Arlon Assizes: Family of Vinciane Welvaert testifies about "time bomb"
On the third day of the assizes trial in Arlon, the siblings and relatives of Vinciane Welvaert described a woman who was unstable and hospitalised for psychiatric disorders, and characterised as a "time bomb" by those close to her. She is accused of the murder of Marie Reding in 2023 in Martelange.
Arlon Assizes: Family of Vinciane Welvaert testifies about "time bomb"
On the third day of the assizes trial in Arlon, the accused's four older brothers took the stand to describe their sister. Vinciane Welvaert is being tried for killing Marie Reding in 2023 in Martelange, in south-east Belgium.
Family ties broke down in 2015, when the accused's partner had a relationship with her sister-in-law. Tensions intensified during the division of the inheritance. The brothers recounted that they did not know the reasons for her stay in a psychiatric hospital. "She would allow us to visit her on the condition that we ask nothing. It was only much later that we discovered her outbursts of rage, her harassment, her abuse of animals," they told the court, as reported by La DH (dhnet.be).
Those close to her expressed their bewilderment at her discharge from the care facility. "She was not recovered and never will be. She was a time bomb," a member of her circle affirmed.
The accused's niece, who is also a healthcare worker, was very severe in her criticism. She had intervened at the crime scene in the context of her duties with the SMUR. It was at that moment that she had found her aunt: "I was astounded to learn that she was working again as a nurse, 24 years after obtaining her diploma. And after leaving a psychiatric hospital! I held those responsible accountable for hiring her in a care home and then for home care. I would not have wished for my grandparents to be cared for in an establishment where she would have worked."
The victim, a resident of Waremme, succumbed after being struck twice to the head and temple with a blunt object.
The trial continues before the Arlon court of assizes.
Source: DHnet