1
00:00:00,240 --> 00:00:04,680
Speaker 1: From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is

2
00:00:04,800 --> 00:00:09,119
Speaker 1: riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or

3
00:00:09,200 --> 00:00:12,079
Speaker 1: learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A

4
00:00:12,240 --> 00:00:25,680
Speaker 1: production of I Heart Radio. Hello, welcome back to the show.

5
00:00:25,760 --> 00:00:28,320
Speaker 1: My name is Matt. Our colleague Nol is not with

6
00:00:28,400 --> 00:00:31,720
Speaker 1: us today, but we'll be returning shortly. They called b Ben.

7
00:00:31,840 --> 00:00:34,640
Speaker 1: We are joined as always with our super producer Ball

8
00:00:34,760 --> 00:00:39,240
Speaker 1: Mission controlled decade. Most importantly, you are you, You are here,

9
00:00:39,440 --> 00:00:42,559
Speaker 1: and that makes this the stuff they don't want you

10
00:00:42,720 --> 00:00:46,800
Speaker 1: to know. Today's show takes us across the Atlantic Ocean

11
00:00:46,880 --> 00:00:50,960
Speaker 1: to Belgium, where not too long ago, a serial killer

12
00:00:51,240 --> 00:00:56,680
Speaker 1: terrorize the country. Eventually, hundreds of thousands of Belgian citizens

13
00:00:56,840 --> 00:01:00,360
Speaker 1: marched in a public protest against what they saw as

14
00:01:00,400 --> 00:01:07,720
Speaker 1: a high ranking ongoing conspiracy, a genuine and horrific cover up. Matt.

15
00:01:07,760 --> 00:01:11,160
Speaker 1: With any kind of episode or conversation like this, we

16
00:01:11,280 --> 00:01:15,720
Speaker 1: always take pains to note this show will contain at

17
00:01:15,760 --> 00:01:20,080
Speaker 1: times graphic descriptions of violence and abuse. As such, this

18
00:01:20,240 --> 00:01:23,680
Speaker 1: may not be appropriate for all listeners. But we're not

19
00:01:23,760 --> 00:01:27,440
Speaker 1: diving into today's show alone. We are joined by the

20
00:01:27,480 --> 00:01:30,800
Speaker 1: one and only Mr Matt Graves, the host and creator

21
00:01:30,840 --> 00:01:34,759
Speaker 1: of the new Tenderfoot I Heart Show, le Monstra, thanks

22
00:01:34,800 --> 00:01:37,480
Speaker 1: for joining us today, Matt Hey, thanks for having me. Guys,

23
00:01:37,600 --> 00:01:39,560
Speaker 1: thrilled to be here. We couldn't be more excited to

24
00:01:39,560 --> 00:01:42,640
Speaker 1: have you on, Matt. Full disclosure everybody. As with most

25
00:01:42,680 --> 00:01:45,400
Speaker 1: of these Tenderfoot shows, i am executive producer on it,

26
00:01:45,680 --> 00:01:47,960
Speaker 1: so I've got a bit of a bias in how

27
00:01:48,240 --> 00:01:50,920
Speaker 1: killer on the show. I a couple of times, but

28
00:01:51,080 --> 00:01:54,120
Speaker 1: not as me, uh, just as like a random reporter

29
00:01:54,240 --> 00:01:58,520
Speaker 1: number seven, I think a couple of times. But honestly,

30
00:01:59,120 --> 00:02:03,280
Speaker 1: this is I wouldn't want to bring on any of

31
00:02:03,280 --> 00:02:07,160
Speaker 1: these shows unless I felt strongly about the story, honestly,

32
00:02:07,480 --> 00:02:11,400
Speaker 1: and this one is supremely important for everyone to know

33
00:02:11,919 --> 00:02:14,680
Speaker 1: to listen to the show just to understand the story

34
00:02:14,840 --> 00:02:17,120
Speaker 1: of what's going on here. Ben and I think you

35
00:02:17,200 --> 00:02:22,400
Speaker 1: share that that feeling. This story is of high importance. Agreed. Yeah,

36
00:02:22,520 --> 00:02:24,920
Speaker 1: we um on stuff that I'll wants you to know.

37
00:02:26,120 --> 00:02:29,880
Speaker 1: We often, we often go on air with things that

38
00:02:29,960 --> 00:02:34,880
Speaker 1: have personally captivated us. And this story, which you will

39
00:02:35,440 --> 00:02:39,240
Speaker 1: you'll often here referred to as the Detro affair. Uh.

40
00:02:39,320 --> 00:02:43,399
Speaker 1: This has been a story going on for decades and

41
00:02:43,520 --> 00:02:48,959
Speaker 1: tragically there Uh, there's still many questions that remain unanswered

42
00:02:49,040 --> 00:02:54,239
Speaker 1: in the modern day here in about this. So, uh, Matt,

43
00:02:54,600 --> 00:02:59,520
Speaker 1: you're based in Belgium now, you're from Texas originally, and

44
00:03:00,280 --> 00:03:03,200
Speaker 1: you are the creator of Harry as well as the

45
00:03:03,280 --> 00:03:06,840
Speaker 1: creator and host of La Monstra. Could you tell us

46
00:03:06,840 --> 00:03:09,600
Speaker 1: a little bit about your background and what led you

47
00:03:10,120 --> 00:03:16,399
Speaker 1: to investigate this harrowing case. Yeah? Thanks. Um. So, I'm

48
00:03:16,400 --> 00:03:20,160
Speaker 1: from Austin, Texas, grew up there, um, and then wound

49
00:03:20,240 --> 00:03:23,240
Speaker 1: up just by chance actually coming to Europe. I was

50
00:03:23,280 --> 00:03:28,280
Speaker 1: bumming around after university and there was a girl involved

51
00:03:28,280 --> 00:03:29,959
Speaker 1: and all that kind of stuff, and I thought I

52
00:03:29,960 --> 00:03:31,800
Speaker 1: would stay in Belgium for just a little while, but

53
00:03:31,919 --> 00:03:34,400
Speaker 1: ended up staying here for a very long time. And

54
00:03:34,560 --> 00:03:38,400
Speaker 1: have you know, a house, a wife, kids and pets,

55
00:03:38,520 --> 00:03:44,160
Speaker 1: the whole catastrophe. So I'm I'm completely living in Europe

56
00:03:44,200 --> 00:03:49,560
Speaker 1: now and have been since. And was the year I

57
00:03:49,600 --> 00:03:53,400
Speaker 1: moved to this country. And I actually moved here, I

58
00:03:53,440 --> 00:03:59,080
Speaker 1: think within two weeks of the first disappearance that we

59
00:03:59,240 --> 00:04:03,880
Speaker 1: cover in Laments the podcast. Um, and I remember it,

60
00:04:04,000 --> 00:04:06,520
Speaker 1: I I just remember it. It was a big deal,

61
00:04:06,680 --> 00:04:10,560
Speaker 1: this affair, and I even remember it before the perpetrator

62
00:04:10,720 --> 00:04:14,760
Speaker 1: was caught because these posters of of of these missing

63
00:04:14,800 --> 00:04:18,440
Speaker 1: girls were we're everywhere, and their parents were really fighting

64
00:04:18,480 --> 00:04:21,120
Speaker 1: to try to find them, and you you know, you

65
00:04:21,160 --> 00:04:25,159
Speaker 1: couldn't be a person living in Belgium without knowing who

66
00:04:25,160 --> 00:04:27,680
Speaker 1: these little missing girls were. Almost their parents were doing

67
00:04:27,720 --> 00:04:30,040
Speaker 1: such a good job of getting the posters out and

68
00:04:30,640 --> 00:04:32,640
Speaker 1: you know, being on TV and talking about it and

69
00:04:32,680 --> 00:04:36,520
Speaker 1: so forth. So it sort of literally corresponds with my

70
00:04:37,320 --> 00:04:40,600
Speaker 1: that my my entire life in Belgium kicked off exactly

71
00:04:40,600 --> 00:04:43,599
Speaker 1: when this affair started, and I've been here for the

72
00:04:43,880 --> 00:04:47,800
Speaker 1: you know, for twenty seven years afterwards, with one exception,

73
00:04:47,880 --> 00:04:50,960
Speaker 1: I spent one year living in the Great State of Oregon,

74
00:04:52,120 --> 00:04:55,039
Speaker 1: which was a wonderful experience. Brought my whole family there

75
00:04:55,040 --> 00:04:57,360
Speaker 1: for a year. That was a couple of years ago.

76
00:04:57,400 --> 00:04:59,800
Speaker 1: But yeah, I've I've lived here and lived through the

77
00:05:00,040 --> 00:05:02,920
Speaker 1: fair as a Belgian would have. In one of the episodes,

78
00:05:03,120 --> 00:05:06,599
Speaker 1: you describe a scene in I believe a grocery store

79
00:05:06,960 --> 00:05:10,159
Speaker 1: where a mother was desperately looking for her daughter. Could

80
00:05:10,160 --> 00:05:13,320
Speaker 1: you just describe that really quickly. Yeah, it was a

81
00:05:13,360 --> 00:05:17,120
Speaker 1: scene that played out a lot for quite a while here,

82
00:05:17,160 --> 00:05:21,400
Speaker 1: and to a certain extent, maybe even still because what

83
00:05:21,480 --> 00:05:23,320
Speaker 1: was going on is is you had a lot of

84
00:05:23,360 --> 00:05:27,960
Speaker 1: girls disappearing and uh, you know, Belgium is a small place.

85
00:05:28,000 --> 00:05:30,280
Speaker 1: It's a small country. It's like ten million people at

86
00:05:30,320 --> 00:05:34,560
Speaker 1: that time, and um, you know, and then it starts

87
00:05:34,560 --> 00:05:38,640
Speaker 1: coming out that there are you know, these awful stories

88
00:05:38,680 --> 00:05:41,640
Speaker 1: that are happening. Um. And it was sort of like

89
00:05:41,680 --> 00:05:44,880
Speaker 1: a psychosis that hit the street and people were afraid.

90
00:05:45,000 --> 00:05:47,000
Speaker 1: And I remember, I mean I told that like in

91
00:05:47,040 --> 00:05:49,119
Speaker 1: an opening I think in one of the episodes about

92
00:05:49,160 --> 00:05:51,520
Speaker 1: it's a true story about being in a supermarket and

93
00:05:52,080 --> 00:05:54,000
Speaker 1: just a woman looking for a kid, you know, and

94
00:05:54,040 --> 00:05:57,240
Speaker 1: it's like she's calling out for a kid, and it's like, okay, yeah,

95
00:05:57,240 --> 00:05:59,560
Speaker 1: I lost in a supermarket. I mean, I've lost my

96
00:05:59,600 --> 00:06:01,720
Speaker 1: kid in a supermarket a few times, and you know,

97
00:06:02,080 --> 00:06:05,840
Speaker 1: it wasn't that big of a deal. Um. And but

98
00:06:05,920 --> 00:06:08,440
Speaker 1: she was hysterical. I mean she was going nuts, you know.

99
00:06:08,560 --> 00:06:10,880
Speaker 1: And and then like people were like and then everyone

100
00:06:10,920 --> 00:06:13,160
Speaker 1: everyone started looking for the girl and stuff. And I

101
00:06:13,680 --> 00:06:16,279
Speaker 1: was like, okay, I guess I'll help find the girl too.

102
00:06:16,279 --> 00:06:18,599
Speaker 1: And I was thinking, wow, it's a big deal to

103
00:06:18,640 --> 00:06:21,640
Speaker 1: lose your kid here, you know, like um, and then

104
00:06:21,640 --> 00:06:24,560
Speaker 1: it was leaving the supermarket. There, I saw the posters

105
00:06:24,680 --> 00:06:28,880
Speaker 1: of of the first posters of Julian Melissa, who are

106
00:06:29,080 --> 00:06:32,520
Speaker 1: the first two victims in this affair, and then the

107
00:06:32,600 --> 00:06:38,600
Speaker 1: second posters were actually the last two victims, uh, Sabine

108
00:06:38,600 --> 00:06:40,800
Speaker 1: and Letitia, and and they were just sort of on

109
00:06:40,839 --> 00:06:43,200
Speaker 1: the same poster board and sort of hit me like,

110
00:06:43,200 --> 00:06:44,920
Speaker 1: oh wow, yeah, that's right. There is a lot of

111
00:06:44,960 --> 00:06:46,880
Speaker 1: stuff going on with Like, you know, I was twenty

112
00:06:46,920 --> 00:06:49,240
Speaker 1: something years old. I wasn't real focused on it, but

113
00:06:49,640 --> 00:06:51,599
Speaker 1: it was it was sort of like a hit me like,

114
00:06:51,640 --> 00:06:53,760
Speaker 1: oh yeah, okay, this is you know, things are going

115
00:06:53,800 --> 00:06:56,960
Speaker 1: on here. It's kind of people are terrorized about their

116
00:06:57,040 --> 00:07:02,240
Speaker 1: kids getting abducted. And before we get into the primary

117
00:07:02,480 --> 00:07:06,960
Speaker 1: person involved in this story, Uh, Mattter, I wonder if

118
00:07:07,000 --> 00:07:11,480
Speaker 1: you wouldn't mind just describing how these disappearances were occurring,

119
00:07:11,520 --> 00:07:13,520
Speaker 1: Like how were people being abducted? What do we know

120
00:07:13,600 --> 00:07:16,840
Speaker 1: about that? Yeah, well, at the time, we knew very

121
00:07:16,840 --> 00:07:21,880
Speaker 1: little because they were just disappearing. Um, almost no clues.

122
00:07:22,360 --> 00:07:25,000
Speaker 1: There were no clues in in this In the six

123
00:07:25,040 --> 00:07:30,400
Speaker 1: disappearances we cover in this uh, in this series, there

124
00:07:30,400 --> 00:07:34,160
Speaker 1: were no clues at all for any of them. Um.

125
00:07:34,240 --> 00:07:38,960
Speaker 1: It was literally girls just disappearing in broad daylight, um,

126
00:07:39,040 --> 00:07:42,560
Speaker 1: which you know is quite uncommon. There's usually at least something,

127
00:07:43,480 --> 00:07:46,760
Speaker 1: but in these cases there was absolutely nothing except for

128
00:07:47,200 --> 00:07:51,640
Speaker 1: the last girl who disappeared, which thankfully there was a

129
00:07:51,640 --> 00:07:54,840
Speaker 1: little something that led them to make an arrest. You know,

130
00:07:54,920 --> 00:07:58,400
Speaker 1: one of the things that stands out, and that you

131
00:07:58,720 --> 00:08:03,760
Speaker 1: emphasize in the show, through interviews and through archival reporting,

132
00:08:04,360 --> 00:08:09,040
Speaker 1: is that the there's a fact that people kept sticking

133
00:08:09,080 --> 00:08:14,560
Speaker 1: on with these um these appear disappearances that begin episode one,

134
00:08:14,720 --> 00:08:19,720
Speaker 1: and it's that two victims disappear at the same time.

