11 May 2020A DAD and step-mum of a nine-year-old girl found dead in a field in Portugal have been arrested on suspicion of killing her before hiding her body who had been reported as missing last Thursday was found covered in shrubs in nearby Atouguia de Baleia It comes after 13 years this month after Brit toddler Maddie McCann vanished while on holiday in Portugal’s Praia da Luz.  The search for Valentina involved 600 civil protection officers along with boy scouts and covered an area of more than 4,000 hectares The Judiciary Police confirmed the victim’s father, 32, and stepmother, 38, had been arrested and accused of homicide and hiding a girl’s dead body.  The coordinator of the Judiciary Police’s Criminal Investigation Department in Leiria, Fernando Jordao, said the girl may have been killed on the day she went missing with her body being taken to the field at the end of the day. He said that the authorities were working to establish the cause of death. But he added "it is clear that it happened in some context of violence" and was not accidental.  The coordinator said he had not received information indicating that the child had been the victim of abuse by the father or that she was being tracked by the Commission for the Protection of Children and Youth. He said Valentina normally lived with the mother but had been with her father "for some time" during the Covid-19 pandemic. Diogo Morgado, spokesperson for the National Republican Guard said the girl had first been reported missing by her father in the morning of May 8. Some reports suggested the father had confessed to hiding the body and shown the investigators where the body was, but Mr Morgado did not confirm this.  He said: "There was always information that was always passed on not only by the child's father, but by other citizens and family members. "That information was always collected and handled by us with the Judiciary Police. All the leads were analysed in the same way, we did not discard any." had written on social media before her body was found: "Oh my God another day has come and more endless hours Come back into our arms for the love of God." The parents of Maddie say they are "still haunted" by thoughts their daughter could be suffering - 13 years after she disappeared Kate and Gerry McCann were due to mark the anniversary of their daughter's disappearance with a prayer gathering on May5, but lockdown measures mean they will hold an online service instead. She had been left sleeping alone with her younger twin siblings while her parents were dining in a nearby tapas restaurant with pals Her family cling on to a glimmer of hope she could still be alive Email us at exclusive@the-sun.com or call 212 416 4552 Our journalists strive for accuracy but on occasion we make mistakes. For further details of our complaints policy and to make a complaint please click this link: thesun.co.uk/editorial-complaints/