It is a murder mystery that gripped Belgium for decades and with the closure of the file on Friday, it would likely remain a cold case forever.
Known as the “Mad Killers of Brabant,” a gang went on a murderous rampage between 1982 and 1985, killing 28 people including children in a series of supermarket robberies.
Outlandish theories have been offered to explain who was behind what local media called Belgium’s “biggest criminal mystery” of the last century.
Photo: AFP
One seriously considered thesis was that it was a bid to destabilize the Belgian state by current or former law enforcement officers close to the far right.
The case was never cracked, and no one has ever been convicted despite multiple overlapping investigations, countless fingerprint and DNA searches, dozens of exhumations and even arrests leading to charges.
On Friday, prosecutors finally gathered together the families of victims — still living without answers many years on — to let them know the case was being closed for good.
“All possible investigative actions have been carried out,” Ann Fransen, head of the Belgian Federal Prosecutor’s Office, which took over the probe six years ago, told reporters in Brussels.
“Unfortunately we have not been able to bring the truth to the surface,” she said.
“This means the case is now buried, and it makes me very sad,” said Irena Palsterman, whose father was one of eight victims of a supermarket attack on Nov. 9, 1985.
One lawyer present, Kristiaan Vandenbussche, blamed a cover-up for the dead end — accusing rogue law enforcement officers of “sabotaging” the investigation to protect the culprits.
After the initial leads had gone cold, prosecutors picked up the case again in 2018 in the wake of a TV interview by a suspect’s relative.
The following year, charges were brought against a retired police officer suspected of hobbling the investigation back in 1986 by throwing guns and ammunition into a canal.
He was never convicted, and despite the efforts of a dozen police officers, prosecutors were eventually forced to admit they had made no serious progress.
It was not from a lack of trying, Fransen said.
In all police checked “1,815 pieces of information, both old and new,” looked at 2,748 sets of fingerprints and compared 593 DNA samples to the ones in the case file.
They exhumed “more than 40 bodies for research purposes,” Fransen said.
The mystery was all the greater since the relatively small sums involved — a total loot of 7 million Belgian francs, or about 175,000 euros (US$187,609 at the current exchange rate) — suggests money was not the motive for killing 28 people.
Although closing the case would be a “blow” for the victims’ families, Fransen said that she felt it necessary to be “clear and transparent” with them.
The case would officially be closed after a procedural hearing to be held soon in Brussels — at which the families would have one more chance to request new avenues for investigation.
Under Belgian law, there is no statute of limitations on the crimes involved.
GLORY FACADE: Residents are fighting the church’s plan to build a large flight of steps and a square that would entail destroying up to two blocks of homes Barcelona’s eternally unfinished Basilica de la Sagrada Familia has grown to become the world’s tallest church, but a conflict with residents threatens to delay the finish date for the monument designed more than 140 years ago. Swathed in scaffolding on a platform 54m above the ground, an enormous stone slab is being prepared to complete the cross of the central Jesus Christ tower. A huge yellow crane is to bring it up to the summit, which will stand at 172.5m and has snatched the record as the world’s tallest church from Germany’s Ulm Minster. The basilica’s peak will deliberately fall short of the
FRAYED: Strains between the US-European ties have ruptured allies’ trust in Washington, but with time, that could be rebuilt, the Michigan governor said China is providing crucial support for Russia’s aggression in Ukraine and could end the war with a phone call, US Ambassador to NATO Matthew Whitaker said. “China could call [Russian President] Vladimir Putin and end this war tomorrow and cut off his dual-purpose technologies that they’re selling,” Whitaker said during a Friday panel at the Munich Security Conference. “China could stop buying Russian oil and gas.” “You know, this war is being completely enabled by China,” the US envoy added. Beijing and Moscow have forged an even tighter partnership since the start of the war, and Russia relies on China for critical parts
Two sitting Philippine senators have been identified as “coperpetrators” in former Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte’s crimes against humanity trial at the International Criminal Court (ICC), documents released by prosecutors showed. Philippine senators Ronald Dela Rosa and Christopher Go are among eight current and former officials named in a document dated Feb. 13 and posted to the court’s Web site. ICC prosecutors have charged Duterte with three counts of crimes against humanity, alleging his involvement in at least 76 murders as part of his “war on drugs.” “Duterte and his coperpetrators shared a common plan or agreement to ‘neutralize’ alleged criminals in the Philippines
In a softly lit Shanghai bar, graduate student Helen Zhao stretched out both wrists to have her pulse taken — the first step to ordering the house special, a bespoke “health” cocktail based on traditional Chinese medicine (TCM). “TCM bars” have popped up in several cities across China, epitomizing what the country’s stressed-out, time-poor youth refer to as “punk wellness,” or “wrecking yourself while saving yourself.” At Shanghai’s Niang Qing, a TCM doctor in a white coat diagnoses customers’ physical conditions based on the pulse readings, before a mixologist crafts custom drinks incorporating the herbs and roots prescribed for their ailments.
RSS