“Their mother is gone, disappeared, missing. And to this day, no sign of life has been heard from her. Her body has also not been found. And just disappearing, without saying anything, their mother would never do that.” This was stated by the public prosecutor today during the trial against a 60-year-old suspect from Zevenaar. The Public Prosecution Service holds him responsible for killing his life partner and subsequently disposing of her body. The demand: a prison sentence of 20 years.
On Friday, December 29, 2023, 42-year-old Yildiz disappears without a trace in Zevenaar. She is last seen that morning at her work and around noon she calls her daughter; that turns out to be the last sign of life. A week later, the woman - her life partner has kept her disappearance quiet until that moment - is reported missing by a colleague. A large team of police and the Public Prosecution Service is involved in the investigation.
Despite valuable time having passed (which is normally essential to find a missing person), an intensive search is launched, with searches at multiple locations using dogs and radars. The public is also engaged through the TV program Opsporing Verzocht. Unfortunately, all of this yields nothing.
Initially, a voluntary departure seems an option, as her son in Turkey and the suspect received a farewell message from her on the evening of December 29, 2023. However, the Public Prosecution Service sees no grounds for this, but rather only contradictory indications. Her phone is left behind in the house and goes offline a day after her disappearance. Normally, she is very active on social media, but that also comes to a halt. No transactions are found on her bank account, whereas she previously transferred money to her children monthly. The car she used daily is still parked in front of the door. On the day she disappeared, she asked at work if she could work more hours.
All other possibilities - natural death, an accident, suicide - have been investigated and excluded; there are no concrete indications for any of them. There is also no support for an alternative scenario, namely that someone else is responsible for her death and disappearance, in the file.
As the investigation progresses, the Public Prosecution Service concludes that the victim is no longer alive and has been killed. Extensive detective research points to the life partner of the victim. According to the Public Prosecution Service, it can only be the suspect who has taken his partners life.
In mid-February 2024, he is arrested and has been in pre-trial detention since then. During police interrogations, the suspect talks himself into a corner. Statements are adjusted when the suspect is confronted with new facts; the suspect also makes false, unbelievable, and contradictory statements, including where he was the day after the victims disappearance. In the words of the public prosecutor before the court in Arnhem: “The suspects statements are inconsistent and completely untrue. The suspect has mainly put himself in the spotlight with his actions.”
On the evening of her disappearance, he was frequently handling mobile phones and changing the SIM cards inside them. Sent farewell messages that the children and the suspect himself received on the evening of the disappearance are, according to those who received the messages, not from the woman. Even the suspects own children confirm recognizing their fathers texts, that is, the suspect himself. The times and location of the sent messages also point to the suspect.
The facts and circumstances, according to the Public Prosecution Service, support a crime scenario, which speaks against the suspect. This includes blood traces that - despite a thorough cleaning - are found in rubbers in the trunk of a car. Blood is also found on decorative cushions in the living room of the house. Both traces contain the victims DNA.
On the day in question (December 29), for example, the suspect gives inconsistent statements. First, he claims to have been home all day and lying in bed. When confronted with the fact that the victims car, which the suspect initially claimed he never used, has been recognized twice on the A12 - on the way there and back - by license plate recognition (ANPR), he adjusts his story. The Public Prosecution Service: “Out of nowhere, the suspect states that he took out garbage bags from Zevenaar to Arnhem that evening. Using Yildizs car, via the highway. It would be about three trash bags.”
The public prosecutor today before the court in Arnhem about the sentence he pronounced: “The suspect has robbed his partner of life. As a result, the suspect has ensured that three young adult children must continue to live without their mother. Through his actions, the suspect has caused the survivors of Yildiz indescribable suffering and grief.”
The Public Prosecution Service holds it against the suspect that no explanation has been given for what happened to the body of his victim. “The suspect has not only killed Yildiz, but also disposed of her body,” said the public prosecutor. “She has never been found. This has deprived the children and survivors of Yildiz even more. They have not been able to say goodbye to their mother and loved one. No last touch, no last kiss. They have not been able to give her a funeral. They have no grave to visit, no place to mourn. This makes it all the more difficult to process.”
