A court in Amsterdam ruled Thursday that the trial of the alleged shooter and getaway driver in the slaying of a prominent Dutch crime reporter must be restarted because one of the judges hearing the case emigrated.
The decision means that the case against two key suspects in last year’s shooting of journalist Peter R. de Vries in Amsterdam will be delayed for a long time, prompting the Dutch Government to announce an increase in efforts to combat organized crime.
The trial of the alleged shooter, Delano G., 23, and the suspected getaway driver, Polish national Kamil E., 36, was nearing completion. Prosecutors sought life sentences for both men.
However, just days before the judges were to deliver their verdicts in July, prosecutors took the unusual step of filing new evidence, reopening the case and forcing the verdicts to be vacated.
Now that one of the three judges who evaluated the evidence has left the Netherlands, a replacement judge must be appointed and the trial must be restarted.
On July 6, 2021, prosecutors accuse Delano G. of shooting De Vries at close range on a downtown Amsterdam street. The campaigning reporter and television personality died nine days later from his injuries, at the age of 64.
Soon after the shooting, police apprehended the suspected gunman and getaway driver near The Hague. Several more suspects have been arrested since then on suspicion of involvement in the hit’s planning.
While the motive for de Vries’ shooting is unknown, it resembled other gangland hits in the Dutch underworld that the journalist had covered.
De Vries was an adviser and confidant for a witness in the trial of the alleged leader and other members of a crime gang described by police as an “oiled killing machine” before his shooting. Both the witness’s brother and his lawyer were assassinated.
Ridouan Taghi, the gang’s suspected leader, was extradited to the Netherlands from Dubai, United Arab Emirates, in 2019 and is currently awaiting verdicts in his murder trial on multiple counts.