Bart J. was convicted of manslaughter on the 16th of May, for the stabbing of 14-year-old Dinant Paré last year in Hoogkerk. The court condemned him to eight years in a cell and to receive mandatory treatment, or terbeschikkingstelling (tbs).
Six days after his incarceration, the man reportedly stabbed a prison worker in the chest with a broken antenna.
In June of 2021, Bart J. assaulted Dinant Paré in an Albert Heijn supermarket with a twenty-centimeter knife he had stolen shortly before the encounter. He reportedly over-powered and tackled Paré to the ground, before stabbing him to death.
J. claims that he stole the knife to “slice a sausage”, and that Paré was a random victim of his psychosis.
The court determined that tbs with mandatory treatment was also required for J., given the high likelihood that he will offend again. According to the Openbare Ministerie’s (public prosecution) website, tbs is typically ordered in cases where traditional sentencing is considered inadequate. These are incidents where the accused may suffer from, for example, “defective development or disease of his mental faculties”.
NPO notes that in cases where tbs with mandatory treatment is declared, patients are typically kept within the confines of a secure care institute until the court, alongside assistance from medical and psychological experts, determines that they are fit to return to society. Usually, this occurs within a period of 6-8 years.
While the Openbare Ministerie wanted to indict Bart J. with murder, he managed to avoid the more serious charge by declaring he was going through momentary psychosis during the attack. Experts were unable to determine whether or not J. indeed suffered from psychosis, however, they did diagnose him with ADHD, a cannabis addiction, and an autism spectrum disorder.
