OUTRAGE swept Belgium yesterday after prosecutors confirmed the imminent early release of Michelle Martin, former wife and accomplice of Marc Dutroux, the most notorious serial killer and pedophile in Europe.

Martin, 51, known as the most hated woman in Belgium, is to be freed for good behaviour. She is to live in a French convent after serving seven years of a 30-year sentence for kidnapping and imprisoning six girls who were raped by Dutroux, 54. She was found guilty of allowing two of them to starve to death.

“We are allowing a monster out into society. She is the murderer of my daughter,” said Jean-Denis Lejeune, whose eight-year-old daughter, Julie, was found dead in Dutroux’s cellar in Charleroi in 1996.

“Michelle Martin was as bad as Dutroux. She could have opened the door, given them water.”

The family of Eefje Lambrecks, another victim, said in court they opposed Martin’s release because “she never voiced sincere regrets”.

Laetitia Delhez, one of two teenagers rescued from the dungeon in 1996, said through her lawyer she was appalled. About 100,000 people have signed up to a Facebook page opposing the release.

Justice Minister Stefaan De Clerck said Martin would be expected to remain in the unnamed French convent for the 10 years of her probation period. She will have to report to French probation officials but will be free to come and go in the daytime.

Commentators focused on the failure of Martin to explain or voice remorse for her actions. Le Soir, the leading Brussels French-language newspaper, called her release “revolting”.

“She has kept the secret of these horrors right to the end,” it said. “She is taking them to her newfound freedom. If Martin is to deserve the benefit of her exit from prison, it would not have been excessive to require of her that she puts a full stop at the end of this sordid affair by speaking the whole truth.”

In her trial, Martin, who has two daughters by Dutroux, depicted herself as helpless against the power of the serial killer.

She claims that she was too scared to go give them food and water!

Michelle Martin, Dutroux’s ex-wife, testified yesterday that she was “too scared” to go down into the dungeon to feed the girls, though she fed two German shepherd dogs that had been left to guard the terrace house under a flyover in the slums of south Charleroi.

Amid gasps from the public gallery, she said she believed that the emaciated creatures – chained to their cell – were “savage beasts” who might kill her.

Martin, 44, who is on trial as an accomplice, admitted that she never asked herself whether the girls were still alive. “I completely blocked the reality of what was happening out of my mind. I know I have some responsibility in the deaths of Julie and Melissa.”

She said the reflex of years of slavish subservience to her husband stopped her going to the police to report the abductions.

“I couldn’t disobey him; it was like that in our home,” she said, adding that she was also concerned that her own two children (later three) would be taken into custody and abused.

Martin claimed that the two girls were still alive when Dutroux returned from prison. She said her husband was far more concerned about dog excrement left in the house than the fate of the girls. It was not until a day later that he called her urgently to come with baby feeding bottles, vitamins and orange juice to revive them.

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Martin is a sick and twisted woman. She is just as bad as Dutroux!

It is hard to fathom what the authorities were thinking when they agreed to let her out after just 7 years!!

She ‘behaved’ in prison so they are going to let her go into a convent for 10 years. I am not sure how much a punishment living in a convent is especially since she is free to come and go?

Even with her convent probation time that is only 17 out of 30 years!

The jury must be ill, they tried.

I just do not understand how a woman could know and assist in the killing of children especially and be out in 7 years.