A reconstruction is being held today (Tuesday) of the events that led up to the death of a 9-year-old whose body was found months later in the Houtdok in the East Flemish city of Ghent. The boy, whose name was Raul, was a Romanian national that lived with his family in Ghent. The public prosecutor’s office hopes that the reconstruction will shed more light on how he died.
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Reconstruction of the hours leading up to 9-year-old’s Ghent boy’s death
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The death of Raul and the discovery of the little boy’s remains in Ghent’s Houtdok last April is a story that schock and saddened many people here in Flanders. The 9-year-old’s body had been put into a holdall weighed down by bricks and thrown into the water at the Houtdok just outside Ghent City Centre. Raul had been missing for months.
But his disappearance had been covered up by his mother and her partner. Eventually family in Romania raised the alarm after a number of disturbing conversations with Raul’s mother. The 9-year-old is believed to have been the victim of extreme physical abuse at the hands of his mother and her partner and possibly evening his sister. The two adult suspects in the case are suspected of manslaughter, assault and battery and concealing a body.
They have both been questioned several times. However, it remains unclear as to exactly what happened. Both suspects say that the other was responsible for Raul’s death and also accuse the boy’s 13-year-old sister of assault and battery on her brother.
To gain more clarity about what happened, the East Flemish public prosecutor’s office is staging a reconstruction. In a statement the public prosecutor’s office said that “all parties have been invited”. A psychiatrist and a pathologist are also present. The reconstruction is taking place at the dead boy’s family home. It is not clear whether later today detectives will return to the Houtdok where Raul’s body was found.