WEBVTT - Horror and Hope [4] 0:00:00.560 --> 0:00:03.600 The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are solely 0:00:03.640 --> 0:00:07.520 those of the podcast author or individuals participating in the podcast, 0:00:07.840 --> 0:00:11.600 and do not represent those of iHeartMedia, Tenderfoot TV, or 0:00:11.640 --> 0:00:15.880 their employees. This podcast also contains subject matter which may 0:00:15.920 --> 0:00:19.720 not be suitable for everyone. Listener discretion is advised. 0:00:23.720 --> 0:00:26.880 It had been three days since Sabine d'arden had been 0:00:26.960 --> 0:00:29.800 ripped off of her bike and transported in a dirty 0:00:29.920 --> 0:00:32.920 van to a run down house and then chained to 0:00:33.000 --> 0:00:37.800 a bed by her neck. The first few days of 0:00:37.840 --> 0:00:41.560 captivity were a blur. Her kidnapper explained that he worked 0:00:41.560 --> 0:00:44.640 for a dangerous man who wanted to take revenge on 0:00:44.680 --> 0:00:48.360 Sabine's father, who was a police officer. He said his 0:00:48.479 --> 0:00:51.120 boss wanted to kill her to get back at her father, 0:00:51.720 --> 0:00:54.240 but that he was going to disobey this boss in 0:00:54.320 --> 0:00:56.880 order to save her life, but that they needed to 0:00:56.960 --> 0:01:01.960 hide her away. On the day, he led her downstairs 0:01:01.960 --> 0:01:05.720 to her new home. It was a basement cellar hidden 0:01:05.760 --> 0:01:09.560 behind a trap door. It was seven feet long and 0:01:09.640 --> 0:01:12.880 three feet wide, with a ceiling of only about five 0:01:12.959 --> 0:01:17.160 feet in height. There was no natural light, and it 0:01:17.240 --> 0:01:23.000 was damp and cold. Sabine was in a very dark place. 0:01:35.600 --> 0:01:41.160 A psychopath is somebody who understands emotions. 0:01:40.959 --> 0:01:43.880 And I told them it is a very exceptional that 0:01:44.120 --> 0:01:46.880 somebody abducts two children at the same time. 0:01:47.720 --> 0:01:50.080 Would have been the yell of it in nineteen six, 0:01:51.000 --> 0:01:53.760 but my god, it was just a beginning. 0:01:54.520 --> 0:01:57.720 I think Belgium was a paralyzed for perverts in those days. 0:02:05.440 --> 0:02:12.200 Welcome to la monstre. I'm your host, Matt Graves. On 0:02:12.320 --> 0:02:16.079 June twenty fourth, nineteen ninety five, two young girls went 0:02:16.160 --> 0:02:20.639 missing in the province of Liege and Belgium. Two months later, 0:02:21.320 --> 0:02:23.680 two more young girls went missing in the province of 0:02:23.760 --> 0:02:29.960 West Flanders on the Belgian coast. In May of the 0:02:30.040 --> 0:02:34.280 following year, Sabine Darden was abducted in Tournee, and then 0:02:34.320 --> 0:02:39.040 in August Letitia de Les went missing from Bertrich. We 0:02:39.160 --> 0:02:42.280 know a lot about Sabine's experiences based on letters and 0:02:42.320 --> 0:02:46.560 a journal found where she was held. Her kidnapper encouraged 0:02:46.560 --> 0:02:49.400 her to write letters to her parents, which he promised 0:02:49.440 --> 0:02:53.079 to get to them. Sadly, it was just a ploy 0:02:53.480 --> 0:02:55.720 to get her to believe that he was protecting her 0:02:55.880 --> 0:02:59.760 from an imaginary, big bad boss and to better understand 0:03:00.160 --> 0:03:05.760 to manipulate her The innocence of Sabine's letters is heartbreaking. 0:03:06.400 --> 0:03:09.720 They were openly published years later, so I decided to 0:03:09.720 --> 0:03:12.640 share parts of them in this episode. Here is an 0:03:12.680 --> 0:03:15.240 excerpt of one of these letters, read by a young 0:03:15.280 --> 0:03:18.880 girl the same age as Sabine at the time. Recording 0:03:18.919 --> 0:03:22.320 this take was upsetting in and of itself. The youth 0:03:22.360 --> 0:03:24.880 and innocence of a twelve year old is something to 0:03:24.919 --> 0:03:30.000 be cherished and nurtured. It's crushing to imagine Sabine writing 0:03:30.000 --> 0:03:32.440 these letters in the hope of reaching out to those 0:03:32.480 --> 0:03:36.480 she loved. Just hearing a recording of her words as difficult. 