Madeline McCann investigation: German police want to retest mystery saliva sample

No DNA match found between evidence and latest suspect

German investigators reportedly want to retest a mystery saliva sample found in the apartment where Madeleine McCann went missing.

No DNA match has been found between the sample and the latest suspect, Christian Brueckner.

The sample is believed to be only a trace and Portuguese forensic tests have been unable to extract any DNA profile from it in the 13 years since it was collected, Sky News reported.

The German investigators believe they should carry out their own tests as they consider the sample to be potentially vital evidence.

However, the Portuguese police are thought to be unlikely to send the sample after Hans Christian Wolters, the German prosecutor in Braunschweig, said the Portuguese police still believe Madeleine’s parents were responsible for their daughter’s disappearance. The Portuguese police discounted the McCanns as suspects in 2008.

It comes after German media reports said girls’ swimming costumes, children’s clothes and 8,000 child abuse images were found by police investigating Brueckner, the latest suspect.

Brueckner also reportedly boasted a motorhome he owned and drove repeatedly between Germany and Portugal was ideal for hiding “drugs and children”.

German investigators believe Brueckner killed Madeleine soon after abducting her from a holiday apartment in the Portuguese resort of Praia da Luz in May 2007.

The 43-year-old Brueckner is serving a 15-month prison sentence in Germany for drug dealing, and is appealing a conviction for the 2005 rape of a 72-year-old American woman, also at Praia da Luz, for which he was sentenced to seven years in jail.

Brueckner has racked up 17 convictions across Europe, including for sex offences against children, drug offences, theft and forgery.

He was named prime suspect over Madeleine’s disappearance earlier this month by German police, although his lawyer, Friedrich Fulscher, said Brueckner denies any involvement in the case.