Dutch Olympic volleyballer van de Velde banned from Australia
Convicted child rapist and Olympic beach volleyballer Steven van de Velde’s attempt to play at the world championships in Adelaide next month has been denied by the Australian government.
Convicted child rapist and Olympic beach volleyballer Steven Van de Velde’s attempt to play at the world championships in Adelaide next month has been denied by the Australian government.
On Tuesday morning it was confirmed van de Velde had been denied a visa to Australia on character grounds and won’t be able to compete at the beach volleyball world championships in Adelaide in November.
Van de Velde, 31, the Dutch player who participated underneath the Eiffel Tower at the Paris Olympics last year despite misgivings from various Olympic committees – including Australia’s – and objections from children’s charities, was selected in the draw for the world championships.
Van de Velde has continued with his beach volleyball career after being sentenced to four years in jail in 2016 after pleading guilty to three counts of rape of a 12-year-old British girl when he was aged 19. He served only 13 months after Dutch authorities released him from his sentence.
In 2016, when Judge Francis Sheridan handed down the four-year sentence, he said van de Velde’s crime was “career-ending”, that appearing at the Olympics was a “shattered dream” and that he had a “dark side”.
But van de Velde restarted his international beach volleyball career in 2018 with the backing of the Dutch beach volleyball association and the Dutch Olympic committee. He has since married and has a three-year-old child.
Dutch officials ratified van de Velde’s Paris Olympic selection, saying last year he had “served his time” and had undergone an intensive, professionally supervised trajectory of assessments and counselling throughout the past seven years.
Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke told The Australian: “The government will continue to use every tool we have available to ensure that Australians can be safe and feel safe in their communities.”
For the world championships, van de Velde was partnered with former world champion Alexander Brouwer, in the same pool as Aussies D’Artagnan Potts and Jack Pearse, as well as a US pair and another Dutch team.
Volleyball Australia was informed on Tuesday morning by the Department of Home Affairs that the visa application of the Netherlands beach volleyball player had been refused.
VA, who is hosting the world championships, now awaits an announcement from the International Volleyball Federation (FIVB) on the replacement team.
“As the Local Organising Committee, our focus remains on ensuring we deliver a spectacular world championships and I look forward to being there to watch the first serve,” Volleyball Australia chief Andrew Dee said.
Like there had been around his Olympic inclusion there was also outrage around van de Velde’s selection for the world championships.
Two weeks ago, South Australian Attorney-General Kyam Maher wrote to the federal government, calling on authorities to reject his visa as his crimes were “utterly abhorrent”.
The letter also said “we do not believe that foreign child sex offenders should be granted entry to this country”.
