Due to a loophole in the law, Elias M. was not yet in a forced and highly secure TBS. This allowed him to take the life of 75-year-old Yvonne from Halsteren. This is what retired criminal lawyer Pieter van der Kruijs says. According to him, several mistakes were made that led to this horrific outcome. “That man should have been treated immediately, but instead he was released.”
Elias M. is suspected of killing 75-year-old Yvonne in broad daylight last week. He had mental disorders and had already been severely assaulted. When he raped a woman in a park in Amsterdam in February 2021, the judge sentenced him to TBS with compulsory treatment.
There are two types of TBS:
- TBS with conditions is a mild form of TBS, where offenders are not allowed to use alcohol or drugs, for example.
- TBS with compulsory treatment is often imposed on more serious criminals. The perpetrator is required to be nursed in a closed TBS clinic for at least two years.
Elias M. received the most severe form, but appealed. That’s where things went wrong, according to Van der Kruijs. “If he had been given a TBS with conditions, the court could demand that he be admitted immediately. But that is not possible with TBS with compulsory treatment.”
This form of TBS only takes effect once the verdict is final, i.e. after the appeal. This means that Elias M. was released after he appealed. “That is of course strange, because if you are sentenced to TBS with compulsory treatment, you are even more dangerous.”
Elias M. did not want TBS, but was in favor of admission. So he did not end up in a closed and secure clinic, but in the mental health institution at the Vrederust Estate in Halsteren, which does not have such a specific clinic. There he received therapy or some form of treatment, but in relative freedom. This is how it happened that he was able to leave the premises of the institution and kill Yvonne from Halsteren.
Van der Kruijs emphasizes that TBS is a good system. “In general, people return to society much better after TBS treatment than people who have only been in prison. The chance of recurrence after TBS treatment is much smaller than after a prison sentence. And of course things sometimes go wrong, but that is why you have to remove the gaps in the law.”
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