Kimberly De Leon.
CASTRIES, St. Lucia--On Thursday, Police Commissioner Verne Garde said that critical evidence in the 2018 murder of Kimberly De Leon is currently unaccounted for, raising fresh concerns about the stalled investigation.
De Leon, a mother of two and wife of police officer Leozandrae De Leon, was shot and killed at her Morne Fortune residence on October 29, 2018. Her unsolved murder has remained a sore point for the public, prompting intense scrutiny over the years.
At a police press conference this week, Garde revealed that just a day prior, investigators informed him of a “breakthrough” update in the case. The development prompted efforts to secure physical evidence, but attempts to retrieve it have so far failed.
“We had to follow up with the exhibit room and also the Special Service Unit armoury,” Garde said. “And as we speak today, we are not in a position to have secured this exhibit.”
The commissioner said the information was first shared with Kimberly De Leon’s mother, Mary Williams, before being made public.
Garde added that the latest developments have further intensified interest in the investigation.
In the early stages of the probe in 2018, police named Kimberly’s husband as “a person of interest”, a designation that was later withdrawn. According to the St. Lucia STAR, De Leon subsequently filed defamation lawsuits against the police, retired radio host Juk Bois and his former employers, and a Facebook user described in reports as “a political activist”.
In a separate STAR article published in December 2019, it was reported that in 2015 Officer De Leon reported to the prime minister and the Public Service Commission a troubling conversation he had with his then police commissioner, “during which De Leon was warned his life was in imminent danger”, the report said. “Also, that the commissioner had told De Leon he could not guarantee his safety, with fellow officers associated with the IMPACS investigation convinced he was ratting on them to the Kenny Anthony government. De Leon claimed his requests for special protection were denied.”
The murder of officer De Leon’s wife three years later sparked outrage across the country, but little progress has been made in the investigation.
Updates included a January 2024 statement made by then Police Commissioner Crusita Descartes-Pelius who, prompted by a reporter, said that part of the investigation could not be conducted by local police and was therefore being handled by external entities.
By April 2024, Descartes-Pelius said police were then awaiting ballistics reports from an overseas laboratory. However, in a sit-down interview shortly after, Williams, who has remained vocal in her pursuit of justice for her daughter, told Newsmaker Live host Timothy Poleon that she was aware ballistics analysis had begun three years earlier.
There have been no substantial updates since. The investigation remains open. ~ St. Lucia Times ~
