“We lived a lie for years”: the most striking letters read out in court this year

“I am ashamed to the depths of my heart,” or “it was out of fear that I did not sound the alarm sooner.” A striking number of letters were read out in Flemish courts in 2025. Not only by – often sobbing – perpetrators or victims, but even employers begged the judge in a letter for leniency. What stories lie behind that? And why do more and more people dare to put their deepest feelings on paper in court?

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