Steven van de Velde: The Dutch Olympian and convicted pedophile booed in Paris

Dutchman, Steven van de Velde was met with boos by the crowd when he was announced for the Netherlands’ opening men’s beach volleyball match against Italy.

Jimmy Golen wrote, “the hooting was louder for the more formal prematch introduction. Immers — and all the other players appearing on the sand so far in the Summer Games — received nothing but cheers,” for AP News, showing the targetted nature of the crowd’s booing.

Van de Velde was convicted of raping a 12-year-old girl in England, having travelled from his home country to meet her.

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Despite being sentenced to four years behind bars, Van de Velde served only 13 months in prison, per Jimmy Golen for AP News.

Following his team’s loss to Italy, van de Velde did not join teammate Matthew Immers during their post-match media session, breaking IOC convention.

Van de Velde’s teammate told reporters, “He’s not here because he just wanted to rest his mind about it and just focus on the game,” per AP News.

For obvious reasons, Van de Velde’s inclusion in the Dutch team has sparked controversy, with some accusing the Netherlands of protecting a child rapist following their decision to separate him from other athletes in the village.

John van Vliet, a spokesman for the Dutch Olympic team told reporters, “We are protecting a convicted child rapist to do his sport as best as possible and for a tournament which he qualified for… In his case, we’ve got a person who has been convicted, who did his sentence, who did everything afterwards which he can do to be able to compete again,” per AP News.

Other countries have been vocal in their criticism of the Dutch decision to allow van de Velde to compete, with Australian head of delegation Anna Meares saying, “If an athlete or a staff member had that conviction, they wouldn’t be allowed to be a member of our team”.

Following Italy’s victory over the Dutch, Adrian Carambula, one of the Italian competitors, refused to comment directly on Van de Velde’s criminal history, but did tell reporters, “We got the crowd in our favor, and we wanted the victory, so that was the key.”

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