Dino Soerel is a Dutch criminal who was sentenced to life imprisonment in June 2017 for inciting two murders in Amsterdam, those of Kees Houtman in 2005 and Thomas van der Bijl in 2006. The Gerechtshof Amsterdam also found that he took part in a criminal organisation whose aim was to commit murder. The judgment closed the appeal stage of what the court's own case page calls the largest and longest criminal case in the Netherlands, tried in Amsterdam. The Hoge Raad, the Dutch Supreme Court, left the sentences in place on April 23, 2019.
His conviction came late and against the first verdict. In January 2013 the Amsterdam District Court acquitted him of the liquidations and sentenced him to six months. The prosecution appealed, and the Court of Appeal reached the opposite conclusion on the strength of two crown witnesses, men who had themselves been convicted of murder and testified in return for halved sentences.
Soerel was 49 when he was arrested in September 2010, which places his birth around 1961. He first came to public attention in the Netherlands as a fugitive. On December 30, 2009 a court sentenced him in his absence to eight years, mainly for drug trafficking, and on January 5, 2010 he was placed on the national list of most wanted fugitives. He was described at the time as a close friend of a well-known Amsterdam crime figure, and as a man wanted for involvement in drug trafficking.
The case grew out of a police investigation into a series of liquidations, the Dutch term for planned killings carried out in the underworld. It covered seven killings and attempted killings between 1993 and 2006. Five of them date from 1993 and involved other defendants. Soerel was at large when the trial opened, and the prosecution later said he would otherwise have been summoned with the other suspects.
Twelve people stood trial at the outset. One of them was killed abroad in 2014 and another died of natural causes before the appeal ended. The hearings ran for roughly ten years and took in at least 396 hearing days. The first-instance hearings were held in a secured courtroom at Schiphol.
Police arrested Soerel in Amsterdam on Friday, August 27, 2010, so that he could serve the eight-year sentence imposed in his absence. On September 21, 2010 the Openbaar Ministerie, the Public Prosecution Service, arrested him again while he was in custody, this time as a suspect in the killings of Thomas van der Bijl and Kees Houtman and in connection with participation in a criminal organisation. He appeared before an investigating judge, was ordered held, and on September 24, 2010 was summoned to appear in the Amsterdam liquidation trial. The prosecution asked for his case to be joined to the trial then under way so that the court could assess all the sub-investigations together.
The charges named him as the man who incited the murders of Houtman and Van der Bijl and as a leader of the criminal organisation. They also included money laundering of more than 25,000 euros and possession of two forged passports.
The Amsterdam District Court gave its judgment on January 29, 2013. It sentenced Jesse R. to life imprisonment for the murder of Kees Houtman and for other killings in the case, and Siegfried S. and Mohammed R. to life as well. Fred Ros, then not yet a crown witness, received 30 years for two attempts at inciting a liquidation and for organising one. Peter la S., who had reported himself and testified as a crown witness, received eight years. Other defendants received fixed terms.
Dino S. received six months for money laundering and for possessing two forged passports. The court acquitted him of the liquidations, for lack of evidence. The court also ruled that part of what Peter la S. had said about a second man had been withheld, and that those statements could not be used as evidence against Dino S.
The prosecution appealed against the acquittal and the Gerechtshof Amsterdam heard the case from 2013. In June 2015 it ordered pre-trial detention in the Amsterdam liquidation case for Dino S., who was already in custody in another case, because the prosecution pointed to so much incriminating material against him. Over the following months the court heard many witnesses, among them the crown witnesses Fred Ros and Peter la S. In the meantime Fred Ros, who had received 30 years in 2013, made a second agreement with the prosecution and gave statements implicating Soerel and the second man. Ros stated that Soerel had engaged him in the murder of Van der Bijl.
A first request to lift the detention was refused in December 2015, and a repeated request was refused on August 26, 2016. The court found that the core of the dispute had not materially changed, that the repeated hearings of the two crown witnesses had not altered the picture, and that Dino S. maintained his denial. In November 2016 the prosecution demanded life imprisonment for four defendants on appeal, Soerel among them, and stated that he had given the orders for the killings of Houtman and Van der Bijl.
