Killing of Sanda Dia
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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In 2018, the twenty-year-old student Sanda Dia died as a result of the physical abuse he underwent during the two-day-long Reuzegom hazing ritual in Leuven and a cabin in the woods in Vorselaar.
He was admitted to Malle Hospital on December 5 at 9:15PM. At arrival, his body temperature read 27.2 °C (81 °F). He was presented bleeding from nose and mouth, and he was found to have extreme levels of blood salinity resulting from forced consumption of fish sauce and his peers' refusal to let him drink water or soda. A few hours after his arrival in the hospital, Dia died from multiple organ failure.
While Dia was being treated in the hospital, the Reuzegom members, in a few hours time, attempted to clear the hut and the surrounding domain in Vorselaar of evidence of the abuse. When a police commissioner arrived at the scene at 4AM, he noted the scene was "completely clean": not a garbage bag had been left behind. The pit in the ground in which Dia was later proven to have lain covered in ice water for hours had been filled in. The members of the club had also attempted to erase their digital traces, but some videos and photos were recovered. They showed Dia unconscious on the ground, a Reuzegom member defecating on someone (Dia or another initiate) in the pit, and the group chanting "Chop off those little hands, the Congo is ours" (a slur celebrating the colonial atrocities committed in the Congo Free State which included mass mutilation of the African peoples) to a homeless person of color on the street.
