More than two months after the disappearance of Leslie and Kevin, the investigation is still ongoing for “arrest, kidnapping, detention or kidnapping” but the leads are tenuous.
Disappeared since the end of November 2022, Leslie Hoorelbeke and Kevin Trompat are still actively sought. The young couple has not been heard from since the night of November 25 to 26 after spending the evening with a friend of Kevin’s parents and when they only had a few tens of meters to go to find the house in which they were to stay, that of Tom, a close friend of the couple.
Faced with this worrying disappearance, a judicial investigation was opened and since then an investigation has been carried out for “arrest, kidnapping, detention or kidnapping”. But with the few elements at their disposal, the investigators have not yet managed to shed light on all the mysteries surrounding the disappearance of Leslie and Kevin. Testimonials reveal details about the last evening during which the couple was seen: round trips during the evening, the €10,000 that Kevin had on him, the discovery of the couple’s personal effects miles away from their home.
Determined to find their daughter and son-in-law, Leslie Hoorelbeke’s parents conduct their own investigations and have their hands on the last text messages sent by Leslie to Tom, the young man who was to house them. In these disturbing messages, seen by RTLLeslie says “[vomir] blood” and complained of stomach aches. According to the lawyer for the young woman’s family, Me Charles-Emmanuel Andrault, these discomforts could come from digestive problems or from the consumption of specific products, and “this contributes to giving this investigates a disturbing character”.
The Parisian returned in detail to the evening of the disappearance of Leslie and Kevin, that of November 25 to 26, 2022. Then in a relationship for less than a month, the two young people decide to spend the evening of Friday evening at Nicolas R., a longtime friend of Kevin’s father, Guy Trompat. Before going to his house, they both have an aperitif at the home of Tom T., a friend of the couple who is to host them for the night, around 5:30 p.m. They go to Nicolas at around 7 p.m. to taste a veal blanquette in the company of the host of the place and another guest. The latter would have left the household around midnight. Leslie and Kevin would have left around 3am.
Many round trips on the evening of the disappearance
During the evening, the partner of Kevin’s father would have gone to Nicolas R. to bring 5,000 euros in cash to his son-in-law, at the latter’s request. The last elements rather evoke a sum close to 10,000 euros. She would have arrived around 8:30 p.m. and would have stayed with Nicolas R. for two hours. During this time, Kevin would have left the house, alone, for fifteen minutes in order to go to an appointment in the village with a man who sold a second-hand car. Kevin would have justified by this appointment the fact of asking this substantial sum of money to his mother-in-law. Kevin’s father claims to have had his son on the phone during this time, and explains that Kevin would have indicated to him, while he was walking, that there were “five suspicious people” in a white car. “He was like, ‘Dad, I was scared. I don’t know what those guys are.’ He’s never scared like that, my son,” said Kevin’s father, according to comments relayed by the show. seven to eightSunday 15 January on TF1. Asked about RTLKevin’s father says that after this meeting related to the sale of this used car, his son was different, “stressed” and “upset”.
For her part, Leslie would have left the small group around 9:30 p.m. to go to Jérémy, a 30-year-old friend who had already hosted her in his home located in Aigondigné. Leslie and Jérémy would have spent two hours talking, and the young woman would then have left to find Kevin in Prahecq, at Nicolas R.. The group would then have started having dinner.
No more news after 3 a.m.
The couple would have disappeared after the evening, around 2:53 am, and would never have arrived at Tom T., the neighbor of Nicolas who was to accommodate them. Leslie would also never have responded to the last text messages sent by Tom. The telephone of the young woman would however have limited to Niort on November 26 around noon. On December 8, the couple’s personal effects were found in a container in Puyravault (Charente-Maritime). These are three pairs of shoes, a toiletry bag, a hairbrush and paint-stained clothes that belonged to the young woman, who was a painter. In addition, two sweatshirts, a wallet, a road safety certificate in Kevin’s name and two shotgun cartridges were discovered.