The Court of Appeal delivered its verdicts in the ten cases on Thursday, June 29, 2017, in a courtroom at Schiphol. It found the statements of the two crown witnesses reliable and described the killings as showing "compelling coldness and lack of conscience". For Dino S. it held the following proven: "met een ander de moord op Houtman heeft uitgelokt" (together with another, incited the murder of Houtman); "met anderen de moord op Van der Bijl heeft uitgelokt" (together with others, incited the murder of Van der Bijl); "heeft deelgenomen aan een criminele organisatie, welke organisatie het plegen van moord tot oogmerk had" (took part in a criminal organisation whose aim was to commit murder); and "een vals en een vervalst paspoort voorhanden heeft gehad" (had a false and a forged passport in his possession).
On a charge concerning a sum of 25,000 euros of criminal origin, the court held that the act was different from the money laundering charged and ordered his discharge from prosecution ("ontslagen van rechtsvervolging"). It imposed a "levenslange gevangenisstraf", a life sentence, and said it saw no room for any other sentence. The prosecution had demanded the same.
The judgment named the commissioning of the two killings as the work of Soerel and a second man, tried in separate proceedings. Houtman died in Amsterdam in 2005 and Van der Bijl in Amsterdam in 2006. The court found, on the evidence of the crown witnesses, that the orders came from the two of them.
Three men already serving life sentences from 2013 received life again: Jesse R., Mohamed R. and Siegfried S. Pinny S. and Nan Paul de B. each received 13 years and 6 months, after a reduction of six months for the length of the proceedings, and Sjaak B. 5 years and 6 months. Peter la S. received 8 years, instead of the 16 requested, and Fred Ros 14 years instead of 28, both after a reduction under the crown witness arrangement. Ros had already served more than two thirds of his term in pre-trial detention and was released at once, together with two others. One defendant was acquitted ("vrijgesproken"). Both crown witnesses entered a witness protection programme.
Six defendants appealed in cassation, mainly against the agreements with the crown witnesses. On April 23, 2019 the Hoge Raad rejected the appeals and the sentences became final. It held that the sentence-reduction agreements were lawful and that the prosecution may settle with a crown witness without prior review by a court. It also upheld the Court of Appeal's finding that the witness statements were reliable and usable as evidence. The lawyers' argument that a life sentence without prospect of release breaches the ban on inhuman treatment in the European Convention on Human Rights was rejected on the ground that a review of life sentences after 27 years is now possible. The ruling covered Dino S., Jesse R., Mohamed R. and Siegfried S. (life), Nan Paul de B. (13 years and 6 months) and Sjaak B. (5 years and 6 months).
The life sentence is final. Under the review system the Hoge Raad described in 2019, a life sentence can be reassessed after 27 years.
Soerel denied the charges throughout, and the Court of Appeal noted in August 2016 that he maintained his denial. The first-instance court acquitted him of the liquidations, and the opposite result on appeal rested mainly on the statements of Fred Ros and Peter la S. The prosecution said he led the criminal organisation; the appeal court held proven only participation in it. The charge of money laundering of more than 25,000 euros ended in a discharge from prosecution, not a conviction on that count.
1993 to 2006: the seven killings and attempted killings tried in the Amsterdam liquidation case.
2005: Kees Houtman killed in Amsterdam.
2006: Thomas van der Bijl killed in Amsterdam.
December 30, 2009: sentenced in his absence to eight years, mainly for drug trafficking.
January 5, 2010: placed on the national list of most wanted fugitives.
August 27, 2010: arrested in Amsterdam on that sentence.
September 21, 2010: arrested as a suspect in the two killings.
September 24, 2010: summoned to appear in the Amsterdam liquidation trial.
January 29, 2013: Amsterdam District Court acquits him of the liquidations; six months for money laundering and two forged passports.
June 2015: Court of Appeal orders pre-trial detention in the Amsterdam liquidation case.
August 26, 2016: request to lift detention refused.
November 22, 2016: prosecution demands life on appeal.
June 29, 2017: Gerechtshof Amsterdam sentences him to life for inciting the two murders.
April 23, 2019: Hoge Raad rejects the appeals; the life sentence is final.