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http://www.guardian.co.uk/elsewhere/journalist/story/0,7792,639371,00.html
Brussels dispatch
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Belgium still haunted by paedophile scandal
Belgium's most hated man, convicted paedophile Marc Dutroux, has been locked
up for the last six years without trial. Andrew Osborn wonders why it is
taking so long for justice to be done
Friday January 25, 2002
He stands accused of committing the vilest of crimes - of raping, torturing
and murdering young girls as young as eight for his own sexual
gratification. And yet Marc Dutroux, already a convicted paedophile, has
still not been brought to justice.
Dutroux, Belgium's public enemy number one without equal, has been
incarcerated since 1996 and yet still there is no trial date. It might be
this year it might be next - who can say, officials shrug.
His alleged crimes brought 350,000 people onto the streets of Brussels in
1996, the largest public march of its kind in this small country's history
and yet still nothing has been done.
The entire criminal justice and police system have been shaken up and
reformed in the wake of revelations about the hideously incompetent way in
which his case has been handled and yet still there is no movement.
The Dutroux affair is a scar on Belgium's national conscience which grows
deeper each year. There is no other single event, bar the second world war,
which has had such a traumatic and damaging effect to the country's
self-image. So why the delay?
The charge sheet against Dutroux, formerly an electrician, could not be more
serious. He is said to have kidnapped and abused six girls aged between
eight and 19 and killed four of them. He is also alleged to have murdered an
accomplice.
But what is worse for many is the sadism and sheer cruelty which appears to
have characterised his captives' last days. Two of his alleged victims -
Melissa Russo and Julie Lejeune, both eight - were sexually abused and
tortured in makeshift dungeons in metal cages in his basement. Their bodies
were later found in his back garden in southern Belgium. They had starved to
death while Dutroux did a short stint in jail for theft.
Two other girls - An Marchal, 17 and Eefje Lambrecks, 19 - also met their
end in his custody and their decomposed corpses were discovered in another
of his houses. Laetitia Delhez, who was then 14 and is now a supermarket
checkout girl, and Sabine Dardenne, managed to escape with their lives but
will never be the same again.
In a recent interview Ms Delhez said she felt abandoned by the authorities
and deprived of support and even basic information about the case against
her former captor. But still the authorities dither.
Meanwhile Dutroux, who inhabits cell 801 in Arlon prison and is watched
night and day, seems to be sneering at his victims. This week he was, not
for the first time, front-page news and for all the wrong reasons.
A Belgian senator connived with a Flemish journalist to give Dutroux airtime
and the reporter, disguised as the politician's chauffeur, smuggled himself
into his cell and conducted an interview.
The senator is in hot water, the journalist may lose his job and the general
public at large is once again traumatised by events which took place six or
even seven years ago. Plus �a change.
Dutroux thrives on controversy but the fiasco did serve one useful purpose -
it reminded people, if they needed it, that justice has yet to be done. It
also exposed serious shortcomings in security for a man who is supposed to
be Belgium's most dangerous convict and many politicians are calling for the
head of the country's justice minister.
But the Dutroux case is littered with bungling and unacceptable
incompetence, so what difference will one more cock-up make? He was known to
the police for years before he was finally arrested in 1996. He had been
released from prison in 1991 after serving three-and-a-half years of a
13-year sentence for multiple child rape.
When he was set free he was given a GBP 1,400 a month invalid's pension.
Unbelievably, police also searched his house when Julie and Melissa were
cowering in cages in his basement but failed to find them. They heard
screaming but chose to believe Dutroux, who told them it must have been
children playing outside.
And, to add insult to injury, Dutroux briefly escaped in 1998 making a
mockery of the police and prompting a wave of government resignations.
Paradoxically he has also come close to being released because of the length
of time it has taken to mount a case against him, a delay which his lawyers
argued breached the European convention on human rights.
The authorities were only able to circumvent this problem by convicting him
for his abortive escape bid. And the closest he has come to a court case is
one he mounted himself - to protest against his conditions in prison. So
what an earth, you may well ask, is going on?
The victims' parents think they have an answer - a cover-up and many
Belgians agree with them. Dutroux was not acting alone, they say, but was
part of a wider paedophile ring which included policemen and senior members
of the establishment. Why else would there be such a delay in going to
trial?
This week Dutroux himself said as much although possibly for his own
reasons. "A network with all kinds of criminal activities really does
exist," he told VTM, a Flemish TV station. "But the authorities don't want
to look into it." And there is no doubting that things do look odd.
The original investigating magistrate was dismissed after sharing a meal
with one of the victim's families and several prosecutors, policemen and
crucial witness have committed suicide. Important evidence has also
disappeared.
So maybe Dutroux is being protected from on high. What other explanation can
there be for such a disgraceful chain of events? But one thing is certain -
the entire credibility of the current reformist government of Guy
Verhofstadt and Belgium's very reputation as a normal civilised country is
on the line. Further delay is unacceptable.
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