Simon Krepps

In Meurtres en solde, the French adaptation of Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot's Christmas for Season 2 of the TV series Les Petits Meurtres d'Agatha Christie, Simon Krepps is the wealthy owner of the Au Bon Temps department store and the parallel of Simeon Lee from the original novel. Simon Krepps is portrayed by Jacques Frantz.

Like Simeon Lee in the original, Krepps is an overbearing, dislikeable person who tyrannizes his family. Over the years he has worked to pit his two sons Albert and David against each other. He had also driven his daughter Annabelle Rochetti from the house because she had married an Italian communist. In this adaptation Krepp's wife Elisabeth is still alive. He keeps her on a tight leash. She says she has to beg just to get a cheque book. In contrast to the original novel, Krepps's wealth did not come from his own endeavours. The wealth belonged to Elisabeth, who was the Au Bon Temps heiress. Krepps married her for her money and took over the commercial empire.

Like Simeon, Krepps here also meets his supposed grand-daughter Francesca Rochetti. In this case, he gives her a job at the department store. He is very impressed by her and after only 15 days of work, he is ready to promote her to become head of marketing of the department store, over the head of his son Albert. She has done more in 15 days, he tells Albert, than he has done in 15 years. He even gives her some uncut diamonds to start her project of creating and selling diamond engagement rings.

Krepps is murdered in circumstances which are fairly similar to that in the original novel. People in the department store hear a crashing sound and rush up to Krepps's office. They have to break the door down and then discover him stabbed to death on the floor, with furniture strewn about. The motive for killing him is however different. There is no illegitimate son in this adaptation. Krepps is killed by Gaspard Carpentier, the personnel manager of the department store. He had been conducting an affair with Elisabeth. Gaspard planned to kill Krepps to free Elisabeth and the rest of the family from Krepps's tyranny. He visited Krepps in his office and stabbed him multiple times. He then turned up the heating to mask the time of death. Later, he ensures that he is downstairs with other witnesses when the crashing sound is heard. This sound is made by his co-conspirator Elisabeth by pulling on a rope attached to furniture in the room and is done to fake the time of death and give Gaspard an alibi. At the same time, Gaspar immediately fakes a call to Elisabeth at her home to tell her about Krepps's death, in order to give her an alibi.