UK News

Madeleine McCann parents say focus on suspect 'potentially very significant'


The parents of Madeleine McCann believe the identification of a convicted German sex offender as the key suspect in their daughter’s disappearance is “potentially very significant”, their spokesman has said.

An international appeal for information is under way after police in Britain and Germany revealed that a serving prisoner is the new prime suspect in the disappearance of the three-year-old on 3 May 2007.

German police said they were investigating the suspected murder of Madeleine and described the 43-year-old man, who has not been named, as a “multiple criminal sex offender who has also been convicted of child sexual abuse”.

Detectives in Germany are due to disclose more details about the investigation in a press conference on Thursday.

Madeleine McCann
Three-year-old Madeleine McCann disappeared on 3 May 2007. Photograph: EPA

Clarence Mitchell, the longtime spokesman for Kate and Gerry McCann, said on Thursday morning: “Kate and Gerry do feel it’s potentially very significant. They have welcomed the appeal; they’re not doing any interviews themselves about it because they wish the focus to remain on the police request rather than they themselves.”

Underlining the significance of the development, Mitchell said it was “the first time in more than 13 years that I can recall [the police] focusing on one individual”.

He said: “There have there been countless sightings, tipoffs, rumours, assumptions made largely by the media about A or B, which have all suddenly come to nothing. Nor would I want to talk about any sense of hope or optimism around this one, given the circumstances. But, as I say, in my memory of being involved in the case, the police have never been quite so specific about an individual, as they have been in this appeal.”

Asked on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme about German police classifying the investigation as a murder appeal, Mitchell pointed out that the Metropolitan police were still classifying it as a missing person case.

He said police in Britain had been at pains to say there remained no evidence that Madeleine had been murdered or harmed and that detectives were keeping an open mind.

Mitchell added: “This is another important chapter in the search for their daughter. They’ve never given up hope that she may still be found alive but they are realistic. They say that whatever the outcome of this particular line of investigation may be, they do need to know what happened to their daughter to find peace and to bring whoever’s responsible to justice.”

The suspect was described as being white, with short blonde hair, and around 6ft tall. Now aged 43, in 2007 he was 30, and police said he may have looked as young as 25. The man, who is in prison on an unrelated matter, had been in the Algarve between 1995 and 2007, with short spells in Germany during that time.

On Wednesday investigators revealed details of the phone number used by the man and a number he had been called from, along with photos of a camper van he was said to have been using to live “a transient lifestyle” in Portugal’s Algarve.

An appeal for information was made for anyone who recognised the numbers, the camper van or a Jaguar car linked to the man. German police also issued an appeal with additional details on national television.

Volkswagen T3 Westfalia campervan
Police want to hear from anyone who recognises this Volkswagen T3 Westfalia campervan. Photograph: EPA

Police said significant information regarding the man had emerged after investigators made an appeal in May 2017, the 10th anniversary of Madeleine’s disappearance. Madeleine would have turned 17 on 12 May this year.

After German federal police authorities were engaged by British and Portuguese forces in November 2017, a “huge amount of work” took place so that investigators could understand all that they could about the suspect and his connections to Praia da Luz.

Images were released of a distinctive VW T3 Westfalia campervan, an early 1980s model with white upper body and a yellow skirting and a Portuguese registration plate, as well as a 1993 Jaguar car that was registered in Germany.

On 4 May 2007, the day after Madeleine’s disappearance, the suspect got the car re-registered in Germany under someone else’s name at a time when police believe the car was still in Portugal. They want information from anyone who may have seen both vehicles, which have been seized and are in the possession of police in Germany.



READ SOURCE

This website uses cookies. By continuing to use this site, you accept our use of cookies.