0:03:37.480 --> 0:03:40.880 Listener discretion is advised. Parts of them have been shortened 0:03:40.880 --> 0:03:43.120 and adjusted. In translation from French. 0:03:44.920 --> 0:03:50.240 Dear Mommy, Daddy, Nanny, Sophie, Sebastian, Sam, Tiffi and all 0:03:50.240 --> 0:03:53.280 the rest of the family. I asked the man who's 0:03:53.360 --> 0:03:56.600 keeping me if I could write you again, because Mommy's 0:03:56.640 --> 0:04:01.280 birthday is approaching. In Sophie Sam's too, I'm so so 0:04:01.560 --> 0:04:04.440 sad I can't wish you a happy birthday and give 0:04:04.480 --> 0:04:08.840 you a big kiss and maybe even offer you a present. Unfortunately, 0:04:08.960 --> 0:04:12.160 that's not possible, and if I came home, we'd all 0:04:12.240 --> 0:04:15.280 be killed. And I don't want that. I'd rather write 0:04:15.320 --> 0:04:19.000 you from here instead of being at home dead. The 0:04:19.080 --> 0:04:22.119 man who's keeping me told me his friend gave mommy 0:04:22.200 --> 0:04:25.200 my last letter, and after reading it, you said, I 0:04:25.200 --> 0:04:28.200 should be sure to watch myself well and learn to 0:04:28.400 --> 0:04:30.400 like what the man does to me, and to be 0:04:30.520 --> 0:04:32.840 nice to him, because if he gets angry with me, 0:04:33.279 --> 0:04:35.719 he could give me to the bad man, who would 0:04:35.760 --> 0:04:38.760 hurt me and kill me. By the way, did you 0:04:38.800 --> 0:04:42.000 eat the radishes? If you want to replant them? There 0:04:42.080 --> 0:04:45.000 is some seed left in the docker's shoe box in 0:04:45.080 --> 0:04:49.120 my room. The food I get here is disgusting. There's 0:04:49.240 --> 0:04:53.240 never any sauce or seasoning. Almost all the food he 0:04:53.320 --> 0:04:57.359 gives me is expired, he says. The expiry date on 0:04:57.440 --> 0:05:01.359 the label is the cell date. Everything I get is 0:05:01.400 --> 0:05:04.479 the generic brand. But Hey drinks real coke and eats 0:05:04.560 --> 0:05:07.960 real nutella. If he has to leave or has visitors, 0:05:08.279 --> 0:05:11.479 I have to stay locked in the basement, sometimes for 0:05:11.600 --> 0:05:16.039 several days without any meals. When he left for five days, 0:05:16.080 --> 0:05:18.960 he gave me some expired chocolate from nineteen ninety three. 0:05:19.560 --> 0:05:22.560 It tasted old, but I ate it anyways. Hope you're 0:05:22.600 --> 0:05:25.200 thinking of me. I miss you and adore you all 0:05:25.360 --> 0:05:25.880 very much. 0:05:29.480 --> 0:05:33.200 The letters from Sabine are long and detailed. I left 0:05:33.200 --> 0:05:36.320 out the parts about the repeated assaults she experienced at 0:05:36.360 --> 0:05:43.159 the hands of this monster. In early August, he locked 0:05:43.200 --> 0:05:45.679 her into the basement and said he'd be back soon 0:05:46.000 --> 0:05:51.279 with a new friend for her. On August tenth, nineteen 0:05:51.360 --> 0:05:54.640 ninety six, after several days with solitude in the dark 0:05:54.680 --> 0:05:57.720 and damp dungeon, he opened the trap door and told 0:05:57.760 --> 0:06:04.760 Sabine her new friend was there. He led her to 0:06:04.839 --> 0:06:10.159 the same upstairs room where she'd been placed after being abducted. There, 0:06:10.400 --> 0:06:14.279 to Sabine's horror, was another girl in a drug induced haze, 0:06:14.640 --> 0:06:18.840 chained to the bed. It was her new future cellmate, 0:06:19.640 --> 0:06:27.000 Letitia Dalaise. You'll remember from the last episode that a 0:06:27.080 --> 0:06:30.320 sixth girl, Leticia d Lais, went missing on August eighth, 0:06:30.440 --> 0:06:33.320 nineteen ninety six, from the village of Bertrie in the 0:06:33.360 --> 0:06:38.240 south of Belgium. The King's Prosecutor Michel Bourlat, along with 0:06:38.360 --> 0:06:42.840 investigating Judge Conrad, and police, were furiously working on tracking 0:06:42.920 --> 0:06:46.920 down a lead that uncovered from interviews. In Bertrie, two 0:06:46.920 --> 0:06:50.560 separate witnesses reported seeing a suspicious looking