135
00:08:20,000 --> 00:08:25,520
Speaker 1: And I believe what I believe that part of why

136
00:08:25,840 --> 00:08:31,400
Speaker 1: this became such a subject of national attention was that

137
00:08:31,560 --> 00:08:36,200
Speaker 1: same lack of evidence that you you describe, right at

138
00:08:36,280 --> 00:08:40,199
Speaker 1: least in the beginning, Um, Matt, you set us up

139
00:08:40,240 --> 00:08:45,600
Speaker 1: perfectly with the discussion of the the villain, the monster

140
00:08:46,200 --> 00:08:51,440
Speaker 1: for whom the Detro affair is named. So, uh, I'm

141
00:08:51,440 --> 00:08:54,440
Speaker 1: wondering if you can tell us a little bit more

142
00:08:54,480 --> 00:09:00,720
Speaker 1: about this character, uh, this individual Mark Detro, and how

143
00:09:00,880 --> 00:09:06,640
Speaker 1: he how the Belgian public and law enforcement first began

144
00:09:06,800 --> 00:09:12,199
Speaker 1: to associate him with this string of horrific crimes. Yeah,

145
00:09:13,280 --> 00:09:17,560
Speaker 1: and as you mentioned, two girls disappearing at once is

146
00:09:17,720 --> 00:09:20,959
Speaker 1: very rare and it's much more difficult to do than

147
00:09:21,040 --> 00:09:26,800
Speaker 1: kidnapping one victim. Um. And he tended to go in

148
00:09:26,920 --> 00:09:34,120
Speaker 1: pairs and um. So the true was a you know

149
00:09:34,280 --> 00:09:38,800
Speaker 1: Belgian guy who came up in a family two teachers.

150
00:09:38,840 --> 00:09:42,280
Speaker 1: His parents were both teachers. Uh, not a great family

151
00:09:42,679 --> 00:09:46,920
Speaker 1: like most times when you have these awful sort of psychopaths.

152
00:09:47,760 --> 00:09:50,640
Speaker 1: His mother was super protective, his dad was a bit

153
00:09:50,720 --> 00:09:54,199
Speaker 1: rough with him. And he also spent some time in

154
00:09:54,240 --> 00:09:57,960
Speaker 1: the Belgian Congo very young in his life. So at

155
00:09:58,000 --> 00:10:00,720
Speaker 1: that time it was called the Belgian Congo. Now we

156
00:10:00,760 --> 00:10:04,480
Speaker 1: know it is Congo um and you know African country

157
00:10:04,520 --> 00:10:08,360
Speaker 1: that was once a colony of Belgium. And so they

158
00:10:08,360 --> 00:10:10,480
Speaker 1: were there, I guess they were doing a teaching stint

159
00:10:10,559 --> 00:10:12,800
Speaker 1: for for a little while, and then came back to

160
00:10:12,880 --> 00:10:15,760
Speaker 1: Belgium and ended up living in this place called Charleroi,

161
00:10:16,200 --> 00:10:18,720
Speaker 1: which is really kind of like almost like a Pittsburgh

162
00:10:18,760 --> 00:10:22,319
Speaker 1: type of place, you know, kind of gritty, um industrial

163
00:10:23,120 --> 00:10:26,640
Speaker 1: and at that time very poor, uh, and lots of

164
00:10:26,760 --> 00:10:31,040
Speaker 1: crime and sort of just seedy, seed nous and underworld.

165
00:10:31,080 --> 00:10:33,200
Speaker 1: And and he kind of came up in that the

166
00:10:33,320 --> 00:10:38,680
Speaker 1: grimy streets of Charleroi as I say, um, and he was, Yeah,

167
00:10:38,760 --> 00:10:41,320
Speaker 1: he was a bad kid early on and got kicked

168
00:10:41,320 --> 00:10:44,160
Speaker 1: out of school a couple of times and was always

169
00:10:44,160 --> 00:10:48,600
Speaker 1: involved with just bad stuff like being a bad kid basically. UM.

170
00:10:48,640 --> 00:10:54,000
Speaker 1: And then his mother she ended up leaving his father,

171
00:10:54,320 --> 00:10:58,520
Speaker 1: and then his mother got a new boyfriend who was

172
00:10:58,559 --> 00:11:00,880
Speaker 1: basically like a year old or than the true or

173
00:11:00,920 --> 00:11:03,520
Speaker 1: something like that, and that was a real shocker for him.

174
00:11:04,280 --> 00:11:07,199
Speaker 1: He frequently comes back to that as being a key

175
00:11:07,480 --> 00:11:09,680
Speaker 1: moment in his life. And I think he was sixteen

176
00:11:09,960 --> 00:11:14,400
Speaker 1: and he left home after that, and then he really

177
00:11:14,760 --> 00:11:17,560
Speaker 1: that there's a real whole in terms of our understanding

178
00:11:17,559 --> 00:11:20,320
Speaker 1: of his details of his life at you know, from

179
00:11:20,320 --> 00:11:25,440
Speaker 1: sixteen until about We do know though that he he

180
00:11:25,520 --> 00:11:29,359
Speaker 1: was basically he studied and he became an electrician technically

181
00:11:29,360 --> 00:11:31,760
Speaker 1: on paper, but really what he was doing is becoming

182
00:11:31,760 --> 00:11:35,679
Speaker 1: a petty thief, stealing cars, uh, doing all kinds of

183
00:11:35,800 --> 00:11:39,240
Speaker 1: you know, basic street crime and all of that. Um.

184
00:11:40,000 --> 00:11:42,920
Speaker 1: And you know, that's the sort of that there was

185
00:11:43,000 --> 00:11:46,040
Speaker 1: Also when when he was eighteen, it's believed that he

186
00:11:46,120 --> 00:11:50,280
Speaker 1: ended up living with a pedophile UM and that it

187
00:11:50,320 --> 00:11:53,839
Speaker 1: was it's believed that during that time he himself became

188
00:11:53,880 --> 00:11:57,840
Speaker 1: a male prostitute. Um. I don't think that was his

189
00:11:57,880 --> 00:12:00,800
Speaker 1: main job, but he was just doing it. Um. So

190
00:12:01,240 --> 00:12:05,599
Speaker 1: it kind of goes from bad to worse with this guy. Um,

191
00:12:05,640 --> 00:12:10,160
Speaker 1: he's you know, living in a bad neighborhood, becoming a thief,

192
00:12:10,520 --> 00:12:14,760
Speaker 1: not getting along with his dysfunctional family, leaving leaving home

193
00:12:14,800 --> 00:12:19,000
Speaker 1: at sixteen years old. Uh, you know, getting into more crime,

194
00:12:19,600 --> 00:12:23,839
Speaker 1: living with some deranged pedophile, and becoming a male prostitute. Uh.

195
00:12:23,880 --> 00:12:28,360
Speaker 1: And now he's only eighteen, right, So from there, um,

196
00:12:28,600 --> 00:12:33,280
Speaker 1: he like I see, we don't know all that much.

197
00:12:33,320 --> 00:12:38,280
Speaker 1: But afterwards, in the eighties, he really starts getting into

198
00:12:39,480 --> 00:12:44,600
Speaker 1: crimes against women or I should say girls and young women. Uh.

199
00:12:44,640 --> 00:12:49,040
Speaker 1: And that's his first wave of crimes outside of his

200
00:12:49,080 --> 00:12:52,680
Speaker 1: regular criminal activity because he was constantly a criminal. Basically,

201
00:12:52,720 --> 00:12:56,880
Speaker 1: he was a full time criminal, mostly involved in in

202
00:12:57,000 --> 00:13:00,480
Speaker 1: stealing cars and not just stealing but trafficking them. Right.

203
00:13:00,520 --> 00:13:04,280
Speaker 1: There's a big there's a big sort of almost mafia

204
00:13:04,360 --> 00:13:08,640
Speaker 1: lad deal in Europe, and Belgium was a big place

205
00:13:08,679 --> 00:13:10,640
Speaker 1: where a lot of that took place. So you know,

206
00:13:10,679 --> 00:13:13,880
Speaker 1: stealing cars and thin numbers and then moving them on

207
00:13:14,040 --> 00:13:17,400
Speaker 1: and doing all that sort of car theft stuff. Uh.

208
00:13:17,440 --> 00:13:22,199
Speaker 1: And then but I guess he made his first forays

209
00:13:22,280 --> 00:13:27,200
Speaker 1: into into raping people and he he you know, the

210
00:13:27,240 --> 00:13:31,439
Speaker 1: first ones that we know about, which there probably were others. Uh,

211
00:13:31,480 --> 00:13:34,440
Speaker 1: you know, we're young girls. I think one of his

212
00:13:34,480 --> 00:13:40,119
Speaker 1: first victims was eleven years old, UM, and he abducted

213
00:13:40,120 --> 00:13:43,840
Speaker 1: her and raped her, UM, threatened you know that if

214
00:13:43,880 --> 00:13:46,960
Speaker 1: she's told me one, he would kill her, took pictures

215
00:13:47,280 --> 00:13:51,240
Speaker 1: and that's another recurring theme with him, and let her go. Um.

216
00:13:51,840 --> 00:13:55,080
Speaker 1: And then from there, you know, there were four more

217
00:13:55,600 --> 00:14:02,120
Speaker 1: girls that we know of at this time that were abducted, UM,

218
00:14:02,400 --> 00:14:07,520
Speaker 1: sequestered and abused up to twenty four hours I think

219
00:14:07,640 --> 00:14:10,880
Speaker 1: was the longest he would hold them. Um. They are known.

220
00:14:12,280 --> 00:14:15,520
Speaker 1: It's known that there were other perpetrators involved. And at

221
00:14:15,559 --> 00:14:18,439
Speaker 1: this time as well, his wife got involved, or his

222
00:14:18,559 --> 00:14:25,160
Speaker 1: second wife, I should say, and she was actually involved.

223
00:14:25,240 --> 00:14:27,920
Speaker 1: I mean she she was literally driving the van when

224
00:14:27,960 --> 00:14:33,120
Speaker 1: they would go abductive girl. UM. And so yeah, it's

225
00:14:33,120 --> 00:14:35,840
Speaker 1: really dodgy and it's really dark, but then it gets

226
00:14:35,880 --> 00:14:39,840
Speaker 1: darker after that. Let's pause here for a word from

227
00:14:39,840 --> 00:14:43,480
Speaker 1: our sponsor, and then we'll dive back into the harrowing story.

228
00:14:43,920 --> 00:14:54,000
Speaker 1: The Monstra and we're back, Matt, can you tell us

229
00:14:54,040 --> 00:14:57,480
Speaker 1: about the timeline a little bit like when when is

230
00:14:58,040 --> 00:15:03,440
Speaker 1: de tro Kidney happening girls or at least assaulting girls?

231
00:15:04,120 --> 00:15:07,640
Speaker 1: And then how does that lead up to the victims

232
00:15:07,640 --> 00:15:10,760
Speaker 1: that are talked about in La Monstra. Yeah, so that

233
00:15:10,880 --> 00:15:13,560
Speaker 1: that that spade that I kind of went through. That

234
00:15:13,600 --> 00:15:17,200
Speaker 1: started five when he was twenty nine years old, he

235
00:15:17,320 --> 00:15:20,840
Speaker 1: met his second wife. He was had a drifter who

236
00:15:20,920 --> 00:15:25,280
Speaker 1: was living in a caravan in his uh in his

237
00:15:26,080 --> 00:15:29,880
Speaker 1: shitty a house that he had down in Charlois, and

238
00:15:31,440 --> 00:15:35,000
Speaker 1: those three of them, his wife, this guy who was

239
00:15:35,040 --> 00:15:37,880
Speaker 1: a guy named Jean van Pettigum who's not real, not

240
00:15:38,000 --> 00:15:42,160
Speaker 1: real smart guy, basically kind of a loser. Um. And uh,

241
00:15:42,600 --> 00:15:44,920
Speaker 1: he the True and the and his wife, and this

242
00:15:44,960 --> 00:15:48,760
Speaker 1: guy went out and kidnapped and raped these five girls

243
00:15:49,480 --> 00:15:54,760
Speaker 1: um and eventually got caught and John van Petegem spilled

244
00:15:54,760 --> 00:15:56,840
Speaker 1: the beans on the True and his wife and they

245
00:15:56,840 --> 00:15:59,280
Speaker 1: were both arrested, and all three of them were arrested,

246
00:15:59,760 --> 00:16:03,360
Speaker 1: and and uh, you know, he was held in in

247
00:16:03,480 --> 00:16:06,800
Speaker 1: jail and then went to trial and then was convicted

248
00:16:07,040 --> 00:16:12,240
Speaker 1: um of of raping and abusing these five girls. And

249
00:16:12,520 --> 00:16:15,360
Speaker 1: they also convicted him because he had he had done

250
00:16:15,360 --> 00:16:19,960
Speaker 1: a shakedown on an elderly woman as well, and basically yeah,

251
00:16:19,960 --> 00:16:22,960
Speaker 1: it was violent and and and extorted money from her.

252
00:16:23,200 --> 00:16:27,200
Speaker 1: So he got sent in killed. None of them were,

253
00:16:27,280 --> 00:16:31,800
Speaker 1: none of them were. They were all left alive. And

254
00:16:31,840 --> 00:16:34,400
Speaker 1: I think you know that changed his calculus for his

255
00:16:34,520 --> 00:16:38,200
Speaker 1: future wave of crimes. But what happened then is he

256
00:16:38,240 --> 00:16:39,960
Speaker 1: was you know, he was convicted. He was since the

257
00:16:40,000 --> 00:16:45,720
Speaker 1: thirteen and a half years um, and he only served

258
00:16:45,760 --> 00:16:48,160
Speaker 1: a total of a belief six years. I mean, he

259
00:16:48,600 --> 00:16:53,080
Speaker 1: was convicted in nine and he was out by that.

260
00:16:53,160 --> 00:16:57,520
Speaker 1: He had time served before that, so um into the

261
00:16:57,640 --> 00:17:03,040
Speaker 1: true was let out of prison, and the week or

262
00:17:03,080 --> 00:17:07,240
Speaker 1: something before, his mother wrote a letter to the warden

263
00:17:07,920 --> 00:17:10,840
Speaker 1: begging them not to let her son out of prison, saying,

264
00:17:11,359 --> 00:17:16,240
Speaker 1: we're worried about what he's gonna do. Um, so she was.

265
00:17:16,640 --> 00:17:19,440
Speaker 1: I think she wrote a couple of letters. Right. Um,

266
00:17:19,480 --> 00:17:22,000
Speaker 1: So he rolls out of prison and his wife at

267
00:17:22,040 --> 00:17:27,919
Speaker 1: that time waited for him, Michel Marta. And yeah, then

268
00:17:28,160 --> 00:17:31,239
Speaker 1: you know that he Belgium is a strange place. You know,

269
00:17:31,320 --> 00:17:33,840
Speaker 1: you can you can get a pension or or or

270
00:17:33,920 --> 00:17:36,960
Speaker 1: social support here more easily than you could in other countries,

271
00:17:37,000 --> 00:17:40,159
Speaker 1: and he managed to you know, he was such a

272
00:17:40,160 --> 00:17:44,919
Speaker 1: manipulator for everything actually, so he really always was always

273
00:17:44,960 --> 00:17:48,520
Speaker 1: manipulating everything to his advantage. And he figured out away

274
00:17:48,640 --> 00:17:52,280
Speaker 1: with him and his wife to get this state pension

275
00:17:53,080 --> 00:17:56,760
Speaker 1: um and then he got them to prescribe him powerful

276
00:17:56,960 --> 00:18:01,879
Speaker 1: sort of tranquilizers and including rypnol. And it's sort of like,

277
00:18:02,040 --> 00:18:05,000
Speaker 1: you know, suddenly here you got a guy he raped

278
00:18:05,040 --> 00:18:08,600
Speaker 1: five kids and and not just raped them, I mean

279
00:18:08,600 --> 00:18:10,680
Speaker 1: it was bad. It was like he raped them and

280
00:18:10,800 --> 00:18:13,360
Speaker 1: you know, abused them and held them for twenty four

281
00:18:13,400 --> 00:18:17,320
Speaker 1: hours and warehouses and took pictures and you know, awful stuff.

