The sentencing request on appeal is actually lower than the 12-year request during the initial trial. That is, prosecutors say, because they have taken the defendant's poor health into account. Willem Holleeder (50) was treated for heart disease and he says he has little time left to live.
But the claim is higher than the nine years Holleeder was given at the end of his 2007 trial for the extortion of three real-estate agents. Holleeder pleaded not guilty at the initial trial. His lawyer will respond to Monday's sentencing request in May with a ruling expected in June.
Holleeder already served seven years for the kidnapping of beer tycoon Freddy Heineken in 1983. He was arrested again in 2006 and has been in prison ever since. Besides extortion and heading a criminal organisation, he has also been accused of being the mastermind behind a series of assassinations in Amsterdam.
Glamorous circles
Until his arrest in 2006, Willem 'The Nose' Holleeder seemed almost untouchable. A glamorous figure, he was often seen in the company of Dutch celebrities. He was known to buy his suits on the posh PC Hooftstraat in Amsterdam, and often cruised the city on scooters with his friends, which earned them the nickname the "moped gang".
At the same time, he was acquainted with all the kingpins of Amsterdam's crime world: Sam Klepper, John Mieremet, Jan Femer, Cor van Hout, Mink Kok - all of whom, except Kok, have since met with a violent end. Justice officials have always suspected Holleeder of being behind the series of gangland killings that shocked the Netherlands around the turn of the century. But proving it has been a different matter.
In 2007, Holleeder was sentenced to nine years at the end of a bizarre trial - dubbed "trial of the century" by Dutch media - that saw Holleeder's attorney, the famous defence lawyer Bram Moszkowicz, withdraw after allegations that he was "tight with the mafia", the defended being admitted to hospital with serious heart problems, and key evidence being given orally by an already assassinated crown witness.
Holleeder was born in Amsterdam on 29 May 1958. His father worked at Heineken for years, but became an alcoholic and lost his job. As a teenager, Holleeder and his future brother-in-law Cor van Hout formed a gang that got rid of squatters for landlords. They were also said to be involved in several robberies.
Career criminal
With the kidnapping of Freddy Heineken in 1983, Holleeder and Van Hout hoped to advance to the upper echelons of organised crime. They collected a ransom of 16 million euros but were eventually caught. In 1987, the pair was sentenced to eleven years in prison.
Both men were released in 1992 and promptly resumed their criminal careers. The justice department failed to find enough evidence of their involvement in extortion and large-scale drug trade. But a long series of assassinations in the Amsterdam underworld, starting in 1999, would eventually bring everything out in the open.
The cold-blooded murder of property magnate Willem Endstra in May 2004 especially caused a shock in a country unused to violent crime. During the unseasonably warm autumn of 2005 no fewer than three high-profile Amsterdam crime bosses were killed in a span of three days.
In the end, it was Willem Endstra - the so-called "banker of the underworld" - who would get the better of Holleeder. In backseat conversations with police detectives while driving around Amsterdam, Endstra said he was being blackmailed by Holleeder. He also told police Holleeder was responsible for 25 gangland killings, including that of his own brother-in-law Cor van Hout in 2003.
By the time Holleeder stood trial, Endstra himself had been assassinated, but the judge allowed his blackmail statements into evidence as posthumously written testimony. It was on the basis of Endstra's testimony that Holleeder was found guilty and sentenced to nine years.
Holleeder’s conviction was a victory for the Dutch justice department, though it ultimately failed to link him to the series of killings in the underworld.
