“Belgium’s Initiation Ceremony Death: 18 Youths Sentenced to Community Service and Fine”

The Antwerp Court of Appeal sentenced 18 Belgian youths each to 300 hours of community service and a fine of 400 euros. They were found guilty of the brutal and humiliating death of their fellow freshman during an initiation ceremony.

The incident that caused a “major storm” in Belgian public opinion took place in 2018. Victim – Sanda Dia, a first-year engineering student at the University of Leuven, wanted to join one of the institution’s elite student clubs, but to do so, he had to go through a two-day initiation ceremony prepared by his fellow students. During the “ritual”, among other things, the young man was asked to stand half-naked in winter in a ditch dug in the forest and filled with ice-cold water, and to eat a large amount of fish sauce with a high salt content. The death of the student, which followed the day after the initiation, was caused by multiple organ failure.

A court spokesman told RTBF that the tribunal convicted the students of Sanda Dia’s death through negligence, but they were acquitted of “deliberate use of harmful substances resulting in death” and thus exempt from the 50-month prison sentence requested by prosecutors.

A spokesman said the high salinity of the fish sauce played a major role in Dia’s death, but the court ruled that the students were unaware that an “overdose” of it could be fatal, as “fish sauce is a freely available food item, and there is no warning on its packaging.

The court also found that the defendants subjected Sanda Dia to humiliating treatment. “It is a degrading treatment to put someone in a ditch filled with ice water in winter and urinate on them to keep them warm. The fact that the victim agreed to this does not detract from the humiliating nature of the act, ”the court said.