Ronald Jannsen was born on February 6, 1971 in
Boorsem, Belgium. He had been a technical drawing teacher at a high
school and was a divorced father of two daughters. He had been
described as "quiet and withdrawn."
Jannsen was arrested after the January 1, 2010
shooting deaths of Shana Appeltans, 18, and her fiancé Kevin Paulus,
22, who were found in their burned car.
He confessed to killing 18 year old student Annick
Van Uytsel in 2007. Annick van Uytsel had been cycling home when
Jannsen forced her into his car at gunpoint and imprisoned her in his
basement cellar for hours. He later bludgeoned her to death and placed
her body, with weights attached, in a lake. He has been connected to
as many as 15 murders dating back to 1991.
Jannsen is also suspected of committing twenty
rapes since 2001. He was sentenced to life imprisonment on October 21,
2011.
'Quiet' teacher who confessed to three murders
'could be Belgium's latest serial killer'
By Graham Smith - DailyMail.com
January 14, 2010
A school teacher who confessed to murdering his
neighbours could be Belgium's latest serial killer, police have
revealed.
Ronald Janssen, 38, admitted shooting Shana
Appeltans, 18, and her fiancé Kevin Paulus, 22, on New Year's Day in
his home town of Halan.
The divorced father-of-two - technical drawing
teacher described as 'quiet and withdrawn' - then told detectives he
murdered an 18-year-old student in 2007.
Now he is being linked to 15 other killings,
usually the rape and murder of young women.
Janssen, who has been nicknamed 'Le Prof', said he
stopped Annick van Uytsel as she was cycling home late one night and
forced her at gunpoint to get into his car.
Then he drove her to his home and imprisoned her in
his cellar for several hours.
After raping her and bludgeoning her to death, he
attached weights to her body and dumped her in a canal. The body was
recovered a year later.
Janssen washed the body to remove all clues and
police said he would never have been suspected.
The teacher allegedly told police he began killing
in the 1990s when he was a student, and has provided gruesome
descriptions of his crimes - but no names or dates, saying he 'can't
remember'.
Detectives believe they are dealing with a Jekyll
and Hyde character, a popular teacher and father who is concerned
about the effect the media coverage of his crimes is having on his
daughters, aged eight and 11.
Prosecutors are now trying to link Janssen to the
murders of two 24-year-old girls at Louvain University, near Brussels,
while he was studying there in the 1990s.
Both victims were stabbed to death.
Police also want to question him about missing
student Tanja Groen from Maastricht, Holland, who vanished in 1993 as
she was cycling home from a party.
At the time Janssen lived a few miles away. No body
has ever been recovered.
He is also suspected of at least five more murders,
of two teenagers and three women in their twenties, which date back to
1991.
Janssen's widowed mother Hilde Houben, 63, said
today: 'I've never seen my son chasing women. He's been a good son.
'I spoke to him by phone and he said it all
happened in a moment of madness.
'I am devastated, but Ronny is still my boy. I must
stand by him however hard that may be.'
Janssen's ex-wife Nathalie had been on good terms
with her husband and had trusted him to look after their two daughters
twice a week.
'I always thought he was a kind and gentle man,'
she said. 'This killer is not the husband I knew.'
