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Speaker 1: those of the podcast author or individuals participating in the podcast,
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Speaker 1: It's October two. While walking down the street, I received
Speaker 1: a text message about some breaking news. The Belgian Minister
Speaker 1: of Justice has just announced DNA comparisons with the true file.
Speaker 1: But this request isn't about any of the victims that
Speaker 1: we've been discussing. It's for a different case. The nine
Speaker 1: three disappearance of a Dutch college student oh Papa. The
Speaker 1: police run slacked of found the warning from mato Agistats
Speaker 1: and eighteen year old tan A Groon disappeared during introduction
Speaker 1: week at Mastricht University in Holland, close to the Belgian border.
Speaker 1: Applicate is marked a true implicated in the disappearance of
Speaker 1: a Dutch student in the Dutch authorities are studying this
Speaker 1: question very seriously. The young woman Tanya Gron disappeared in Mastricht,
Speaker 1: close to the Belgian border. In Dutch authorities are requesting
Speaker 1: evidence from Belgian authorities related to this affair. Her case
Speaker 1: has gone unsolved for nearly thirty years, but it bears
Speaker 1: striking similarities to some of the Trus victims. Could this
Speaker 1: renewed interest in DNA from the True affair opened the
Speaker 1: door to more victims and more accomplices. Psycho is somebody
Speaker 1: who understands emotions, and I told them it is a
Speaker 1: very exceptional that somebody attacks two children at the same
Speaker 1: time to the six. But my gods, it was just
Speaker 1: the beginning. I think Belgium was a paralyzed for perverts
Speaker 1: in those days. Welcome to La Monster. I'm your host,
Speaker 1: Matt Graves. The announcement of DNA testing in the da
Speaker 1: True case came at the request of authorities in Holland,
Speaker 1: where Tanya Grund disappeared. They requested DNA profiles obtained from
Speaker 1: mark the Trus houses and vehicles. It's a fortuitous development,
Speaker 1: as I've been working on the DNA aspects of the
Speaker 1: d True affair for over a year now. I'm hopeful
Speaker 1: that this might help shake up the otherwise dormant case file.
Speaker 1: Tanya disappeared just three miles from the Belgian border. It
Speaker 1: was a warm summer night on the evening of August
Speaker 1: thirty first, when eighteen year old Tanya Grun attended a
Speaker 1: student association party in the center of Mastricht. It was
Speaker 1: her first year of university and Tanya just moved into
Speaker 1: her new room in the nearby suburb of Gronsfeld. She
Speaker 1: spoke with her mother at around seven thirty that evening
Speaker 1: before riding her bike to the party, and everything seemed normal.
Speaker 1: Fellow students who attended the party reported that nothing seemed
Speaker 1: out of the ordinary when she left by bike at
Speaker 1: around midnight, presumably to ride back to her room in Gronsveld,
Speaker 1: about five miles away. Tanya was approximately five ft seven
Speaker 1: with long, dark shoulder length hair, and was last seen
Speaker 1: wearing blue jeans. Her housemates were concerned when she never
Speaker 1: showed up the next day, but it wasn't until she
Speaker 1: didn't show up at her parents house in the north
Speaker 1: of Holland as planned the following day that they became alarmed.
Speaker 1: The disappearance was particularly mysterious, as it seemed as if
Speaker 1: she simply vanished without a trace. There was no sign
Speaker 1: of Tania or her bike and no clues whatsoever as
Speaker 1: to what may have happened. This case as stumped investigators
Speaker 1: for decades, and her parents have never stopped working to
Speaker 1: find out what happened to their daughter. In one their
Speaker 1: efforts got a boost when the award winning Dutch investigative
Speaker 1: journalist Peter de Vries launched a crowd funded initiative called
Speaker 1: the Golden Tip Foundation to collect money as a reward
Speaker 1: for tips leading to the discovery of what happened to Tanya.
Speaker 1: In a cruel twist of fate, Peter de Vrees was
Speaker 1: brutally murdered in broad daylight in the center of Amsterdam
Speaker 1: on July six one, just after walking out of a
Speaker 1: television studio. I was working on this podcast at the time,
Speaker 1: and it really shocked me and the entire world for
Speaker 1: that matter, to see a highly respected journalist gunned down
Speaker 1: in the capital city of a modern Western democracy. He
Speaker 1: was a courageous man who took on many dangerous stories,
Speaker 1: including the notorious drug gangs operating in Holland. It's not
Speaker 1: believed that his murder had anything to do with the
Speaker 1: investigation into Tanya's disappearance. His foundation raced over a million
Speaker 1: euros to investigate the Tanya Grund case. Given the proximity
Speaker 1: of the disappearance to Belgium and the circumstances of a
Speaker 1: young woman and her bike vanishing into thin air has
Speaker 1: led the cold case team in Holland to investigate the
Speaker 1: possibility that the True may have been involved in some way.
Speaker 1: Else Screws, who you heard from an episode two is
Speaker 1: the partner of Jean Lambrex, the father of Effie Lambrex,
Speaker 1: who was abducted and murdered by the True and his
Speaker 1: accomplices in n I spoke to else about in his case.
Speaker 1: The Dutch authorities thought that maybe there might be a
Speaker 1: link to the DO two case as at the time
Speaker 1: of Danya's disappearance due to was first of all not
Speaker 1: in prison. He was very active. He was very much
Speaker 1: driving around Europe. He went to Amsterdam, he went to
Speaker 1: Mastrich that we know for sure, he went to Berlin.