van near where 0:06:50.640 --> 0:06:54.080 Letitia was last seen, and by chance one of the 0:06:54.120 --> 0:06:57.799 witnesses was able to recall the van well, even remembering 0:06:57.839 --> 0:07:01.159 the first three letters of the license plate. He thought 0:07:01.160 --> 0:07:04.400 the van was a Renault traffique and a license plate 0:07:04.440 --> 0:07:09.360 began with fr R. They quickly ran a search of 0:07:09.400 --> 0:07:12.440 all Renault vehicles in Belgium with a license plate starting 0:07:12.480 --> 0:07:15.280 with f r R, and the query gave them seventy 0:07:15.280 --> 0:07:19.640 seven hits. Only one of these seventy seven Renault vehicles 0:07:19.880 --> 0:07:23.240 was a traffique model. It was registered to a man 0:07:23.440 --> 0:07:31.840 from the town of Charlewais named Mark de True. During 0:07:31.880 --> 0:07:35.280 my interview with the former King's prosecutor, Michel Boulet, he 0:07:35.400 --> 0:07:37.240 talked me through how it went down from there. 0:07:37.600 --> 0:07:41.880 Monsieur the agent van Rillard ran a search in his 0:07:41.960 --> 0:07:46.040 computer and several names come back, one of which was 0:07:46.080 --> 0:07:52.400 a certain to True. I asked, who's this guy? He 0:07:52.560 --> 0:07:56.320 was someone very interesting and had been under surveillance for 0:07:56.360 --> 0:08:03.040 a year then by the Gendarmerie of Challerroois, and we 0:08:03.040 --> 0:08:06.440 set up a meeting that evening with the first Sergeant 0:08:06.520 --> 0:08:10.320 Michaud and two officers from challah Wah who were going 0:08:10.320 --> 0:08:14.400 to bring more information about the suspect and their surveillance operation. 0:08:18.400 --> 0:08:21.360 At eight pm, I was there and the three officers 0:08:21.360 --> 0:08:24.640 from shallow Wah arrived with a relatively large case file, 0:08:25.000 --> 0:08:27.240 and mister Michaud tells us that they have a lot 0:08:27.240 --> 0:08:30.400 of suspicions about Du True, who'd already been sentenced to 0:08:30.480 --> 0:08:35.480 thirteen years of prison for abduction, rape and sequestration of miners, 0:08:36.800 --> 0:08:40.040 got out of prison two years ago and had apparently 0:08:40.120 --> 0:08:44.000 solicited people to help him abduct young girls and imprison 0:08:44.040 --> 0:08:46.320 them in hiding places he was building at his home. 0:08:47.040 --> 0:08:47.480 Shit we. 0:08:50.920 --> 0:08:54.240 I said, that's great. What's he doing in Bertree where 0:08:54.240 --> 0:08:59.480 a young girl just disappeared? An operation was set in 0:08:59.520 --> 0:09:03.440 motion right away at nine pm. The investigating judge set 0:09:03.440 --> 0:09:08.240 it up with a gendarmerie. It's after nine pm and 0:09:08.440 --> 0:09:11.319 we can execute a warrant without obvious offense at night. 0:09:12.440 --> 0:09:15.480 There's no obvious offense at this point. There are clues 0:09:15.520 --> 0:09:18.400 that it could be true, but there is no obvious offense. 0:09:18.880 --> 0:09:21.880 We can't make an arrest just based on suspicion between 0:09:21.920 --> 0:09:26.480 sunset and sunrise, but there's nothing preventing us from surveilling him. 0:09:27.160 --> 0:09:29.520 At three am, all of the addresses of Du Tru 0:09:29.679 --> 0:09:34.000 are under surveillanced. 0:09:34.120 --> 0:09:37.640 True owned several rundown properties which he'd managed to accumulate 0:09:37.679 --> 0:09:41.440 over time. Judicial authorities and police moved as quickly as 0:09:41.480 --> 0:09:44.760 they could. When they found the name Mark de True 0:09:45.040 --> 0:09:48.280 and checked his records, they knew he was a strong suspect. 0:09:49.160 --> 0:09:51.959 The Gendarmerie of Charlewas had a huge file on to 0:09:52.080 --> 0:09:54.640 True and it was obvious that he could be a perpetrator. 0:09:55.840 --> 0:10:00.560 His file included other possible accomplices, including his wife Miche Martin, 0:10:01.240 --> 0:10:05.200 and friends Michel Lelievre and a french Man named Bernard Weinstein. 