The Criminal Division of the Hainaut Appeal Court has decided to investigate a potential French connection to the Brabant Killings, following new developments revealed on TV Lux by the attorney for the civil parties, and confirmed by the federal prosecutor.
Investigators are now tasked with determining whether two notorious criminals from northern France, the Sliman brothers, Thierry and Xavier, both deceased for several years now, were involved in the killings.
The Brabant Killings were a series of violent crimes, particularly bloody robberies, that resulted in 28 deaths. They were committed primarily in supermarkets in Brabant Province, Belgium, between 1982 and 1985.
In June 2024, the federal prosecutor announced the closing of the investigation into the killings, citing the inability to conduct any more active inquiries, although victims were still permitted to access the files and request additional investigative actions.
Several civil parties took advantage of this option. In January, the Mons Criminal Court ordered an investigation into statements by two boys from Opwijk who, on 9 November 1985, just hours before a deadly robbery at a Delhaize store in Aalst, had noted down the registration numbers of two cars linked to the attack.
The boys wrote down the numbers in a small notebook and informed their father when news of the robbery broke. The father passed the information to the police, and it was added to the case file. However, the two witnesses were never questioned, and no investigation was conducted at the Brussels company where a Volkswagen Golf linked to the attack was registered as a company vehicle at the time.
Recently, the court also directed the investigation to explore another lead involving the Sliman brothers: these criminals, known for their violence, had committed several robberies in northern France during the Brabant Killings period.
According to retired gendarme Jean-Pierre Adam, multiple clues suggest the potential involvement of the two criminals in the bloody raids in Brabant. Adam documented his findings in two books about 'the French Connection,' a lead he stumbled upon while investigating the Dutroux case. Last month, France Télévision aired a programme on this angle, previously unexplored by Belgian judicial authorities.
Adam observed that the Belgian crimes occurred when Thierry Sliman was not in custody. Thierry had allegedly told an associate during a visit to Belgium that he had blood on his hands in the country.
Xavier Sliman was reportedly incarcerated on 19 March 1984, and Thierry on 30 September the same year, remaining in jail until mid-1985. This corresponds to a period when no Brabant Killings took place in Belgium.
Additionally, one of the suspect sketches from the Brabant Killings bore a striking resemblance to an associate of the Sliman brothers.
Furthermore, during an investigation into the murder of a restaurateur in the 2000s, Adam discovered a French warrant for Xavier Sliman related to the attack on the Dekaise armoury in Wavre, the first crime attributed to the Brabant Killers.
Xavier Sliman bore a strong resemblance to the wanted photo, but this detail was never relayed to Belgian investigators.