Speaker 1: So um that comes with the element that Danya was
Speaker 1: riding her bike. The bike disappeared as well, So it's
Speaker 1: exactly the same thing that happened with Savin Daddin. She
Speaker 1: was subducted and her bike vanished as well together with her.
Speaker 1: Also during the years DO two committed a similar crime.
Speaker 1: He had abducted a girl that was riding a bike. Also,
Speaker 1: he took the bike with the girl. Remember that way
Speaker 1: back in during his first wave of kidnappings and rapes,
Speaker 1: the True and other accomplices bundled a girl and her
Speaker 1: bike into their van while she was riding down the street.
Speaker 1: The abduction of Sabine Dardne ten years later had the
Speaker 1: exact same m o um. These are things that are known,
Speaker 1: and the Dutch detectives that are working on the case
Speaker 1: thought that maybe it was worth looking into the two
Speaker 1: case in order to find out whether he might be
Speaker 1: implied in this crime. Apart from that in the two case,
Speaker 1: and that is also something that is known, there are
Speaker 1: a lot of DNA profiles. There are hairs, so, in
Speaker 1: other words, biological traces that have not been awarded to
Speaker 1: some to one of the victims or to one of
Speaker 1: the perpetrators. In other words, these DNA profiles, these hairs
Speaker 1: belonged to unknown persons. Now the Dutch authorities, if I
Speaker 1: understand correctly, want to compare Damia's profile with the unknown
Speaker 1: pro files found in the DO two case. The DNA
Speaker 1: in the d True cases a labyrinth that I've spent
Speaker 1: much time trying to understand. It's important to remember that
Speaker 1: when the true was arrested, in DNA testing and analysis
Speaker 1: was far less sophisticated than today. There was a lot
Speaker 1: of evidence collected and analyzed back in the late nineties
Speaker 1: and early two thousand's. Else and I did a lot
Speaker 1: of digging through the original case file to track down
Speaker 1: the profiles that were established. So in the DO two case,
Speaker 1: there is a police report stating the fact that twenty
Speaker 1: six unknown DNA profiles were established. So, in other words,
Speaker 1: twenty six people left traces either in cars belonging to
Speaker 1: DO two or in his house, going from from the
Speaker 1: basement of his house to the attic um up till today.
Speaker 1: Up until today, it has not been possible to match
Speaker 1: these unknown profiles to either victims victims we don't know about,
Speaker 1: or even perpetrators we don't know about. About a year ago,
Speaker 1: I reached out to an independent forensic DNA expert in
Speaker 1: the United States named Dr Richard Eichelnboom to see if
Speaker 1: he could help me make sense of what we found.
Speaker 1: Dr Eichelnboom's company, Independent Forensic Services, specializes in bloodstained pattern analysis,
Speaker 1: touch traces, and forensic pathology. His work has led to
Speaker 1: resolution in a number of cases, including the wrongful conviction
Speaker 1: of Tim Masters and that of former Indiana State trooper
Speaker 1: David Cam, where Dr Eichelnboom found touch DNA of the killer,
Speaker 1: leading to David Cam's exoneration and the conviction of another man.
Speaker 1: He's also worked extensively on other high profile cases, including
Speaker 1: Jean beIN at Ramsey and Aaron Hernandez. One of the
Speaker 1: reasons that I wanted to elicit his help is that
Speaker 1: he's actually from Europe and spent twelve years as a
Speaker 1: forensic scientist at the Netherlands Forensic Institute, so he brings
Speaker 1: an interesting mix of cutting edge US based techniques with
Speaker 1: deep experience in Europe. With permission of the loan Brex family,
Speaker 1: I shared the DNA information that we could find in
Speaker 1: the case file. So I look, I looked at the
Speaker 1: reports and information you send me the pictures and yeah,
Speaker 1: and in order to come to uh two better conclusions,
Speaker 1: we need the raw data. So this is the real
Speaker 1: data instructed by computers, and what's in here these are
Speaker 1: just DNA reports. This this give me enough information about
Speaker 1: the DNA profiles obtained that I missed the raw data.
Speaker 1: So what I had the DNA profiles. Yeah, you have
Speaker 1: them in a in an Excel file whatever it is,
Speaker 1: but it's a table and what we look at is
Speaker 1: the big profiles from the outset. It was difficult to
Speaker 1: have a clear view of what we have and what
Speaker 1: we don't have. After our first meeting with Dr Eichlandboom,
Speaker 1: Jean Lambres sent a letter to the General Prosecutor of
Speaker 1: Liege requesting information about the profiles we we basically asked.
Speaker 1: We sent two letters. The first letter was about the
Speaker 1: DNA profiles and we wanted to know whether they were
Speaker 1: still available to be checked. And the answer we received
Speaker 1: to that letter was clearly not the answer. The exact
Speaker 1: answer to the question. We got a message saying that
Speaker 1: the DNA profiles were introduced in UM databases. The thing is,
Speaker 1: we don't know in which databases they were introduced. It's
Speaker 1: so frustrating that the family of a victim can't seem
Speaker 1: to get a straight answer to a simple question from
Speaker 1: what we could deduce from the information included in the
Speaker 1: case file. There are multiple unidentified profiles that were established
Speaker 1: based on DNA collected from the truth House and vehicles.
Speaker 1: There is, for instance, a profile of an unknown person
Speaker 1: called unknown number two. This trace was found inside of
Speaker 1: the dungeon on the wall, the left wall. But the
Speaker 1: problem is that it is with the DNA of Julie LuJean,
Speaker 1: and that's what makes it very suspicious and that troubles us.
