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Outrage Mounts Over Convicted Child Abuser's Inclusion at Paris Olympics; Pressure Grows on IOC to Probe
Not everybody is taking the inclusion of child rapist turned Olympian Steven van de Velde as easily as the Dutch Olympic team.
Trigger Warning: This article contains mention of rape and abuse.
Dutch volleyball star Steven van de Velde will now live his dreams of competing in the Paris Olympics this week under the ethereal Eiffel Tower. Steven van de Velde is also a convicted child rapist, and naturally, a vast majority of people are not okay with this. The IOC is now under heavy pressure to explain how he was allowed into the Games despite his criminal past.
There's growing public anger over the inclusion of Dutch beach volleyball player Steven van de Velde, who was convicted of raping a British 12-year-old girl in 2016. Groups are warning that allowing him to compete sends a dangerous message to rapists and harms victims of sexual abuse.
Ciara Bergman, the CEO of Rape Crisis England & Wales, called Van de Velde's inclusion in the Olympics “irresponsible” and said it created an “enormous sense of impunity.” She added: “If you can rape a child and still compete in the Olympics, despite all athletes signing a declaration promising to be a role model, that is just shocking.”
The inclusion of Steven van de Velde in the Dutch Olympic team would have ‘serious consequences’
According to Bergman, the IOC needs to investigate the Dutch sporting authority for allowing Van de Velde to compete. Van de Velde, now 29, was sentenced to four years in prison in 2016 after he pleaded guilty to raping a 12-year-old British girl. He had flown to England to meet her in 2014, knowing her age, after meeting her on Facebook.
After pleading guilty, Van de Velde served 12 months in a British prison before being transferred to his home country, where he was released after a month. He has since played internationally for the Netherlands.
Van de Velde qualified for the Olympics in June with his volleyball partner, Matthew Immers. In an interview on the Netherlands Volleyball Federation website, Van de Velde said, “I cannot reverse it, so I will have to bear the consequences. It has been the biggest mistake of my life.”
When it was announced he would be part of the team, several rape support charities criticized his inclusion. However, the Dutch Olympic delegation has defended him. The anger at his involvement in the Games has continued, especially as Van de Velde arrived for the competition.
Steven van de Velde’s participation has sparked fury from the public and campaign groups
Van de Velde’s appearance at the Games has angered campaign groups, who say he shows a “chilling” lack of remorse and empathy for his victim. A petition with nearly 81,000 signatures calls on the IOC to ban known sex offenders from competing.
The Survivors Trust, a UK-based group supporting victims of sexual violence, said in a statement that his inclusion was a “further endorsement of the shocking toleration we have of child sexual abuse.” It added: “The rape of a child was planned, calculated, involving international travel, and will undoubtedly cause his victim lifelong trauma, irreversibly changing the course of her life. As a society, we have to start embracing a zero-tolerance approach to this heinous and costly crime.”
Here’s how the IOC and the Dutch Olympic Committee responded
In its statement via the Athletic, the Dutch Olympic Committee said Van de Velde deserved a second chance as he had shown he’d “grown and positively changed his life.” The volleyball federation added that “when Van de Velde looks in the mirror now, he sees a mature and happy man, married and father of a beautiful son.”
To let Steven van de Velde represent the Netherlands at the Paris Games, the Dutch Olympic Committee has concluded that he should stay outside the athletes’ village and not interact with the media, who would definitely ask about his prison charges for raping a 12-year-old girl when he was 19.
As for the IOC? Well, the IOC does not have its own rules for selecting individual participants for the Games, leaving it to each national Olympic committee to decide.
The Dutch Olympic Committee has put out a statement; they’ve made it very clear that there’s a lot of safeguarding going on, IOC spokesman Mark Adams told a news conference in Paris on Saturday.
What was Steven van de Velde sentenced in 2016?
When Van de Velde was sentenced in 2016, Judge Sheridan told him: “Your hopes of representing your country now lie as a shattered dream. Your actions in those two days in England have wrecked your life, and you could, had you never come to England and committed these offenses, have been a leader in your sport.”
After 8 long years, Steven van de Velde's dream is anything but shattered.
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