0:10:06.280 --> 0:10:09.679 Michel Martin was de Tru's wife or second wife, i 0:10:09.679 --> 0:10:13.160 should say. In my interview with the King's prosecutor, he 0:10:13.280 --> 0:10:17.920 refers to her as Martin. Michel Lo Lievre was a 0:10:17.920 --> 0:10:20.480 friend of Dtruz, or more like a lackey who was 0:10:20.520 --> 0:10:23.200 strung out on drugs and did odd jobs for the True. 0:10:24.080 --> 0:10:27.880 In the interview, he's referred to as Li Lievre. Bernard 0:10:27.880 --> 0:10:30.679 Weinstein was another friend of Dtruz, or more like an 0:10:30.720 --> 0:10:35.280 associate who worked with him on various criminal enterprises. Weinstein 0:10:35.360 --> 0:10:37.800 was a hardened criminal from France with a very long 0:10:37.880 --> 0:10:41.640 rap sheet. It was now three am on August thirteenth, 0:10:41.720 --> 0:10:48.040 nineteen ninety six, four days after Letitia had gone missing. Julie, Melissa, Anne, 0:10:48.120 --> 0:10:51.880 Effia and Sabine were all still missing as well. Police 0:10:51.920 --> 0:10:54.880 had all of Dtru's properties under surveillance, but they couldn't 0:10:54.880 --> 0:10:58.320 move in for arrest until after sunrise because of an 0:10:58.440 --> 0:11:01.600 arcane Belgian law proclies luting warrants to be served at night. 0:11:03.480 --> 0:11:06.480 During surveillance, they believe that Marked True as well as 0:11:06.520 --> 0:11:09.600 two of his possible accomplices were all together at a 0:11:09.640 --> 0:11:12.960 property registered to his wife, Michelle Martin, in the town 0:11:13.000 --> 0:11:17.120 of Sarce Labuisier. As the sun rose, they applied for 0:11:17.160 --> 0:11:18.840 a warrant to search the property. 0:11:21.160 --> 0:11:22.040 I'm a modernie. 0:11:22.120 --> 0:11:25.079 At one point we got information from sar Labuisier that 0:11:25.679 --> 0:11:28.880 d True, Martin, and the Lievre were all three there 0:11:29.120 --> 0:11:32.400 at the residence of Martin, I think with a famous 0:11:32.440 --> 0:11:38.520 Renault traffic that was the object of multiple consistent witness testimony. You, 0:11:38.559 --> 0:11:41.800 Judge Conrad, said, Okay, let's go exercise the warrants, make 0:11:41.840 --> 0:11:43.079 the arrests and bring them in. 0:11:44.040 --> 0:11:47.360 Police rushed into the residence in Sarce Labuisier on August 0:11:47.360 --> 0:11:51.559 thirteenth and arrested the three suspects. The True was thirty 0:11:51.640 --> 0:11:54.359 nine years old with thick, dark hair and a mustache. 0:11:54.720 --> 0:11:58.240 He kept us cool and submitted to the arrest. Martin 0:11:58.320 --> 0:12:02.160 de True's wife was thirty six. Underneath her long blonde banks, 0:12:02.280 --> 0:12:06.720 her eyes looked vacant and wary, and Lolievre to Truz 0:12:06.760 --> 0:12:09.520 Lackey was twenty five years old with greasy hair, and 0:12:09.600 --> 0:12:12.960 he looked strung out on drugs. As police brought them 0:12:12.960 --> 0:12:16.360 into the local station for interrogation, other officers searched the 0:12:16.440 --> 0:12:21.000 van in residence. They'd heard rumors from an informant that 0:12:21.040 --> 0:12:23.320 the True had tried to hire others to help him 0:12:23.360 --> 0:12:27.760 build hidden chambers in his home, but the police's search 0:12:27.840 --> 0:12:31.400 turned up nothing, and without more concrete evidence of a crime, 0:12:31.760 --> 0:12:34.440 police could only hold them for twenty four hours, so 0:12:34.640 --> 0:12:38.440 time was of the essence. At the station, one police 0:12:38.480 --> 0:12:41.480 team was interrogating to True while another was interviewing his 0:12:41.559 --> 0:12:46.040 Lackey Lolievre, but the wife, Martin, was just sitting there 0:12:46.080 --> 0:12:49.800 and no one was interrogating her, and Boulet grew frustrated. 