Speaker 1: This unknown profile mixed with the blood of victims Julie
Speaker 1: LuJean found on the wall of the dungeon is extremely suspicious. Again,
Speaker 1: Dr Richard Keel and Boom. As I understood, there's at
Speaker 1: least one ann person present in the bloodstain of one
Speaker 1: of the victims, and of course that's always important. If
Speaker 1: you have a donor in blood of the victim, that
Speaker 1: can be a very incriminating piece of evidence. And if
Speaker 1: you look at the sex part of this DNA table,
Speaker 1: it says x y. That means that's the mail. So
Speaker 1: they have an unknown mill in this case. But you
Speaker 1: can also see that they're missing information. So DNA parts
Speaker 1: of this person dropped out during DNA profiling, and if
Speaker 1: you put that in the database you get you get
Speaker 1: no matches because you didn't exactly put in the right profile.
Speaker 1: So the more information you gain from such a profile,
Speaker 1: the better. So if you use a more sensitive kit,
Speaker 1: then it's possible that certain amounts of the DNA which
Speaker 1: was dropped out of this unknown donor would come up
Speaker 1: and then you're you know, okay, this profile is a
Speaker 1: little bit different than than what we thought, and that
Speaker 1: happened a lot with cases out of two thousands. If
Speaker 1: you redo them, you gain more information, you get a
Speaker 1: better view on this real person. And since all the
Speaker 1: victims in this case were female, young girls, you could
Speaker 1: filter those out if you start doing vibromosome on the
Speaker 1: DNA test, which is only present in MIL subjects, so
Speaker 1: then you get a very good look at the amount
Speaker 1: of donors mill donors. An example, for instance, one of
Speaker 1: the problems with John bin A Ramsey cases that you
Speaker 1: had complex DNA mixtures with a lot of dnaged victim
Speaker 1: and then likely to other donors which could be both male,
Speaker 1: which could also be male and female and maybe the mother.
Speaker 1: So if you filter the female DNA out of that
Speaker 1: with why chromos only DNA testing because that cannot detect
Speaker 1: female DNA, then you left with the mail donors. That
Speaker 1: gives you a lot of information about the case. So
Speaker 1: forensically we use that why romosome and DNA testing a
Speaker 1: lot else explains further about the unknown DNA profiles. Um,
Speaker 1: then we have an unknown profile called number three. It's
Speaker 1: a profile that was found on a piece of of
Speaker 1: of a pajama something, a piece of cloth that was
Speaker 1: found in the attic of the house of Dutwin maximil Um.
Speaker 1: It has bloodstains on it, it has hairs on it.
Speaker 1: So on this piece of cloth a trace is found
Speaker 1: and it's determined that it is comes from a female
Speaker 1: human being. But this trace found in the attic has
Speaker 1: so far not been matched to anyone. This unknown female
Speaker 1: blood found on pajamas could certainly be an unidentified victim.
Speaker 1: All profiles were tested against the victims Michelle Martin and
Speaker 1: the true children, so it didn't come from any of them.
Speaker 1: So apart from the DNA profiles that have been established,
Speaker 1: there are also a lot of hairs found has that
Speaker 1: were found in cars also in the house in several places.
Speaker 1: These has are still available today, but at the time
Speaker 1: they have been briefly investigated, but still not matched to
Speaker 1: any of the victims, to any of the perpetrators. And
Speaker 1: the King's prosecutor what did this well, this line of
Speaker 1: inquiry cleared, but well obviously the investigating magistrate didn't want
Speaker 1: to do it, and he was forced. In the end,
Speaker 1: he was forced by the court for pills of Liege
Speaker 1: back in two thousand and one. Anyway, the result is
Speaker 1: still there is still no result today. I asked Dr
Speaker 1: Eichel and Boom for his thoughts about who the DNA
Speaker 1: profiles could belonged to. It could be or it's even
Speaker 1: very likely that the perpetrators left some of their hairs there.
Speaker 1: So in that sense, given that it's much easier and
Speaker 1: also much cheaper to do DNA profiling now, it could
Speaker 1: be useful to to look at those hairs and and
Speaker 1: and start testing those. Yeah, I would certainly want to
Speaker 1: know who is the person who they donated his DNA
Speaker 1: or her DNA inside the blosso and one of the victims.
Speaker 1: That's incriminating evidence to go for all the forensic evidence
Speaker 1: which is still there, and then review a number of
Speaker 1: samples already taken. But also you could refrow evidence itself
Speaker 1: still there and see if you can get better results
Speaker 1: out of that with the new DNA kids and then
Speaker 1: using a combination of sensitive news the standard kids. But
Speaker 1: also why Gromosom DNA said that you have a much
Speaker 1: better view of these mill donors in these samples. Els
Speaker 1: and Jean Lambres sent a second letter to the Prosecutor
Speaker 1: General in August to ask if the evidence collected in
Speaker 1: the case still exists. They haven't yet received an answer
Speaker 1: to this letter, but I'm hopeful that the evidence still
Speaker 1: exists and that it could be retested. Not only could
Speaker 1: it potentially help to find out more about other missing
Speaker 1: persons from the time, like Tanya Groom, but it might
Speaker 1: also turn up new suspects who are never brought to justice.
