When did Madeleine McCann disappear?
Madeleine disappeared on May 3, 2007 when her family from Leicestershire was holidaying in Algarve.
Parents Gerry and Kate left their three children – including toddler twins Sean and Amelie – sleeping in their apartment while they dined at a nearby tapas bar.
Kate discovered Maddie missing when she returned around 10pm to check the kids.
In September of that year, Gerry and Kate, who are both doctors, were sensationally named as ‘arguidos’ by Portuguese police.
While arguido is often translated as ‘suspect’, it actually means a person being questioned under caution.
In the summer of the next year, investigators in Portugal declared that they had exhaustion all options in the McCann case.
In 2010, Maddie’s distraught parents met with then-home secretary Theresa May to talk about the hunt for their daughter.
At the request of the next PM, Scotland Yard conducted its own investigation, Operation Grange.
Scotland Yard reported that they had discovered new leads two years after the original case, while Portuguese police said their investigation was reopened.
Operation Grange has been reduced from 29 to four detectives since October 2015.
As police investigated the new theory, that Maddie had been snatched up by a trafficking ring, the Tory government injected additional funding to this operation.
Meanwhile, cops are now hunting a “person of significance” in a shock new development.
A source close to Scotland Yard’s search Operation Grange said the person is now a “critical line of inquiry” in the £12million investigation, according to The Times.
And a former Met police chief has called for fresh interview of Maddie’s parents and the Tapas Seven – who have never been quizzed by British cops.