A 67-year-old Belgian woman was allegedly raped by an illegal migrant who requires a Berber language translator, typically spoken by Moroccans, in the Belgian city of Morstel outside a Moroccan café.
In harrowing detail, the woman’s lawyer, Manon Cop, describes how the man “pushed his tongue into the woman’s mouth, groped her everywhere, and held her down.” The victim was only saved when a neighbor alerted police due to the woman’s screams.
“He is the type of perpetrator that every parent warns their child about,” said the victim’s lawyer. “My client is now back in psychiatry.” She says the illegal migrant has shown little sign of any guilt about the incident.
The case began on Oct. 18 of last year, when the victim went to dinner with friends at a cafe and began drinking alcohol. Her friends left, but she decided to stay and enjoy the evening a bit longer.
Manon Cop said that it was at that moment that the “gentleman saw his chance. He was also sitting on the terrace and saw an older woman who was quite drunk. He approached her, sat down at her table, and started to harass her. After that, the lady experienced the longest half hour of her life. He groped her, grabbed her head, and kissed her, even pushing his tongue into her mouth. Then he ran his hand along her breasts and intimate parts. What he did also hurt, and he kept her pinned down.”
The elderly woman violently resisted, scratching his face, and even biting his tongue, while shouting for him to stop. However, the man refused to stop.
“It is incomprehensible that someone can continue to act out their fantasies for so long in such a public place. My client was terrified,” said Cop.
During the incident, the woman was screaming very loudly: “Help, I’m being raped! Why doesn’t anyone do anything?”
The police arrived and caught the man in the act of sexually assaulting his elderly victim. His belt was undone and his pants were completely open.
HLN newspaper obtained a personal letter from the victim, only known by the initial M., which was read in the courtroom. It states: “You have partly destroyed my life. This will haunt me for a long time. I hope you regret your actions, but I cannot forgive you for what you did to me.”
Cop is not convinced the perpetrator regrets his actions at all.
“His apology was very believable,” she said sarcastically. She mockingly said that he claimed to have been drinking and using cocaine.
“‘So I don’t remember anything.’ It is easy to avoid responsibility like that. The least you can do after something like that is to apologize. My client feels very bad that she never got an ‘apology.’ She suffers from nightmares, is often afraid, and constantly feels unsafe. She has relapsed into excessive alcohol consumption and was also a particularly vulnerable woman. Her only son died in 2009. She is in psychiatric care again, and now she is also becoming isolated because she does not dare to go outside anymore,” said Cop.
Cop describes how her client had injuries on her thigh, lip and nose. She was very drunk during the incident but viciously fought back against the perpetrator and yelled she was being raped.
The defendant has no criminal record in Belgium, but he showed up an hour late for his trial, where he needed a Berber translator, which delayed the hearing further.
The defendant, J.H., said: “I can still remember that I had a drink and went to that café, Normally I go to a Moroccan café nearby, but it was closed. That woman was sitting there with her friends. At one point the café closed, and she was left alone. She started talking to me and took my hand, after which I stayed with her. I talked back, but we did not understand each other. I started touching her buttocks and kissed her. At a certain moment, she did start crying and a little later the police arrived.”
When asked why his belt was off, he said “It was possible that I forgot it after I had been to the toilet.”
He told police he did not remember anything. He then said: “I don’t know the woman, but I didn’t try to go in her underwear. I did kiss her.”
The prosecutor demanded a four-year prison sentence. The trial is ongoing.