Overview
- In a Rotterdam hearing Friday morning, Mels van B., 46, apologized to victims and parents and said he did not distribute the images he recorded.
- Prosecutors were due to present their sentence request Friday after two days of emotional victim statements by children and parents.
- The defendant is accused of abusing 31 children, including 18 physically, secretly recording at least 13, and sedating victims with sleep medication in drinks.
- The Pieter Baan Centrum advised imposing TBS with compulsory treatment, and 63 civil claims have been filed seeking damages for abuse and privacy violations.
- Other Dutch cases progressed this week: a 12‑month demand for a Hoogeveen man over years of online grooming, a four‑year demand for a Putten grandfather who admitted abuse and burning a tablet, and Assen convictions of two men to five and 4.5 years with a third suspect acquitted.