Kim (11) en Ken (8) verdwenen exact 29 jaar geleden in Antwerpen: zo verliep de spraakmakende zaak die nooit is opgelost
This article gives a good timeline of the events. Here's a translation (google translate) :
Kim (11) and Ken (8) disappeared in Antwerp exactly 29 years ago: this is how the controversial case happened that was never solved
ANTWERP - The disappearance of Kim (11) and Ken (8) Heyrman is now 29 years ago, but is still etched in the memory of many Antwerp residents. They searched with all their might for the brother and sister. Kim was found murdered, and there is no trace of Ken to this day. One of the most controversial disappearance cases in recent Belgian history remains unsolved. A reconstruction.
January 4, 1994: disappearance
On a drizzly Tuesday, Kim (11) and her brother Ken (8) left their home in Kerkstraat in Antwerp to stay the night with a friend who lived a stone's throw from them. First they took the tram to Fort Merksem, where their comrade was currently completing a football training session. However, they would never get there. The children got out near the Sports Palace, still far from their destination. They decided to ask a couple walking past for directions, and shortly afterwards they disappeared from the radar.
January 5, 1994: neighborhood is combed
Mom Tinny Mast assumed that her children spent the night safe and sound with their boyfriend. The police initially reassured the mother, because there were suspicions that they were runaways who would return home automatically.
It soon became apparent that there was more going on. There was a massive search for the children. Police, friends and sympathizers, just about everyone gathered to scour the neighborhood. Posters were distributed with a call for Kim to contact us: “Kim, call,” came the plea. It included a telephone number and a drawn snail. But unfortunately Kim would never be heard from again.
February 11, 1994: Kim is found
In the weeks after the disappearance, the Antwerp police received several tips. People thought they had seen the children at various locations, including the Metropolis cinema, at a chip shop on the Luchtbal and in Putte-Kapellen, near the Dutch border. In vain. A month after brother and sister closed the door behind them for the last time, Kim was found raped and murdered in the cables of a push boat in the Asia dock. She had stab wounds in the neck.
The girl was unrecognizable because she had been in the water for so long. Based on her teeth it was confirmed that it was indeed the missing Kim. According to the autopsy, the girl was killed three hours after her disappearance.
Because the big sister had been found in the Asia dock, investigators suspected that Ken had also been dumped in the water. They faced the almost impossible task of searching the 70,000 square meter dock. A needle in a haystack, especially if you take into account the limited technology with which the divers had to work at the time. The search yielded nothing useful other than a battery, a moped and the carcass of a dog. Ken's body was never found.
Despite the fact that dozens of people were questioned and at least as many DNA samples were taken, there has been no trace of the perpetrator to date.
February 18, 1994: search for Ken halted
Six weeks after the disappearance, police forces called off the search for Ken. The investigators believe that they can no longer do anything for the boy.
1996: link with Dutroux case?
There was radio silence about the case for two years. Until 1996, when the Dutroux case threw our country into turmoil. The Antwerp judiciary woke up again and investigated whether Dutroux had anything to do with the kidnapping of Kim and Ken. Detectives compared DNA samples from the main suspects, but they also came to the disappointing conclusion that there is no link between the two cases. Once again, the research will be shelved for years.
June 24, 1999: Similar murder
Another three years after the next dead end, 12-year-old Steve Vissers was murdered, a tragic event that shed new light on the disappearance case. The boy was knocked off his bicycle, dragged into the woods, raped and murdered. Steve died as a result of numerous stab wounds, mainly in the chest and neck area. The case was eerily similar to Kim's murder.
29-year-old Danny Immens was arrested and sentenced to life imprisonment a year after the facts. However, the man has strongly denied any involvement in Kim's murder case all along. His DNA also did not match the marks on Kim's body.
2014: Ken is officially declared dead
Exactly twenty years after Ken was never seen again, his mother wanted him declared dead so she could finally say goodbye to her son.
2023: cold case not yet completely resolved
Nearly three decades later, the investigation is still ongoing. “The traces and elements in the file are examined and re-examined based on the most recent techniques and developments,” Kristof Aerts, spokesperson for the Antwerp public prosecutor's office, previously said in our newspaper.
