Raphaël Verstraeten

Raf is a member of the Tax Dispute Resolution team at Deloitte Legal. He specialises in criminal law, criminal procedure law and human rights.

Raf is professor at the KU Leuven’s Institute of Criminal Law. He obtained his Ph.D. from the KU Leuven with a dissertation concerning the legal position of the victim during the judicial inquiry. He also holds a postgraduate degree 'Théorie et pratique du droit pénal' from the University of Paris.  Raf lectures the course Criminal Law and Criminal Procedure Law in the bachelor years and the courses The Criminal Trial and Economic, Fiscal and Social Criminal Law in the master years.

He acted as an expert for the parliamentary inquiry commission for the investigation on the crimes committed by the 'Bende van Nijvel' (1996-97). He was also the president of the ministerial committee for the establishment of a federal prosecutor's office (1989-90) and co-president of the ministerial committee Reform of the Assize Court (2005-06). He is member of the Commission Reform of the criminal procedure (2016-today). 

Raf led the criminal law department of law firms Stibbe & Simont (1994 -2000) and Eubelius (2000 to 2014), and worked until 2020 at VDG Advocaten. He is also the author of several books and numerous papers on the subject of criminal law.