Madeleine McCann would have turned 22 in May (Picture: PA Archive/PA Images)
Madeleine McCann’s disappearance could have links to an international paedophile network, a former investigator fears.
Maddie went missing from her family’s holiday apartment in Portugal’s Praia da Luz 18 years ago. Any searches for her, one as recently as this summer, have led investigators nowhere.
Now a former Belgian official, who led the investigation into the notorious murderer and paedophile Marc Dutroux, has revealed a theory over the disappearance.
Marc Verwilghen, who worked as the Belgian justice minister, told the Sun: ‘I have never had access to the Madeleine McCann files.
The prime suspect in the case, Christian Brueckner, has been locked up for an unrelated crime, but is due to be released tomorrow (Picture: AFP/Getty Images)
‘All I can say is as soon as I heard about the case I had deja vu — because it reminded me straight away of Dutroux.
‘When you look at the case it is of course possible Madeleine was stolen to order. The alert that was sent looks like it must have come from Belgium police and it should have been taken seriously.
‘Dutroux investigators uncovered reports of possible paedophile rings operating in Belgium at that time but couldn’t finish their enquiry as this was focused on Dutroux, handling him as a lone actor.’
His comments come just days before the prime suspect in the case, Christian Brueckner, is set to be released from a German prison after being jailed for the rape of an American woman in the same Algarve region where Maddie vanished.
Maddie was three years old when she vanished from a holiday apartment she was sleeping in with her twin siblings (Picture: Rex/Shutterstock)
Dutroux kidnapped, sexually assaulted and murdered girls in Belgium in the 1980s and 1990s before he was caught. The handling of his case led to widespread criticism of the police and Belgian leaders and protests, with the police accused of ignoring leads and tip-offs, including from Dutroux’s own mother.
Dutroux, who was jailed for life in 2004 and who had several accomplices, is accused of having sold children into slavery in other countries.
His former lawyer claimed that Dutroux told him he wanted to create an ‘underground city’ in an abandoned mine where he would lock up kidnapped children.
Verwilghen insisted that European peadophile networks ‘existed to make money.’
He continued: ‘These could be informal networks, one person dealing with another, but they existed.
Belgium’s former justice minister Marc Verwilghen, who was involved in the investigation into paedophile and murderer Dutroux, has put forward his own theory of what could have happened to Madeleine (Picture: AFP/Getty Images)
‘The Dutroux case showed us the abduction of children took organisation and planning and more than one person to make this work.
‘Intelligence suggests a paedophile ring in Belgium made an order for a young girl three days before Madeleine McCann was taken. Somebody connected to this group saw Maddie, took a photograph of her and sent it to Belgium. The purchaser agreed that the girl was suitable and Maddie was taken.’
Brueckner, 49, has refused to be interviewed by the Metropolitan Police after the force made an international letter of request to question the German national.
Christian Brueckner appeared in court in October last year charged with sexual crimes unrelated to the Maddie case(Picture: Reuters)
He has not been formally charged in relation to Madeleine’s case, and he has denied being involved.
Brueckner remains a suspect in the Met Police’s own investigation, the force confirmed.
A witness in the German investigation, Helge Busching, 54, a former associate of Brueckner’s has said he fears revenge from him after his release from prison.
Busching’s comments were integral to the German investigation, which led to him being declared the prime suspect.
Fresh searches were carried out in the countryside in June a few miles from the Praia da Luz resort where Madeleine was last seen
(Picture: James Manning/PA Wire)
Busching claimed his former associate revealed details about hisinvolvement, with Brueckner describing how Madeleine ‘wasn’t screaming.’
He told ITV about a conversation he had with Brueckner in 2008 at a Spanish festival, a year after Maddie vanished: ‘I was thinking, yeah, how you know this…yeah he have to do something with this.
‘He took Maddie out from this hotel. He is involved, sure.’
Busching said he left a voicemail for Scotland Yard that year, but it is thought his message got lost among 60,000 others, remaining buried until 2017.