Speaker 1: There are many loose ends in the true affair that
Speaker 1: have troubled victims families for years. Some of them, like
Speaker 1: DNA test are out of our hands, but following leads
Speaker 1: and tracking people down are loose ends that we may
Speaker 1: be able to tie up. Over the past several months,
Speaker 1: I've made progress on that front. You'll remember that throughout
Speaker 1: this podcast. Starting with episode two, I talked about an
Speaker 1: establishment called the Hotel Brazil in the seaside town of Blankenberg,
Speaker 1: where Ann Marchal and Effie Lambres attended a hypnosis show
Speaker 1: shortly before disappearing. More than one witness claimed to have
Speaker 1: seen Anne and Effia after the hypnosis show, either in
Speaker 1: front of the Hotel Brazil or nearby on the same street.
Speaker 1: The owner of this hotel and bar had been charged
Speaker 1: with engaging in prostitution and human trafficking, and a friend
Speaker 1: of the hotel and bar owner, who was also an
Speaker 1: acquaintance of Mark d Trude, was staying at the Hotel
Speaker 1: Brazil when Anne and Effia went missing. I spoke about
Speaker 1: this with the investigative journalist Douglas Dakonik, who actually interviewed
Speaker 1: the witness who claimed to have seen Anna and Ifia
Speaker 1: in front of this hotel. I recorded this while driving
Speaker 1: with Douglas, so there's a bit of background noise. UM.
Speaker 1: I think it was Paul march Child, the father of it,
Speaker 1: just spoke about something in Blankemberger. But the butcher named
Speaker 1: Eric van Damon, and so I went to Blackenberger, knocked
Speaker 1: on his door. He opened and he started telling me
Speaker 1: his incredible story for ball Mark Shuffle, which is very
Speaker 1: important his daughter and if they went to a show
Speaker 1: in Blankemberg in the casino, um they had to take
Speaker 1: the last trying to the place the States. But after
Speaker 1: the show they have been in Blankemberger for about an hour.
Speaker 1: And what this butcher said was explaining was that he
Speaker 1: was in trouble with his neighbor. His neighbor was a
Speaker 1: current kind of prostitute born named Hotel Brasil. And what
Speaker 1: a butcher told me was that it was coming and
Speaker 1: going in that hotel of clients women of which you
Speaker 1: could divine that there were prostitutes. But he said that evening,
Speaker 1: a few days after the appearance of an if, I
Speaker 1: saw the pictures in the paper and I immediately remembered
Speaker 1: that those were the two girls I saw going into
Speaker 1: that hotel that evening. I think it's yeah. In in
Speaker 1: in the context of neighbors having fights, you should always
Speaker 1: should be very careful about abo what this kind of testimony.
Speaker 1: So later on I discovered that on the day of
Speaker 1: the arrest of marget two, police search his house and
Speaker 1: close to the phone they found the note with the
Speaker 1: phone number. It was the phone number of the hotel president.
Speaker 1: This is an important piece of information that Douglas just shared.
Speaker 1: On the day of the arrest of marget two, police
Speaker 1: search his house and close to the phone they found
Speaker 1: the note, but the phone number it was a phone
Speaker 1: number of the Hotel bresident. When da True was arrested,
Speaker 1: police found a piece of paper near his phone at
Speaker 1: the house in Martinelle where the girls were held captive.
Speaker 1: On this piece of paper was the name and telephone
Speaker 1: number of the Hotel Brazil. These aren't the only coincidences
Speaker 1: that make this whole Hotel Brazil connection suspicious. I mentioned
Speaker 1: that the True had an acquaintance that was staying at
Speaker 1: the Hotel Brazil during the summer when Anne and Effiat disappeared.
Speaker 1: That acquaintance, who was also a friend of the Hotel
Speaker 1: Brazil owner, drove a car with a license plate that's
Speaker 1: almost an exact match to a license plate identified by
Speaker 1: a witness in Garcelonna under the bridge where Julian Melissa disappeared.
Speaker 1: The car was a red Ford Fiesta. I interviewed ex
Speaker 1: gendarmes Jean Pierre Radon, who worked with a special unit
Speaker 1: that was formed just after Da True's arrest and investigated
Speaker 1: the red car lead at the behest of the King's Prosecutor,
Speaker 1: Michel Borle. The prosecutor Borley came into my office one
Speaker 1: day and he asked me to look into finding information
Speaker 1: about a red Ford Fiesta there could have been used
Speaker 1: for the abduction of Julien and Melissa. I started to
Speaker 1: look into it, and indeed, indeed there were several testimonies
Speaker 1: about a little red car or a red Ford Fiesta
Speaker 1: Senior the bridge where Julie and Melissa were abducted, Julia Melissa.
Speaker 1: And then I stumbled upon something, and I can tell
Speaker 1: you it's it's a catastrophe. I stumbled upon a letter
Speaker 1: from from a doctor, the doctor Arroa. Shortly after the
Speaker 1: abduction of Sheeli and Melissa. He sent a letter to
Speaker 1: the investigation unit in Gracelogna, where he explained that on
Speaker 1: the day of the abduction, he noticed something that seemed
Speaker 1: out of place. There was a van and a red
Speaker 1: car on the side of the highway, very close to
Speaker 1: where the girl had disappeared, and he remembered the first
Speaker 1: three letters of the license plate n k V, and
Speaker 1: then he couldn't remember the rest. And he sent this
Speaker 1: letter to the investigation unit, and I don't know who
Speaker 1: processed it, but they marked it as non exploitable, non exploitable.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, but if someone had taken the time to
Speaker 1: read the Othello report with the names that were in there.
