The lead suspect in the Madeleine McCann case once confessed to stealing a child in Portugal, a court has heard today.
Christian Brueckner, currently imprisoned for raping an American pensioner in holiday hotspot Praia da Luz, is understood to have asked a fellow inmate if he "too" was locked up for child-related offences.
Brueckner, 47, proceeded to confide in his cellmate Laurentiu Codin that he had taken "a child" during a break-in in Portugal - and even pleaded with him to burn down his home when he was let out of jail.
Codin, speaking in court in Germany, raised concerns Madeleine may have been buried - saying the rapist had asked him whether "the DNA from a child can be taken from bones under the ground".
Defendant Christian Brueckner "found a kid and took the child", Laurentiu Codin said
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He told Braunschweig Regional Court: "He said he stole in Portugal... He told me that in Portugal, he had stolen there.
"He was in a region where there are hotels and rich people live.
"He said there was somewhere with an open window, he told me this... He was looking for money.
"He said he didn't find any money - but found a kid and took the child.
"He said that two hours later, there were police and dogs all over the place, so he then went away, out of the area.
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Madeleine McCann was last seen in 2007 in PortugalPA"I am just saying what he told me. He told me that a person was with him, who he had had an argument with - allegedly it was his woman.
"He said he took the child in Portugal in his car, and in the time when the police and dogs were at the house, he drove away and he was gone.
"He asked me if the DNA from a child can be taken from bones under the ground."
Codin also claimed that convicted paedophile Brueckner had seemed worried about potentially having left evidence at a crime scene - and had asked if a person could be traced by their hair or whether they might leave any traceable evidence by climbing over a balcony.
Madeleine McCann suspect Brueckner is said to have confessed to a litany of offences to his cellmate
PAGerman investigators later searched Brueckner's property, where they found a litany of hard drives and other cyber storage - but they've remained tight-lipped on just how relevant their findings might be to the case.
Brueckner's cellmate also alleged the 47-year-old told him about abusing "tiny" young girls on a "bus" which he owned after taking them.
He told the court: "There was talk of a girl, I don't know if what he said was true or not.
"He said that he had a bus and that he had taken her with it. He said he kept some of them, but not others, but he never said that he had killed them.
Defendant Christian Brueckner is the prime suspect in the long-unsolved case of Madeleine McCann's disappearance
GETTY"We're talking about girls, not boys. Not all at once, always one at a time. He told me about two. He said that he had taken someone, had sex with her but he didn't kill her."
When asked by the judge in Braunschweig how old his victim was, Codin said: "I don't want to get it wrong - but it was very young. Tiny. I mean young.
"Each time when we were together he spoke about it because he was convinced that I was a paedophile."
The trial continues.