A Belgian enterprise court in Ghent has ruled that Lesley-Ann Poppe and her husband, Kevin Lebreton, did not genuinely attempt to rescue their struggling beauty academy, and it moved the academy’s effective date of payment cessation back by nearly five months — a finding that puts assets transferred during the so-called rescue operation, including a Jaguar sold to Lebreton, within reach of the bankruptcy trustee, Gazet van Antwerpen reported.
The ruling, issued by the Ghent enterprise court, dismantles the couple’s claim that they spent months doing everything possible to save the Beauty Academy. The court found the academy had already stopped payments in April 2025, almost five months before the official bankruptcy filing, and concluded the bankruptcy was artificially delayed to buy time to settle a tax dispute and reorganize the couple’s other companies.
Unpaid wages, unpaid rent, €50,000 in outstanding invoices
The financial troubles at the Beauty Academy of Lesley-Ann Poppe and Kevin Lebreton date to spring 2025. According to GVA, five employees stopped receiving wages, rent on two commercial premises went unpaid, and at least €50,000 in invoices remained outstanding while barely €3,000 sat in the account.
The couple responded by launching a judicial reorganization, arguing that a “new business model” adapted to “changed digital market conditions” would save the academy. Through their lawyer, they maintained they had done everything in their power to keep the school afloat. The court swept those arguments aside.
The judges noted that staff and rent on the two rented properties were no longer being paid, that there were repeated default judgments over unpaid wages and invoices, and that beauty equipment essential to the academy’s operations had been handed to creditors instead of being used to pay outstanding bills.
“A company that genuinely wants to be rescued and reorganize with continuity in mind does not allow itself to be evicted from two rented premises, does not allow itself to be condemned by default numerous times toward employees and subcontractors, and does not hand over equipment necessary for its activities in exchange for payment of invoices. The facts show the board’s disinterest from March 2025,” the court stated, according to GVA.
Bankruptcy delayed to reach a tax deal
It took another five months before Poppe and Lebreton filed for the academy’s bankruptcy. The court said the reason was clear: the couple artificially postponed the bankruptcy to try to reach an agreement with the tax authorities and to gain time to organize their other companies.
According to GVA, Het Nieuwsblad reported the week before the ruling that a settlement with the tax authorities had since been reached. Separately, GVA reported in October 2025 that the federal government was claiming just over €1.1 million from the bankrupt academy, with more than 30 other creditors including former teachers, an energy supplier, the social security office (RSZ), and the couple’s own lawyers.
Jaguar transferred to husband’s private assets for €18,000 — with no money paid
Because the “date of cessation of payments” was moved back by nearly five months, the trustee can now challenge certain payments and transfers made during that period. In other words, the money and goods pulled out of the non-profit behind the Beauty Academy during the “rescue operation” have come into focus.
The court, together with the trustee, established that the non-profit’s Jaguar was sold to Lebreton in July 2025 for €18,000. But he put no money on the table. The car — reportedly a Jaguar E-Pace, the compact luxury SUV — was settled against a credit that the bookkeeping showed had arisen from earlier “corrections.”
The court did not rule on the validity of that construction, but found the transfer of the Jaguar to Lebreton’s private assets “difficult to reconcile” with the claim that the couple believed in the rescue of the academy until the very end. The ball is now in the trustee’s court: he can challenge the Jaguar transfer in hopes of recovering money for the creditors.
Stock sale raises further questions
Questions also remain over the sale of a large stock of beauty equipment and products. That inventory was part of Poppe and Lebreton’s “rescue plan.” The couple valued the purchase price of their stock at around €595,000 and wanted to recover that money through a stock sale to pay off debts. But according to the couple, the sale in summer 2025 brought in only €100,000. They blamed the disappointing proceeds on reputational damage from what they called defamatory accusations about the Chinese origin and quality of their products.
The court also declined to rule here on the validity of those transactions, any fraud, or the directors’ personal liability. But the trustee can now still examine whether more money from that stock sale should have flowed to the bankrupt non-profit. That Poppe and Lebreton were no longer concerned with rescuing their beauty academy at the time of the stock sale is, the court found, established.
Creditors left with no prospect of payment
The early cessation-of-payments date means the trustee can now scrutinize everything that left the academy in the months before the formal bankruptcy, from the Jaguar to the equipment stock.
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