Translated from Dutch
In the case against motorcycle club Bandidos, lawyer Gitte Stevens denounces the length of the proceedings. “Having to wait six years for a trial is inhumane,” she says in the closing plea of the mega trial.
She believes such a long duration is contrary to due process. There is no question of a criminal organization of which the Public Prosecution Service (OM) speaks, she says. At most individual members have committed criminal offenses, but according to the lawyer that did not happen in a club context.
“The case should simply be judged on its merits. Lady Justice is blind, or at least she should be, even to tattoos and colors,” said Stevens.
Belgian drug research
The court in Maastricht held the last of seventeen court days in this extensive trial on Friday. Former vice president Marco H. (54) of the motorcycle club, who was on trial on Friday with his wife Martha S. (53), will not be there, says Stevens. He is stuck in Hasselt (B) for another (drugs) case.
Suspected of various criminal offenses
Stevens strongly criticizes the length of the proceedings. The 25 suspects, most of whom were members of the motorcycle club, are suspected of varying degrees of involvement in a criminal organization, public violence, money laundering, drug trafficking and extortion. The authorities demanded sentences ranging from three months in prison to five years and seven months against the suspects. The prosecution applied a reduced sentence of an average of 20 percent because the case has been going on for so long.
Insufficient evidence
“The Public Prosecution collects facts, which often cannot be proven, in order to arrive at a conviction of participation in a criminal organization,” said the counsel. She says that ten of the eleven charges brought by the law cannot be proven or are demonstrably false.
Then what remains: an open act of violence at the Sittard café Dug-Out on May 7, 2015. The motorcycle club had problems with Hells Angels and wanted to talk them out. However, that turned out differently. Some members of Red Devils, a support club of the Angels, were beaten up. Because of this fact, the defense considers a lighter sentence to be appropriate. The prosecutor demanded a prison sentence of five years and seven months against Marco on Thursday.
July ruling
After six years and one day after the arrest of members of the Bandidos, the trial has come to an end, the court president said. “It was quite a thing, I must say!” On July 9, the judge will rule on all cases against the Bandidos.