If Tom T. told investigators that he saw Leslie and Kevin before the couple went to Nicolas R., he did not mention the other contacts he had after 7 p.m. In his story, the young man explained that he saw the couple who “had the potato” around 5:30 p.m. before going to a techno party at his brother’s house. But according to information from The Noon DispatchTom T. would have joined the couple at Nicolas R. in the middle of the evening, between 10:30 p.m. and 11 p.m., when only Leslie was missing because he was visiting his friend Jérémy.
Once gone Tom T. would have continued to take news of Leslie and Kevin by exchanges of SMS to which the young lovers would have replied. According to Leslie’s relatives, in these messages Tom T. would have sought to know what time the couple intended to leave the home of Nicolas R. An approach that the young man justified by “the desire to give them a little kiss before their leaving the next morning”. It was shortly before the couple left Nicolas R. that Leslie sent her last known message: at 2:53 a.m., she reportedly told Tom T. that she and Kevin were still at Nicolas R.’s but that they were going be back soon. Tom T.’s house has been sealed.
On February 21, 2022, new text messages sent by Leslie to Tom were found and revealed by the family of the missing youngster. In these messages, Leslie says she feels bad and “[vomir] blood”. Discomfort that can come from digestive problems or substance abuse, according to the lawyer for the Hoorelbeke family.
The purchase of a car and the deal mixed up with the disappearance of Leslie and Kevin?
What was the large sum of money that Kevin had in his possession supposed to be used for? According to the father and mother-in-law of the young man, the 10,000 were to allow the purchase of a car, a transaction which would have been organized on the night of November 25 to 26, 2022. Disturbing facts, Kevin does not have the license and none of Leslie’s friends seem to be aware of this purchase project, like Cassandra, a friend of the deceased who testified to near TF1 : “I was not aware of a car purchase. These stories of money, it’s still quite suspicious”.
The shadow of a deal deal could surround the thesis of buying a car. As reported by Kevin’s father, Guy Trompat, the young man would have seen and was worried by “five suspicious people” during the evening. “Before disappearing, Kévin felt watched by five guys in a white car. Five people he didn’t know. Someone was after the boy for his money. But Kévin doesn’t deal, he only buys for his personal consumption”, added the father at the microphone of TF1. On the question of a possible deal, Cassandra is categorical: Leslie was not steeped in this world. “I know very well that Leslie was not dealing drugs, I know that it was not towards her that there was a concern. It does not come from her in any case”, she judged.
Did Leslie and Kevin run away to Portugal?
Since the disturbing disappearance of Leslie and Kevin, several hypotheses have emerged as to their disappearance. There are rumors of a leak in Portugal. A runaway categorically rejected by Leslie’s parents: “In Portugal, in a cart without a license, we found it so big…” they rejected to the New Republic. For them, it is only a diversion to cover up a criminal case. Leslie wouldn’t have “Never did that to her dad, she would never have done that to her brother. She even asked us so that Kevin could come over Christmas.”
“We have the impression that they are trying to take us elsewhere” suspected Leslie’s family on RTL. “If we want to make evidence disappear, like clothes, we put them in a garbage bag. While there they were dumped with no bags, nothing, loose. It was made so that we find them in this place, with, at least, an identity paper which put the chip in the ear and that the gendarmes were immediately warned” they revealed to the media .
A friend of Leslie revealed that it had already happened to her friend that she went on an excursion some day but she always gave news to her relatives. “She always sent a message, at least, to her parents or one of us. She would never have abandoned her father, her twin brother or her friends!” added her friend to the daily.
After the opening of an investigation for “disturbing disappearance” by the Niort public prosecutor’s office on December 3, following the report of Leslie’s family, the city public prosecutor’s office relinquished the case on December 27 for the entrust to the criminal investigation center of Poitiers (Vienne), as reported The Parisian. The criminal track is therefore now privileged, with the opening of a judicial investigation for “arrest, kidnapping, detention or forcible confinement”.
Leslie’s parents do not believe in the theory of a voluntary departure as they indicated to the Parisian, January 26, 2023: “Leslie was unable to disappear voluntarily, she may be kidnapped, held against her will, collateral victim of a situation that completely escapes her…” The investigations are entrusted to the research section of Poitiers. For the moment, they have not given rise to any arrest, and the investigation is stalling.