Ger Meeüse, the husband of one of the victims of Thijs H., is relieved that H. has received a heavier sentence on appeal. “He did this to himself.”
H. was appealed today by the court in Den Bosch sentenced to 22 years in prison for the murder of three people in 2019. He was also ordered to undergo compulsory treatment.
Last month, the Public Prosecution Service demanded thirty years in prison and TBS against H., after he was sentenced to eighteen years in prison and TBS in July 2020. The sentence is higher than the original conviction, because according to the court, the legal order is seriously shaken by the murders. H.’s lawyers will appeal the ruling.
‘Not so much regret’
Thijs H. stabbed a woman to death in The Hague in May 2019 and then a man and a woman on Brunssummerheide. One of them was Diny, the wife of Ger Meeüse. He tells to 1Limburg that he is satisfied with the verdict. “I’m glad he was punished more severely in this way than he was originally going to be.”
Meeüse says he was not pleased with H.’s decision to appeal. “If you say that you are so very sorry and that you understand the grief of the relatives, you will not appeal. Then you will not regret so much. I also let him know in my last words that I told him.”
‘We can move on with our lives’
Now that the verdict on appeal is known, a lot of Meeüse has fallen off. “It feels like I’ve lost at least ten kilos. We can actually only start processing now. It took three years before there was finally peace in the tent. It’s good.”
Meeüse says that the past few years have been tough for him. “But I didn’t think about the case every day. I was mainly concerned with the lack that you always come home to an empty house,” he says. Yet Meeüse is also cautiously looking ahead: “For us, this chapter is now closed. We can move on with our lives.”
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