Conviction Christian institutions & contexts Catholic Harreveld, Netherlands · 1956

Netherlands (1956): two friars convicted after a boarding-school pupil's complaint — the Heithuis case

Record class

Core record

Evidence status

Convicted

Authority role

friars of the Catholic boarding school at Harreveld

Organization

Catholic boarding school, Harreveld

Spiritual nexus

A pupil in the friars' residential care — and a church apparatus that punished the complainant more severely than the courts punished the convicted.

Evidence structure

Proceedings

1956-01-01 · two clergymen convicted

Dutch court, 1956. After pupil Henk Heithuis filed a criminal complaint on 30 January 1956 against friars of the Catholic boarding school at Harreveld for abuse suffered in 1951–53, two clergymen were convicted by a Dutch court that year. Heithuis himself was then castrated at church instigation — a fact documented in the reporting that followed the Deetman commission half a century later.

Primary record

national newspaper court reporting conviction history report The Telegraph (archived): Dutch Roman Catholic Church castration revelations, 19 Mar. 2012.: Reports the 1956 convictions and the Heithuis case history from NRC Handelsblad's investigation.
reference index case chronology Henk Heithuis (case overview; lead index).: Case chronology anchor — used as index alongside the press source.

Related record