Madeleine McCann investigators ‘believe there are two other areas to search for clues’

Investigators leading the search for Madeleine McCann reportedly believe there are two other areas in Portugal where they can search for clues.

Investigators last week searched the Algarve’s remote Barragem do Arade reservoir, which prime suspect Christian Brueckner called a “little piece of paradise” and is 30 miles from where Madeleine was taken in 2007.

Police said they found a “relevant clue” during their search for the beauty spot after an informant was able to match photos showing Brueckner close to the reservoir.

And it is now understood that there may be other areas around Praia da Luz, where Madeleine stayed with her family, where police can search for German detectives who searched more than 8,000 photos of Brueckner.

A source told it Sun: ‘German agents have viewed more than 8,000 photos of Christian B. That forensic work led them to Barragem – but there are other places that have come up in the photos as well.

Authorities gather at a makeshift base camp of the Judicial Police (PJ) in the Arade dam area during the search during the investigation into Madeleine’s disappearance on May 23

Madeleine (left) was three years old in May 2007 when she disappeared from her bedroom in the apartment where her family was staying in the Praia da Luz resort on the Algarve coast. German prosecutors believe Christian Brueckner (right) is behind her disappearance

“Detectives are trying to find out where they are and why Christian B took pictures of those places.”

Last week, researchers cleared a large area of ​​forest near the reservoir and dug eight deep holes to collect soil samples, which were sent to Germany for forensic and DNA testing.

During the last day of the search, a “relevant clue” was found, leading police to focus on a specific part of the remote beauty spot.

Several items have been removed from the site, which may or may not be relevant to the investigation of Madeleine’s disappearance. They include a bra strap, clothing items, and plastic items.

The source said German police believe the original investigation into Madeleine’s disappearance by Portuguese police was flawed.

They said: ‘German detectives remain hugely skeptical about the way the investigation has been carried out in Portugal and so they are keen to continue searching and looking at areas – even those where the Portuguese police claim to have investigated.

“They believe new work could provide new clues that will help the case further.”

Last week’s investigation was the first major search for the toddler in nine years and comes after German police discovered photos of Brueckner in his self-described “little paradise” in the Portuguese region, it is understood.

The 45-year-old Brueckner camped weekends or sometimes even an entire weekend at the reservoir and is said to have set up a sinister camp there to “cleanse himself,” as it turned out last week.

A former friend of Brueckner, who has lived in the Algarve for almost 30 years and has helped police with their investigation, claims the criminal visited the reservoir ‘often’ but was ‘always secretive about it’.

The German mother of three, whose identity has not been released, recalled how Brueckner would drive his motorhome to the edge of the lake because he “liked being near the water.”

She claimed he always camped in the same spot and “there was usually no one else around.”

“This was just his special place that he said he liked to come to cleanse himself,” she said of his campsite, telling The Sun: “I don’t know what he was doing there because he was very secretive.”

Details of Brueckner’s secret lair came to light when a British couple told The Mail on Sunday how they saw a bizarre ‘sanctuary’ for Madeleine in the reservoir just seven months after she disappeared.

The retired couple, who want to be called only Ralf and Ann, were so shocked by what they saw that they took pictures and sent them to Portuguese detectives, thinking they were of significance, but, amazingly, never heard from again.

The makeshift memorial, made up of arrow-shaped boulders pointing to a picnic area excavated by police last week, was weighed down by a large rock and featured a bouquet of flowers and a picture of the kidnapped Madeleine.

Last week, researchers cleared a large area of ​​forest near the Algarve reservoir and dug deep holes to collect samples, which were sent for forensic and DNA testing to Germany

Christian Brueckner, 45, was said to be camping at the Barragem do Arade reservoir, where police searched last week for clues in the case of the missing Madeline McCann. The convicted rapist and pedophile is said to have built a circle of stones from the water (pictured)

For more than a decade, Madeleine’s tormented parents Gerry and Kate (pictured together in 2017) have been waiting in vain for any news – any clue – that their little girl is somehow alive after all this time

Three years ago – when prime suspect Christian Brueckner, 45, was identified by German police – the couple contacted detectives after seeing a call for anyone holidaying in the Algarve when Madeleine went missing in May 2007 to contact them. record.

This time, the German BKA (criminal investigation unit) officers responded within hours of Ralf and Ann emailing them and questioned them on the phone for several hours before asking them to make a formal statement.

It raises the question of whether it was their information that prompted German authorities to conduct a search of the remote picnic area on the edge of the reservoir near Silves, which Brueckner sinisterly referred to as his “little paradise.”

German prosecutors last year named convicted child molester and drug dealer Brueckner as the prime suspect in McCann’s disappearance.

Madeleine was three in May 2007 when she disappeared from her bedroom in the apartment where her family was staying in the Praia da Luz resort on the Algarve coast. The reservoir is located about 50 kilometers inland from the resort.

Bruecker is currently behind bars in Germany for raping a 72-year-old woman in the same part of the Algarve where McCann went missing.

Pictured: Christian Brueckner was filmed behind the wheel of a battered VW camper weeks before Madeleine was kidnapped

The German suspect had been living in a warehouse outside Praia da Luz for several years, but moved into a camper just before Madeleine disappeared

Sources close to Brueckner’s legal team said new searches are “a waste of time.”

The source told the sun: “He didn’t kill Madeleine, and all of this diverts attention from the task of finding out who really did it.”

Brueckner was known to break into hotel rooms and apartments in the Algarve to supplement his drug-trafficking income, and suddenly left the south of Portugal in 2007 – the year Madeleine disappeared – after living there for more than a decade.

He allegedly admitted kidnapping Madeleine to a friend in a bar – and German detectives would firmly believe he killed the three-year-old.

But more than three years after linking Brueckner to Madeleine’s disappearance, he has still not been charged with her kidnapping because prosecutors lack sufficient evidence.