vrt.be is a very reputable site and not a tabloid. It belongs to the Flemish public broadcasting service, and they mostly write articles in Dutch. They do have an English section as well, though obviously it’s not as thorough as their Dutch site. After all, we are a Dutch speaking region.

I can assure you that this case is very real, and has been all over the Belgian media the past week. Just google “verkrachter leuven”, and you’ll literally find hundreds of news articles about this case.

decided to literally figure out how to search Dutch google in Dutch just to find something more reputable

Looks like you didn’t do a very good job then.