Speaker 1: There was a certain Niccolo Madzerin who was cited in
Speaker 1: the Othello report as an accomplice of d True. The
Speaker 1: Othello report that he's referring to is the report on
Speaker 1: the operation of Fellow, the secret surveillance operation of the
Speaker 1: True that started shortly after Julian Melissa disappeared. The name
Speaker 1: he mentions, Nicolo Mazara, was not only an accomplice of
Speaker 1: d True, but he was also a friend of the
Speaker 1: Hotel Brazil owner. The red car with the license plate
Speaker 1: starting with n kV was recorded in the Othello report
Speaker 1: because it had been observed visiting d True's house in Charloix.
Speaker 1: It's more, if someone had taken the time to look
Speaker 1: at the cars attributed to Mandara and his wife, they
Speaker 1: would have found the n k V nine seven, and
Speaker 1: that license plate was at one of Dutrue's properties on
Speaker 1: a car that was put up for sales, and no
Speaker 1: one made the connection at the time. Even a rookie
Speaker 1: cop would have found this, but they didn't. And I'm
Speaker 1: convinced that if someone would have looked at this, they
Speaker 1: could have found Julie and Melissa alive. They were alive
Speaker 1: at that time. I asked Jean Pierre Haden if they
Speaker 1: had ever interviewed the doctor who wrote the letter. They
Speaker 1: never did I requested permission to interview him. I made
Speaker 1: requests and requests and requests, and I was told yes,
Speaker 1: But I never got the authorization because I needed a
Speaker 1: judge's authorization, but never got it. The witness is dead now.
Speaker 1: The poor guys. They sabotaged the lead about the Red Fiesta,
Speaker 1: and they sabotaged others afterwards, even without interviewing the doctor.
Speaker 1: Had a already followed the evidence, they would have found
Speaker 1: a clear connection between the True Mazara, the NKV license plate,
Speaker 1: and the red Ford Fiesta. You recall that the owner
Speaker 1: of the Hotel Brazil was questioned by police after the
Speaker 1: True was arrested. Else explained this in episode two, so
Speaker 1: eventually this bar owner he was questioned by the police.
Speaker 1: Um He was questioned the first time on the first
Speaker 1: of October and then one time was a second time
Speaker 1: on the sixteenth of October. But after that he actually
Speaker 1: vanished from the earth. So he left. He left Blankenberg.
Speaker 1: He announced to the local authorities that he would go
Speaker 1: to Germany, but in Germany there was no trace of
Speaker 1: him left. Both the True and Lilieva later admitted to
Speaker 1: abducting ann and Efia at the Belgian seaside. The question
Speaker 1: here is whether or not they were helped in some way.
Speaker 1: I believe this man from the Hotel Brazil could share
Speaker 1: light on this question. He may not have been involved
Speaker 1: in any way, or perhaps his friend maza Haa with
Speaker 1: the red Ford Fiesta was involved. Unfortunately, maza Haa has
Speaker 1: since passed away. So I set out to try to
Speaker 1: find the Hotel Brazil owner, who all refrain from naming
Speaker 1: because I don't want to falsely implicate anyone for something
Speaker 1: as abhorrent as being involved with the abuse and murder
Speaker 1: of children. He certainly isn't a saint, but his other
Speaker 1: dodgy affairs are of no concern to us here. Our
Speaker 1: last tip was that he lived in Brazil, so that's
Speaker 1: where we started. I was able to find a local
Speaker 1: journalist named Fernanda to help try to locate him for
Speaker 1: an interview. I checked the public databases and there is
Speaker 1: no trace of him in the system here as far
Speaker 1: as I can tell you. We've decided not to share
Speaker 1: Fernanda's full name or exact location, as snooping around the
Speaker 1: world of international organized crime is dangerous business. I drove
Speaker 1: by the address we discussed it last time, and it's
Speaker 1: definitely not a residence. It's like a pharmacy. After a
Speaker 1: lot of searching and even a drive by at a
Speaker 1: place where we thought he might be, we were getting nowhere,
Speaker 1: so I asked her to switch her focus to searching
Speaker 1: for a woman who spent time at the Hotel Brazil
Speaker 1: in Belgium before fleeing back to Brazil. You'll recall an
Speaker 1: episode two that I spoke with a man who described
Speaker 1: an incident involving a Brazilian woman at the Hotel Brazil.
Speaker 1: My father came in conflicts with this person because they
Speaker 1: found outside the front door of his house. We found
Speaker 1: a young woman, a Brazilian woman, crying and who had
Speaker 1: been beaten, and my father took the woman inside and
Speaker 1: it turned out that this woman had been fetched from
Speaker 1: Brazil and she had been brought to Belgium with the
Speaker 1: expectation that she she would have work, but in reality
Speaker 1: it was meant for prostitution, and Mr had taken all
Speaker 1: documents passport so that he controlled this woman. My father
Speaker 1: then contacted the police and the police went inside the house,
Speaker 1: found another woman and also found weapons. Our goal is
Speaker 1: to try to find this woman and hopefully have her
Speaker 1: lead us to the Hotel Brazil owner. After six months
Speaker 1: of searching, we believe we actually found this woman thanks
Speaker 1: to the dogged work of Fernando. It was really hard
Speaker 1: to find her because her name, Kim Brazil, is so
Speaker 1: so common that made my researchers almost impossible. I did
Speaker 1: locate a boy who seems like being her son because
Speaker 1: the name was exactly the same. So I decided to
Speaker 1: go to Facebook and Instagram to find this boy, and
Speaker 1: she tried to discover if the woman we're looking for
Speaker 1: was his mother. Fernando was able to contact him and
Speaker 1: confirmed that he was indeed the son of the woman
Speaker 1: we were looking for. He verified his mother's name and
Speaker 1: that she'd spent time in Belgium in the mid nineties.
