
The prime suspect in the disappearance of British girl Madeleine McCann has been arrested after he evaded police surveillance and got into a fight. Christian Brueckner, 49, was wearing an ankle monitor and under round-the-clock surveillance when the incident took place, leaving the German authorities scrambling to explain what happened. Brueckner and an unnamed British man were arrested on suspicion of “mutual assault” in the north-German city of Kiel in April. In the wake of the incident, the German police said Breuckner gave them the slip, and Interior Minister Magdalena Finke has now admitted the episode showed that the surveillance operation around Brueckner had failed. Madeleine McCann went missing from a vacation villa in Praia da Luz, Portugal, in 2007. Brueckner has been on the police’s radar since 2008, when his name was given to both the English and German police by an informer. Brueckner has prior convictions for child abuse, and was released from jail late last year after serving seven years for the brutal rape of an older woman. Police say there is significant circumstantial evidence linking him to McCann’s disappearance, but Bruecker denies it. His lawyer challenged Scotland Yard to bring an extradition case, and said Britain never would. No charges have ever been filed over then-three-year-old Madeleine’s disappearance.






















