In an astonishing late-night development, investigators have confirmed that partial fingerprints taken from a young woman claiming to be Madeleine McCann show a partial match to a print lifted from the McCanns’ holiday apartment in Praia da Luz, Portugal, in 2007.
According to two officials close to the case, the results came from a British forensic laboratory assisting in the renewed inquiry. The discovery has been described as “a potential game-changer” by one investigator.
“When we ran the sample, we didn’t expect this,” a source told reporters under condition of anonymity. “The partial match corresponds to one of the latent prints recovered from Apartment 5A in 2007 — a print that was never identified.”
While experts caution that partial matches are not conclusive proof, the result has nonetheless triggered urgent follow-up testing and international coordination between British, Portuguese, and German authorities.
The girl at the center of the investigation — who recently surfaced in Eastern Europe — has already provided DNA and dental records for comparison, with final results expected within days.
A senior Home Office official confirmed tonight that Scotland Yard has been briefed and that the new findings are being handled with “extreme sensitivity.”
“If this result holds up,” said one forensic analyst, “we could be looking at the first physical link between the missing child and anyone found alive since her disappearance.”
The McCann family has been informed of the development but has declined to comment publicly.
As one investigator put it late Wednesday:
“We’ve seen false hopes before. But this—this feels different.”
