British police officers involved in the search for Madeleine McCann will be asked to testify at the ongoing trial of prime suspect Christian Brueckner, MailOnline can exclusively reveal.
The sensational development means that for the first time Scotland Yard detectives who have been investigating the 2007 disappearance of Madeleine, then aged three, will have to reveal under oath what they know.
MailOnline has been told that the officer dealing with key witness Helge Busching, Detective Constable Mark Draycott, will be called to give evidence in Brueckner’s current trial for unrelated sexual offences.
DC Draycott was the Scotland Yard officer who took Busching’s statement in 2017 in a hotel room in the Greek capital of Athens, where he told police of his fears that Brueckner was involved in Madeleine’s disappearance.
At the time, Busching, 50, had just been released from a human trafficking conviction and, according to Greek media reports, contacted Operation Grange to alert them of his suspicions.
British police officers involved in the search for Madeleine McCann will be asked to testify at the ongoing trial of main suspect Christian Brueckner (pictured in court earlier this week), MailOnline can exclusively reveal.
Madeleine McCann (pictured) disappeared on May 3, 2007, when she was just three years old. She has never been found. The German prosecutor’s office names criminal Christian Brueckner as the main suspect in her disappearance.
It was in this statement that she told Operation Grange that Brueckner, 47, told her at a hippie festival in Orgiva, Spain, that Madeleine “didn’t scream” when she was taken from the holiday apartment where she was staying.
Operation Grange officers contacted their counterparts in Germany and Brueckner’s previous convictions for rape and pedophile emerged and as a result he became the prime suspect.
In 2011, under then Home Secretary Theresa May, Scotland Yard was asked to take over the investigation following a request from its boss, Prime Minister David Cameron, and Operation Grange was organised.
Since then they have received more than £13 million and last month MailOnline revealed they had applied for a further £100,000 grant which was expected to be given the green light.
Now it appears that for the first time taxpayers will be able to see what they have managed to uncover when members of the team appear in court in Germany.
Sources close to Brueckner’s defense team have told MailOnline they have seen inconsistencies in what Busching told British police and what he told the court when he testified earlier this month.
They also want to know why Busching claims to be “under police protection” when there is apparently no threat against him that they are aware of.
A source close to the legal team said: ‘We will call in the British police from Operation Grange to present evidence, especially those officers who spoke to Mr Helge Busching.
‘We want to know what exactly he told them and why what he told the court was different. This will be the first time the court will have the opportunity to see what exactly is known about Brueckner.
“We have been asking for records on the case for years but we haven’t seen anything, so let’s see what they have, they will have to go to court and speak under oath about what they know.”
The development comes after it was also revealed that a former British detective, Dave Edgar, who was employed by Kate and Gerry McCann from 2008 to 2011 when Scotland Yard took over, will also be questioned as part of Brueckner’s defence.
Busching claimed he had called Mr Edgar in 2008 and told him about Brueckner, but he does not remember taking the call and told MailOnline that if he had “known the details, he would have acted”.
In his testimony, Busching told the court that he had seen videos of Brueckner raping two women, one elderly and one younger, but they have never been recovered and defense attorneys doubt they exist.
He claimed he found the images in 2006 and the following year Madeleine disappeared from the Algarve resort of Praia da Luz and since then her parents from Rothley, Leicestershire, have led a global campaign to find her.
Pictured: The holiday resort where the McCanns were staying in Portugal’s Algarve region in May 2007, when their three-year-old daughter disappeared without a trace.
On November 18 last year, prosecutors confirmed that Brueckner would be tried on several counts of sexual abuse against women between the ages of 10 and 80.
It has since emerged that Busching suffers from intestinal cancer and one witness described his prognosis as “poor”, meaning he may not live to testify at any future trial.
Brueckner is currently serving seven years in prison for the rape of an elderly American woman in the Algarve and was jailed in 2019.
He is currently on trial for a series of sexual attacks against women and children in the same area between 2000 and 2017 in Braunschweig, Germany, where he used to live.
MailOnline has contacted Scotland Yard for comment.