0:12:53.200 --> 0:12:55.760 The police team, with Inspector de Moulain, took Mark d 0:12:55.840 --> 0:12:59.959 True in for interrogation. Lollievre was interrogated by another team 0:13:00.120 --> 0:13:03.720 from enough Chateau, and Martin was held in waiting until 0:13:03.720 --> 0:13:06.000 one of those teams would be free to interrogate her. 0:13:10.040 --> 0:13:12.959 I told Captain Deneux, who was in charge of this 0:13:13.040 --> 0:13:16.680 operation in Charlerois, that there was another team of judicial 0:13:16.679 --> 0:13:21.240 police there, so let's use them to interrogate Martin. I 0:13:21.280 --> 0:13:24.240 only had twenty four hours to hold these people, and 0:13:24.280 --> 0:13:27.440 they moaned about the judicial police always arriving at the 0:13:27.440 --> 0:13:31.000 eleventh hour, and I said, listen, as the King's prosecutor, 0:13:31.200 --> 0:13:33.960 I'm the one who decides here, okay. I told them 0:13:34.120 --> 0:13:36.880 they had to give Martin to another officer who was available, 0:13:37.360 --> 0:13:41.680 and the gendarmes started complaining, et cetera, et cetera. Moreover, 0:13:42.280 --> 0:13:45.600 just after having this altercation with an officer of the Gendarmerie, 0:13:45.880 --> 0:13:47.800 I walked up to the window and see a guy 0:13:47.880 --> 0:13:51.160 leaving the station and I said, who's that and someone 0:13:51.160 --> 0:13:53.720 said it was the Lievre and I asked, is he leaving? 0:13:54.559 --> 0:13:54.760 Yes? 0:13:54.800 --> 0:13:57.160 They said the enough shot to investigators didn't think he'd 0:13:57.160 --> 0:14:01.120 done anything wrong. And then Commander Law arrived, who had 0:14:01.160 --> 0:14:05.760 been questioning neighbors at detru'z house in Marceinelle and Detruz 0:14:05.800 --> 0:14:08.440 neighbors had said that they saw the True arrive home 0:14:08.480 --> 0:14:11.240 in the van on Friday night together with Michelle the 0:14:11.240 --> 0:14:15.240 olive skinned guy, and I said, who's Michelle the olive 0:14:15.280 --> 0:14:19.440 skinned guy, and they said, oh, that's Michelle Lilievre, and 0:14:19.480 --> 0:14:21.440 I said, well, he just fucked off out the door. 0:14:22.640 --> 0:14:24.960 At that point all of the police again started looking 0:14:24.960 --> 0:14:28.600 for Lollievre, who was now walking around freely in Charlewaugh. 0:14:29.920 --> 0:14:32.080 We found him an hour later at the train station, 0:14:32.160 --> 0:14:33.640 trying to flee to Slovakia. 0:14:35.440 --> 0:14:37.840 Needless to say, it was a bumpy start to the arrest, 0:14:37.920 --> 0:14:41.040 with different police forces interviewing suspects in the same case 0:14:41.080 --> 0:14:46.080 and making uncoordinated decisions, but fortunately Prosecutor Boulat was there 0:14:46.240 --> 0:14:51.320 to knock their heads together. After recapturing lo Lievre, the True, 0:14:51.560 --> 0:14:55.240 his wife, Martin, and Lilliere were all being questioned separately 0:14:55.440 --> 0:14:59.640 by interrogation teams. All of them denied any involvement right 0:14:59.720 --> 0:15:02.880 from the beginning. De True was questioned for five hours 0:15:02.880 --> 0:15:06.800 and admitted nothing. They left him alone in the interrogation 0:15:06.960 --> 0:15:09.040 room for a few hours and then came back and 0:15:09.080 --> 0:15:13.040 continued questioning him for another three hours until three am, 0:15:13.320 --> 0:15:16.680 but he stuck to his story. The next morning, Judge 0:15:16.720 --> 0:15:20.280 Conrad indicted to True for the disappearance of Letitia. Nonetheless, 0:15:21.640 --> 0:15:25.160 meanwhilel Lievre was still being questioned and was suffering from 0:15:25.200 --> 0:15:29.280 heroin withdrawal. One can't help but think that the police 0:15:29.360 --> 0:15:31.920 used this to their advantage to get Li Lievre to talk. 0:15:33.400 --> 0:15:36.320 In any case, he finally cracked and admitted that he 0:15:36.400 --> 0:15:40.760 and a True had abducted Letitian bare Tree. This gave 0:15:40.840 --> 0:15:43.680 police what they needed to continue holding and interrogating the 0:15:43.680 --> 0:15:47.560 three suspects beyond twenty four hours, but the clock was 0:15:47.600 --> 0:15:52.440 still ticking because Letitia was still unaccounted for. Lalievre vehemently 0:15:52.480 --> 0:15:55.280 insisted that he didn't know what happened to Letitia and 0:15:55.320 --> 0:15:57.480 that he just dropped her off with the True at 0:15:57.480 --> 0:16:00.440 his house in Charlewaugh. As soon as that's the team 0:16:00.440 --> 0:16:04.880 responsible for interrogating the True learned ofl Lievre's confession. Sergeant 0:16:04.880 --> 0:16:08.480 Michelle du Moulain and his partner Jean Laboule, took another 0:16:08.520 --> 0:16:12.680 crack at the True. After a long search, I was 0:16:12.720 --> 0:16:15.520 able to track down Michelle du Moulain, and he agreed 0:16:15.520 --> 0:16:18.520 to discuss the case. The recording is poor, so it 0:16:18.560 --> 0:16:20.400 will fade out and you'll hear a translation. 