282
00:18:17,359 --> 00:18:19,919
Speaker 1: And then he gets out with a really light you know,

283
00:18:19,920 --> 00:18:22,800
Speaker 1: spend six years in jail in prison, and then he

284
00:18:22,840 --> 00:18:25,320
Speaker 1: gets out and gets a punt pension which is enough

285
00:18:25,400 --> 00:18:27,119
Speaker 1: to live on because he gets it both for him

286
00:18:27,119 --> 00:18:31,520
Speaker 1: and his wife. And then uh, they gave him a

287
00:18:31,520 --> 00:18:35,640
Speaker 1: bunch of for hypno and it's like okay, so now

288
00:18:35,680 --> 00:18:39,600
Speaker 1: he's he's collecting his for hypninal and he gets right

289
00:18:39,640 --> 00:18:42,760
Speaker 1: back into the game. He starts uh stealing again, getting

290
00:18:42,760 --> 00:18:46,640
Speaker 1: involved in the criminal networks and Charle Wau and then

291
00:18:46,680 --> 00:18:50,560
Speaker 1: he gets you know, called out a few times for

292
00:18:51,600 --> 00:18:55,919
Speaker 1: he was molesting girls at like ice ice rinks. Um.

293
00:18:55,960 --> 00:18:58,680
Speaker 1: You know, he got caught for that as well, you know. Uh.

294
00:18:59,000 --> 00:19:02,680
Speaker 1: And he then at that time started going to Slovakia

295
00:19:02,800 --> 00:19:06,600
Speaker 1: as well, Uh, Slovakia and Eastern Europe. And I think

296
00:19:06,600 --> 00:19:10,320
Speaker 1: he had thoughts that he could do good, you know,

297
00:19:10,400 --> 00:19:16,120
Speaker 1: dodgy illegal things between Slovakia and and Belgium involving probably

298
00:19:16,240 --> 00:19:20,240
Speaker 1: human trafficking. Um. And it's known and he was known

299
00:19:20,280 --> 00:19:22,880
Speaker 1: that he did rape at least two victims in Slovakia

300
00:19:23,640 --> 00:19:29,040
Speaker 1: and he actually had to um girls who visited him

301
00:19:29,440 --> 00:19:32,440
Speaker 1: in Belgium with his wife, you know, almost like as

302
00:19:32,440 --> 00:19:38,320
Speaker 1: exchange student type of things, and he raped them too, um.

303
00:19:38,400 --> 00:19:42,399
Speaker 1: And he he drugged them and raped them. And in fact,

304
00:19:42,440 --> 00:19:45,000
Speaker 1: one of the victims never knew she was raped until

305
00:19:45,280 --> 00:19:48,560
Speaker 1: after he was arrested the second time, and they found

306
00:19:48,560 --> 00:19:51,399
Speaker 1: a cassette of him raping her. So he was a

307
00:19:51,560 --> 00:19:55,359
Speaker 1: he was a real piece of ship, uh, this guy.

308
00:19:55,520 --> 00:20:01,000
Speaker 1: And he then what was started started putting together his

309
00:20:01,119 --> 00:20:05,200
Speaker 1: plans for his next big crime spreef or or or

310
00:20:05,320 --> 00:20:09,920
Speaker 1: sexual crime spree if you will. This is again this

311
00:20:10,000 --> 00:20:14,639
Speaker 1: is incredibly dark and disturbing stuff. But folks listening along

312
00:20:14,680 --> 00:20:19,359
Speaker 1: at home believe it or not. This is only the

313
00:20:19,440 --> 00:20:24,840
Speaker 1: beginning of the larger story. And one thing that you

314
00:20:24,960 --> 00:20:30,720
Speaker 1: point out there, Matt is not just his activities going

315
00:20:30,760 --> 00:20:35,119
Speaker 1: abroad regarding the abuse of children, but he was still

316
00:20:35,160 --> 00:20:39,040
Speaker 1: doing the petty crime you described throughout this period as well,

317
00:20:39,600 --> 00:20:44,160
Speaker 1: which we mentioned in no way are we drawing an

318
00:20:44,160 --> 00:20:48,119
Speaker 1: equivalency between the gravity of those uh those crimes. We

319
00:20:48,240 --> 00:20:54,240
Speaker 1: mentioned this because it is further evidence that someone at

320
00:20:54,280 --> 00:20:58,760
Speaker 1: the very least dropped the ball in in the course

321
00:20:58,880 --> 00:21:04,399
Speaker 1: of this investigation and when when Matt, Frederick and I

322
00:21:04,600 --> 00:21:09,000
Speaker 1: were getting familiarized with this. Of course, you know we

323
00:21:09,160 --> 00:21:14,679
Speaker 1: are not Belgian legal experts, right, We don't know, We

324
00:21:14,720 --> 00:21:18,880
Speaker 1: don't know the Belgian justice system. But it does seem

325
00:21:18,920 --> 00:21:23,680
Speaker 1: astonishing just from the outside looking in that someone could

326
00:21:23,800 --> 00:21:31,000
Speaker 1: commit any sort of crime at such regular intervals, right,

327
00:21:31,480 --> 00:21:35,320
Speaker 1: let alone sexual abuse, torture and kidnapping and you know,

328
00:21:35,520 --> 00:21:42,159
Speaker 1: later murder. It seems astonishing that someone could continually go

329
00:21:42,520 --> 00:21:46,160
Speaker 1: through the system and then come back out. And one

330
00:21:46,200 --> 00:21:48,719
Speaker 1: thing you point out in the Monster is that he

331
00:21:49,400 --> 00:21:53,959
Speaker 1: Detroit Detroit is the pension he and his wife were

332
00:21:54,000 --> 00:21:59,000
Speaker 1: receiving at this point is higher than the average Belgian

333
00:21:59,119 --> 00:22:03,720
Speaker 1: salary at that time. Yeah. So here's a guy who's

334
00:22:03,880 --> 00:22:06,280
Speaker 1: on pension now and then he sets about buying houses.

335
00:22:06,760 --> 00:22:10,000
Speaker 1: He was a clever person. He likes to think he's

336
00:22:10,000 --> 00:22:15,840
Speaker 1: in a super intelligent person. Maybe he's, you know, decently intelligent,

337
00:22:15,840 --> 00:22:19,679
Speaker 1: but he's very clever. He's very crafty and manipulative. He

338
00:22:19,800 --> 00:22:23,720
Speaker 1: ended up on this state pension together with his petty crimes,

339
00:22:24,119 --> 00:22:28,000
Speaker 1: buying five different properties. He bought these run down, shitty

340
00:22:28,040 --> 00:22:31,520
Speaker 1: houses and then he would become a slum lowered and

341
00:22:31,520 --> 00:22:34,840
Speaker 1: rent him out to people. Um. So he built up

342
00:22:34,880 --> 00:22:38,719
Speaker 1: a whole sort of life despite having already you know,

343
00:22:39,080 --> 00:22:40,439
Speaker 1: I think about it. You got you got a guy

344
00:22:40,440 --> 00:22:42,760
Speaker 1: who rapes five kids, gets thrown in jail for six years,

345
00:22:42,840 --> 00:22:45,199
Speaker 1: comes out and start buying houses. And he didn't have

346
00:22:45,240 --> 00:22:47,879
Speaker 1: any money from to start with. He didn't inherit any money,

347
00:22:47,960 --> 00:22:51,919
Speaker 1: this guy. Um, and then you talk about dropping balls.

348
00:22:51,920 --> 00:22:56,639
Speaker 1: Well that's where this gets really really crazy, right, So

349
00:22:56,720 --> 00:22:59,840
Speaker 1: we only talked about the first crime spree. The second

350
00:23:00,080 --> 00:23:03,040
Speaker 1: rhyme spree is what we're covering in the most and

351
00:23:03,119 --> 00:23:07,200
Speaker 1: there we have starts with the disappearance of two girls, um,

352
00:23:07,240 --> 00:23:11,159
Speaker 1: and then uh, there's more disappearances and then more and

353
00:23:11,200 --> 00:23:15,840
Speaker 1: then another one Um. And the crazy thing about this

354
00:23:16,000 --> 00:23:21,000
Speaker 1: is just so crazy, is that these parents were so

355
00:23:21,160 --> 00:23:25,159
Speaker 1: convinced that their kids were still alive. Now, most parents

356
00:23:25,240 --> 00:23:27,960
Speaker 1: usually are they don't want to give up. But these

357
00:23:28,040 --> 00:23:31,800
Speaker 1: particular parents of the first two victims, Julie and Melissa

358
00:23:31,840 --> 00:23:35,400
Speaker 1: were their names. They were eight year old girls who disappeared.

359
00:23:35,440 --> 00:23:39,480
Speaker 1: They were only away from their mother for fifteen minutes.

360
00:23:39,960 --> 00:23:44,159
Speaker 1: They wandered off for fifteen minutes and wound up being abducted, abducted,

361
00:23:44,680 --> 00:23:46,639
Speaker 1: and you know, it was like it was a small

362
00:23:46,760 --> 00:23:48,160
Speaker 1: you know, it was not that big of a deal.

363
00:23:48,240 --> 00:23:53,040
Speaker 1: Wasn't a national story. You got two missing girls, right, So, Um.

364
00:23:53,160 --> 00:23:56,239
Speaker 1: The thing is though, and they did a campaign. They

365
00:23:56,280 --> 00:23:59,840
Speaker 1: never gave up with their campaign, and for fourteen months,

366
00:24:00,080 --> 00:24:03,560
Speaker 1: fourteen months they they they were still in the media,

367
00:24:03,720 --> 00:24:08,359
Speaker 1: still fighting, and police and justice sort of abandoned this family.

368
00:24:08,800 --> 00:24:13,480
Speaker 1: And all that time, all that time, police is number

369
00:24:13,520 --> 00:24:17,200
Speaker 1: one suspect. After two weeks after the girls went missing,

370
00:24:17,680 --> 00:24:22,080
Speaker 1: was marked the true And then this whole thing becomes

371
00:24:22,640 --> 00:24:27,600
Speaker 1: really like very It's it's hard. I mean, if balls

372
00:24:27,640 --> 00:24:30,400
Speaker 1: can be dropped at that level, then this is the

373
00:24:30,440 --> 00:24:33,359
Speaker 1: you know, ultimate ball drop in the history of police work.

374
00:24:33,800 --> 00:24:38,640
Speaker 1: But it's so blatantly awful that you think maybe there's

375
00:24:38,640 --> 00:24:41,280
Speaker 1: a reason they didn't want to find him. I think

376
00:24:41,320 --> 00:24:43,159
Speaker 1: we need to arm our listeners with a little bit

377
00:24:43,200 --> 00:24:46,879
Speaker 1: of context around the police or the authorities at that time.

378
00:24:47,000 --> 00:24:50,359
Speaker 1: Matt Um, just tell us really quickly, what is the

379
00:24:50,520 --> 00:24:54,159
Speaker 1: gender marie and how does that different from the local

380
00:24:54,200 --> 00:24:57,640
Speaker 1: police force. Yeah, so in in Belgium at the time,

381
00:24:57,680 --> 00:25:01,320
Speaker 1: you had technically three police forces. You have the municipal police,

382
00:25:01,800 --> 00:25:04,719
Speaker 1: you had them the judicial police, and then you had

383
00:25:04,720 --> 00:25:08,960
Speaker 1: the Gendarmerie, which was like our FBI, and the judicial police,

384
00:25:08,960 --> 00:25:12,199
Speaker 1: which is like sort of a big national police, but

385
00:25:12,359 --> 00:25:16,280
Speaker 1: separate than the separate from the FBI. Uh. The Gendarmerie

386
00:25:16,520 --> 00:25:20,160
Speaker 1: is a military structure, so um. You know, the heads

387
00:25:20,200 --> 00:25:24,640
Speaker 1: of the genemie were colonels and whatever generals or whatever, um,

388
00:25:24,720 --> 00:25:28,560
Speaker 1: and so you had and you definitely had a backdrop

389
00:25:28,640 --> 00:25:32,920
Speaker 1: of strong rivalry between jurisdictions, and so the genre marie,

390
00:25:33,600 --> 00:25:37,439
Speaker 1: we're constantly trying to undermine the judicial police and vice versa.

391
00:25:38,080 --> 00:25:41,840
Speaker 1: And so you know what kind of happened here is

392
00:25:41,920 --> 00:25:45,240
Speaker 1: that the Gendarmerie were the ones who kind of started

393
00:25:45,280 --> 00:25:47,640
Speaker 1: picking up on the true as a possible suspect here

394
00:25:48,480 --> 00:25:52,360
Speaker 1: and what they did is they went off in secret

395
00:25:53,080 --> 00:25:57,560
Speaker 1: and decided to start trying to surveil him and and

396
00:25:57,760 --> 00:26:01,240
Speaker 1: to do their own little secret operation normal Lee. They

397
00:26:01,320 --> 00:26:04,639
Speaker 1: needed to ask for a warrant and to and to

398
00:26:04,760 --> 00:26:06,679
Speaker 1: do that you have to go to a judge, and

399
00:26:06,760 --> 00:26:10,199
Speaker 1: that judge works with the judicial police, not the gendamerie, right,

400
00:26:10,240 --> 00:26:13,480
Speaker 1: so the gean Marie. Uh didn't want to give up

401
00:26:13,720 --> 00:26:15,520
Speaker 1: the scoop, if you will. They wanted to be the

402
00:26:15,520 --> 00:26:17,960
Speaker 1: guys who caught or a lot of people think they

403
00:26:18,000 --> 00:26:20,399
Speaker 1: wanted to be the guys who caught these girls because

404
00:26:20,400 --> 00:26:23,040
Speaker 1: they're these girls. Faces were plastered all over the media,

405
00:26:23,600 --> 00:26:26,359
Speaker 1: and you know, suddenly they've caught on to market the

406
00:26:26,400 --> 00:26:29,600
Speaker 1: true as a possible suspect. But they never arrest him.

407
00:26:29,960 --> 00:26:33,080
Speaker 1: They never arrest the guy I'm talking fourteen months later

408
00:26:33,480 --> 00:26:36,720
Speaker 1: their bodies were found, those two girls two weeks after

409
00:26:36,800 --> 00:26:40,080
Speaker 1: they disappeared. He was already a suspect, and then a

410
00:26:40,119 --> 00:26:43,679
Speaker 1: month after that he was their number one suspect. And

411
00:26:43,680 --> 00:26:47,000
Speaker 1: and they never issued a warrant, they never did a search,

412
00:26:47,680 --> 00:26:51,880
Speaker 1: they never did anything. And it's just it's just mind boggling.

