Now, those lists that Portuguese police have luckily kept, They hadn't been destroyed. So in 2017, when German police got a tip off that Christian Bruckner might have been involved in the Madeleine McCann case, and they decided to look into it in more detail, they discovered on that list a phone number of Christian Bruckner's, a number that he used regularly. So they knew that he'd been outside

the Ocean Club at exactly 7.30, I think it was 7.32 on the night that Maddie went missing. Had a half an hour phone call. It's a long phone call, isn't it? Half an hour with somebody who's never come forward, who's never been able to discount from the inquiry that night outside the Ocean Club. And that, I think, is where the police really started thinking, this guy is very interesting. And Matty was found missing around 9.15? About an hour after the phone call. Yeah, they're about an hour and a half after the phone call. So he was in the area.

And of course, the same night, two blonde men were seen outside the apartment. They've never been discounted. Two blonde men were standing on an apartment. They've never been discounted. Two blonde men were standing on an apartment right next to her apartment. They've never found them. They've also seen a guy that was watching the apartment by two witnesses who saw a guy, old looking guy, slightly scruffy hair.

What about the fact that Christian Bruckner apparently got drunk and confessed to someone he knew what happened to Manny McCann? Again, allegedly various times. Allegedly it happened at a festival in Spain in 2008. He admitted it. And again, allegedly on the 10th anniversary, he was in a bar with a friend of his that he knew in Portugal very well,

allegedly told him as well that he knew what happened and came clean. Now, again, that confession, we don't know about. We've never heard exactly what he said, but we do know, and I believe there's three or four very key people here that are keeping quiet, aren't saying anything, and are really very critical in this inquiry. Guys, take a listen to our friends at Inside Edition. Do you still have the same suspect you had three months ago? Yes.

We have only one suspect, only Chris for me. How much information has he been sent? We got hundreds of hints. Of course, there are some hints which are only rubbish, but there are some hints we are hopeful that can make our investigation more successful. Three months ago, you said you needed good evidence, forensic evidence. Have you found that yet?

We have no forensic evidence, but it's not necessary to have forensic evidence to charge our suspect. But we need some more evidence, maybe a witness, maybe a photo or a video. I asked the prosecutor what evidence he has that makes him certain that Madeline is dead. He won't say, but he is aware of rumors. Someone told me that we have found the clothes of Maddie. Yes, the pajamas. Yeah.

But it's not true. If we found something like that, it would be great for our investigation. So let me ask you, guys, you're hearing CBS's Peter Van Zandt questioning the prosecutor, Hans Christian Walters, about the investigation of Bruckner. To John Clark, what do you believe the evidence is that they've got against Bruckner thus far? And why aren't they acting on it? I think, as I explained, that they are what we would say, getting your ducks in a line.

They have not just this one case. They are duty bound to investigate other children, other rape cases. And I believe they are biding their time to charge him and question him. I believe that they have so much good circumstantial evidence. And as he says, we don't need forensic evidence because if they have enough good witnesses or people he's admitted it to, or even if he admits it himself, maybe they have a tape confession from him that he might have said to someone. We don't know exactly, but they have enough evidence. And I believe and I now understand I thought it was going to be this autumn,

but I now believe it's going to be in the spring they will first question him. We wait as justice unfolds. Joining me, Wendy Patrick, Dr. Angela Arnold, Joseph Scott Morgan, an investigative journalist, author of a new book, My Search for Madeline, on Amazon now, John Clark. Nancy Grace, Crime Story, signing off. Goodbye, friend. This is an iHeart Podcast.