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Dramatic scenes in Roysambu as Dutch victims confront their molester


Two victims who were molested in Netherlands when they were aged just seven by a Dutch national who is facing similar charges in Kenya this week jetted into the country and confronted their molester in the streets of Nairobi.

The duo; Eustacia and her cousin Suzana, both 35 (surnames withheld) arrived in the country on Monday night with the aim of testifying against Mr Hans Vriens Egon Dieter, 66.

This did not, however, take place as the case was postponed from Friday this week to April 23 when a judgement will be made on whether Mr Hans is guilty of the sexual charges levelled against him.

OPENED ORPHANAGES

The paedophile was convicted and jailed for two and a half years in prison in Netherlands after he was found guilty of molesting six minors. He later fled to Kenya and opened a series of orphanages where he continued with his crooked ways.

“We still have interest in being enjoined in the case and we testify against him, he should not be free because that is endangering more lives,” Eustacia said.

On Thursday this week, the duo confronted Mr Hans in Nairobi’s Roysambu estate.

The confrontation was witnessed by this writer and Dutch journalists John Van den Heuvel and Koen Nederhof, who work for Telegraaf.

As soon as the case was highlighted in Netherlands on Thursday this week, the Netherlands Legal Protection Minister Dekker Mr Sander Dekker regretted that Mr Hans was still running an orphanage in Kenya.

During the confrontation, at first, the suspect dismissed them saying that he did not identify them but later agreed that he knew them after the women insisted that he had messed their lives.

‘NASTY THINGS’

“You messed our lives and ran away from the Netherlands to come to Kenya and go on with the nasty things that you did to us,” Ms Eustacia told the suspect.

Ms Eustacia and her cousin wonder how Mr Hans is a free man while his victims were still traumatized by his actions.

When he was confronted by the victims Mr Hans said that the current complaints about him were fake.

He said that he might have done nasty things in the past but he was already through it. He claimed that he had done nothing wrong in the recent past and referred journalists to his lawyer.

“Let me share with my lawyer about the matter and he will get back to you,” he said as he disappeared into the vast Thika Road.

At the Kitui home, the victims were shocked to see how the minors who stay at Hans place live.

They said that they would do all it takes to ensure that they change the lives of the minors who according to them “led a hard life inside the orphanage.”

Hans Egon Dieter Vriens was charged with defilement and committing an indecent act to two minors in Roysambu Estate. PHOTO | FRANCIS NDERITU

HARD TO BELIEVE

Ms Rachael during the visit at the home said that she knows Mr Hans as a great man and that it was hard to believe that he had ever molested minors.

“Is it true that he ever did that? He might have done mistakes in the past but all I can say now is that he is a changed man,” she said.

She said that the suspect visits the home twice every month and that she had never seen anything suggestive about the suspected pedophile.

However, she did not accept anyone to have a look at where the minors reside saying that it was only Mr Hans who could give an okay of whether it was right to visit the home.

It is not clear how he left Netherlands to Kenya but it is also clear that he might be using a fake passport.

In February this year after a joint investigation by the Sunday Nation and Nairobi News exposed his life in Kenya, the Netherlands House of Representatives asked the Legal Protection Minister Mr Dekker to temporarily take the passports from pedophiles in the country.

DEFILED MINORS IN DONHOLM

His first arrest in Kenya on sexual related charges was in 2002 when he was equally arraigned in court for allegedly defiling three minors aged 12, 12 and 15 years at Donholm Estate in Nairobi.

He was released on a bond of Sh200,000 but we were unable to obtain details of the determination of the case.

The two victims said they tried to closely follow the case with the aim of pinning him down by providing evidence to the Kenyan government but lost track of it.

“We did not hear about him until in November 2018 when we saw an article about his arrest and since then we hatched a plan to ensure that we be part of the case,” said Eustacia.

Mr Hans was later released on bond by the police who accused him of defiling three minors aged eight, nine and 10 years in 2016.

He could later disappear until November 1, 2018 when the police arrested him from his house in Roysambu estate in Nairobi County.

The following day he was arraigned in the Milimani law courts a day later and according to the lead investigator in the case Mr Pazul Aboge, who is attached to the Transnational Organised Crime and Child Protection Unit, the suspect duped the children’s mothers that he would sponsor their education in his “school”.

FUNDRAISING

The victims said that they immediately started fundraising as soon as they learnt of his arrest. They also said that they were in plans to start an orphanage in the country that will be home to the less fortunate kids in the country.

“We want justice for the kids and that is why we came to the country so as we testify against the man who also molested us when we were aged seven,” Ms Eustacia said.

Nairobi News and Sunday Nation have also established that Mr Hans on November 21, 2013 fraudulently tried to get money from a Kenyan local ban using a fake USA passport and name; Donald Mc Daniel. However, he did not succeed as the hotel manager reported him to the police leading to his arrest.

The case was due on the March 25 but sentencing was delayed after someone who had paid the bond retracted himself from the case. A ruling on the matter will be made end of April.