413
00:26:51,960 --> 00:26:55,840
Speaker 1: It's mind boggling, Yeah, it is, Uh And and the

414
00:26:55,920 --> 00:27:01,560
Speaker 1: idea of jurisdictional turf wars makes sense. That's that's a

415
00:27:01,680 --> 00:27:07,720
Speaker 1: very real thing. But also we have to, you know,

416
00:27:07,800 --> 00:27:13,679
Speaker 1: we have to objectively ask ourselves some really difficult questions

417
00:27:13,760 --> 00:27:17,080
Speaker 1: when we talk about what what you describe as the

418
00:27:17,119 --> 00:27:21,239
Speaker 1: biggest ball drop in the in the history of policing. Um,

419
00:27:22,119 --> 00:27:26,320
Speaker 1: I tend to agree, and it's it's quite understandable, even

420
00:27:26,359 --> 00:27:28,920
Speaker 1: if you consider yourself a died in the wool skeptic,

421
00:27:29,040 --> 00:27:32,720
Speaker 1: it is quite understandable how so many members of the

422
00:27:32,760 --> 00:27:37,280
Speaker 1: Belgian public would begin to suspect that there was something

423
00:27:37,400 --> 00:27:44,760
Speaker 1: beyond incompetence that could explain some of the missing steps

424
00:27:44,800 --> 00:27:49,040
Speaker 1: in these investigations. And what what you're saying now here

425
00:27:49,640 --> 00:27:55,840
Speaker 1: about the jurisdictional police relationship with with justices, it makes

426
00:27:55,880 --> 00:28:00,160
Speaker 1: me wonder without sounding too conspiratorial, hopefully it may makes

427
00:28:00,200 --> 00:28:05,440
Speaker 1: me wonder whether the Jenda Marie was concerned that they

428
00:28:05,440 --> 00:28:08,840
Speaker 1: would get shut down by the judges if they asked

429
00:28:08,840 --> 00:28:12,000
Speaker 1: for a warrant. Would you say that would is that

430
00:28:12,000 --> 00:28:16,520
Speaker 1: a possible motivation for them. It's very interesting that you're

431
00:28:16,560 --> 00:28:21,720
Speaker 1: asking that question, because what they ended up doing was

432
00:28:21,800 --> 00:28:26,360
Speaker 1: this state did this stupid surveillance operations so they think

433
00:28:26,400 --> 00:28:30,240
Speaker 1: the true could be involved, and so they do this

434
00:28:30,320 --> 00:28:34,919
Speaker 1: secret literally secret Operation a Fellow they called it. And

435
00:28:34,960 --> 00:28:38,320
Speaker 1: they started surveiling his house, but only during daylight hours,

436
00:28:38,360 --> 00:28:41,640
Speaker 1: which is odd, um, and they were filming it and

437
00:28:41,720 --> 00:28:45,240
Speaker 1: they were taking you know, uh, license plate numbers of

438
00:28:45,240 --> 00:28:47,040
Speaker 1: people driving it out of the neighborhood and that kind

439
00:28:47,040 --> 00:28:52,040
Speaker 1: of stuff. But it's sort of the next logical step

440
00:28:52,120 --> 00:28:54,520
Speaker 1: would be you have to do a warrant or make

441
00:28:54,560 --> 00:28:58,560
Speaker 1: an arrest or something, but you can't do that legally

442
00:28:58,560 --> 00:29:00,840
Speaker 1: without going to the judge. And as soon as you

443
00:29:00,880 --> 00:29:03,480
Speaker 1: go to the judge, the judge is going to say, Okay,

444
00:29:03,560 --> 00:29:06,440
Speaker 1: let's get the judicial police on this, right or you know,

445
00:29:07,000 --> 00:29:09,640
Speaker 1: or maybe okay, gendarme, you need to work together with

446
00:29:09,680 --> 00:29:11,760
Speaker 1: the judicial police and and and go in and do

447
00:29:11,840 --> 00:29:14,200
Speaker 1: this together. But they didn't want to do that. They

448
00:29:14,360 --> 00:29:16,960
Speaker 1: really wanted to keep it as their own. But keeping

449
00:29:16,960 --> 00:29:19,520
Speaker 1: it as their own made it such that they had

450
00:29:19,560 --> 00:29:22,520
Speaker 1: to keep it a secret. And so it gets so

451
00:29:22,680 --> 00:29:26,400
Speaker 1: ridiculous at some point after the surveillance, and it's one

452
00:29:26,400 --> 00:29:31,160
Speaker 1: of the saddest parts of the whole story is that, um,

453
00:29:31,320 --> 00:29:34,320
Speaker 1: they don't ever go into that house until the true

454
00:29:34,320 --> 00:29:37,960
Speaker 1: gets arrested for something else, He gets arrested for something else.

455
00:29:38,640 --> 00:29:41,640
Speaker 1: He gets arrested for some car theft thing. Okay, this

456
00:29:41,680 --> 00:29:44,200
Speaker 1: is in December. This is six months, seven months after

457
00:29:44,240 --> 00:29:47,920
Speaker 1: the girls disappeared. And only then did they go in

458
00:29:47,960 --> 00:29:50,360
Speaker 1: the house and guess what, they didn't do it with

459
00:29:50,400 --> 00:29:53,680
Speaker 1: a warrant to search for girls. They used the warrant

460
00:29:53,880 --> 00:29:57,440
Speaker 1: for this car theft thing, and they secretly went and

461
00:29:57,480 --> 00:30:00,400
Speaker 1: looked for the girls, apparently as they say they did it.

462
00:30:00,400 --> 00:30:03,320
Speaker 1: It's just so weird. It's like, Okay, you know, obviously

463
00:30:03,360 --> 00:30:05,520
Speaker 1: there's a warrant out for this guy because he was

464
00:30:05,560 --> 00:30:08,400
Speaker 1: involved in stealing cars, but they still they can't get

465
00:30:08,400 --> 00:30:12,560
Speaker 1: a warrant because he's possibly involved in kidnapping children. It's crazy.

466
00:30:12,640 --> 00:30:15,720
Speaker 1: It's just crazy. And we'll pause here for a word

467
00:30:15,760 --> 00:30:19,200
Speaker 1: from our sponsor before returning with more from Matt Graves.

468
00:30:25,960 --> 00:30:31,280
Speaker 1: And we've returned. What we're what we're seeing is, from

469
00:30:31,360 --> 00:30:36,200
Speaker 1: some perspectives, a a matter of tracing bread crumbs, right

470
00:30:36,280 --> 00:30:42,520
Speaker 1: with the benefit of retrospect when you're looking at the

471
00:30:42,760 --> 00:30:48,360
Speaker 1: ensuing investigation. Um we're talking about, you know how, maybe

472
00:30:48,400 --> 00:30:51,560
Speaker 1: there was a bit of shooting oneself in the foot

473
00:30:52,080 --> 00:30:57,360
Speaker 1: by having this secrecy right for whatever motivation. Um, let's

474
00:30:57,480 --> 00:31:02,680
Speaker 1: get to let's get to the moment where they do

475
00:31:03,280 --> 00:31:12,040
Speaker 1: find evidence that whether an OTHELLO or related related incidents.

476
00:31:12,440 --> 00:31:16,280
Speaker 1: Let's get to the moment where they do find evidence

477
00:31:16,400 --> 00:31:23,280
Speaker 1: that de Trourou has has been committing these crimes or

478
00:31:23,400 --> 00:31:28,320
Speaker 1: has been abducting and holding these victims. How do they

479
00:31:28,480 --> 00:31:32,320
Speaker 1: find this out? So we're we're in the we're in

480
00:31:32,400 --> 00:31:36,880
Speaker 1: the house were one of the properties. We have the

481
00:31:37,320 --> 00:31:40,880
Speaker 1: we have to go ahead to look into uh, car

482
00:31:41,040 --> 00:31:45,600
Speaker 1: theft or you know, auto related crimes. But we're we're

483
00:31:45,720 --> 00:31:48,920
Speaker 1: using that as a cover to figure out what's going

484
00:31:49,000 --> 00:31:55,760
Speaker 1: on with this wave of abductions and torture. How do

485
00:31:55,840 --> 00:31:59,040
Speaker 1: they break the case? Well, what happens is that the

486
00:31:59,080 --> 00:32:03,000
Speaker 1: gendarmes don't break it on their own. Um. And and

487
00:32:03,040 --> 00:32:05,840
Speaker 1: that's always that That's why this is so mysterious, because

488
00:32:05,960 --> 00:32:08,400
Speaker 1: when you look at it, you could say, Okay, this

489
00:32:08,440 --> 00:32:10,560
Speaker 1: isn't that hard to understand. These guys wanted to be

490
00:32:10,600 --> 00:32:13,480
Speaker 1: the Knights insurance shining armor, right, I mean, these poor

491
00:32:13,560 --> 00:32:16,480
Speaker 1: cute little girls, Julia Molliss had been missing. It was

492
00:32:16,600 --> 00:32:20,720
Speaker 1: highly televised and people were you know, everyone felt concerned

493
00:32:21,240 --> 00:32:24,600
Speaker 1: and they didn't want the judicial police to make the rest.

494
00:32:24,720 --> 00:32:26,680
Speaker 1: They wanted to go make the arrest. That would have

495
00:32:26,720 --> 00:32:29,480
Speaker 1: been all logical. The part that gets illogical as they

496
00:32:29,600 --> 00:32:31,920
Speaker 1: never made the arrest, and so the only way the

497
00:32:32,000 --> 00:32:36,080
Speaker 1: arrest was made was afterwards they were they were forced

498
00:32:36,120 --> 00:32:39,440
Speaker 1: to make an arrest because there was the last victim,

499
00:32:39,880 --> 00:32:43,120
Speaker 1: Leticia de Liz went missing and she was a fourteen

500
00:32:43,160 --> 00:32:45,520
Speaker 1: year old girl and she was abducted in a place

501
00:32:45,520 --> 00:32:48,240
Speaker 1: called Bertri, which is in the south of Belgium, in

502
00:32:48,280 --> 00:32:52,880
Speaker 1: the Ardennes region, beautiful region. And um, there were a

503
00:32:52,880 --> 00:32:55,760
Speaker 1: couple of witnesses who noticed a few things, one of

504
00:32:55,760 --> 00:32:58,360
Speaker 1: which was this dirty white van. I mean it sounds

505
00:32:58,440 --> 00:33:01,960
Speaker 1: like stereotypical. I mean there they were in a dirty

506
00:33:02,000 --> 00:33:05,040
Speaker 1: white van, you know. Um. And and then there was

507
00:33:05,080 --> 00:33:10,520
Speaker 1: another witness who who was actually a sister in the order, um,

508
00:33:10,720 --> 00:33:15,000
Speaker 1: a sister at a Catholic church, who also saw that van.

509
00:33:15,240 --> 00:33:17,080
Speaker 1: And the police sort of zeroed in on that, and

510
00:33:17,120 --> 00:33:20,800
Speaker 1: they had this in what you call a king's prosecutor.

511
00:33:21,200 --> 00:33:25,280
Speaker 1: The Belgium isn't monarchy, and so a high level prosecutor

512
00:33:25,400 --> 00:33:28,640
Speaker 1: are are called the crown prosecutor or a king's prosecutor.

513
00:33:29,080 --> 00:33:32,680
Speaker 1: And this particular prosecutor had the jurisdiction over this area

514
00:33:32,720 --> 00:33:36,000
Speaker 1: where this girl had disappeared. And he just happens to

515
00:33:36,040 --> 00:33:41,719
Speaker 1: be this wildly incredible individual who just jumped on it immediately,

516
00:33:41,800 --> 00:33:44,440
Speaker 1: Unlike a lot of the other paper pushing kind of people.

517
00:33:44,840 --> 00:33:47,360
Speaker 1: He just was like, oh was this girl went missing?

518
00:33:47,560 --> 00:33:49,440
Speaker 1: And he got in his car and drove to this

519
00:33:49,680 --> 00:33:52,920
Speaker 1: you know, drove to the town and started running a

520
00:33:52,920 --> 00:33:57,040
Speaker 1: police operation basically um and and basically you know through

521
00:33:57,160 --> 00:34:00,040
Speaker 1: him and his investigating judge that he you know, in

522
00:34:00,080 --> 00:34:02,040
Speaker 1: Belgium you have to have an investigating judge. When you're

523
00:34:02,080 --> 00:34:05,200
Speaker 1: gonna go do something serious and start asking for warrants

524
00:34:05,200 --> 00:34:07,520
Speaker 1: and all that, you needed judge behind you. And so

525
00:34:07,600 --> 00:34:11,040
Speaker 1: he got his judge, this guy named Conrad so Boulet

526
00:34:11,160 --> 00:34:13,400
Speaker 1: is the is the famous prosecutor, and Conrad is the

527
00:34:13,440 --> 00:34:16,520
Speaker 1: famous judge. And these guys just went whole hog and

528
00:34:16,560 --> 00:34:21,000
Speaker 1: they found the true and they arrested him and they

529
00:34:21,040 --> 00:34:22,920
Speaker 1: got it through a license plate, and they did a

530
00:34:22,920 --> 00:34:24,920
Speaker 1: bunch of work. It wasn't easy. They had to They

531
00:34:24,960 --> 00:34:26,640
Speaker 1: really had to do a bunch of police work to

532
00:34:26,719 --> 00:34:29,680
Speaker 1: get to find him. Right, because there was these two

533
00:34:29,760 --> 00:34:34,000
Speaker 1: witnesses who witnessed them and is strangely, this second witness,

534
00:34:34,200 --> 00:34:38,040
Speaker 1: this young man, he remembered the first three letters of

535
00:34:38,080 --> 00:34:41,040
Speaker 1: this license plate and the make and model of that fan.

536
00:34:41,400 --> 00:34:43,520
Speaker 1: And he did because A he was kind of an

537
00:34:43,560 --> 00:34:47,600
Speaker 1: engineering kid who loved to like memorize things and be

538
00:34:48,160 --> 00:34:51,200
Speaker 1: and he's an engineer today, by the way, um and

539
00:34:51,280 --> 00:34:55,000
Speaker 1: be is that he uh, he was afraid that this

540
00:34:55,040 --> 00:34:57,880
Speaker 1: crappy looking van parked in the street might try to

541
00:34:57,920 --> 00:34:59,880
Speaker 1: steal his bike or something, so he's like made him

542
00:34:59,880 --> 00:35:02,279
Speaker 1: in the note, I'll remember that license plate. And then

543
00:35:03,200 --> 00:35:06,080
Speaker 1: it only came up really by chance. It was literally

544
00:35:06,320 --> 00:35:10,040
Speaker 1: by chance, because they were interviewing everyone canvassing the area

545
00:35:10,520 --> 00:35:13,719
Speaker 1: and someone said, oh, well, you know, and then he

546
00:35:13,880 --> 00:35:18,000
Speaker 1: was the boyfriend of someone who knew the sister, and

547
00:35:18,000 --> 00:35:20,960
Speaker 1: it was almost random that they interviewed this guy and

548
00:35:21,000 --> 00:35:23,480
Speaker 1: they thought he had seen someone and he was like, no, no,

549
00:35:23,640 --> 00:35:26,000
Speaker 1: didn't see anyone. Didn't see anyone, and only a sort

550
00:35:26,000 --> 00:35:27,680
Speaker 1: of in the middle of the interview and they said,

551
00:35:27,760 --> 00:35:30,359
Speaker 1: is there anything else that you saw? He was like, oh, yeah,

552
00:35:30,400 --> 00:35:31,839
Speaker 1: I did see this van. It was a little weird.