Speaker 1: And then the most important question I asked him was
Speaker 1: can you give me your mother's cell phone? And he
Speaker 1: was like, okay, I can give you some. I was like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, so many months in his search for this,
Speaker 1: so easy. This is the voice of the victim Fernando located.
Speaker 1: We'll withhold her name and location. And she was initially
Speaker 1: afraid to speak about this, and I want to respect
Speaker 1: her privacy. Fernando explains what she learned through their many exchanges.
Speaker 1: So when she arrived in Vision, she was thinking that
Speaker 1: she was going to work as an enny, because that
Speaker 1: was the promise. But once she arrived, she was talking
Speaker 1: to a hotel. So she started to live there in
Speaker 1: the hotel and worked there in the hotel. But one day,
Speaker 1: um also in this hotel, asked her to sleep with
Speaker 1: her and her husband, and she thought that maybe something
Speaker 1: wrong that because I am here to work as a enny,
Speaker 1: but I am in a hotel and right now these
Speaker 1: crazy couple are asking me to sleep every day, and
Speaker 1: so she she thought that something strange there. And later
Speaker 1: other strange situations happened, such as saved her. She keeps inversion.
Speaker 1: He had to marry with Version, and she didn't want
Speaker 1: to to get married with anybody, but she agreed to
Speaker 1: meet the guy, but she doesn't remember, unfortunately, how he
Speaker 1: looked like and his name. But after all that situation,
Speaker 1: decided to get back home to get back to Brazil,
Speaker 1: and did not allowed her to get back, so they
Speaker 1: took it her passport. They forbidden her to have contact
Speaker 1: with phones at this time. At this point she started
Speaker 1: to find really strange and one day she could have
Speaker 1: assessed to a phone and she called to a place
Speaker 1: their Inbsion that she doesn't remember the name. She asked
Speaker 1: for help, and saw her asking for help and just
Speaker 1: say to her that he was going to kill her,
Speaker 1: and he was going to throw her downstairs, and he
Speaker 1: grabbed her arms and really hurted her. She was really
Speaker 1: really afraid of him, and she wanted to get out
Speaker 1: of there as quickly as possible. The fact that this
Speaker 1: woman was originally afraid to speak and wishes to remain
Speaker 1: anonymous after twenty five years speaks volumes about this man's reputation.
Speaker 1: Fernando shared a picture of Mark the True with her,
Speaker 1: and she said that she'd never seen him, nor did
Speaker 1: she ever see children at the Hotel Brazil. It could
Speaker 1: all truly be a coincidence, but to find out, I
Speaker 1: need to speak with the owner of the hotel Brazil
Speaker 1: to hear his side of the story. He didn't seem
Speaker 1: to be in Brazil, so I refocused my search on Germany.
Speaker 1: Chals become cut off of This man's name and location
Speaker 1: will remain confidential given the nature of his work, but
Speaker 1: I have a lot of confidence in his ability to
Speaker 1: find people. He explained to me that the man we're
Speaker 1: looking for isn't in the system in Germany, and that
Speaker 1: he'd have to mobile has other sources to find him,
Speaker 1: and that it wouldn't be easy. I kept searching myself
Speaker 1: in Vain and was about to give up when I
Speaker 1: got a text to call back my contact. He doesn't
Speaker 1: speak English and my German isn't all that great, but
Speaker 1: we managed. He explained that he had indeed found something,
Speaker 1: and according to his info, he could give me an address,
Speaker 1: which I bleeped out here. He said he couldn't promise
Speaker 1: the man was there, but that he was pretty sure
Speaker 1: he'd located him. It would be a scoop if I
Speaker 1: could actually locate this man. The parents of Anne and Efia,
Speaker 1: the king's prosecutor, Michel Bole, and several journalists have wanted
Speaker 1: to question him for over twenty five years. Although my
Speaker 1: chances of actually speaking with him were low, I felt
Speaker 1: I had to give it a try. The investigative journalist
Speaker 1: Douglas Dakonic originally broke the story about the hotel Brazil,
Speaker 1: so I invited him to join me on a trip
Speaker 1: to Germany to find this mysterious man. Okay, they've got
Speaker 1: a lot of car noise here, so he jumped at
Speaker 1: the occasion and we found ourselves cruising down the auto
Speaker 1: bonn towards a destination that will remain unnamed. So summary
Speaker 1: of this guy is that he was a sergeant in
Speaker 1: the army. He was certainly involved in being a pimp,
Speaker 1: had a hotel, got accused of human trafficking, I was arrested,
Speaker 1: I was convicted of arms imports. I believe importing an
Speaker 1: illegal arm. And there's another point, and that's the red
Speaker 1: car that was seen in Garsidon with the license plate
Speaker 1: that starts with n kV, and that this license plate
Speaker 1: is the same first three letters as a license plate
Speaker 1: that Mazara was using at that time. The red car
Speaker 1: was interesting because, um, a few hours before they get
Speaker 1: napping of there's another someone else tries to kidnap two
Speaker 1: girls in who with a red car. Yeah, but the
Speaker 1: description that doesn't fit seem to fit. Douglas is talking
Speaker 1: about the other attempted kidnapping of two girls nearby on
Speaker 1: the same day Julie Melissa were abducted. In this case,
Speaker 1: the mother got a good look at a man driving
Speaker 1: a red car, but a description doesn't really match that
Speaker 1: of Mark. The true The true has always insisted and
Speaker 1: still insist today, that he did not carry out the
Speaker 1: actual kidnapping of Julian Melissa, but that they were brought
Speaker 1: to him. The parents of Julian Melissa still to this
Speaker 1: day do not know how their girls were taken or
Speaker 1: who actually abducted them. So I don't think, you know,
Speaker 1: I don't think he's gonna threaten us violence or anything,
Speaker 1: but be ready in case he does. Because he's a
Speaker 1: guy who has guns, we know that, and he has
Speaker 1: a history of attacking people physically apparently as well, because
Speaker 1: he had said the dangerous dolts. Probably that's where that's
Speaker 1: where I run away. You've heard a lot of information
Speaker 1: about the Hotel Brazil connection, so let me remind you,
Speaker 1: in the simplest of terms of why this hotel owner
Speaker 1: may have the answers that we've been seeking and why
Speaker 1: I need to speak with him. First, when Anne and
Speaker 1: if You had disappeared, they were seen in front of
Speaker 1: his hotel that night. Second, he had an indirect connection
Speaker 1: with Mark d True because his friend who stayed at
Speaker 1: his hotel that summer was also an acquaintance of the trus.
