Up to 28 victims in Gelderland child porn case, Prosecutor says

A child pornography and sexual abuse case in the Gelderland town of Alem may be much larger than the authorities believed. A 45-year-old man is already accused of making child pornography of eight children. But the Public Prosecutor now believes that there may be 20 more victims, was revealed in a pro-forma hearing in the court in Zutphen on Thursday, AD reports.

The 45-year-old man was arrested on July 26th. The Public Prosecutor did not want to say much about the case following the man's arrest. Only a group of people involved received more information. This created great unrest in Alem and surroundings.

What is known, according to newspaper AD, is that the man sexually abused at least 5 children between the ages of 8 and 15 and produced child pornography. This happened between January 2015 and the summer of 2018. This information was revealed to around 30 involved people during a private meeting at the town hall of Maasdriel.

In court on Thursday the Public Prosecutor said that further analysis of footage confiscated from the man revealed that another 20 children were filmed, bu not touched by the suspect. Not all the children involved have been identified yet and they may not know that they were filmed. 

The suspect has been in custody since his arrest. He did not ask the court on Thursday to suspend his custody. While he did not make an official confession, he did say that he must "pay for everything he did", according to the newspaper. He wants to cooperate with further investigation.

The next hearing in this case is scheduled for January 10th.