Update: Madeleine McCann cops carry ‘a number of bags’ from suspect’s ‘little paradise’ lake in major search
MADELEINE McCann police officers were spotted carrying a number of bags away from a search area.
German and Portuguese police officers investigating Christian B yesterday began searching the abandoned place 45 minutes from Praia da Luz where Maddie disappeared in 2007.
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German investigators suspecting Christian B are believed to have requested the search after uncovering new leads.
Video taken this afternoon showed officers using shovels to dig at the search site.
The excavations began around 11 a.m. local time and were carried out at two different sites.
Several bags were taken from the search area this afternoon, according to the BBC.
The location is about 30 miles from the Ocean Club apartment the three-year-old disappeared from while on vacation with her parents, Kate and Gerry.
Accessible only by dirt road, Arade Dam has previously been linked to the Maddie case and was raided in 2008.
It was where she was spotted days after she disappeared, a woman handing a mysterious man a child that matched her description.
The evidence that sparked the renewed search remains unknown – but sources say Christian B called the dam his “little paradise”.
He was reportedly “seen there often,” sometimes spending the night in the barren area near an abandoned hilltop restaurant.
And the reservoir lies between where he parked his dilapidated trailer in Praia da Luz and a villa where he would stay in Foral.
German police insist Christian B is the man they believe kidnapped Maddie – but three years after naming him as a suspect, they still haven’t pressed charges.
A 2008 search of the dam found a 17-foot length of string, strips of duct tape and small bones — but none of this was ever definitively linked to the case.
Portuguese broadcaster SIC reported that in an official court request to Portugal, German police asked permission to search the dam after concluding it was an “area of interest”.
It said: “Investigators are aware that suspect Christian B regularly came to this dam.
“He called it his little paradise and stayed here often. He was often seen here.
“The German authorities considered this reservoir an area of interest and finally sent an international request or request for legal assistance.”
The reservoir was twice searched by divers in February and March 2008 on behalf of a Portuguese lawyer.
Marcos Aragao Correia organized the privately funded operation after claiming he had received an “underworld” tip.
He claimed he had been informed by underworld contacts that Madeleine had been murdered within 48 hours of her disappearance and her body dumped in the reservoir.
Madeleine’s parents Gerry and Kate McCann had previously dismissed Mr Correia as a self-promoter, saying there was no evidence their daughter was linked to the reservoir.
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