Busching told the Sun he is ‘afraid’ of his impending release.
‘Christian knows I’m the only one who can pin the Madeleine McCann case on him. He will want me out of the way. Brueckner knows what he told me, he said.
Timeline of events since Madeleine's disappearance
May 3, 2007: Kate and Gerry McCann leave their children asleep in their holiday apartment in Praia da Luz, Portugal, while they dine with friends. They check on their children three times throughout the night, and, at 10 pm, they find her missing
May 14, 2007: Police take property developer Robert Murat in for questioning and make him a formal suspect – this is later withdrawn.
August 11, 2007: 100 days after her disappearance, detectives acknowledge that she could be dead.
September 7, 2007: Maddie’s parents become formal suspects in their daughter’s disappearance.
September 9, 2007: The McCanns return to England with their two-year-old twins.
July 21, 2008: Portuguese authorities shelve the investigation and remove the McCanns and Murat as suspects.
May 12, 2011: Kate McCann publishes a book about her daughter’s disappearance on her eighth birthday
April 25, 2012: Scotland Yard detectives say they believe Madeleine could still be alive and release a picture of how she may look as a nine-year-old. They ask Portuguese police to reopen the case, but they say they have found no new information.
July 4, 2013: Scotland Yard confirms it has launched its own investigation and says it has identified 38 people of interest, including 12 Britons.
October 24, 2013: Portuguese police decide to reopen the case
January 29, 2014: British detectives fly out to Portugal
June 3, 2024: Sniffer dogs and specialist teams are used to search an area of scrubland close to where Madeleine went missing.
December 12, 2024: Detectives begin questioning 11 people who it is thought may have information on the case.
September 16, 2014: The Government states that the investigation into Madeleine’s disappearance has so far cost £10 million
October 28, 2014: Scotland Yard cuts the number of officers working on the inquiry from 29 to four.
Maddie’s family remembered her as a ‘very beautiful and unique person’ ahead of her 22nd birthday on May 12, 2025 (Picture: PA Wire)
April 30, 2017: The McCanns mark 10 years since her disappearance with a BBC interview.
May 3, 2019: Local media reports say Portuguese detectives are investigating a foreign paedophile as a suspect in the abduction of Madeleine.
June 3, 2020: Police reveal that a 43-year-old German prisoner, later named as Christian Brueckner, has been identified as a suspect in Madeleine’s disappearance.
April 21, 2022: Christian Brueckner is made a formal suspect by Portuguese authorities.
October 11, 2022: Brueckner is charged with three counts of rape and two charges of child sex abuse, unrelated to Madeleine’s disappearance.
May 3, 2023: Kate and Gerry McCann mark the 16th anniversary of Madeleine’s disappearance by saying she is “still very much missed” and that they ‘await a breakthrough’.
May 22, 2023: An area near the Barragem do Arade reservoir, about 30 miles from Praia da Luz, is sealed off as police prepare to start searching on May 23.
May 23, 2023: Searches begin with police divers in the water and officers with sniffer dogs and rakes seen on the banks.
June 23, 2023: A man named Helge B claimed to the German newspaper Bild that Brueckner almost confessed to killing Maddie, allegedly telling him ‘she didn’t scream’ when the pair talked about the case at a music festival
July 11, 2023: The German prosecutor involved with the case warns not to ‘expect too much’ from the search.
February 16, 2024: Brueckner’s trial starts over three counts of alleged rape and sexual abuse of two children not connected to the Madeleine investigation
October 8, 2024: He is
acquitted of all the allegations due to ‘insufficient’ evidence. An appeal over the acquittal is launched, which is still ongoing
March 27, 2025: A 60-year-old woman is charged with
stalking the McCann family
May 3, 2025: Maddie’s parents, Kate and Gerry McCann, mark the 18th anniversary of her disappearance with
a heartbreaking message
June 3, 2025: a new search near Brueckner’s home and trenches around Praia da Luz begins
September 17, 2025: This is the date Brueckner could be released from prison if no further charges are brought
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