553
00:35:31,840 --> 00:35:35,080
Speaker 1: I thought they were gonna steal my bike. Ah. And oh,

554
00:35:35,120 --> 00:35:37,400
Speaker 1: by the way, I know the license plate number, damn.

555
00:35:37,640 --> 00:35:39,319
Speaker 1: And then they did the search and then they got

556
00:35:39,400 --> 00:35:42,000
Speaker 1: seventy seven hits, and then they narrowed it down and

557
00:35:42,040 --> 00:35:45,440
Speaker 1: then they pops up to Truth's name. And of course,

558
00:35:45,480 --> 00:35:48,560
Speaker 1: you know, now you've got the John Darmes can't control

559
00:35:48,600 --> 00:35:52,279
Speaker 1: this anymore because you've got an investigating judge and the

560
00:35:52,360 --> 00:35:55,200
Speaker 1: King's prosecutor on the case. Right, So this these guys

561
00:35:55,200 --> 00:35:57,560
Speaker 1: are like, who the hell is this guy? And then

562
00:35:57,600 --> 00:36:00,799
Speaker 1: they look into the files and they're like, oh my god, Yeah,

563
00:36:00,840 --> 00:36:04,560
Speaker 1: this is guy's a he's awful. He's raped, you know,

564
00:36:05,080 --> 00:36:07,760
Speaker 1: five kids and went to jail for it, and he's

565
00:36:07,800 --> 00:36:11,920
Speaker 1: been you know, there's multiple leads that he's building basements

566
00:36:11,920 --> 00:36:13,840
Speaker 1: and his seller. Let's go get this guy. You know,

567
00:36:13,920 --> 00:36:17,640
Speaker 1: That's what happened. And and so the gendarmer he didn't

568
00:36:17,640 --> 00:36:20,840
Speaker 1: do it on their own. They they they almost didn't

569
00:36:20,840 --> 00:36:24,120
Speaker 1: want to do it, you think, actually, and somehow they

570
00:36:24,120 --> 00:36:26,719
Speaker 1: got undermined by the by the investigating judge and the

571
00:36:27,000 --> 00:36:32,040
Speaker 1: and the prosecutor. Well, let's talk about the consequences that

572
00:36:32,040 --> 00:36:35,360
Speaker 1: that occur, because the Gen. D. Murray kind of slows

573
00:36:35,400 --> 00:36:38,560
Speaker 1: their role for some reason early on in the investigation.

574
00:36:39,520 --> 00:36:41,160
Speaker 1: Let's talk about and and Fa and some of the

575
00:36:41,160 --> 00:36:44,399
Speaker 1: other victims, because if many more victims were picked up

576
00:36:44,440 --> 00:36:47,759
Speaker 1: after they knew the true was the guy, or at

577
00:36:47,840 --> 00:36:51,839
Speaker 1: least had deep suspicion. Yeah, and that's that's the real

578
00:36:51,960 --> 00:36:54,359
Speaker 1: sad part of this story, is that you know he's

579
00:36:54,360 --> 00:36:57,719
Speaker 1: their number one suspect. But after that, he went and

580
00:36:57,800 --> 00:37:03,040
Speaker 1: kidnapped to teenage girls on the Belgian seaside, seventeen and

581
00:37:03,120 --> 00:37:07,279
Speaker 1: eighteen year old Anne Martial and if Lambres come from

582
00:37:07,280 --> 00:37:10,760
Speaker 1: the Flemish side of the country, so speaking a different language,

583
00:37:11,480 --> 00:37:14,520
Speaker 1: Flemish is like Dutch. And then in the south where

584
00:37:14,800 --> 00:37:20,200
Speaker 1: Julie Melissa disappeared as the French speaking region and um

585
00:37:20,239 --> 00:37:25,319
Speaker 1: then uh, he kidnapped two more girls, um and and

586
00:37:25,360 --> 00:37:28,319
Speaker 1: these were both French speaking girls. But you think about it,

587
00:37:28,400 --> 00:37:31,719
Speaker 1: like all four of those, you know, should never have

588
00:37:31,760 --> 00:37:35,400
Speaker 1: really been kidnapped, because he should have been investigated, and

589
00:37:35,560 --> 00:37:38,520
Speaker 1: if he would have been investigated properly, they certainly would

590
00:37:38,520 --> 00:37:41,680
Speaker 1: have found Julian Melissa his first two victims, because this

591
00:37:41,760 --> 00:37:44,520
Speaker 1: is where the story gets really dark. But he built

592
00:37:44,960 --> 00:37:48,399
Speaker 1: a seller, He built a dungeon in his basement where

593
00:37:48,400 --> 00:37:51,520
Speaker 1: he kept these eight year old girls, and he kept

594
00:37:51,560 --> 00:37:56,320
Speaker 1: them there locked up in a dark, damp, tiny room,

595
00:37:56,440 --> 00:38:00,880
Speaker 1: and um, he would take them out every once in

596
00:38:00,920 --> 00:38:03,640
Speaker 1: a while and abuse them and put them back in. Um.

597
00:38:04,120 --> 00:38:11,040
Speaker 1: And it's it's the saddest story you'll almost ever come across, because, um,

598
00:38:11,160 --> 00:38:15,640
Speaker 1: what happens to those two girls is when he's arrested, okay,

599
00:38:15,680 --> 00:38:19,560
Speaker 1: for a car theft, they're still there. And now they're

600
00:38:19,560 --> 00:38:23,400
Speaker 1: in an empty house and it's December in Belgium. It's cold,

601
00:38:24,200 --> 00:38:28,200
Speaker 1: and it's damp, and it's dark, and the true is

602
00:38:28,239 --> 00:38:32,640
Speaker 1: not there, and no one's there except for the stupid

603
00:38:32,680 --> 00:38:36,640
Speaker 1: ass gendarmes who are still, you know, trying to surveil

604
00:38:36,760 --> 00:38:40,359
Speaker 1: him somehow, and go look at his house and and

605
00:38:40,440 --> 00:38:43,000
Speaker 1: you know, we think that most likely those girls were

606
00:38:43,000 --> 00:38:45,480
Speaker 1: sitting there when they went in and did that search

607
00:38:45,840 --> 00:38:48,719
Speaker 1: that they were faking. You know, they were pretending to

608
00:38:48,760 --> 00:38:51,439
Speaker 1: be searching for car stuff, but they were supposably looking

609
00:38:51,480 --> 00:38:55,080
Speaker 1: for little girls. And you know, underneath their noses were

610
00:38:55,080 --> 00:38:59,160
Speaker 1: these two little girls in this basement, starving to death.

611
00:38:59,760 --> 00:39:02,439
Speaker 1: And and you know, it even gets worse in that

612
00:39:03,560 --> 00:39:06,440
Speaker 1: while they're down there in the basement looking and this

613
00:39:06,480 --> 00:39:10,319
Speaker 1: guy Michaux, the John Darmos in charge, knew he was

614
00:39:10,360 --> 00:39:13,920
Speaker 1: looking for girls. Knew he was looking for Julian Melissa.

615
00:39:14,520 --> 00:39:17,400
Speaker 1: And he's there with a locksmith. And the locksmith is

616
00:39:17,440 --> 00:39:19,640
Speaker 1: there to open doors and do things that you need

617
00:39:19,680 --> 00:39:22,320
Speaker 1: to do when you're doing it, you know, a search.

618
00:39:22,680 --> 00:39:25,120
Speaker 1: And the locksmith has no idea why he's there. He's

619
00:39:25,160 --> 00:39:27,719
Speaker 1: just there with the police, right, it's not his business. So,

620
00:39:28,520 --> 00:39:31,120
Speaker 1: but there's voices they hear a little. The locksmith is

621
00:39:31,120 --> 00:39:34,200
Speaker 1: sure he heard little voices and he heard this whispering

622
00:39:34,320 --> 00:39:37,920
Speaker 1: voice sound and he's like, white stop and and and

623
00:39:38,000 --> 00:39:43,719
Speaker 1: basically this this John Darme says, shut up to everybody, uh,

624
00:39:43,760 --> 00:39:47,120
Speaker 1: and then the voices stopped right. And afterwards, when you

625
00:39:47,200 --> 00:39:48,839
Speaker 1: learn what happened to these girls and how they were

626
00:39:48,920 --> 00:39:51,080
Speaker 1: manipulated and how the true told him a story, how

627
00:39:51,160 --> 00:39:53,480
Speaker 1: they were bad people coming to get them and he

628
00:39:53,520 --> 00:39:56,440
Speaker 1: was actually protecting them, you understand that if they heard that,

629
00:39:56,520 --> 00:39:58,600
Speaker 1: they were like, oh, very quiet, the bad people and

630
00:39:58,680 --> 00:40:01,880
Speaker 1: maybe here, and so they were really quiet, and then

631
00:40:03,000 --> 00:40:07,200
Speaker 1: they didn't find them, um, and so they left the house.

632
00:40:07,400 --> 00:40:10,680
Speaker 1: And and afterwards, you know, under oath at the court

633
00:40:10,719 --> 00:40:13,840
Speaker 1: of the proceedings, this this locksmith, you know, he said,

634
00:40:14,400 --> 00:40:16,920
Speaker 1: I don't know anyone if they would have known that

635
00:40:16,960 --> 00:40:18,799
Speaker 1: they were looking for girls, which I did not at

636
00:40:18,800 --> 00:40:21,000
Speaker 1: the time. I don't know anyone who would have left

637
00:40:21,000 --> 00:40:25,400
Speaker 1: that house without tearing it to pieces. Um And you know,

638
00:40:25,440 --> 00:40:27,560
Speaker 1: it's just another one of those things. It's just another

639
00:40:27,600 --> 00:40:30,720
Speaker 1: one of this story. And believe me, we've only gotten

640
00:40:31,040 --> 00:40:33,760
Speaker 1: to a little tip of the iceberg here. This story

641
00:40:33,880 --> 00:40:38,120
Speaker 1: keeps going. This story goes and it goes and it

642
00:40:38,200 --> 00:40:42,560
Speaker 1: and it has almost every thing that you can imagine. Um,

643
00:40:42,800 --> 00:40:45,160
Speaker 1: I don't want to. I've got there. There's there. There's

644
00:40:45,239 --> 00:40:50,000
Speaker 1: parts of it where it gets so crazy that it's

645
00:40:50,040 --> 00:40:53,080
Speaker 1: not just crazy police stuff. The story just gets crazier

646
00:40:53,600 --> 00:40:58,200
Speaker 1: on many levels. Um. And and around episode nine, it's

647
00:40:58,239 --> 00:41:00,160
Speaker 1: going to take a big turn that people are going

648
00:41:00,200 --> 00:41:02,000
Speaker 1: to be like, what, that's the last thing in the

649
00:41:02,040 --> 00:41:04,880
Speaker 1: world that they were going to be expecting and it happened,

650
00:41:04,920 --> 00:41:08,120
Speaker 1: and it's all true. It's just all true. That's why

651
00:41:08,160 --> 00:41:11,319
Speaker 1: I did this. I started this being suspicious. I I

652
00:41:11,400 --> 00:41:15,400
Speaker 1: hate conspiracy theories. I'm not a conspiracy theorist, and I thought, oh,

653
00:41:15,520 --> 00:41:18,040
Speaker 1: this was just incompetence. And but it's an incredible story,

654
00:41:18,040 --> 00:41:20,440
Speaker 1: you know, because it almost led to the demise of

655
00:41:20,480 --> 00:41:23,919
Speaker 1: the entire country. Actually the biggest protest in the history

656
00:41:23,960 --> 00:41:27,799
Speaker 1: of this country. Um. But but you know, when I

657
00:41:27,840 --> 00:41:30,680
Speaker 1: came into it, I was very skeptical. But now I'm like,

658
00:41:30,719 --> 00:41:34,000
Speaker 1: oh my god, something something was going on there, Something

659
00:41:34,120 --> 00:41:39,880
Speaker 1: was going on. Right, It's unusual for a criminal investigation

660
00:41:41,520 --> 00:41:46,000
Speaker 1: to lead to things like the judge being kicked off

661
00:41:46,040 --> 00:41:50,960
Speaker 1: of a case, ministers resigning, hundreds of thousands of people

662
00:41:51,160 --> 00:41:55,560
Speaker 1: marching in the streets. Uh. And this maybe we talk

663
00:41:55,760 --> 00:41:59,440
Speaker 1: a little bit about this because we don't look, folks

664
00:41:59,680 --> 00:42:03,680
Speaker 1: fell conspiracy realists listening along at home. There is excellent,

665
00:42:04,400 --> 00:42:08,600
Speaker 1: excellent research in this show. And again it is. It

666
00:42:08,760 --> 00:42:11,880
Speaker 1: is disturbing, but as you said, Matt, it is also

667
00:42:13,120 --> 00:42:17,759
Speaker 1: undeniably true. The facts are there. One thing I think

668
00:42:17,800 --> 00:42:20,719
Speaker 1: we could we could talk about a little bit is

669
00:42:22,160 --> 00:42:28,440
Speaker 1: maybe we can We're mentioning some of the missed opportunities

670
00:42:28,520 --> 00:42:31,680
Speaker 1: and investigation and I'm being very diplomatic calling them that.

671
00:42:32,400 --> 00:42:38,440
Speaker 1: But let's let's also go back to the first judge.

672
00:42:38,600 --> 00:42:41,680
Speaker 1: You called him the famous judge, right this Uh, this

673
00:42:41,719 --> 00:42:44,839
Speaker 1: one comes up when people are learning about the story.

674
00:42:44,880 --> 00:42:48,880
Speaker 1: But he's not the only judge because he was dismissed

675
00:42:48,960 --> 00:42:53,600
Speaker 1: from the case due to a conflict of interest. Could

676
00:42:53,600 --> 00:42:56,680
Speaker 1: you tell us a little bit about what led to

677
00:42:57,040 --> 00:43:00,239
Speaker 1: his dismissal. Yeah, and that's really when the ship had

678
00:43:00,239 --> 00:43:04,319
Speaker 1: the fan here in Belgium was when so this guy

679
00:43:04,440 --> 00:43:08,280
Speaker 1: was these this couple of this prosecutor in this judge

680
00:43:08,840 --> 00:43:12,919
Speaker 1: Boule and Conrad everyone like these guys, you could tell

681
00:43:12,920 --> 00:43:14,920
Speaker 1: that they were just rolling up their sleeves and saying, damnit,

682
00:43:14,960 --> 00:43:16,920
Speaker 1: these girls are going disappearing. We're not going to let

683
00:43:16,920 --> 00:43:19,320
Speaker 1: this stand in our country. We're going to find whoever

684
00:43:19,360 --> 00:43:21,439
Speaker 1: did this, and we're gonna not stop until we find

685
00:43:21,520 --> 00:43:25,879
Speaker 1: everybody involved. Right And and he was already almost sort

686
00:43:25,920 --> 00:43:28,320
Speaker 1: of a hero of the people for for just getting

687
00:43:28,360 --> 00:43:31,120
Speaker 1: so involved and getting results early on, as soon as

688
00:43:31,160 --> 00:43:37,840
Speaker 1: it crossed his jurisdiction, right um. And then you know, suddenly, uh,

689
00:43:37,920 --> 00:43:40,279
Speaker 1: they were both invited to like a dinner to say

690
00:43:40,320 --> 00:43:43,399
Speaker 1: thank you, you know, for finding the Leticia Dudas who

691
00:43:43,400 --> 00:43:48,440
Speaker 1: who had disappeared and was saved. Um and right. Like

692
00:43:49,000 --> 00:43:52,720
Speaker 1: it was like a formal, like just a thing, potluck dinner.