Speaker 1: This friend's license plate can possibly be tied back to
Speaker 1: the disappear, hearents of Julian Melissa, therefore potentially linking the
Speaker 1: two separate abductions. Third, you recall that when they arrested
Speaker 1: the true they found the Hotel brazil owners name and
Speaker 1: number written on a piece of paper next to the phone,
Speaker 1: And finally, after being questioned by police, he disappeared and
Speaker 1: has never been seen since. Drove all day long to
Speaker 1: surprise this guy. He's probably not home. Yeah, if that's
Speaker 1: the case, we're gonna go get a beer somewhere. Which
Speaker 1: are we gonna do? Anyway? What you're gonna do? Anyway?
Speaker 1: After a long day of driving, we went straight to
Speaker 1: the address we had and decided to try and make
Speaker 1: contact right away without any warning. He's going to do
Speaker 1: a last check to make sure this thing is actually recording,
Speaker 1: and it says it is. How does my recorder look?
Speaker 1: Does it? Is it popping out too much? It was
Speaker 1: a relatively quiet neighborhood on a beautiful spring day, and
Speaker 1: as luck would have it, he was standing outside in
Speaker 1: front of his house as we made our way up
Speaker 1: the driveway. Hi, my name is Matt Graves, and I
Speaker 1: am looking for you. I believe uh. When I greeted him,
Speaker 1: in English. He answered in French, saying that he didn't
Speaker 1: understand what I was saying. When I switched to French,
Speaker 1: we immediately noticed his expression turned dark and that he
Speaker 1: knew exactly why we were there. He said, okay, get
Speaker 1: out of here. This is private property. Just say he
Speaker 1: was jubilet. I told him we wanted to ask him
Speaker 1: questions about his old friend Mazaha, and he kept repeating
Speaker 1: avoir or goodbye, and he said, am I clear, this
Speaker 1: is private property? Get out of here. No, just only
Speaker 1: when we see I explained that we drove a long
Speaker 1: ways to ask him questions and that we didn't want
Speaker 1: to accuse him of anything. We just wanted to hear
Speaker 1: his side of the story. He kept repeating goodbye and
Speaker 1: get out of here, so I asked why he didn't
Speaker 1: want to talk to us. The more I insisted, the
Speaker 1: more angry he became. He ducked inside of his front
Speaker 1: door for a few seconds, and I have to admit
Speaker 1: I was concerned he might come back out with the weapon.
Speaker 1: Jim was your is just as explicating. He yelled loudly
Speaker 1: that he wasn't interested and said, I'm going to tell
Speaker 1: you one last time, get out of here. I suggested
Speaker 1: that we could talk in the street, and he said,
Speaker 1: do I look like a guy who's going to meet
Speaker 1: you in the street. Do you think I'm an idiot?
Speaker 1: Or what I'll fetch you in vain? I made it
Speaker 1: clear that I was there with questions on the behalf
Speaker 1: of the parents of Ifia, and he said, I don't care,
Speaker 1: get out of here. I told him I wanted to
Speaker 1: tell the parents the truth, and then I think he
Speaker 1: knows it. But there was no use in continuing. I'm
Speaker 1: pretty sure it was about to get violent, so we
Speaker 1: walked away. Well that didn't go so well, let's let's
Speaker 1: get the funk out of here before he goes and
Speaker 1: gets his gun. But I would have rather had it
Speaker 1: toss me. But it was obviously the first second. Both
Speaker 1: Douglas and I were confident that we had just talked
Speaker 1: face to face with the owner of the hotel Brazil,
Speaker 1: more than two decades after he disappeared. There was no doubt.
Speaker 1: The first thing I did after confirming this man's whereabouts
Speaker 1: was to send a copy of the recording to the
Speaker 1: parents of Anne Michelle and Effie Lambrex. I got a
Speaker 1: WhatsApp message straight away from else Matt High. Oh my god,
Speaker 1: I have been so curious all day long and I
Speaker 1: had to wait until three minutes ago to listen to
Speaker 1: your tape. Um well, no, not welcoming, and as far
Speaker 1: as I'm concerned, that is personal. It actually prooves what
Speaker 1: we are thinking, that this person is majorly involved in
Speaker 1: the case. Anyway, Um, we can talk about this whenever
Speaker 1: you want to to discuss how to proceed. I hope
Speaker 1: you had a pretty good journey to Germany and that
Speaker 1: anyway you had, um, well, a normal day by Matt,
Speaker 1: have a nice weekend. We'll talk to you soon. Bye bye.
