Here are the main dates of the Maëlys case, while the murder trial of Nordahl Lelandais begins this Monday before the Assize Court of Isère.
Disappearance
On the night of August 26 to 27, 2017, Maëlys De Araujo disappeared around 3 a.m. from a wedding party in the village hall of Pont-de-Beauvoisin (Isère). Her family searches for her for an hour before alerting the gendarmes. Very quickly, the investigators believe that she was able to get into a car, three tracking dogs having stopped at the same place in the nearby parking lot. Searches are fruitless.
On video
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suspicions
On August 31, Nordahl Lelandais, 34 years old at the time, a former soldier, friend of the groom who came as a neighbor, was placed in police custody. Invited late to the wedding, he was absent during the party. The one his friends call “Nono” admits having had contact with the child but refutes the suspicions: he says he went away to change and cleaned his car thoroughly the day after the wedding, with the aim of selling it.
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Indictment
On September 3, while divers were still probing the many bodies of water in the region, Lelandais was arrested again: a trace of Maëlys’ DNA was found in his car. He is indicted for kidnapping and imprisoned. He assures him that Maëlys got into her car with a little boy, to see if a dog was there, and that they all then returned to the room.
Silhouette
In November 2017, the prosecutor reported CCTV images detecting his car at the time of the disappearance: on the way there is a small figure dressed in white by his side, he is alone on the way back. He is indicted for murder preceded by kidnapping and forcible confinement. He always denies.
The Walnut folder
The Maëlys case led investigators to question Lelandais about the disappearance in Chambéry of Arthur Noyer, a 23-year-old alpine hunter. Telephone expertise shows that the two men traveled together on the night of April 11 to 12, 2017, when the corporal disappeared. Lelandais denies any involvement. He is indicted for murder on December 20, 2017.
Multiple surveys
In January 2018, a specialized cell of the gendarmerie was created to check for possible links with other cases. The cell went through some 900 disappearance files, without result, before being dissolved in October 2020. Confessions On February 14, 2018, Lelandais, confused by a trace of blood discovered under a carpet in his car, said he hit the girl and the having killed her “involuntarily”. He leads the investigators to the remains of his victim, in the Chartreuse massif. On March 19, he declared that Maëlys died in her car after a “very violent blow” to the face when she started screaming. On March 29, taken to the place of discovery of the bones of Arthur Noyer, he recognizes his involvement in the death of the soldier, evokes a fight that went wrong.
Sexual assaults
The discovery of child pornography images on his telephones and computer led in 2018 to his indictment for sexual assaults on two five- and six-year-old cousins, during the summer of 2017. He admitted the facts in December 2018. Funeral Le June 2, 2018, three months after the discovery of the body, nine months after the disappearance, the church of La Tour-du-Pin (Isère) hosts the funeral of Maëlys.
Other Complaint
On February 27, 2020, Lelandais was indicted by a judge from Charleville-Mézières (Ardennes) for a sexual assault on a third cousin. The facts, which he disputes, date back to March 2017 when she was 14 years old. Noyer trial Nordahl Lelandais was sentenced on May 11, 2021 to 20 years’ imprisonment for the murder of Corporal Noyer. He does not call.
Maëlys trial
On June 1, 2021, he was returned to the assizes of Isère for the murder of Maëlys, for two sexual assaults on minors and for “possession of child pornography images”.
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