Belgian castle lord convicted for sexually abusing boys in Netherlands

The court in Brussels convicted 84-year-old Belgian castle lord Marc d. V. G. of sexually abusing a number of teenage boys between 1996 and 2013 and sentenced him to eight years in prison. A number of these abuses happened on his boat on the Wadden sea in the Netherlands, Het Laatste Nieuws reports.

The man was a leader of the Belgian sea scouts. He took a number of boys to his boat or two his castle in Godinne, where he forced them to participate in sexual games and torture, some of his victims told the court. He called this "groundbreaking exercises". Some of the boys were raped. He also threatened to kill his victims if they ever told someone what happened.

Marc d. V. G. confessed to sexually abusing the boys, but not to torturing them.