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Former Luxembourg police officer Gilles L. has now been charged with parricide over the 2014 poisoning of his 56-year-old mother.

The Luxembourg Public Prosecutor's Office announced on Thursday that there has been progress in an old investigation concerning the death of a 56-year-old woman in Bereldange. The woman was found dead in her bathtub in August 2014.

Her son has now been charged by the investigating judge with parricide and is suspected of having poisoned her. The suspect is former police officer Gilles L., who is already serving a life sentence for the poisoning murders of his sister and her husband. In September 2016, he put cyanide in their aperitif and the pair died shortly afterwards in their apartment in Bereldange. During his 2020 trial, Gilles L. admitted ordering the poison on the darknet and mixing it into the drinks. However, he maintained that he had not intended to kill his sister and brother-in-law, claiming instead that he had wanted to ruin a holiday from which he had been excluded. He said he had been delivered the wrong poison.

At the time, the Police General Inspectorate Inspection (IGP) took over the investigation because the man himself was a police officer. The prosecutor's office said the judicial investigation was opened in January 2018 after elements emerged during another inquiry and was relaunched in 2025, leading investigators to uncover evidence considered sufficiently serious and consistent to justify charging the woman's son with premeditated parricide by poisoning. According to the Prosecutor's Office, the case underlines the importance of work on cold cases and unresolved criminal investigations, and demonstrates that the passage of time does not always argue against pursuing further enquiries when questions remain unanswered.

Also today

• Luxembourg Foreign Minister Xavier Bettel has proposed Jean-Claude Juncker as a potential European negotiator with Russia regarding the Ukraine war.
• MeteoLux has introduced a new heat warning system focusing on perceived temperature rather than just measured air temperature.
• The EKABE dairy has told producers it will not renew its contract with the cooperative of nearly 70 farmers, raising the prospect that the Eschweiler plant will switch to imported milk.
• A fire in a girls' dormitory in Kenya today, has killed 16 children and hospitalised 79 in the latest deadly blaze to hit a school in the east African country
• The EU has fined Chinese-owned online retailer Temu 200-million-euro today for allowing the sale of illegal products.
• Italy said today it was seizing more than 200 million euros in assets belonging to late Mafia boss Matteo Messina Denaro derived from drug trafficking that was reinvested in Europe and beyond.
• France's lower house is set to overturn a series of royal decrees from the 17th and 18th centuries that established the legal status of enslaved people in its colonies.

On air

Ticket give away during the day for the Luxembourg v Italy match next week, which were hotly contested. And the gang are all off to see Antony Szmerek tonight! Hope to see you there!

Figure of the day

MS Princesse Marie-Astrid celebrates 60th birthday

• On 28 May 1966, exactly 60 years ago, the first excursion ship named after the then 12-year-old Princess Marie-Astrid was christened in Grevenmacher. This week, the beloved Moselle vessel celebrates a big birthday, and RTL looked both back and ahead with the outgoing president of the Entente Touristique de la Moselle Luxembourgeoise, Steve Reckel.
• The Marie-Astrid carries a long history, and it remains a major fixture on the Moselle, something Reckel hopes will continue.

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