0:16:22.040 --> 0:16:24.680 I was the most experienced investigator in the team, so 0:16:25.040 --> 0:16:28.360 they asked me to take the lead on interrogating to True. 0:16:28.440 --> 0:16:31.480 I proceeded like I usually do with suspects. I asked 0:16:31.560 --> 0:16:33.280 him a lot of questions in order to get to 0:16:33.280 --> 0:16:36.080 know him about his life, who did he live with, 0:16:36.240 --> 0:16:38.840 what was his house like, and so on, to get 0:16:38.840 --> 0:16:42.680 an idea about his personality. And I realized at one 0:16:42.680 --> 0:16:45.600 point that he was a vain person and he needed 0:16:45.640 --> 0:16:48.040 to be recognized in to be respected for what he was, 0:16:48.400 --> 0:16:50.960 so I worked with that as well. The first time, 0:16:51.160 --> 0:16:54.440 I questioned him from three point fifteen until around eight 0:16:54.520 --> 0:16:57.240 thirty pm, and then took a break for about two hours, 0:16:57.880 --> 0:17:00.160 and then I questioned him again from around eleven one 0:17:00.200 --> 0:17:03.840 pm to four o'clock in the morning, and then he 0:17:03.840 --> 0:17:07.159 said he had indeed heard about Letitia's disappearance, but he 0:17:07.200 --> 0:17:10.600 had nothing to do with it. He'd seen her and 0:17:10.720 --> 0:17:13.560 she'd actually gotten into his van at one point, but 0:17:13.600 --> 0:17:14.280 that he let her go. 0:17:16.320 --> 0:17:19.800 With multiple witnesses having identified his van, the True must 0:17:19.840 --> 0:17:21.840 have felt he had to admit something in order to 0:17:21.880 --> 0:17:25.320 remain credible. By the end of a second interview, it 0:17:25.480 --> 0:17:28.200 was four am and de Moulain was breathing down to 0:17:28.280 --> 0:17:32.720 Truth's neck, so he decided to share some crumbs. Hear 0:17:32.800 --> 0:17:36.320 the Truth's actual words from transcripts of this interview read 0:17:36.320 --> 0:17:37.120 by an interpreter. 0:17:38.440 --> 0:17:41.680 I saw a cute girl. She was wearing a skimpy 0:17:41.760 --> 0:17:45.919 summer outfit, and when she passed by, I said hello. 0:17:46.160 --> 0:17:48.520 She was interested in my van and I told her 0:17:48.560 --> 0:17:50.439 to jump in, and she sat down next to me. 0:17:51.600 --> 0:17:54.320 We jetted a bait and I asked her ah, and 0:17:54.400 --> 0:17:56.000 she said she was fifteen. 0:17:55.720 --> 0:17:57.240 Years old or something like that. 0:17:58.280 --> 0:18:01.080 She said she was sped up and had family problems. 0:18:01.640 --> 0:18:04.680 I could see she was open and easy. She wasn't afraid. 0:18:05.640 --> 0:18:09.080 When I found out her age, I was disappointed and 0:18:09.160 --> 0:18:12.200 decided I didn't want to have any troubles. 0:18:12.720 --> 0:18:18.280 And then she left. 0:18:18.320 --> 0:18:21.320 And the next day, on the fifteenth of August, I 0:18:21.440 --> 0:18:23.720 was waiting for him with all of the elements, and 0:18:23.800 --> 0:18:27.439 I interrogated him. Actually it wasn't even an interrogation. I 0:18:27.520 --> 0:18:30.359 demonstrated to him that he was the author of the kidnapping, 0:18:30.920 --> 0:18:34.520 and I squeezed him squeezed him, squeezed him, and to 0:18:34.600 --> 0:18:37.040 avoid making him loose face in front of me, I 0:18:37.080 --> 0:18:39.720 brought him along so he could admit it and to 0:18:39.800 --> 0:18:43.800 take control. He said quote, it's not one girl I'm 0:18:43.800 --> 0:18:50.119 going to give you, but