Speaker 1: I also reached out to the former King's prosecutor, Michel Bourl.
Speaker 1: He was very surprised to hear that we actually found
Speaker 1: the owner of the hotel Brazil, and suggested that if
Speaker 1: the case ever gets reopened, his DNA profile should be
Speaker 1: collected and compared with any unknown profiles. The challenge is
Speaker 1: that this case is officially closed and apparently it will
Speaker 1: only be reopened if a concrete new element is discovered.
Speaker 1: But if there's one thing we've learned about the surviving victims,
Speaker 1: the victims families, and the citizens of Belgium, it's that
Speaker 1: they won't simply take no for an answer. Locating the
Speaker 1: owner of the Hotel Brazil is a good first step,
Speaker 1: and while it might not be enough to reopen the case,
Speaker 1: it surely warrants some investigative measures by authorities, like an
Speaker 1: interview or, as Prosecutor Boule suggested, a DNA sample. It's
Speaker 1: my belief that the judicial authorities will never act unless
Speaker 1: they're forced to. It's up to us to hold them accountable.
Speaker 1: The recent breaking news about Dutch authorities requesting DNA information
Speaker 1: from the true file in connection with the Tanya Gruen
Speaker 1: case might provide additional momentum in the argument, not only
Speaker 1: to retest the evidence, but to seek new evidence. While
Speaker 1: this project may be coming to an end, the work
Speaker 1: isn't done. I've decided to send all of my findings
Speaker 1: throughout this investigation, including the whereabouts of the Hotel Brazil owner,
Speaker 1: with the parents of Julie le Jeune, Melissa Rousseau, An
Speaker 1: Machal and Effie Lambres, so that they can pursue this
Speaker 1: fight for justice if they so choose. When I started
Speaker 1: this project, my plan was simply to recount history of
Speaker 1: this incredible affair. I never intended to find myself personally
Speaker 1: tracking down suspects and having strategy meetings with the former
Speaker 1: King's prosecutor and victims families, lawyers, and DNA experts. I've
Speaker 1: become emotionally invested in this affair in a way I
Speaker 1: didn't anticipate. My family and friends have suggested a more
Speaker 1: than one occasion that I should take a step back,
Speaker 1: and that I've unnecessarily put myself at risk. But of
Speaker 1: all the incredible aspects of this affair that we've covered
Speaker 1: and uncovered, there's one thing that I simply cannot let go.
Speaker 1: The blood of an eight year old girl found on
Speaker 1: the wall of that awful dungeon and massignelle, mixed with
Speaker 1: the d n A of an unidentified person. We shouldn't
Speaker 1: rest until that person is identified and held to account.
Speaker 1: The name of that eight year old girl whose blood
Speaker 1: was found on that wall is Julie le Journe. I
Speaker 1: leave you with the trans lation of a letter published
Speaker 1: by her father, Jean Deni le Jeune to you, my Julie,
Speaker 1: my dear, it's been twenty years since they've ripped you
Speaker 1: away from me, twenty years that you're no longer here.
Speaker 1: You'd be twenty eight and a half to day, maybe
Speaker 1: you'd be married with children. I still see your face
Speaker 1: at eight years old and can't imagine what you'd look
Speaker 1: like today. As I write this, it's a painful day,
Speaker 1: just like the seven thousand three other days until now.
Speaker 1: I'm still enraged with those responsible for your disappearance and
Speaker 1: those who cowardly let you die in that dungeon, and
Speaker 1: also those in whom we had confidence, police, gendarmerie, magistrates.
Speaker 1: How many times did we hear trust the professionals? We
Speaker 1: didn't have a choice. I will never forgive the system.
Speaker 1: It's not in the normal course of nature to lose
Speaker 1: a child, and certainly not as you were lost. As
Speaker 1: I write these lines, I wanted you to know that
Speaker 1: although you didn't survive, others have because of the fight
Speaker 1: we lead and are still leading today. But at what
Speaker 1: price the life of my daughter, My Julie. I Love you.
Speaker 1: The Monster is a production of Tenderfoot TV and I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio, hosted and executive produced by me Matt Graves,
Speaker 1: produced by Thomas Resumon of Bubbles Sound. Donald Albright and
Speaker 1: Payne Lindsay are executive producers on the behalf of Tenderfoot TV,
Speaker 1: with producer makeup and vanity set. Matt Frederick and Alex
Speaker 1: Williams are executive producers on the behalf of I Heart
Speaker 1: Radio with producer Trevor Young. Original music by Jay Ragsdale,
Speaker 1: Sound design by Cooper Skinner and Thomas Resimon, mixed and
Speaker 1: mastered by Cooper Skinner. Cover design by Trevor Eisler. La
Speaker 1: Monstra includes archival audio from Sonoma, RTBF archives and CNN Archives.
Speaker 1: Special thanks to back Media and marketing Station sixteen, Jean
Speaker 1: Savigna and the team's at I Heeart Radio and Tenderfoot TV.
Speaker 1: Find us on social media at Monster Underscore pod. For
Speaker 1: more podcasts from I Heart Radio or Tenderfoot TV, visit
Speaker 1: the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen
Speaker 1: to your favorite shows.