LONDON: The family of missing British girl Madeleine McCann is seeking answers in the case after a key suspect was identified in Germany and as authorities there said Thursday they believe she is dead.
McCann was 3 at the time of her disappearance in May 2007 while she was on vacation with her family in Portugal.
UK and German authorities haven’t named the suspect but said he is 43 and currently in prison in Germany for another crime, and that he was in and around the Praia da Luz resort area on the Algarve coast at the time McCann disappeared. Though numerous suspects have come to light in the case previously, McCann family spokesman Clarence Mitchell said that it seems as if there is something different this time.
“In more than 13 years of working with the family I can’t recall the police being so specific about an individual,” Mitchell told Sky News. “He is not being named and the police are quite adamant they are not going to do that, certainly not yet, but they want very specific details around his movement in 2007, even down to phone calls he received the night before Madeleine went missing and the fact he changed the registration of his car the day after.”
Hans Christian Wolters, a prosecutor in Braunschweig, Germany, told reporters investigators are operating on the assumption that McCann is dead.
“In connection with the disappearance of the then 3-year-old British girl Madeleine Beth McCann on May 3, 2007 from an apartment complex in Praia da Luz in Portugal, Braunschweig prosecutors are investigating a 43-year-old German citizen on suspicion of murder,” he told reporters.
“You can infer from that we assume the girl is dead.”
The long-running case of McCann, who vanished shortly before her fourth birthday, has mesmerized Britain for years. Her parents say Madeleine disappeared after they had left her and her twin siblings asleep in their holiday complex while they had dinner with friends at a nearby restaurant.
More than 600 people had been identified as being potentially significant, but officers were tipped off about the German suspect following a 2017 appeal, 10 years after the girl went missing.
Police said the suspect, described as white with short, blond hair and a slim build, was linked to a camper van seen in the Algarve in 2007 and was believed to be in the resort area in the days before and after May 3 that year.
Christian Hoppe of Germany’s Federal Criminal Police Office told German public broadcaster ZDF that the suspect, a German citizen, is currently imprisoned in Germany for a sexual crime. He spent numerous years in Portugal and has two previous convictions for “sexual contact with girls.”
Hoppe said German police aren’t ruling out a sexual motive. They said whoever abducted the girl may have broken into the holiday apartment and then spontaneously committed the kidnapping.
The suspect is being investigated on suspicion of murder by prosecutors in the German city of Braunschweig, where he was last registered before moving abroad.
Wolters wouldn’t give any other details of the suspect’s identity so as not to jeopardize the ongoing investigation.
The description, however, fits that of a 43-year-old man who was convicted in December of the 2005 rape of an American woman, who was 72 at the time, in her apartment in Portugal, the local Braunschweiger Zeitung newspaper reported.
Hoppe said the suspect in the McCann case lived between Lagos and Praia da Luz, was regularly in the Algarve region from between 1995 to 2007. The newspaper, which covered the recent rape trial, said that description and other details match the suspect in that case, who was linked to the 2005 attack recently by DNA.
The suspect denied the charges during the trial and the verdict is currently being appealed. The court didn’t answer an email seeking comment or answer its phones.
Police from Britain, Germany and Portugal launched a new joint appeal for information in the case Wednesday. They asked for anyone to come forward if they had seen two vehicles linked to the suspect — a Volkswagen camper van and a Jaguar. They also sought information on two Portuguese phone numbers, including one believed to have been used by the suspect on the day of Madeleine’s disappearance.
The family, as ever, as searching for answers.
“They do remain hopeful that she could still be found alive,” Mitchell said. “They’ve never given up on that hope, nor will they, until they are presented with any incontrovertible evidence to the contrary. But they say that despite all that, whatever the outcome of this particular line of enquiry might be, they need to know as they need to find peace.”
McCann family seeks closure as Germany presumes Madeleine is dead
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McCann family seeks closure as Germany presumes Madeleine is dead
- Madeleine McCann was three at the time of her disappearance in May 2007
Proposals on immigration enforcement flood into state legislatures, heightened by Minnesota action
- Oregon Democrats plan to introduce a bill to allow residents to sue federal officers for violating their Fourth Amendment rights against unlawful search and seizure
NASHVILLE, Tennessee: As Democrats across the country propose state law changes to restrict federal immigration officers after the shooting death of a protester in Minneapolis, Tennessee Republicans introduced a package of bills Thursday backed by the White House that would enlist the full force of the state to support President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.