two girls. And with that 0:18:50.600 --> 0:18:54.359 in his mind, he became superior to me because he 0:18:54.440 --> 0:18:56.440 was giving me more than what I was asking for. 0:18:57.600 --> 0:19:00.960 It was a game for him, and he didn't want 0:19:01.000 --> 0:19:03.520 to tell me where they were. He wanted to hold 0:19:03.560 --> 0:19:06.080 me in suspense and take me to where he had 0:19:06.080 --> 0:19:10.080 the girls. He said he wouldn't admit anything then, but 0:19:10.119 --> 0:19:11.600 that he would go to Marcinelle with me. 0:19:17.240 --> 0:19:20.119 To get a deeper understanding of the True's character, I 0:19:20.200 --> 0:19:22.240 was able to interview a man who spent a lot 0:19:22.280 --> 0:19:26.320 of time with him, his lawyer, Ronnie Bodwain, My co 0:19:26.400 --> 0:19:28.680 producer Thomas, and I met with him in his offices 0:19:28.720 --> 0:19:33.520 in Brussels. After introductions and some chit chat, I asked 0:19:33.600 --> 0:19:35.760 him about when the True became his client. 0:19:36.400 --> 0:19:41.200 From two thousand and three until fourteen, I was his lawyer, 0:19:41.240 --> 0:19:44.959 which means that I have done the preparation of his 0:19:45.040 --> 0:19:48.440 court case, the whole court case, and even years after that, 0:19:48.480 --> 0:19:50.560 I have been in contact with. 0:19:50.560 --> 0:19:53.359 Him, okay, and so you were in the thick of 0:19:53.400 --> 0:19:57.960 it and spend I guess countless hours with your client. 0:19:58.119 --> 0:19:58.919 Unfortunately. 0:19:59.040 --> 0:20:02.880 Yes, Ronnie is a sprightly man, full of the energetic 0:20:02.920 --> 0:20:05.439 confidence he'd want to have in your corner when facing 0:20:05.480 --> 0:20:08.760 an uphill battle. I asked him to give his opinion 0:20:08.800 --> 0:20:13.360 on a mental state of Mark the True. 0:20:11.960 --> 0:20:15.280 If you read the report of doctor Denas. He said, 0:20:15.520 --> 0:20:17.520 I've done in my career. He was already at the 0:20:17.600 --> 0:20:19.280 end of his career at the time that he was 0:20:19.320 --> 0:20:22.159 coming to testify in court about the report that he 0:20:22.240 --> 0:20:24.480 made on Mark the True, And I said, I've done 0:20:24.560 --> 0:20:30.399 about four thousands of these expertises, you know, in investigations 0:20:30.440 --> 0:20:33.480 towards the personality of somebody else, that I never met 0:20:33.520 --> 0:20:38.080 anybody so close to one hundred percent psychopath. He says, 0:20:38.080 --> 0:20:40.080 if I have to put something on that, I think 0:20:40.119 --> 0:20:42.400 he must be about ninety seven or something, right. But 0:20:42.440 --> 0:20:44.840 the strange thing is that it is exactly the one 0:20:44.960 --> 0:20:49.119 thing of feelings that he had left that became his downfall, 0:20:49.200 --> 0:20:52.080 and that is that pride, right, because there at a 0:20:52.080 --> 0:20:56.240 certain moment the police commissioner Monsieur de Mulain, who did 0:20:56.280 --> 0:21:00.159 the investigation, he also got to know through the investigation 0:21:00.520 --> 0:21:04.080 how Mark the Trux was and you know, it's very silly, 0:21:04.080 --> 0:21:06.919 but in fact he challenged him. He said, oh, but 0:21:07.520 --> 0:21:11.119 you don't know anything about those girls that were abducted. 0:21:12.119 --> 0:21:14.359 It inverse the rules, and he said, you're trying to 0:21:14.359 --> 0:21:17.119 make me believe that you know something about them, and 0:21:17.640 --> 0:21:21.960 Mark the true this pride, you know, overwhelming. He said, 0:21:22.000 --> 0:21:24.120 oh no, I'm not going to give you one. I'm 0:21:24.160 --> 0:21:26.960 going to give you another one. And he showed one 0:21:26.960 --> 0:21:29.240 of the girls what that was on the billboard in 0:21:29.280 --> 0:21:33.600 the police station. And suddenly, because they didn't even ask 0:21:33.680 --> 0:21:37.120 anything to him about the second girl, they didn't even 0:21:37.200 --> 0:21:40.040 realize that he was involved, Suddenly they had two girls. 