Last night hundreds of people gathered at the Elisabeth Park in the Brussels suburb of Ganshoren to hold a vigil for 11-year-old Fabian. The boy died in the park on Monday after being chased by police.
At 5.50pm yesterday evening, the vigil started in the Elisabeth Park. It is here that 11-year-old Fabian was hit by a police car 24 hours earlier. To support the boy's parents, hundreds of people turned up. They laid flowers and lit candles and held a minute's silence.
‘Local residents and lots of families with children came here because they sympathise with Fabian's parents,’ says VRT NEWS reporter Philip Heymans. ‘You can feel people's incomprehension at the fact that the police drove into the park to stop an 11-year-old boy.’
‘It is so relatable’
During the vigil, Fabian's parents were greeted by long applause.
‘It is so relatable,’ says one woman. 'I am also a mother of an 11-year-old son who plays around here. We feel it is important that children can play outside safely and that the police can be considered safe. What happened is incomprehensible.'
‘A little boy has been robbed of his life,’ another person present adds. ‘His life has been taken away from him.’
According to the prosecutor's office, the officers wanted to stop the boy - who was riding an electric scooter - but he drove away, and the police gave chase, resulting in a fatal collision.
Why the police wanted to stop the boy is not yet entirely clear. The exact circumstances are under further investigation.
In a joint press release, the police and the mayors of the municipalities involved called for the family's grief to be respected.
‘No words could ease such grief, but we offer them our full support at this particularly difficult time. It is essential that the facts are fully clarified. We therefore call for respect for the work of the investigators and calmness while awaiting their conclusions.’