To think how can Christian Bruckner be let out of prison?

[Ace56]

Just finished watching the channel 4 documentary on new evidence in the Madeleine McCann case.

Christian B is clearly a dangerous, disturbed man who has been offending since he was a teenager. He has spent many years in prison for various sex offences and is currently serving time for breaking in and raping a woman in her seventies in her holiday apartment. He’s due to be let out in September. If the police want to convict him for kidnapping Madeleine, they basically have until then to put their case together as the moment he’s let out they know he will flee to another country and likely disappear into the ether.

Obviously by Sept he would have ‘served his time’, but surely no one could say that he is safe to be released on society? He will disappear and undoubtedly offend again, just as he has been doing his whole life. How broken is the justice system (this is in Germany but the same could apply in the UK) that allows people like this to be free, when everyone knows he will definitely offend again? Surely there could be some kind of lifetime order where if people commit multiple similar offences over a number of years, they are just deemed to be permanently unsafe and a danger to society, locked up and the key thrown away? It just seems so ridiculous to be letting him out.

I agree. I would like to see a complete overhaul of the way we use incarceration - prisons should be for those who pose a genuine risk to the public, so violent and sexual offenders etc, and it should be possible to commit someone for the rest of their natural life if the threat they pose is ongoing. It’s insane to have serial rapists, recidivist violent offenders and paedophiles out in the community. A much broader system of community-based sentences for those who aren’t a risk to the public, rather than prisons overflowing with people who don’t need to be there.

He is clearly a very dangerous man and is probably a risk to the public so should be kept in jail. But there is no evidence linking him to Madeleine McCann. It is just more sensationalism.

Sorry for the slight derail but what did the new evidence say?

Unfortunately nothing linking him directly to Madeleine (that’s been made public anyway), just that his phone signal puts him in the area by the resort at the time. He’s a known paedophile with a particular interest in young girls. A raid on his farm in Germany uncovered lots of hard drives, stories he’d written etc, really gross stuff.

I watched the same documentary last night op. I'm horrified that he could be free so soon. The items the police found in his warehouse were chilling. I hope they charge him before it's too late. Agree with the pp, there should be life orders for 'men' like him. He will remain dangerous until the day he dies. It's also shocking that he was found not guilty of the other 5 offences due to the judge not admitting evidence.
At the end of the programme, I thought the police said they had other evidence on a laptop (that hadn't been disclosed) which shows that he did murder Madeleine? Whatever it is, I hope it's compelling enough to keep him locked up.

We will need more prisons and overall investment in the prison service

here in U.K. we do have whole life orders not sure about Germany

I don't think that he can, nor will he be. The German authorities have a stack of circumstantial evidence and are obviously hoping for more before he is released. However, I think that they will chance it and charge him if the other option would be to let him free. Although they don't have juries, a panel of judges would review the evidence and you would hope that they would have the sense to incarcerate him, even if they cannot specifically tie him to the crime with physical evidence. It's a shame that they don't have juries though. If I were on a jury I would definitely be able to relax the rules around 'beyond reasonable doubt'. I would consider which was the greatest harm, a miscarriage of justice, or risking releasing what has already been proven to be an extremely dangerous man.