Momentum in Democratic-led states for the measures, some of them proposed for years, is growing as legislatures return to work following the killing of Renee Good by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer. But Republicans are pushing back, blaming protesters for impeding the enforcement of immigration laws.
Democratic bills seek to limit ICE
Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul wants New York to allow people to sue federal officers alleging violations of their constitutional rights. Another measure aims to keep immigration officers lacking judicial warrants out of schools, hospitals and houses of worship.
Oregon Democrats plan to introduce a bill to allow residents to sue federal officers for violating their Fourth Amendment rights against unlawful search and seizure.
New Jersey’s Democrat-led Legislature passed three bills Monday that immigrant rights groups have long pushed for, including a measure prohibiting state law enforcement officers from cooperating with federal immigration enforcement. Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy has until his last day in office Tuesday to sign or veto them.
California lawmakers are proposing to ban local and state law enforcement from taking second jobs with the Department of Homeland Security and make it a violation of state law when ICE officers make “indiscriminate” arrests around court appearances. Other measures are pending.
“Where you have government actions with no accountability, that is not true democracy,” Democratic state Sen. Scott Wiener of San Francisco said at a news conference.
Democrats also push bills in red states
Democrats in Georgia introduced four Senate bills designed to limit immigration enforcement — a package unlikely to become law because Georgia’s conservative upper chamber is led by Lt. Gov. Burt Jones, a close Trump ally. Democrats said it is still important to take a stand.
“Donald Trump has unleashed brutal aggression on our families and our communities across our country,” said state Sen. Sheikh Rahman, an immigrant from Bangladesh whose district in suburban Atlanta’s Gwinnett County is home to many immigrants.
Democrats in New Hampshire have proposed numerous measures seeking to limit federal immigration enforcement, but the state’s Republican majorities passed a new law taking effect this month that bans “sanctuary cities.”
Tennessee GOP works with White House on a response
The bills Tennessee Republicans are introducing appear to require government agencies to check the legal status of all residents before they can obtain public benefits; secure licenses for teaching, nursing and other professions; and get driver’s licenses or register their cars.
They also would include verifying K-12 students’ legal status, which appears to conflict with a US Supreme Court precedent. And they propose criminalizing illegal entry as a misdemeanor, a measure similar to several other states’ requirements, some of which are blocked in court.
“We’re going to do what we can to make sure that if you’re here illegally, we will have the data, we’ll have the transparency, and we’re not spending taxpayer dollars on you unless you’re in jail,” House Speaker Cameron Sexton said at a news conference Thursday.
Trump administration sues to stop laws
The Trump administration has opposed any effort to blunt ICE, including suing local governments whose “sanctuary” policies limit police interactions with federal officers.
States have broad power to regulate within their borders unless the US Constitution bars it, but many of these laws raise novel issues that courts will have to sort out, said Harrison Stark, senior counsel with the State Democracy Research Initiative at the University of Wisconsin Law School.
“There’s not a super clear, concrete legal answer to a lot of these questions,” he said. “It’s almost guaranteed there will be federal litigation over a lot of these policies.”
That is already happening.
California in September was the first to ban most law enforcement officers, including federal immigration officers, from covering their faces on duty. The Justice Department said its officers won’t comply and sued California, arguing that the laws threaten the safety of officers who are facing “unprecedented” harassment, doxing and violence.
The Justice Department also sued Illinois last month, challenging a law that bars federal civil arrests near courthouses, protects medical records and regulates how universities and day care centers manage information about immigration status. The Justice Department claims the law is unconstitutional and threatens federal officers’ safety.
Targeted states push back
Minnesota and Illinois, joined by their largest cities, sued the Trump administration this week. Minneapolis and Minnesota accuse the Republican administration of violating free speech rights by punishing a progressive state that favors Democrats and welcomes immigrants. Illinois and Chicago claim “Operation Midway Blitz” made residents afraid to leave their homes.
Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin accused Minnesota officials of ignoring public safety and called the Illinois lawsuit “baseless.”
