  Contemporary research suggests that the reionisation of the intergalactic
medium (IGM) in the early Universe was predominantly realised by star-forming
(proto-)galaxies (SFGs). Due to observational constraints, our knowledge on the
origins of sufficient amounts of ionising Lyman continuum (LyC) photons and the
mechanisms facilitating their transport into the IGM remains sparse. Recent
efforts have thus focussed on the study of local analogues to these
high-redshift objects.
  We used archival spectroscopic SDSS DR12 data to select a sample of low-z He
II 4686 emitters and restricted it to a set of SFGs with an emission line
diagnostic sensitive to the presence of an AGN, which serves as our only
selection criterion. Our final sample consists of eighteen low-mass,
low-metallicity dwarf galaxies which appear to be predominantly ionised by
stellar sources. We find large O32 ratios and [S II] deficiencies, which
provide strong indications for these galaxies to be LyC Emitters (LCEs). At
least 40% of these objects are candidates for featuring cosmologically
significant LyC escape fractions >10%. Their SFHs exhibit strong similarities
and almost all galaxies appear to contain an old (>1 Gyr) stellar component,
while also harbouring a young, two-stage (~10 Myr and <1 Myr) starburst, which
we speculate might be related to LyC escape.
  The properties of the compact emission line galaxies presented here align
well with those observed in many local LCEs. In fact, our sample may prove as
an extension to the rather small catalogue of local LCEs, as the extreme
interstellar medium (ISM) conditions we find are assumed to facilitate LyC
leakage. Notably, all of our eighteen candidates are significantly closer
(z<0.1) than most established LCEs. If the inferred LyC photon loss is genuine,
this demonstrates that selecting SFGs from He II 4686 is a powerful selection
criterion in the search for LCEs.
