Madeleine McCann’s suspected abductor was allegedly plotting to kidnap a child to give to a rich family in Portugal one week before Maddie disappeared, an expat has claimed.
Ken Ralphs said that Christian Brueckner, the prime suspect in the case, tried to recruit a friend to help find a young person to sell to a childless couple.
The man whom Brueckner made the offer to was allegedly extremely poor and living in a tent on the Algarve coast, some 20 miles outside of Praia da Luz, the resort where Maddie vanished from in 2007.
Ralphs, a former political campaigner, said his friend began to cry whilst out one evening. After Ralphs asked him what was wrong, he confessed that he was involved in a plot to steal a child.
An expat has claimed that Christian Brueckner was plotting to steal a child in Portugal to give to a rich couple
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At the time, both were part of a nomadic, bohemian community living off-grid in southwest Portugal. Brueckner was also part of the same group.
Ralphs claimed that Brueckner knew the man living in a tent was vulnerable and needed money. He cautioned his friend to not get involved in the plot.
He explained to Sky News: “I said you can't get involved in kidnapping a person for ransom, that's ridiculous, then he explained, no, it's not like that. Christian had a customer, a buyer lined up, a German couple who couldn't have children.”
Ralphs then returned to the UK and was dismayed to hear the news of a young girl’s disappearance in the very same area he had been in a week prior.
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Madeleine McCann was last seen in 2007PAAfter telling the police what he knew, he returned to the Algarve but found his friend had gone and his tent burnt down.
He never saw his friend or Brueckner again.
Ralphs added: “The GNR [local police] asked me, 'have you made your statement to the British police'? I said, 'yeah' and they said, 'well, don't worry, go home. If they need to contact you, they will'. And of course, over the years nobody contacted me.”
When Brueckner was publicly identified as the prime suspect in 2022, Ralph reached out to the police again. He has since sent a statement to the German prosecutor leading the investigation.
Brueckner is set to stand trial next month over five more alleged sex crimes. He is currently serving a prison sentence in Germany for the rape of a 72-year-old woman.
Christian Brueckner has been a prime suspect in the Madeleine McCann case since 2022
GettyAccording to court documents, he also allegedly abducted another child just days before Madeline was taken.
A German court heard that on April 7, 2007, less than a month before Madeleine went missing, he “lay in wait for a child on the beach”.
The documents also claim that after taking the child, the 47-year-old forced them to “perform sexual acts on him”.
Brueckner has denied any involvement in Madeleine's disappearance and has not been charged by authorities.