The new prime suspect in the Madeleine McCann case has been described as "strange" and "intimidating" by people living in the village in Portugal where he worked around the time of the British toddler’s disappearance.
Madeleine, three, went missing from a Praia da Luz resort while holidaying with her parents in 2007.
In Germany last December 43-year-old Christian Bruckner was sentenced to seven years' imprisonment after being convicted of the 2005 rape of a 72-year-old American woman in her apartment in Portugal.
Bruckner is said to have turned up at a village about 50 kilometres from the resort in the weeks following Madeleine's disappearance, where he asked for work, the BBC reports.
Bruckner was often seen in the company of two friends, a couple who claimed to be fostering German children, in the months he stayed at the village, locals said.
A woman, who wished not to be identified, rented the home to the couple and said Bruckner was feared in the village.
"Everybody was really terrified of him because my friend's daughter had a health issue - a mental health issue - and my friend was very scared that he could really do something to her," she said.
"Being seen with a gun, I suppose, people would be frightened."
German police are also investigating a potential link between Bruckner and the disappearance of five-year-old Inga Gehricke from a forest near Stendal, Germay in 2015; and six-year-old Rene Hasee, who went missing from a beach in Portugal's Algarve region 1996.
Jose Marreiros, a local fireman who helped in the search for Rene, said they "never had any evidence" about where the boy may have been seen.
"Normally, when people drown in this part of the coast, a body appears after a few hours," he said.
Police have since received almost 400 tip-offs from members of the public in the four days since Bruckner was named the prime suspect in Madeleine's disappearance.
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