---
aliases:
- Tony Van den Bogaert
category: Belgium Scandals
created: 2026-05-14
location: Belgium
summary: Family friend of Regina Louf (witness X1) who, her parents told police, had
  a key to their home and access to their twelve-year-old daughter, and who admitted
  his relationship with her to police.
tags:
- Person
- Belgium
- Dutroux
updated: 2026-09-22
---

Tony Van den Bogaert was a friend of the family of [Regina Louf](/people/regina-louf/), the witness X1 in the [Marc Dutroux](/people/marc-dutroux/) investigation, in Ghent. Louf's parents admitted to police that Van den Bogaert, then in his forties, had had a key to their home and unlimited access to their twelve-year-old daughter, and he admitted his relationship with her to police. In 2002 he was living on the border of Belgium and the Netherlands and had not been prosecuted.[^1] On April 23, 1998, in a confrontation with Louf, a man described as her "so-called protector" admitted that he had had sex with her when she was twelve, with her parents' knowledge, and had once lent her to others; the admission was not pursued because the acts were time-barred.[^2]

### Louf's Account

Louf said that from about the age of twelve Van den Bogaert acted as her pimp, taking her from Ghent to parties in Brussels attended by [Jean-Michel Nihoul](/people/jean-michel-nihoul/), to the [Le Dolo](/organizations/le-dolo/) club and to Amsterdam, and that he was present on the night of the 1984 murder of [Christine Van Hees](/people/christine-van-hees/).[^3] The prosecutors-general of Antwerp, Ghent and Brussels found on April 23, 1998, that "no proof could be found that Regina Louf could make any contribution whatsoever to these investigations."[^2]

[^1]: Frenkiel, Olenka. "Belgium's silent heart of darkness." *The Observer,* May 5, 2002. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2002/may/05/dutroux.featuresreview
[^2]: Sénat de Belgique. Proposition visant à instituer une commission d'enquête parlementaire chargée d'enquêter sur l'éloignement de deux enquêteurs de la cellule d'enquête bruxelloise « Neufchâteau », déposée par M. Frans Lozie, Doc. 2-563/1, October 9, 2000. The proposal does not name the "so-called protector."
[^3]: Dovey, S. *Eye of the Chickenhawk.* Thehotstar, 2023. Its statement that he died by suicide in 1995 is contradicted by *The Observer*'s 2002 report that he was living on the Belgian-Dutch border. Sole source for the passages so cited.