693
00:43:52,960 --> 00:43:55,759
Speaker 1: It was thrown by like the little village where she

694
00:43:56,560 --> 00:43:58,960
Speaker 1: was from. It's a tiny little village and the parents

695
00:43:59,000 --> 00:44:01,600
Speaker 1: and stuff. We're just like all these two heroes who

696
00:44:01,640 --> 00:44:04,040
Speaker 1: found my daughter and we want to invite him for

697
00:44:04,080 --> 00:44:08,320
Speaker 1: a spaghetti dinner, you know, like probably worth about three bucks,

698
00:44:08,320 --> 00:44:12,440
Speaker 1: you know, total total investment. Uh. And lawyers for the

699
00:44:12,560 --> 00:44:15,920
Speaker 1: True saw this picture of Conrad there. He was a judge,

700
00:44:16,000 --> 00:44:20,080
Speaker 1: so technically he shouldn't be there because he's supposed to

701
00:44:20,120 --> 00:44:23,120
Speaker 1: be neutral, although I don't think his neutrality was compromised

702
00:44:23,120 --> 00:44:26,239
Speaker 1: by him being there, you know. Anyway, the Court of

703
00:44:26,239 --> 00:44:30,399
Speaker 1: the Seas ruled all that and said, no, you're out, Um,

704
00:44:30,440 --> 00:44:32,160
Speaker 1: we've got to take him off the case. And man,

705
00:44:32,200 --> 00:44:35,200
Speaker 1: at that point, that's when everyone was already piste off

706
00:44:35,239 --> 00:44:37,719
Speaker 1: about this thing. And then when that happened, everyone just

707
00:44:37,960 --> 00:44:39,640
Speaker 1: you know, like I said, the ship hit the fan

708
00:44:39,760 --> 00:44:43,360
Speaker 1: here in Belgium, I mean people, you know, the Hell's

709
00:44:43,440 --> 00:44:47,239
Speaker 1: Angels rolled into town literally and you know that. One

710
00:44:47,239 --> 00:44:51,719
Speaker 1: of the images that that I'll never forget is imagine

711
00:44:51,800 --> 00:44:55,840
Speaker 1: a fired fire brigades like fire engines pulled up to

712
00:44:55,920 --> 00:45:00,840
Speaker 1: the Supreme Court and hosing it down, just literally hosing

713
00:45:00,840 --> 00:45:03,920
Speaker 1: it down to symbolize that the court and the law

714
00:45:04,360 --> 00:45:08,520
Speaker 1: and is corrupt and we're turning our hoses against the

715
00:45:08,520 --> 00:45:12,000
Speaker 1: Supreme Court to give it a washing down because it's

716
00:45:12,040 --> 00:45:15,680
Speaker 1: all corrupt. And dirty and we've had enough. And and

717
00:45:15,920 --> 00:45:19,200
Speaker 1: like it was, you're talking three over three percent of

718
00:45:19,239 --> 00:45:23,920
Speaker 1: the entire population protested that day. That's that's the equivalent

719
00:45:24,000 --> 00:45:27,680
Speaker 1: like ten million people in America rights unheard of level.

720
00:45:28,000 --> 00:45:32,480
Speaker 1: You've got fire departments sprang down the Supreme Court, You've

721
00:45:32,480 --> 00:45:36,840
Speaker 1: got uh all of the Hell's Angels of Belgium rolling

722
00:45:36,840 --> 00:45:40,920
Speaker 1: into town. You've got just people, just everybody in the

723
00:45:40,960 --> 00:45:44,400
Speaker 1: streets just going nuts about like no, we cannot have this.

724
00:45:44,840 --> 00:45:48,640
Speaker 1: This has to stop. And and luckily, luckily the parents

725
00:45:49,080 --> 00:45:52,160
Speaker 1: who are who are wonderful people, the parents of these victims,

726
00:45:52,680 --> 00:45:55,200
Speaker 1: they're incredible people like that. That's part of the whole

727
00:45:55,200 --> 00:45:59,359
Speaker 1: story is that they stopped everyone from tearing everything down.

728
00:45:59,360 --> 00:46:02,560
Speaker 1: They were like, oh, come with us, and let's do

729
00:46:02,640 --> 00:46:06,600
Speaker 1: a peaceful march insisting about how this all has to

730
00:46:06,680 --> 00:46:08,560
Speaker 1: change and we need to clean up this system and

731
00:46:08,600 --> 00:46:11,600
Speaker 1: get results in these cases. And it was a big

732
00:46:11,680 --> 00:46:15,760
Speaker 1: moment of national solidarity. Everyone came together and supported these families.

733
00:46:15,920 --> 00:46:19,319
Speaker 1: And these families were from two language. It's almost like,

734
00:46:19,440 --> 00:46:23,359
Speaker 1: you know, a big congregation of Republicans and Democrats coming

735
00:46:23,360 --> 00:46:26,120
Speaker 1: together and hugging each other and saying, we all need

736
00:46:26,200 --> 00:46:28,840
Speaker 1: to you know, work better and be better and do things,

737
00:46:29,160 --> 00:46:32,600
Speaker 1: you know, together and achieve greatness and fix everything. You know.

738
00:46:33,280 --> 00:46:35,920
Speaker 1: That's because those are those communities don't mix very well.

739
00:46:35,960 --> 00:46:39,040
Speaker 1: You know, they have long historical grievances, and so they

740
00:46:39,120 --> 00:46:41,319
Speaker 1: really came together at this point and it was an

741
00:46:41,320 --> 00:46:45,880
Speaker 1: amazing moment. It's incredible. It's a great picture too. And

742
00:46:45,880 --> 00:46:49,440
Speaker 1: that's actually what episode seven is largely based around. Right,

743
00:46:49,480 --> 00:46:52,480
Speaker 1: that just came out. It's called LaMarche Blanche. Oh, how

744
00:46:52,520 --> 00:46:55,000
Speaker 1: how would you say it? Matt? I'm sorry, the Witch,

745
00:46:55,440 --> 00:47:01,359
Speaker 1: the Frenches, La Marche blanche, the White March. Yes, um,

746
00:47:01,520 --> 00:47:03,640
Speaker 1: And it really does focus on that, and just man,

747
00:47:03,680 --> 00:47:06,200
Speaker 1: there's so much information in there. I just really want

748
00:47:06,400 --> 00:47:10,640
Speaker 1: wanna ask you. You spoke with Karin Is that how

749
00:47:10,640 --> 00:47:13,440
Speaker 1: you say her name? Russo? One of the mother of

750
00:47:13,480 --> 00:47:16,239
Speaker 1: Melissa Russo, who is one of the victims. And she

751
00:47:16,320 --> 00:47:18,239
Speaker 1: has this quick quote that I just want you to

752
00:47:18,520 --> 00:47:21,439
Speaker 1: react to when it comes to I guess the White

753
00:47:21,480 --> 00:47:24,239
Speaker 1: March and how people were feeling at the time. She

754
00:47:24,360 --> 00:47:28,360
Speaker 1: states the gendarmes seemed like guys who wanted to find

755
00:47:28,400 --> 00:47:30,799
Speaker 1: the girls, but at the same time, they seemed like

756
00:47:30,840 --> 00:47:34,640
Speaker 1: they were afraid of everything. What what do you think

757
00:47:34,680 --> 00:47:39,280
Speaker 1: that means that this police force was afraid of everything. Well,

758
00:47:39,320 --> 00:47:42,800
Speaker 1: I think, and this is such a hard mystery about

759
00:47:42,840 --> 00:47:46,560
Speaker 1: why the gendarmes didn't act right? Um? And I think

760
00:47:46,560 --> 00:47:49,200
Speaker 1: and she thinks that those guys that she was talking

761
00:47:49,239 --> 00:47:51,920
Speaker 1: to on a daily basis, and even the guy who missed,

762
00:47:52,000 --> 00:47:54,239
Speaker 1: you know, missed the girls when they were looking for them,

763
00:47:54,239 --> 00:47:57,319
Speaker 1: and that they were low level guys in the gendarmerie.

764
00:47:58,200 --> 00:48:00,880
Speaker 1: But there was something bigger going on there. There were

765
00:48:00,960 --> 00:48:06,080
Speaker 1: some people upstairs who had decided that they didn't want

766
00:48:06,560 --> 00:48:10,600
Speaker 1: to do what they should have done. And the big

767
00:48:10,680 --> 00:48:15,200
Speaker 1: question mark is why? Right? Uh? And I mean, I

768
00:48:15,239 --> 00:48:17,279
Speaker 1: mean some people just say it was all incompetence. A

769
00:48:17,320 --> 00:48:18,879
Speaker 1: lot of people still say that, But when you look

770
00:48:18,920 --> 00:48:20,920
Speaker 1: at it and studied as hard as I have, you

771
00:48:21,000 --> 00:48:23,880
Speaker 1: can't have that much smoke without some fire. There was

772
00:48:24,000 --> 00:48:28,400
Speaker 1: something wrong, Something was going on right now? Was was

773
00:48:28,440 --> 00:48:31,640
Speaker 1: it that they were protecting this crazy pedophile? No, I

774
00:48:31,640 --> 00:48:33,520
Speaker 1: mean the Drew was a loser. They didn't give a

775
00:48:33,600 --> 00:48:38,160
Speaker 1: damn about him. Um. Was it? Was it that they

776
00:48:38,160 --> 00:48:40,839
Speaker 1: were protecting one of the Drew's customers who might be

777
00:48:41,320 --> 00:48:46,080
Speaker 1: high ranking John darm or politician? Maybe? Was it something

778
00:48:46,120 --> 00:48:49,799
Speaker 1: a lot more complicated, probably probably to do with the

779
00:48:49,840 --> 00:48:53,279
Speaker 1: police war, war between the police services and and the

780
00:48:53,360 --> 00:48:58,160
Speaker 1: stolen car network and various levels of of of sort

781
00:48:58,200 --> 00:49:01,520
Speaker 1: of corruption within the police. And there was some reason,

782
00:49:01,800 --> 00:49:06,040
Speaker 1: some reason that they didn't want to go in there.

783
00:49:06,719 --> 00:49:09,719
Speaker 1: And I think they might have seen if you're skeptical,

784
00:49:10,000 --> 00:49:11,880
Speaker 1: or if you're a cynic, you say they saw the

785
00:49:11,920 --> 00:49:17,000
Speaker 1: girls as basically collateral damage. We have a big because

786
00:49:17,000 --> 00:49:18,920
Speaker 1: they were in a war. They were literally trying to

787
00:49:18,960 --> 00:49:20,920
Speaker 1: take over the police force at this time, and they

788
00:49:20,920 --> 00:49:24,000
Speaker 1: were trying to to to to bury the judicial police,

789
00:49:24,160 --> 00:49:26,640
Speaker 1: and they wanted to take over the judicial police and

790
00:49:26,680 --> 00:49:29,520
Speaker 1: put them underneath the gendarmerie and make the gendarmerie the

791
00:49:29,600 --> 00:49:31,880
Speaker 1: law of the land. And this was stated all the

792
00:49:31,880 --> 00:49:34,239
Speaker 1: way from the top of the organization. And this was

793
00:49:34,280 --> 00:49:38,279
Speaker 1: a ten year strategic plan like within these don't forget

794
00:49:38,280 --> 00:49:41,240
Speaker 1: it's a military operation, and and they could have seen

795
00:49:41,360 --> 00:49:44,239
Speaker 1: like this, they've got something and they're doing something here,

796
00:49:44,640 --> 00:49:49,479
Speaker 1: and for some reason they didn't want to go get

797
00:49:49,560 --> 00:49:51,520
Speaker 1: the true And as I swear to you, it's it's

798
00:49:51,560 --> 00:49:55,600
Speaker 1: so hard to understand. Either they were protecting someone or

799
00:49:55,640 --> 00:49:58,480
Speaker 1: it has something to do with a very complicated thing

800
00:49:58,840 --> 00:50:01,960
Speaker 1: related to that stole and car ring that the judicial

801
00:50:02,000 --> 00:50:05,520
Speaker 1: police were dirty on they were involved. The judicial police

802
00:50:05,760 --> 00:50:07,880
Speaker 1: were involved, they were corrupt, they were involved with the

803
00:50:07,960 --> 00:50:11,160
Speaker 1: mafia and the and the car theft rings in Shara,

804
00:50:11,640 --> 00:50:14,520
Speaker 1: and so there's speculation that maybe they were trying to

805
00:50:14,600 --> 00:50:17,560
Speaker 1: show up trying to catch the judicial police, but that

806
00:50:17,640 --> 00:50:20,279
Speaker 1: the True was in the way somehow and they or

807
00:50:20,400 --> 00:50:22,520
Speaker 1: or if they if they if they caught him, then

808
00:50:22,520 --> 00:50:25,440
Speaker 1: they didn't get to win their long battle of of

809
00:50:25,640 --> 00:50:28,680
Speaker 1: of undermining the judicial police. But it's just it's just

810
00:50:28,760 --> 00:50:32,000
Speaker 1: crazy and it's it's Uh, whatever they were doing, they

811
00:50:32,040 --> 00:50:35,359
Speaker 1: didn't do their job, that's for sure. Well let's you know,

812
00:50:35,440 --> 00:50:38,280
Speaker 1: let's follow up on this, because one thing that stands

813
00:50:38,280 --> 00:50:41,520
Speaker 1: out to me when you talk about we're talking about

814
00:50:41,560 --> 00:50:45,120
Speaker 1: the Belgian public coming together in such an enormous show

815
00:50:45,160 --> 00:50:49,400
Speaker 1: of solidarity, is that they were coming together, at least

816
00:50:49,440 --> 00:50:55,800
Speaker 1: in some aspect two, to protest against what they saw

817
00:50:56,400 --> 00:51:02,160
Speaker 1: as another much more sinister form of operation. Right, the

818
00:51:02,160 --> 00:51:07,719
Speaker 1: the allegations were that, uh, the True was not alone. Right,

819
00:51:07,880 --> 00:51:13,759
Speaker 1: the idea that he was not simply I don't want

820
00:51:13,800 --> 00:51:17,280
Speaker 1: to diminish this, The ideas that he was not simply

821
00:51:18,040 --> 00:51:25,120
Speaker 1: a monstrous criminal with no other motivation than the commission

822
00:51:25,160 --> 00:51:28,759
Speaker 1: of monstrous crimes, but that he had as you as

823
00:51:28,800 --> 00:51:31,680
Speaker 1: you mentioned Matt, that he had customers, that he had

824
00:51:31,719 --> 00:51:38,320
Speaker 1: financial motivation, that he was connected with some sort of larger,

825
00:51:39,400 --> 00:51:43,799
Speaker 1: um larger operation on on its own. And this is

826
00:51:44,320 --> 00:51:47,279
Speaker 1: I think one of the one of the aspects of

827
00:51:47,280 --> 00:51:51,760
Speaker 1: the story that remains mysterious to a lot of observers,

828
00:51:52,040 --> 00:51:57,800
Speaker 1: the the concept that this individual may have had accomplices.

