AFPPolice investigation after a theft at a Delhaize department in Aalst
NOS Information•yesterday, 12:09•Adjusted yesterday, 13:55
The investigation into the Gang of Nijvel in Belgium has been closed, the Belgian federal prosecutor’s workplace has introduced. This implies it’s going to most likely by no means be clear who was behind the collection of violent crimes that gripped Belgium for years from 1982 onwards.
The Gang of Nijvel is claimed to be answerable for 28 fatalities in a collection of murders, robberies and burglaries. Essentially the most well-known is a theft of a Delhaize grocery store in Aalst, during which eight folks have been shot lifeless.
Regardless of the police investigation that has been happening for over 40 years, there has by no means been a breakthrough. There have been suspects within the image, nevertheless it by no means led to a conviction.
4 million pages
So as to power a breakthrough, the investigation was transferred to the Belgian federal public prosecutor’s workplace in 2018. It has nationwide authority to conduct analysis.
Greater than 1,800 outdated suggestions have been re-checked and a large-scale DNA research was arrange, a way that didn’t beforehand exist. DNA was taken from 600 folks concerned. A few of this got here from individuals who had already died. Greater than 40 our bodies have been exhumed for the investigation.
However now, six years later, there aren’t any new suspects. The investigation file has grown to a bundle of greater than 4 million pages.
The Gang of Nijvel owes its title to a theft of a Colruyt grocery store in Nijvel in 1983. An officer and two bystanders have been shot lifeless. In French-speaking Belgium the group has a special title: ‘Les tueries du Brabant’, or ‘The loopy gang of Brabant’.
The police investigation was troublesome from the beginning. Questions arose in regards to the gang’s motive. Tens of 1000’s of euros have been stolen throughout the collection of robberies. Along with the 28 deaths, 40 have been injured. It seems that the gang members used extra violence than was crucial.
Regularly, the general public started to suspect that law enforcement officials have been concerned, partly due to the precision with which they operated throughout their actions. The speculation arose that the gang was a far proper political motive had and that its members labored within the police and the military, however this has by no means been conclusively confirmed.
There are actually severe doubts as as to if there was a ‘gang’. It’s attainable that the violence was wrongly attributed to at least one felony group.
In Belgium there was a shocked response to the gang:
The Gang of Nijvel prompted demise and destruction within the Eighties
A weapon and a large
It’s clear that one weapon was utilized in a number of violent robberies. The outline of one of many robbers can be usually discovered. The person is claimed to be so tall that he’s described as ‘the large’.
Family have already been knowledgeable in current days in regards to the transfer by justice to shut the investigation. They’ll nonetheless object. If new details emerge, it might be determined to reopen the case, as a result of an exception has been made in Belgian regulation for the actions of the Gang of Nivelles: they will by no means expire.
Belgium correspondent Heleen D’Haens:
“For many years, the thriller of the Gang of Nijvel has stored the entire of Belgium occupied. Books, documentaries and fictional collection have been printed in regards to the case.
The truth that one of many largest and most violent circumstances in Belgium’s current historical past stays without end unpunished is a stain on the fame of the Belgian Public Prosecution Service.
Survivors, a few of whom misplaced a number of members of the family forty years in the past, had lengthy since misplaced hope of discovering the reality. However, this official announcement is a heavy blow to them.”
