Huge security for Belgian trial
(Agencies)
Updated: 2004-03-02 14:24

Belgium's public enemy Number One and three co-defendants have gone on trial for kidnapping, abusing and killing young girls in a mid-1990s crime spree that shocked Europe.

Dutroux, the main accused, is likely to give evidence on Wednesday.  [AP/File]

Marc Dutroux, 47, his ex-wife and two other defendants sat silently Monday during selection of a 12-member jury and 12 alternates.

At one point Dutroux seemed to nod off. "Your client is going to fall asleep," Judge Stefane Goux told Xavier Magnee, one of Dutroux' three lawyers.

The start of the trial attracted intense attention from the world's media -- and huge security.

Hundreds of police were deployed in Arlon in southern Belgium, where some shopkeepers have posted pictures of the victims in their windows.

The first day of the trial was mostly taken up with choosing a jury.  [AP]

The defendants' box in the new, barricaded courthouse is equipped with bulletproof glass.

The case deepened on the eve of the trial, when Dutroux said in a letter to VTM television network, The Associated Press reported, that he was part of a criminal network with tentacles in Belgian law enforcement. He said co-defendant Michel Nihoul, a 62-year-old Brussels lawyer, played a key role in the wider organization.

"Of course it happens often that defendants accuse each other," AP quoted court spokesman Nico Snelders as saying.

The trial focuses on six girls, two of them only 8 years old, who were randomly kidnapped and abused in a cell behind a custom-built door in a basement in one of Dutroux's homes.

Four died and two were rescued in a case that raised questions about the quality of police work. In 1989, Dutroux was convicted of abducting and raping young women, including one minor.

An investigation originally failed to link Dutroux to the kidnappings, and an early police search of his home did not find two of the victims.

A legislative investigation found that rival police units hindered the search for Dutroux, and investigating magistrates have disagreed over whether he was a loner or part of a larger crime network, AP said.

"There is the feeling that police did not properly do their job," CNN Senior International Correspondent Walter Rodgers reported from Arlon.

"This is going to be an extraordinarily sensational case, certainly the case of the century for Belgium."

In addition to public outrage over the crimes and investigation -- at one point 300,000 people took to the streets demanding justice and resignations -- the case contributed to the 1999 election defeat of Prime Minister Jean-Luc Dehaen's government.

The arrest of other suspects led to conspiracy theories about a child sex ring operating at the highest levels of Belgian society.

Dutroux is likely to take the stand Wednesday, when he is expected to plead guilty to only one of three murders he is charged with -- that of an accomplice whose body was found near one of Dutroux's homes, AP reported.

He is also expected to enter guilty pleas to kidnapping two girls who survived, AP said.

Dutroux is standing trial with his estranged wife, Michelle Martin, 44, and two men alleged to have helped him kidnap several young girls.

Martin is accused of conspiracy in the kidnappings. Co-defendant Nihoul faces charges of kidnapping one of the girls found alive. Michel Lelievre, 32, faces various kidnapping, rape and drugs possession charges.

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