A former tour guide has told a court that she still suffers physically from a brutal sex attack allegedly committed by Christian Brueckner twenty years ago.
Hazel Behan, 40, who has waived her anonymity, tearfully described her horrific ordeal at the hands of the convicted rapist and pedophile.
He was sensationally named by German police in June 2020 as the man suspected of kidnapping Madeline McCann, but has yet to be charged and is currently on trial for unrelated sex crimes.
Ms Behan told the court in Braunschweig, Germany, that she was raped in June 2005 by a masked man who later whipped her and filmed her in her apartment in Praia da Roch, just a few minutes from the seaside resort of Praia da Luz . Coast of the Algarve, where then three-year-old Madeleine was snatched in May 2007.
The Irish former tour guide, who was reduced to tears as Brueckner’s defense team conducted a brutal cross-examination, revealed she was still bleeding as a result of the horrific sexual assault.
Hazel Behan, 40, (pictured), who has waived her anonymity, tearfully described her horrific ordeal at the hands of convicted rapist and pedophile
Christian Brueckner (pictured) was sensationally named by German police in June 2020 as the man suspected of kidnapping Madeline McCann
The defense team asked whether her rapist had used lubricant when he attacked her, leaving members of the public gallery horrified.
Brueckner’s lawyers also claimed that DNA evidence showed she had sex with her then-boyfriend Jason Coates immediately after the brutal rape.
She said: ‘I had sex before the incident because we were a couple, and I had sex afterwards because we were a couple and had a child, but I didn’t have sex straight after.’
Ms Behan contacted police after recognizing a photo of 47-year-old Brueckner and appealing for information. When asked why she was sure it was him, she gave a poignant answer.
She said, “When you spend time in this situation and there’s nothing else you can see about this human being, that’s the only thing you can remember. They drilled into my skull and I’ll never forget it.’
Brueckner’s defense team conducted a brutal cross-examination of the Irish woman
Ms Behan, from Mullingar, Ireland, added that his eyes were completely illuminated against the black mask and tight-fitting clothing he was wearing when he raped her.
She added, “They were just so blue… everything so dark that he had one, so they worked like lights, they were so bright, and I just know them.”
Behan further revealed that she has managed to use the nightmare ordeal in a positive way, choosing to help other women in similar situations.
She told chairman Ute Insa Engeman: “I visited the rape crisis center and received the help I didn’t know I needed at the time.
‘It reminded me of the many other women who may have been in a similar situation.
‘I never felt heard, and that someone had listened to me. I had been listening to the radio one morning and on a program I listened to regularly, someone was talking about a theme, a theme completely different from the rape. I thought it was great that she was so brave to use something terrible that had happened to her in such a positive way.
Ms Behan explained how the attacker then threatened to kill her before fleeing across the balcony after the attack (exterior view of the apartment’s windows from the road shown)
Ms Behan was raped in an apartment in Praia da Rocha, Portugal in 2004 (exterior of building pictured)
The attacker entered Ms Behan’s room while she was sleeping and held a knife to her throat before carrying out the attack (inside view of the apartment block pictured)
“So I wrote to the radio station and they invited me to speak on air. At first I really didn’t want to do it, but then I realized that I could do for other people what this person had done for me.
“At first it was radio, there were no plans for anything on TV, but based on the radio there was an increase in calls to the rape crisis center, and so I was invited to the late show, so I agreed, and there There were a lot of reasons why I wanted to do it, to be heard.
Brueckner, currently serving a seven-year prison sentence for raping an elderly woman in Portugal in 2006, listened impassively without any visible emotion.
He is accused of raping three women and committing a series of sexual assaults against children in the Algarve between 2000 and 2017.
The process continues.