829
00:51:57,960 --> 00:52:01,640
Speaker 1: And sometimes when people are talking about that aspect, they

830
00:52:01,920 --> 00:52:04,879
Speaker 1: point to things that we've discussed, like the fact that

831
00:52:04,920 --> 00:52:11,320
Speaker 1: he was regularly getting off very easily for horrific crimes,

832
00:52:11,440 --> 00:52:16,560
Speaker 1: or the fact that so many aspects of investigation seemed

833
00:52:16,719 --> 00:52:21,600
Speaker 1: to be stone walled or somehow stymied or even just

834
00:52:21,680 --> 00:52:25,879
Speaker 1: completely ignored, like um like DNA testing for instance, which

835
00:52:25,920 --> 00:52:29,000
Speaker 1: feels like day one stuff. In this kind of investigation.

836
00:52:29,960 --> 00:52:34,240
Speaker 1: You know all about the the alleged and the proven accomplices,

837
00:52:34,400 --> 00:52:37,879
Speaker 1: proven being his wife for instance, uh and and some

838
00:52:37,920 --> 00:52:43,160
Speaker 1: of his other accomplices in car theft and car trafficking crimes.

839
00:52:43,160 --> 00:52:48,480
Speaker 1: But what do you think about the allegations that, uh,

840
00:52:49,000 --> 00:52:51,239
Speaker 1: if we just look at this as a thought experiment,

841
00:52:51,440 --> 00:52:55,200
Speaker 1: what do you think about the allegations that there was

842
00:52:55,400 --> 00:52:58,080
Speaker 1: a larger network at play and that he was just

843
00:52:58,160 --> 00:53:03,399
Speaker 1: sort of a field agent for that for that initiative. Yeah,

844
00:53:03,440 --> 00:53:06,240
Speaker 1: this is the biggest question that still divides people today.

845
00:53:06,560 --> 00:53:12,200
Speaker 1: Um for me personally, just looking at it, Uh, it

846
00:53:12,440 --> 00:53:14,959
Speaker 1: seems you just got to go back to the facts again.

847
00:53:15,080 --> 00:53:17,160
Speaker 1: Let's go back to the facts, like what was the true?

848
00:53:17,200 --> 00:53:20,840
Speaker 1: The true didn't ever do anything for without money. Everything

849
00:53:20,840 --> 00:53:22,920
Speaker 1: he did was to make money, every single thing. And

850
00:53:22,960 --> 00:53:26,919
Speaker 1: he was notoriously cheap. I mean he bought the cheap

851
00:53:26,960 --> 00:53:29,719
Speaker 1: ship for everybody else and saved the good stuff for him.

852
00:53:29,800 --> 00:53:32,120
Speaker 1: He's still gas. He had this weird way of stealing

853
00:53:32,160 --> 00:53:34,799
Speaker 1: gas for his car so he never had to pay

854
00:53:34,840 --> 00:53:37,520
Speaker 1: for gas. He wouldn't pay for anything. He was really

855
00:53:37,560 --> 00:53:40,560
Speaker 1: really known as a skin flint this guy. Um, and

856
00:53:40,640 --> 00:53:43,399
Speaker 1: every single thing he ever did was for money. And

857
00:53:43,440 --> 00:53:44,920
Speaker 1: by the way, he told people that he was going

858
00:53:44,960 --> 00:53:48,360
Speaker 1: to kidnap girls and sell them. So the idea that

859
00:53:48,480 --> 00:53:51,359
Speaker 1: he suddenly took on like oh, I'm going to take

860
00:53:51,400 --> 00:53:55,600
Speaker 1: six girls and manage that right without any profit motive

861
00:53:55,719 --> 00:53:58,920
Speaker 1: is hard for me to believe. Um. So I think

862
00:53:58,920 --> 00:54:00,640
Speaker 1: if you just like back up and look at the

863
00:54:00,680 --> 00:54:03,279
Speaker 1: general facts you think. Of course, he had to be,

864
00:54:03,840 --> 00:54:06,719
Speaker 1: you know, looking to monetize this. I think he was

865
00:54:07,520 --> 00:54:10,200
Speaker 1: a pervert himself and probably trying to have best of

866
00:54:10,280 --> 00:54:13,080
Speaker 1: both worlds for himself to say, yeah, I'm gonna you know,

867
00:54:13,160 --> 00:54:16,040
Speaker 1: be under rape and and abuse these people and then

868
00:54:16,080 --> 00:54:18,839
Speaker 1: I'm gonna make money out of them. Um. So if

869
00:54:18,880 --> 00:54:20,560
Speaker 1: you ask me, do I think there are people walking

870
00:54:20,600 --> 00:54:24,640
Speaker 1: around today in the world that were never tried or convicted,

871
00:54:24,960 --> 00:54:28,279
Speaker 1: I would say yes, I do believe there are, um, absolutely,

872
00:54:28,440 --> 00:54:32,320
Speaker 1: and and for me that's that's you know, it's just

873
00:54:32,360 --> 00:54:34,719
Speaker 1: out of control to to think about that. If it

874
00:54:34,840 --> 00:54:37,120
Speaker 1: was a different crime, I'd say, okay, But we're talking

875
00:54:37,160 --> 00:54:44,120
Speaker 1: about murdering, raping, abusing children. Yeah, there's a moment in

876
00:54:44,480 --> 00:54:48,400
Speaker 1: La Monster where you have someone, i think a little

877
00:54:48,440 --> 00:54:53,560
Speaker 1: girl read letters that were sent um to the parents

878
00:54:54,280 --> 00:54:56,600
Speaker 1: of one of the victims by that were written by

879
00:54:56,800 --> 00:55:01,120
Speaker 1: the victim. It's really harrowing to to hear at. I

880
00:55:01,200 --> 00:55:04,439
Speaker 1: wonder when we're talking about monetary gain for this kind

881
00:55:04,480 --> 00:55:09,319
Speaker 1: of thing, it seems as though rationally a strategy would

882
00:55:09,360 --> 00:55:13,399
Speaker 1: be ransoming the children if you're really trying to make

883
00:55:13,480 --> 00:55:16,480
Speaker 1: money off off of it. Um. I think the harder

884
00:55:16,520 --> 00:55:22,560
Speaker 1: thing to think about is using the children, uh for

885
00:55:22,640 --> 00:55:26,560
Speaker 1: sexual purposes, Like I don't even know, I say it

886
00:55:26,600 --> 00:55:32,120
Speaker 1: without throwing up. Um. It seems as though that's more

887
00:55:32,160 --> 00:55:35,320
Speaker 1: likely as to what was happening, if he was making

888
00:55:35,360 --> 00:55:37,040
Speaker 1: money off of them. I just want to see if

889
00:55:37,040 --> 00:55:38,919
Speaker 1: you heard, if you had any proof of you found

890
00:55:39,000 --> 00:55:44,400
Speaker 1: anything that would would lead would lead you to believe

891
00:55:44,480 --> 00:55:46,839
Speaker 1: that he was making money or profiting in some way

892
00:55:46,880 --> 00:55:50,200
Speaker 1: off of the girls. Well, this is you know. I

893
00:55:50,200 --> 00:55:53,280
Speaker 1: did an interview about this today actually, and I won't

894
00:55:53,320 --> 00:55:55,000
Speaker 1: do any spoiler alerts. I don't even know if we're

895
00:55:55,000 --> 00:55:59,000
Speaker 1: going to use it. But it was harrowing, let's just say. Um.

896
00:55:59,440 --> 00:56:03,200
Speaker 1: And one of the things that you realize when you

897
00:56:03,239 --> 00:56:07,040
Speaker 1: start looking at these types of affairs is that there's

898
00:56:07,080 --> 00:56:09,759
Speaker 1: a lot of this stuff. Actually, there's really a lot

899
00:56:09,840 --> 00:56:14,600
Speaker 1: of this stuff, not just in Belgium, everywhere. Um. And

900
00:56:14,600 --> 00:56:20,440
Speaker 1: and there's definitely child trafficking networks. That's a proven you know,

901
00:56:20,520 --> 00:56:25,040
Speaker 1: that's a proven for sure. There's lots of them and

902
00:56:25,040 --> 00:56:30,000
Speaker 1: and um and it's lucrative business and so there's business

903
00:56:30,000 --> 00:56:33,120
Speaker 1: behind it. And I think that as humans, I hate

904
00:56:33,160 --> 00:56:35,239
Speaker 1: this kind of stuff. I never wanted to cover this

905
00:56:35,360 --> 00:56:38,000
Speaker 1: I I thought, I'm covering this story, right. This is

906
00:56:38,000 --> 00:56:41,719
Speaker 1: a crazy story. The country almost had a revolution. The

907
00:56:41,800 --> 00:56:44,920
Speaker 1: FBI was canceled. I mean, there's there's no more FBI.

908
00:56:45,080 --> 00:56:47,680
Speaker 1: By the way, that was you know, it's over. Uh,

909
00:56:47,920 --> 00:56:50,719
Speaker 1: this affair killed the FBI. Imagine that a case so

910
00:56:50,800 --> 00:56:53,600
Speaker 1: big in America that the FBI gets closed down. Well

911
00:56:53,600 --> 00:56:57,480
Speaker 1: that's what happened here. Um. So you know, I was

912
00:56:57,520 --> 00:57:01,160
Speaker 1: thinking just about the whole story, right, And I don't

913
00:57:01,200 --> 00:57:03,279
Speaker 1: like the details, and I don't go into too many

914
00:57:03,320 --> 00:57:06,040
Speaker 1: details about the abuse because the abuse was really bad,

915
00:57:06,040 --> 00:57:08,719
Speaker 1: because I do know those details and have read them

916
00:57:08,800 --> 00:57:12,719
Speaker 1: and and and all that. But um, the point is

917
00:57:12,719 --> 00:57:15,320
Speaker 1: is that we just don't want to see that as humans.

918
00:57:15,360 --> 00:57:19,320
Speaker 1: It's so unimaginable, especially those of us who are parents.

919
00:57:20,000 --> 00:57:22,880
Speaker 1: It's just so terrible. Like my wife can't stand it.

920
00:57:23,000 --> 00:57:25,040
Speaker 1: She can't stand this stuff. She's like, oh my god,

921
00:57:25,120 --> 00:57:27,560
Speaker 1: you know. Like, but I kind of turned back to

922
00:57:27,600 --> 00:57:29,840
Speaker 1: her sometimes I say, well, what do you want to

923
00:57:29,880 --> 00:57:32,240
Speaker 1: just ignore it? Should we all just ignore it? Like

924
00:57:32,280 --> 00:57:33,800
Speaker 1: She's like, oh, don't talk about that. How could you

925
00:57:33,800 --> 00:57:36,400
Speaker 1: talk about that? Why? And I'm like, well, okay, what's

926
00:57:36,440 --> 00:57:38,520
Speaker 1: the alternative? We just ignore it? And I think as

927
00:57:38,600 --> 00:57:42,600
Speaker 1: people we tend to ignore it because it's so awful

928
00:57:42,800 --> 00:57:45,560
Speaker 1: that we can't stand it, we can't bear it. But

929
00:57:45,720 --> 00:57:49,959
Speaker 1: it's real and this stuff happens, and there's people right

930
00:57:50,000 --> 00:57:53,040
Speaker 1: now that are that are suffering from this, and there's

931
00:57:53,120 --> 00:57:56,840
Speaker 1: big networks. And I'm not a conspiracy theorist. You know,

932
00:57:56,880 --> 00:58:00,320
Speaker 1: this has proven you know, um and and so one

933
00:58:00,320 --> 00:58:02,480
Speaker 1: of the things that's opened my eyes and this project

934
00:58:02,600 --> 00:58:06,000
Speaker 1: is because again I'm so skeptical, you know. I was like,

935
00:58:06,040 --> 00:58:07,880
Speaker 1: there's not going to be a network or anything like.

936
00:58:08,320 --> 00:58:10,120
Speaker 1: But you know, you start looking at it and you say,

937
00:58:10,120 --> 00:58:15,080
Speaker 1: out there, of course there's networks. There's networks everywhere. Um,

938
00:58:15,120 --> 00:58:17,640
Speaker 1: you know, it's a business and and it's a sickness,

939
00:58:18,040 --> 00:58:21,200
Speaker 1: uh that's existed in humanity for a very long time

940
00:58:21,640 --> 00:58:25,040
Speaker 1: and sweeping under the carpet. I don't think it's the solution.

941
00:58:25,680 --> 00:58:28,480
Speaker 1: So we need to probably be able to face it.

942
00:58:28,680 --> 00:58:30,800
Speaker 1: And because if you ignore it, and you're never going

943
00:58:30,840 --> 00:58:33,800
Speaker 1: to solve it. Very well said that, and there are

944
00:58:33,880 --> 00:58:37,840
Speaker 1: you know, there are so many things that we're not

945
00:58:38,000 --> 00:58:44,360
Speaker 1: getting to in our conversation today candidly because they are

946
00:58:44,400 --> 00:58:49,800
Speaker 1: addressed in the Monstra and they are you should experience

947
00:58:49,880 --> 00:58:56,760
Speaker 1: them there this this is an ongoing, an ongoing mystery.

948
00:58:57,040 --> 00:59:02,720
Speaker 1: Like you said, Matt, there are moult hard questions left

949
00:59:02,800 --> 00:59:08,080
Speaker 1: in the wake of the official conclusion of the Belgian government. Right.

950
00:59:08,120 --> 00:59:11,760
Speaker 1: And I think it's fair to say that even today

951
00:59:10,920 --> 00:59:16,960
Speaker 1: two many people living in Belgium do not do not

952
00:59:17,280 --> 00:59:23,760
Speaker 1: accept the entirety of the official conclusions. It may it

953
00:59:23,880 --> 00:59:28,960
Speaker 1: may shock some people to know that the the person

954
00:59:29,000 --> 00:59:33,960
Speaker 1: we're discussing today is in fact still alive. Uh And

955
00:59:34,280 --> 00:59:39,080
Speaker 1: I have actually gone and checked, trying to keep up

956
00:59:39,320 --> 00:59:42,680
Speaker 1: with the news about this. But as as I understand,

957
00:59:43,120 --> 00:59:46,840
Speaker 1: the true is still in prison, right, a sentence of

958
00:59:46,880 --> 00:59:53,760
Speaker 1: life imprisonment. Yes, he's still around. Um and he's the

959
00:59:54,080 --> 00:59:56,240
Speaker 1: problem with the TRUEZ. I thought about trying to see him,

960
00:59:56,280 --> 00:59:59,080
Speaker 1: but he's such a liar. Um. You can never trust

961
00:59:59,080 --> 01:00:02,360
Speaker 1: the word that comes out of a mouth. Um. And

962
01:00:02,760 --> 01:00:06,920
Speaker 1: I've talked to his lawyers about that too, so uh

963
01:00:07,120 --> 01:00:09,160
Speaker 1: And and the parents, you know, he said that he

964
01:00:09,200 --> 01:00:10,440
Speaker 1: was going to tell them the truth because that they

965
01:00:10,440 --> 01:00:13,160
Speaker 1: still don't know the truth. They still don't know what happened,

966
01:00:13,320 --> 01:00:16,040
Speaker 1: that's the thing. They still don't know the actual truth.

