German trial witness says he saw Madeleine McCann suspect in rape videos

Christian Brückner is accused of five sex offences unrelated to the disappearance of Madeleine McCann

A key witness has told a court in Germany he saw videos of the prime suspect in the disappearance of three-year-old Madeleine McCann raping an elderly woman and a young girl.

The man, named as Helge B, told the court in Braunschweig that he had picked up the videos when he broke into the Portuguese home of Christian Brückner, 47, who was a former friend.

Brückner faces five sex offence allegations.

They are unrelated to the McCann case.

He has previously denied involvement in the three-year-old's disappearance and has never been charged.

Brückner is on trial, in the German state of Lower Saxony, for three counts of rape and two of the sexual abuse of children.

The offences are all alleged to have taken place between 2000 and 2017 in Portugal, where he lived in the Algarve region on and off for years.

Brückner's lawyers have previously declared the case to be based on "very shaky foundations".

They have also questioned whether their client can get a fair trial after being publicly linked, by prosecutors, to the disappearance of Madeleine.

Helge B described meeting Brückner in Portugal in 2006 but claimed they did not get along well: "We just never vibed."

He recalled breaking into the suspect's home in Portugal while Brückner was in jail, along with another witness identified as Manfred S under German privacy conventions.

Helge B told judges that they took various things including cameras and videos - "the biggest mistake of my life" - and later watched the tapes at his mobile home.

He claimed to have seen an "old lady" being raped on a bed and that he had then recognised Brückner as the rapist when he removed a mask.

Another tape, he claimed, showed the rape of a girl, who told him in German: "Hey, Christian you know what this is - it's rape."

Helge B is also seen as a potentially key witness should Brückner ever be charged in the Madeleine McCann case.

He has previously told German tabloid newspaper Bild, that when he discussed the British girl's disappearance with the suspect in 2008, Brückner replied she "didn't scream".

In the past, Brückner has referred to his claims as "not even worthy of comment".

In court on Wednesday, Brückner's defence team sought to question Helge B's reliability as a witness.

Under cross-examination, the 52-year-old witness admitted to substance abuse between 2000 and 2010.

When asked if he had been paid €5,000 (£4,300) for the Bild interview, he replied: "Could be."

Madeleine McCann went missing from her family's Algarve holiday apartment in 2007, in what remains one of the most prominent missing persons cases in the world.

German authorities have classed the three-year-old's disappearance as a murder inquiry, but no charges have been brought.

The trial continues.