I'll offer my reasons for thinking the suggestion that the alleged spate of burglaries were 'connected' to the missing child's disappearance is far-fetched
In the first place, had any abductor involved a gang of immigrant petty thieves in the crime, in any way, then the the chances of it being solved ( and quickly ) increased exponentially
Quite apart from the 'loose lips sink ships' risk, there was a well publicised reward of almost two million euros announced very early on ... what are the chances that these 'in the know' petty criminals would stay absolutely silent ? ( and given that not a single piece of hard evidence has emerged in the last six years, they would have to be assumed to have stayed silent )
Then there is the 'casing the apartments' angle
Why ?
Why would any abductor risk involving a number of others merely to have a better idea about the layout of a holiday apartment ?
We are not talking about employing an experienced cat-burglar to obtain the floor plan for some sprawling mansion ... coming back with a blue-print for every alarm, every private guard on duty, every trip-wire and electronic viewing device ... we are talking about a small single floor holiday flat
'Casing' the place beforehand ... especially to the extent of involving others to do it ... simply wouldn'd be neccessary
I don't think it would be a case of a lone abductor invoking the services of burglars for the sake of casing the place. Obviously that would pose significant detection risks and would be of little assistance or need.
I am imagining a single gang of criminals, or criminal organisation of some kind, with different members of the organisation playing different roles, like a production line. The criminals are either individuals who work with each other and do favours when it suits them, or they are a more formal unit. Or possible two 'formal' units (such as a gang of gypsies, and a paedophile ring, for example). Please excuse political incorrectness; just an example.
A paedophile ring - not that I know much of such a thing I admit; I am only imagining this - must have different people doing different jobs. There must be people looking at children; people abducting the children; people doing the transporting; people paying them; the paedophiles themselves - who may be involved in procurement etc or perhaps not. It is a network of many people sometimes extending across different national boundaries.
Such a scenario puts paid to the concern of secrecy. Everyone is criminally involved somehow, therefore everyone keeps quiet. We all understand that there are people in the high echelons in society who are involved in these things and their identity can sometimes remain guarded for decades. If they are exposed it is usually through some uncontrollable event extraneous to the organisation, not because anyone breaks ranks. These peoples' reputations are so important that millions are not enough of an incentive.
Quite what the purpose of the intruders into the apartments was for I don't know, and I can't fully answer the question of why specifically knowing about the other apartments would help them with 5A. Perhaps they were looking at the entry and exit points on the block. 5A wasn't a mansion, but a predator - or even simple burglar - would still need to work out entry and exit points, and not only for the apartment itself but in the block as a whole. I understand that the alley way at the back of the apartments contained some dead ends, for example. An intruder would need more than one escape route in case disturbed.
Perhaps the 'burglars were looking for other children sleeping in their beds. Or perhaps they were looking for hiding places in the building itself in case their escape was blocked or delayed. (There was a strange man reported lurking in the stairwell, for example). Until we know more about the break ins themselves it is hard to say what the reason would be, but the point is that the 'burglars' could well have had some 'higher' purpose.
