Suspect's pics led cops to his little paradise

Maddie police scouring reservoir | Snaps found on Brueckner laptop'

- MARTIN FRICKER

SEARCHES of a reservoir for Madeleine McCann were sparked after police found photos of the area on Christian Brueckner’s computer, it is claimed. 

Portuguese media reported that detectives found snaps taken at the isolated Barragem do Arade on the suspect’s seized laptop.

Another report said the material was found in 2016 on a USB stick in the paedophile’s “secret lair” in a derelict factory in Germany.

It is believed Brueckner stayed at the reservoir in his campervan around the time of Madeleine’s disappearance. He reportedly told pals that the site was his “little paradise”.

It is not known why investigators have now chosen to search the popular hippy haunt.

But Kate and Gerr y McCann’s Portuguese lawyer, Rogerio Alves, said police are “looking for traces of the presence of her body”.

German authorities refused to say what sparked the first major search in nine years for Madeleine, who vanished in 2007 aged three.

Prosecutor Hans Christian Wolters said: “We are investigating on the basis of certain tip-offs.

“Why we’re looking there and what we specifically hope to find there, that should remain secret for the moment.”

Last night he told German TV: “It’s not like we’re just looking at any old place and digging and searching it.

“We have clues that give us hope that we will find something. But as to what kind of clues they are and what we hope to find, I can’t say at the moment.”

A German source said: “This search really is credible. It’s based on information they discovered.