Dutch volleyball player who was jailed for raping a 12-year-old British girl after meeting her on Facebook qualifies to compete in the Paris Olympics

A Dutch volleyball player who was jailed for raping a 12-year-old girl has qualified to compete in the Paris Olympics next month. 

Steven van de Velde was 19 when he flew from the Netherlands to the U.K. to meet the schoolgirl in August 2014 after the pair started chatting on Facebook before taking her virginity.

The 6-foot-6 athlete, who knew how young the girl was at the time, was sentenced in March 2016 to four years in prison after admitting three counts of rape. 

But despite the judge at the time telling Van de Velde his promising career was a 'shattered dream', the volleyball player is set to return to limelight after sealing his spot at the Paris Games in July. 

The 29-year-old has qualified in the national pair with his partner Matthew Immers, who are now the 11th-ranked team in the world, according to The Telegraph. 

During his trial just less than a decade ago, Aylesbury Crown Court heard how van de Velde had travelled to the U.K. and met up with his victim and had sex with her. 

Sandra Beck, prosecuting, told the court at the time: 'She describes that she had met Steven Van de Velde on Facebook, they spoke regularly through that and he made her "feel special."

"She certainly made it clear she was seven years younger than him. This relationship over social media was taking place over a period of time."

The volleyball player's victim had added him as a friend on Facebook after he commented favorably on one of her photos, the court heard.

They began to speak on a daily basis over Facebook, Snapchat and Skype before he arranged to visit her, arriving in Milton Keynes in August 2014.

The schoolgirl told her family she was staying with a friend and snuck out to try and book a hotel with the older teenager, age 19 at the time. 

When they couldn't find a room, they went to Furzton Lake in the town, where they drank Baileys and she performed a sex act on him.

The following day, after the pair slept in cardboard boxes under a stairway at Premier Inn, having again been unable to book a room, she took him to her empty house and he took her virginity.

Before he returned to the Netherlands Van de Velde advised her to get the morning after pill as they had not used contraception. It was her visit to a family planning clinic that alerted the authorities, who stepped in because of the girl's young age.

The sportsman, of Westeinde 46, Voorburg, the Netherlands, was extradited to the U.K. on Jan. 8, when he was arrested on suspicion of the sex acts. He later admitted three counts of rape against a child.

Van de Velde was released from prison in 2017 after serving just a year of his four-year sentence. 

Following his release, he said: "I do want to correct all the nonsense that has been written about me when I was locked up. 

"I did not read any of it, on purpose, but I understand that it was quite bad, that I have been branded as a sex monster, as a pedophile. That I am not, really not.

"Everyone can have their opinion about me, but it is only fair if they also know my side of the story."

 (Via Daily Mail)

At least one person I follow -- Martina Navratilova -- is outraged by the news. I'm kind of two minds here: Yes, he committed a seriously wrong offense, albeit something that passes for normal in many places in the world, including our own South. But are people who have been convicted of crimes and served their time to be banished from society afterward? Should others be allowed to pick and choose which things they can and cannot do once they're free again? I'm assuming the International Olympic Committee doesn't have any rules against this, so perhaps Martina (and others) should take it up with them.