Madeleine McCann search resumes in Portugal 16 years after British toddler’s disappearance

Portuguese authorities on Monday resumed a search for missing Madeleine McCann – a British girl who went missing as a toddler from a 2007 family vacation in Praia da Luz.

Madeleine was abducted from the family’s ground-floor apartment in the coastal, southern Portuguese city on May 3, 2007, when she was 3 years old.

Over the next several days in Portugal’s Algarve region, police will conduct “new searches… at the request of the German Authorities” and with the “presence of British authorities,” Portugal’s Judiciary Police said in a translated statement.

Police are expected to provide more information once it becomes available.

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Earlier on Monday, police were seen conducting a search near the Arade dam, about 31 miles from Praia da Luz.

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In 2020, German authorities named Christian Brueckner, 45, as a suspect in Madeleine’s disappearance. Brueckner continues to deny his involvement in the case.

Brueckner spent many years in Portugal, including in Praia da Luz, around the time of Madeleine’s disappearance.

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Brueckner has been serving a seven-year sentence for raping a 72-year-old woman in 2005, Reuters reported. He was charged in 2022 for sex crimes against children that German authorities allege he committed in Portugal between 2000 and 2017.

Madeleine was born in May 2003 and would be turning 20 years old this month.

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On May 3, Madeleine’s parents, Kate and Gerry McCann, said in a statement marking 16 years since their daughter’s disappearance that they await a “breakthrough” in the case. 

“Thank you to everyone for your support — it really helps,” they said in the statement posted to the “Official Find Madeleine Campaign” Facebook page.

Madeleine’s missing persons case received renewed attention this year after a Polish woman shared her belief that she could be the missing girl on social media – an idea that was later debunked by a DNA test.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.