In recent months, the pardon scandal undoubtedly dominated the Hungarian public discourse. Probably no one needs to introduce the main characters: Katalin Novák, who resigned after the president of the republic pardoned Endre K., the deputy director of the children’s home in Bicske, who helped to cover up the pedophile scandal of director János Vásárhelyi. While their names appeared in many articles, less could be heard about a third person: Béla K., the secondary defendant in the case.

It is a global scandal that he was suspended for this

In 2016, the public learned about the series of crimes carried out by the director of the Kossuth Zsuzsa Children’s Home in Bicske, who was seriously pedophile, for a decade, which he was able to continue for five years even after the first reports came to the attention of the authorities in 2011 . The trial was only concluded in 2019.

K. Béla worked as a teacher in Bicské

In 2015-2016, Béla K. worked as an educator in the children’s home in Bicske. According to the indictment, during this time he performed sexual acts with four boys entrusted to his upbringing:

he satisfied them orally, pressing his penis against their bottoms, making the children satisfy him orally.

According to the indictment, in the Gárdony resort of the home, he reached under the blanket of a fourteen-year-old boy who was in the same room as him, first caressing his thigh and then his genitals. The boy let him do this because he had heard that the tutor had done this to others in exchange for money.

After that, Béla K. started to excite the boy orally, but since the child did not have an erection, he stopped the act.

The boy then told him: never do this again. K. Béla paid HUF five thousand at the boy’s request. In another case, he had anal intercourse with a drunk teenager for ten thousand forints, he writes the Telex.

K. Béla’s actions were revealed in such a way that the residents of the children’s home accused him, along with the director János Vásárhelyi.

Two court proceedings were launched: in one, director János Vásárhelyi and kindergarten teacher Béla K. were on the dock, in the other, deputy director K. Endre, who was pardoned by the president.

János Vásárhelyi received an 8-year prison sentence, Béla K. only a 3-year suspended sentence

János Vásárhelyi was sentenced to 8 years in prison for sexual violence and abuse, K. Béla was sentenced to one and a half years in prison in 2019 by the Győr Jury, the sentence was suspended for 3 years. So Béla K. did not have to go to prison.

In his reasoning, the judge said: the fact that the educator was cooperative and provided information in the director’s case was taken into account as a mitigating circumstance

“There is no one who thinks that a suspended prison sentence would be sufficient for this”

lawyer András Gál, who represented the abused children in the Bicske case, told Telex. According to the verdict, Béla K. sexually abused vulnerable young people under the age of 18 whom he was entrusted to raise. According to the lawyer, it is a global scandal that he was suspended for this.

It wasn’t the focus

“Everyone knew who János V and who Endre K. were, but few knew who Béla K. was”

– one of the director’s victims, Pop Mert, who was first molested by János Vásárhelyi when he was 13, told Telex.

Pop Mert met Béla K. around 2013-14. They got into a company because of a mutual friend. She met the later tutor as a good-humoured, very entertaining person, whom she knew was that he plays music and works as a real estate agent.

K. Béla started working at the children’s home in 2015, Pop Mert no longer lived in Bicske at that time, but he returned to the institution several times. On one occasion, he was surprised to find that Béla K. was working there.

“I saw that the children really liked Béla because he tried to organize programs”

he recalled.

Because later he heard from his childhood friend who lived in the home that not only the director of the institution, but also Béla K. had sexual relations with several young people. Pop Mert told Telex:

“It was rumored that the children’s home has a holiday home in Gárdony, where Béla and another teacher were downstairs, and things happened there as well”.

Pop Mert was shocked by this, but then he didn’t even talk about what the director did to him, so he suppressed this information to himself.

Then came 2016, when Mert and another victim, Levente, went public. However, Béla K.’s name did not even come up here at the beginning. Mert justified this by saying that he and everyone else were focused on the director. Then, sooner or later, the name of Béla K. surfaced during the interrogations.

After what happened, Mert first met the tutor on the day of the trial, in the corridor. “Béla acted as if nothing had happened. He greeted me kindly, we shook hands, he asked me how I was,” recalled Mert. According to him, it was already apparent during the trial that Béla felt very uncomfortable in the dock, he was ashamed of what had happened.

Pop Mert does not know exactly whether this was because Béla K. was confronted with what János Vásárhelyi had committed. Or maybe he actually committed the crimes because he knew about the director’s actions and because of that he felt entitled to sexually harass minors.

It hurt Merte that the teacher was finally suspended. But he added: he was not really interested in the teacher’s fate, only that the principal was convicted.

According to the educator Mert, he was not featured in the media as much because neither professionally nor in the local context was he a prominent figure like the director or K. Endre. According to him, if someone is suspended, one can rightly believe that they have not committed a serious crime. Because he hasn’t spoken to Béla K. since the procedure, so he doesn’t know how he’s been living his life since then.

There is no trace of the children’s home in Bicske

Little can be heard from Béla K. since the case was closed. Looking at his public Facebook page, there is no sign that he was ever connected to the children’s home in Bicske. The only reminder of this part of his past is that his name is included in the pedophile registry available to anyone.

At the time of writing the article, Telex contacted Béla K. as well. They were curious about what he thought about the pardon scandal that broke out, his own sentence, and how he is living these days. He did not answer their questions until the publication of the article.