967
01:00:16,360 --> 01:00:18,760
Speaker 1: They know that their girls died, they know he was involved.

968
01:00:19,080 --> 01:00:22,520
Speaker 1: But they don't know even the circumstances you know, of

969
01:00:22,520 --> 01:00:27,000
Speaker 1: of how they exactly died, and and they want to know.

970
01:00:27,120 --> 01:00:28,680
Speaker 1: But and the true at one point that I'll tell

971
01:00:28,720 --> 01:00:31,320
Speaker 1: you now. But and he was trying to get something

972
01:00:31,320 --> 01:00:33,600
Speaker 1: out of it, and he just can't trust this guy.

973
01:00:33,720 --> 01:00:37,640
Speaker 1: He's a manipulator, he's a psychopath. He's really a bad psychopath.

974
01:00:38,640 --> 01:00:40,000
Speaker 1: So I thought, you know what, I don't even want

975
01:00:40,000 --> 01:00:42,320
Speaker 1: to talk to this guy. Um if I thought I

976
01:00:42,320 --> 01:00:45,840
Speaker 1: could get something that would help the families, but all

977
01:00:46,200 --> 01:00:48,320
Speaker 1: no matter what he says, they won't believe him. Probably,

978
01:00:48,400 --> 01:00:51,080
Speaker 1: so it's just, you know, it's not even worth the time.

979
01:00:51,920 --> 01:00:54,520
Speaker 1: That's one thing I do want to highlight here, Matt.

980
01:00:55,000 --> 01:00:57,080
Speaker 1: That I think is Another thing I think is very

981
01:00:57,120 --> 01:01:02,000
Speaker 1: well done is that this show is not exploitation, which,

982
01:01:02,080 --> 01:01:05,200
Speaker 1: let's be honest, can sometimes happen. We're talking true crime.

983
01:01:05,720 --> 01:01:10,560
Speaker 1: Uh So, I I think it's an immensely respectful and

984
01:01:10,680 --> 01:01:15,840
Speaker 1: thorough objective investigation of some of the problems with this case.

985
01:01:16,080 --> 01:01:18,400
Speaker 1: So I this isn't even a question on my end.

986
01:01:18,440 --> 01:01:20,400
Speaker 1: I just want to say I think that was, uh

987
01:01:20,520 --> 01:01:23,120
Speaker 1: that was very well done and and the correct way

988
01:01:23,160 --> 01:01:26,840
Speaker 1: to approach this. Thank you. I really appreciate that it's

989
01:01:26,960 --> 01:01:30,080
Speaker 1: haunted me when I started this because I have to

990
01:01:30,120 --> 01:01:33,400
Speaker 1: live in this country, and um, you know, I want

991
01:01:33,480 --> 01:01:36,439
Speaker 1: to be able to you know, I want Belgians, don't

992
01:01:36,600 --> 01:01:39,080
Speaker 1: you know. There was a couple of big attempts to

993
01:01:39,120 --> 01:01:42,320
Speaker 1: do documentaries and stuff about this that we're completely shut

994
01:01:42,320 --> 01:01:45,480
Speaker 1: down by the families and the public just saying get

995
01:01:45,480 --> 01:01:47,280
Speaker 1: out of here, leave us alone. We don't want you to,

996
01:01:48,040 --> 01:01:51,120
Speaker 1: you know, make a big production out of our you know,

997
01:01:51,400 --> 01:01:58,200
Speaker 1: awful uh misery um or story. Um. But so as

998
01:01:58,280 --> 01:02:00,720
Speaker 1: I started the project, I thought my my goal and

999
01:02:00,760 --> 01:02:03,160
Speaker 1: I said this to the my sound guy the first day,

1000
01:02:03,360 --> 01:02:06,040
Speaker 1: I said, my goal is that the families would listen

1001
01:02:06,080 --> 01:02:08,080
Speaker 1: to this and field that I did the story justice

1002
01:02:08,960 --> 01:02:13,280
Speaker 1: and I think I think I'm I think I'm getting there. Um.

1003
01:02:13,360 --> 01:02:15,440
Speaker 1: And and it was big in Belgium, by the way,

1004
01:02:15,520 --> 01:02:17,840
Speaker 1: when it came out, so they heard someone heard that

1005
01:02:17,920 --> 01:02:21,000
Speaker 1: this story is coming out, and before like the next

1006
01:02:21,080 --> 01:02:24,440
Speaker 1: day there it's hard to believe there's a front page

1007
01:02:24,560 --> 01:02:31,280
Speaker 1: article about it in major national newspaper papers. Actually uh.

1008
01:02:31,320 --> 01:02:34,560
Speaker 1: And then by the following Monday, I was already invited

1009
01:02:34,600 --> 01:02:40,720
Speaker 1: to the prime time TV interview like talk show right

1010
01:02:40,800 --> 01:02:43,960
Speaker 1: at prime time like Monday. Uh you know, like I

1011
01:02:43,960 --> 01:02:46,680
Speaker 1: don't know the equivalent of NBC News or CNN or

1012
01:02:46,680 --> 01:02:48,960
Speaker 1: Fox or whatever like the Big even not even like

1013
01:02:49,080 --> 01:02:51,760
Speaker 1: more like the BBC. It's like the BBC of Belgium.

1014
01:02:51,800 --> 01:02:54,480
Speaker 1: And so the BBC of Belgium had me on their

1015
01:02:54,480 --> 01:02:59,400
Speaker 1: primetime show like within days of learning about this project,

1016
01:02:59,600 --> 01:03:03,040
Speaker 1: and that that's how focused they are on this. And

1017
01:03:03,120 --> 01:03:06,560
Speaker 1: for me, I was really nervous about this because it's

1018
01:03:06,560 --> 01:03:10,400
Speaker 1: easy to talk to you guys, but talking to Belgians

1019
01:03:10,400 --> 01:03:12,200
Speaker 1: who lived through this and who know the case because

1020
01:03:12,240 --> 01:03:14,560
Speaker 1: they obsess about this case. This case is the most

1021
01:03:14,600 --> 01:03:18,880
Speaker 1: that there's there's no case where Belgiums have obsessed over

1022
01:03:19,000 --> 01:03:22,160
Speaker 1: more than this one. Um. But the good thing is

1023
01:03:22,160 --> 01:03:24,160
Speaker 1: is that, you know, I think it came off really well.

1024
01:03:24,520 --> 01:03:28,600
Speaker 1: I was. There's a press gave me a fair hearing,

1025
01:03:28,840 --> 01:03:32,160
Speaker 1: and the families have you know that I've been in

1026
01:03:32,200 --> 01:03:36,400
Speaker 1: contact with, remained supportive. So h that's a big load

1027
01:03:36,440 --> 01:03:37,960
Speaker 1: off of my back because I was a little worried

1028
01:03:38,000 --> 01:03:41,040
Speaker 1: they might, you know, not like this as somebody who's

1029
01:03:41,080 --> 01:03:43,280
Speaker 1: working on it with you. I'm really proud of the

1030
01:03:43,280 --> 01:03:46,760
Speaker 1: show because I I do point zero three of the

1031
01:03:46,800 --> 01:03:50,400
Speaker 1: work on that show, and I really do appreciate just

1032
01:03:51,080 --> 01:03:53,360
Speaker 1: what you're doing, So keep it, keep it going. How

1033
01:03:53,400 --> 01:03:57,640
Speaker 1: can people find the show and learn more about it? Yeah,

1034
01:03:57,640 --> 01:03:59,120
Speaker 1: so you can get it. It's on the I Heart

1035
01:03:59,200 --> 01:04:05,520
Speaker 1: radio app, It's on um Athhole, Spotify everywhere UM and

1036
01:04:05,880 --> 01:04:10,440
Speaker 1: it's called Monstra l E and then next word Monstra

1037
01:04:10,800 --> 01:04:15,520
Speaker 1: spelled French m O n s t r E. And

1038
01:04:15,680 --> 01:04:19,320
Speaker 1: it's gotten off to a huge start, um, more than

1039
01:04:19,360 --> 01:04:24,280
Speaker 1: I ever dreamed of. And it's a credit to the

1040
01:04:24,320 --> 01:04:27,360
Speaker 1: team at Tenderfoot and I heart to be honest that

1041
01:04:27,640 --> 01:04:31,080
Speaker 1: we've been able to have such a really, really strong

1042
01:04:31,120 --> 01:04:36,320
Speaker 1: show because the support and attention to detail is floored me,

1043
01:04:36,400 --> 01:04:39,760
Speaker 1: to be honest, UM, and I love it. It's it's

1044
01:04:40,160 --> 01:04:42,400
Speaker 1: you know, I'm I'm getting my rocks off for things

1045
01:04:42,440 --> 01:04:46,720
Speaker 1: that frustrate me elsewhere by working you know, with people

1046
01:04:46,800 --> 01:04:51,520
Speaker 1: that understand, you know, quality and don't accept anything uh

1047
01:04:51,760 --> 01:04:55,439
Speaker 1: that's not you know, fact checked a and be done

1048
01:04:55,440 --> 01:04:59,240
Speaker 1: correctly and with support. So I really find it. It's

1049
01:04:59,280 --> 01:05:02,120
Speaker 1: it's been fantastic to work with the team at at

1050
01:05:02,120 --> 01:05:06,200
Speaker 1: Tenderfoot and I are Radio, so I'm absolutely thrilled and

1051
01:05:06,200 --> 01:05:09,480
Speaker 1: hope to do another story at some point. You can

1052
01:05:09,520 --> 01:05:13,040
Speaker 1: also head over to Monster Dash podcast dot com to

1053
01:05:13,240 --> 01:05:16,680
Speaker 1: learn more. Fellow conspiracy realists, thank you, as always for

1054
01:05:16,880 --> 01:05:21,880
Speaker 1: tuning in. I do very much hope you enjoyed that interview. Again,

1055
01:05:22,080 --> 01:05:26,240
Speaker 1: we want to emphasize that there are ongoing questions. In

1056
01:05:26,280 --> 01:05:29,960
Speaker 1: this case, Matt Graves is doing an excellent job researching

1057
01:05:30,120 --> 01:05:35,040
Speaker 1: and exploring these. We have also only scratched the surface

1058
01:05:35,800 --> 01:05:38,720
Speaker 1: of this affair. So if you would like to learn

1059
01:05:38,800 --> 01:05:42,400
Speaker 1: more about the Monster of Belgium and the questions that

1060
01:05:42,480 --> 01:05:46,440
Speaker 1: remain unanswered, do check out the monstra available, as we said,

1061
01:05:46,560 --> 01:05:50,640
Speaker 1: on any podcast platform you prefer. In the meantime, we

1062
01:05:50,720 --> 01:05:54,400
Speaker 1: would like to hear from you. Don't hesitate to reach

1063
01:05:54,440 --> 01:05:58,760
Speaker 1: out if there's another story that you feel needs more

1064
01:05:58,800 --> 01:06:02,480
Speaker 1: public attention, and do not hesitate to reach out if

1065
01:06:02,560 --> 01:06:06,080
Speaker 1: you yourself may have some leads on the questions Matt

1066
01:06:06,080 --> 01:06:09,720
Speaker 1: Graves mentions in our conversation today, how do I reach out?

1067
01:06:09,800 --> 01:06:12,680
Speaker 1: You might be asking, Well, it's pretty easy. We want

1068
01:06:12,720 --> 01:06:15,360
Speaker 1: you to be able to find us online Facebook, Here's

1069
01:06:15,360 --> 01:06:19,680
Speaker 1: where it gets crazy, Instagram, Twitter, check out our YouTube

1070
01:06:20,080 --> 01:06:25,160
Speaker 1: where you can see me trying to convince my merry

1071
01:06:25,160 --> 01:06:28,440
Speaker 1: band of miscreants to uh to get a little weirder

1072
01:06:28,520 --> 01:06:31,160
Speaker 1: with things, So more to come on that front in

1073
01:06:31,200 --> 01:06:33,800
Speaker 1: the meantime. If you don't sip the social needs. But

1074
01:06:33,840 --> 01:06:35,520
Speaker 1: I have a story to tell, why not give us

1075
01:06:35,560 --> 01:06:38,120
Speaker 1: a phone call. We are say it with me one

1076
01:06:38,320 --> 01:06:42,320
Speaker 1: eight three three st d w y t K. You'll

1077
01:06:42,360 --> 01:06:45,360
Speaker 1: hear a familiar voice and a beep like so beep,

1078
01:06:45,520 --> 01:06:47,640
Speaker 1: and then from there you'll have three minutes. Those three

1079
01:06:47,640 --> 01:06:50,400
Speaker 1: minutes are yours. Go nuts with them, get really weird

1080
01:06:50,480 --> 01:06:52,800
Speaker 1: with it. We listen to every phone call we get.

1081
01:06:52,880 --> 01:06:54,960
Speaker 1: Just All we ask is that you give yourself a

1082
01:06:55,000 --> 01:06:58,680
Speaker 1: cool moniker nickname and a k A. Tell us what's

1083
01:06:58,720 --> 01:07:01,440
Speaker 1: on your mind, tell us uh what, whether or not

1084
01:07:01,520 --> 01:07:03,520
Speaker 1: you are comfortable with us using your name and or

1085
01:07:03,640 --> 01:07:07,280
Speaker 1: voice on the air, And most importantly, do not edit yourself.

1086
01:07:07,320 --> 01:07:10,840
Speaker 1: If you have a story that needs more than three minutes,

1087
01:07:11,120 --> 01:07:14,520
Speaker 1: you don't have to keep calling repeatedly, and you know,

1088
01:07:14,600 --> 01:07:16,960
Speaker 1: forgetting where you left off and then jumping back on. No,

1089
01:07:17,160 --> 01:07:19,800
Speaker 1: we've got your back. You can write it to us,

1090
01:07:20,200 --> 01:07:22,880
Speaker 1: send us those links, send us those photographs, take us

1091
01:07:22,920 --> 01:07:25,040
Speaker 1: to the edge of the rabbit hole, and we will

1092
01:07:25,080 --> 01:07:27,040
Speaker 1: do the rest. All you have to do is drop

1093
01:07:27,080 --> 01:07:29,600
Speaker 1: us a line at our good old fashioned email address.

1094
01:07:29,720 --> 01:07:52,040
Speaker 1: We are conspiracy at i heart radio dot com. Stuff

1095
01:07:52,080 --> 01:07:53,960
Speaker 1: they don't want you to know is a production of

1096
01:07:54,040 --> 01:07:56,960
Speaker 1: I heart Radio. For more podcasts from my heart Radio,

1097
01:07:57,120 --> 01:07:59,920
Speaker 1: visit the i heart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever

1098
01:08:00,080 --> 01:08:01,320
Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows.