Maurice, a former professor at UNamur, hopes to see the 84,000 euros that Julienne, prosecuted for child trafficking, owes him: "I'm at rock bottom, she's blown my family up"

Julienne Mpemba from Namur is currently being prosecuted for child trafficking. But two years ago, she was ordered to repay €84,363 to Maurice Luca, a former professor at UNamur. He hasn't received anything yet, but he's giving her a chance.
 

Julienne Mpemba , a 47-year-old Belgian-Congolese woman living in Namur, is currently being prosecuted for adoption fraud, human trafficking, kidnapping of minors, hostage-taking, fraud, corruption, forgery and use of forged documents. After eight years of investigation, the case was argued two weeks ago before the criminal court. From the beginning, Julienne has denied the evidence against her. However, the public prosecutor is requesting a 12-year prison sentence.

After some research, we learned that Julienne Mpemba had already been convicted in another case. We contacted Maurice Luca, a philosophy professor at UNamur who has been retired for two years. She actually owes him the sum of €84,363 since a judgment handed down on 20 December 2022 by the Namur Court of First Instance.

Before telling us his story, this former teacher indicates that he wants to respect the principle of presumption of innocence for the case in which Julienne Mpemba is currently charged. But as far as his story is concerned, Julienne has in fact been convicted. "We met in 2012 and she told me about her project for the "Tumani" orphanage in Kinshasa (Editor's note: an orphanage through which the stolen children passed). We got on well and she quickly asked me for €2,500 for her project. I decided to help her because I trusted her," believes Maurice, who has faith in human beings.

For two and a half years, however, he had no news from Julienne. It turns out that she had spent some time in prison for fraud in the context of adoption fraud, a case that is currently being argued. “Then around 2018, when I had no news, I showed up at her house. She was at rock bottom and was taking a lot of medication. I listened to her. She told me she wanted to relaunch a legal consultancy firm in Congo. But she had no money. I offered to help her again.”

Maurice is not afraid to lend her different amounts of money one after the other. In total, the bill came to €84,363. “I trusted her because she had shown me different contracts and everything seemed solid. She had also shown me a bank statement with €93,575 on it. She claimed that this money was blocked and that she could pay me back later.”

Maurice takes responsibility for his mistakes. "I'm in a hole. She blew up my family. She never paid me back for anything."

He filed a complaint and hired a lawyer. Julienne Mpemba was ordered to repay the 84,363 euros. "She told me she was going to reimburse me but she still hasn't paid anything. I think she has nothing left in her accounts." But Maurice wants to believe: "I still hope to get my money back and I dare to hope that she is a little human. If she would at least apologize and reimburse me a little, that would be good. I keep an outstretched hand. I want to believe in the possibility that she could have regrets," concludes the philosopher.