The investigation carried out on the spot did not make it possible to put forward an external intervention explaining the death. Despite a disturbing element: Younès had ingested an SD card before losing his life. After 5 years, the instruction closed. The substitute Seminara spoke this Friday before the criminal court of the long investigation carried out in order to understand this disappearance: “It did not result in any criminal findings. No external cause or intervention might be put forward. The causes of death mentioned are suicide by self-immolation, or an accident, the vehicle may have caught fire while the victim had fallen asleep. Many questions still remain unanswered: why did his phone signal stop, why did Younès head for France, was he alone or threatened by a third party? The analysis of the vehicle did not make it possible to establish a priori a possible technical failure, the analysis of the surveillance cameras of the motorways gave nothing.
A strange new element in this file explains the fact that it was mentioned this Friday before the criminal court of Namur.
Youssef’s sister was the victim of harassment and telephone threats on December 5, 2015, exactly 6 months following the disappearance of the young man. Me Blankoff and Nakad, lawyers for Younès’ 2 sisters and dad, who are each claiming 2,000 euros in non-pecuniary damage, recounted the nature of the remarks made that evening: “Younès’ sister received 5 phone calls. In the first, an English-speaking person offered to release information regarding his brother’s disappearance and death. The same person called back several times, first offering an appointment in Antwerp and asking our client not to call the police. Another person, speaking this time in Moroccan, then called back, asking if Younès had not left an object for the attention of a third person before his disappearance and threatening the members of the family with death. We threatened to do the same to them as to him”
Younès’ sister had recorded 2 of the conversations and noted down the phone number. The police investigation made it possible to identify the defendant, a resident of Borgerhout, thanks to the place where he had bought the SIM card which was used for the calls. The latter, who was absent from the hearing and who had been in Morocco for a while, explained that he had been threatened by an unknown person who put a gun to his head and asked him to make the remarks reproduced above at the victim. Allusions to drug trafficking taking place in the Netherlands and a debt were made, money was claimed. Substitute Seminara demanded a year in prison and a fine of 200 euros once morest the author of the phone calls, already known for similar acts. “The remarks made are more than unpleasant because they were with regard to a bereaved family, who wondered regarding the circumstances of the death of their loved one. Letting them think that their son might be involved in drug trafficking or that he died following a settling of scores is intolerable.”
Judgment in this case will take place on January 13. The Younès family is still waiting, as the two lawyers explain. “Relatives do not explain how or why he ended up in Narbonne. They are convinced that there was an assassination that might not be proven, despite the fantastic work done by the police. Why would he swallow an SD card? That does not make sense. He did not frequent the world of narcotics. After all this time, it’s still misunderstanding.”
