A police profile of a new suspect in the disappearance of Madeleine McCann has exposed his violent past and “suspicious behaviour with children”, it was claimed today.
Portuguese newspaper Correio da Manhã said the profile had heightened police suspicions about an immigrant thief, who has since died. The paper has identified a former worker at the Ocean Club, the Algarve holiday club Madeleine disappeared from, as the man police believe may have kidnapped her in an act of revenge after being sacked.
Detectives are investigating the possibility he then killed the child after seeing the huge backlash the crime generated, reports say.
The man, who died aged 40 in a tractor accident in 2009, emigrated to Portugal from Cape Verde and was convicted of theft in 1996. The paper said the man had a past “marked by some episodes of violence”.
The family of the suspect, who has been named in parts of the UK press, insist he was innocent.