0:21:40.320 --> 0:21:43.080 And that is just by pushing on the one button 0:21:43.240 --> 0:21:44.920 left where there is some feeling, and that. 0:21:44.960 --> 0:21:46.080 Is this pride right. 0:21:46.760 --> 0:21:48.960 And I've used the same technique to let him do 0:21:49.119 --> 0:21:52.119 things that I wanted him to do, because after a while, 0:21:52.160 --> 0:21:56.199 you learn you know how people are acting. And I 0:21:56.359 --> 0:22:00.399 had to spend many hours with him, so after while, 0:22:00.480 --> 0:22:03.200 I was able to find out exactly what this Durmula 0:22:03.280 --> 0:22:06.080 had found out as well on the personality. 0:22:05.480 --> 0:22:06.040 Of my client. 0:22:08.760 --> 0:22:11.880 When Da True finally cracked. He agreed to take police 0:22:11.920 --> 0:22:15.639 where Sabine and Letitia were hidden, but he wouldn't just 0:22:15.720 --> 0:22:18.600 give them the address. He wanted to stay in control 0:22:18.760 --> 0:22:23.000 and watch it all happen. Little time was wasted before 0:22:23.040 --> 0:22:25.920 De True was secreted away from the station to lead 0:22:25.960 --> 0:22:30.040 a group of gendarmes to his house in Charlewis. He 0:22:30.200 --> 0:22:33.480 led them down to a basement and walked over to 0:22:33.520 --> 0:22:37.920 an unassuming shelf along the wall. He revealed that behind 0:22:37.960 --> 0:22:43.280 it was a trap door that opened up into a 0:22:43.359 --> 0:22:49.680 pitch black chamber beneath his house. Police shined their flashlights 0:22:49.720 --> 0:22:52.840 into the darkness, and what they saw shocked them to 0:22:52.880 --> 0:22:57.320 their core. Crouched into the corner of a dark and 0:22:57.440 --> 0:23:02.359 damp dungeon were two naked girls, visibly scared to death 0:23:02.880 --> 0:23:07.600 of whoever was coming for them. They were so afraid 0:23:08.080 --> 0:23:10.880 that they refused to move until De True told him 0:23:10.960 --> 0:23:16.440 it was okay. Remember from Sabine's letter that de True 0:23:16.480 --> 0:23:18.800 had told her that he was hiding her from a 0:23:18.840 --> 0:23:20.719 bad man who wanted to kill her. 0:23:20.960 --> 0:23:23.359 Give me to the bad man who would hurt me 0:23:23.520 --> 0:23:24.080 and kill me. 0:23:25.240 --> 0:23:28.120 He had told the same story to Letitia, so both 0:23:28.160 --> 0:23:32.280 girls were frightened to death. When they first saw the police. 0:23:33.640 --> 0:23:38.120 At approximately six thirty pm on August fifteenth, nineteen ninety six, 0:23:38.880 --> 0:23:42.240 all of Belgium in the world for that matter, witnessed 0:23:42.240 --> 0:23:45.480 the surreal scene of Leticia de Les and Sabine Darden 0:23:45.960 --> 0:23:49.760 emerging into the light after being rescued from De True's 0:23:49.800 --> 0:23:53.479 House of Horrors in Charlewaugh. It was filmed live by 0:23:53.520 --> 0:23:56.920 the Belgian TV channel VTM and the footage is both 0:23:57.000 --> 0:24:01.200 harrowing and relieving. It wasn't long before or international media 0:24:01.280 --> 0:24:04.440 picked up the story for the whole world to see. 0:24:04.600 --> 0:24:08.560 Twelve year old Sabine dar Den disappeared in May. Letitia 0:24:08.640 --> 0:24:12.040 Dalais had been missing for only six days. Both were 0:24:12.080 --> 0:24:17.200 imprisoned into truth makeshift dungeon. Patricia Kelly CNN Brussels. 0:24:18.560 --> 0:24:23.439 Letitia emerged first, looking confused and disheveled, followed by a 0:24:23.480 --> 0:24:27.360 pale and emaciated Sabine, who had spent eighty days in captivity, 0:24:27.920 --> 0:24:31.520 most of them in the macabre dungeon. The King's prosecutor 0:24:31.640 --> 0:24:34.520 addressed the nation in a press briefing shortly after the 0:24:34.600 --> 0:24:38.080 discovery of the girls. A younger version of the man 0:24:38.080 --> 0:24:41.760 I interviewed Michel Bourlet appeared in a crowded room full 0:24:41.800 --> 0:24:46.360 of journalists, sitting next to the investigating judge, Jean Marc Conrad. 0:24:47.240 --> 0:24:50.480 He was visibly tired with bloodshot eyes, but he also 0:24:50.560 --> 0:24:52.800