Court acquits man previously sentenced to 30 years in prison for murder

The court of appeal in Den Bosch acquitted Sergio K. from Brunssum in the murder of Sven Prins (30), according to the verdict released on Thursday. K. was sentenced to thirty years in prison in January 2018. Two co-defendants, Xionel B. and Jurandy T., received 30 years and life in prison respectively.

K. spent five years, two months and 11 days in prison for the murder. But the case took an unexpected turn during the original trial in September 2021. Just after the Public Prosecution Service demanded 30 years in prison against all three suspects, someone from the public gallery shouted out the name of a fourth possible suspect.

The claim was that this fourth person committed the murder, and not K. Jurandy T., who was convicted and sentenced to life in prison for the shooting, also said that Sergio K. was not involved in the murder and had been wrongly implicated.

K. was provisionally released a month later following an investigation. Then, a month ago, the Public Prosecution Service repeated its sentencing demand of 30 years in prison for K. as part of the appeal, arguing that those involved were “playing games.”

Prins was shot at several times during a car chase in September 2015, in which a Kalashnikov rifle fired multiple rounds. Prins was shot in the back as he fled the car and stumbled into a garden. The man who was in the car with Prins was injured but managed to escape. The court said the act was "inconceivably ruthless."

According to the court, it is “not implausible" that another person committed the murder. However, that person is abroad and has not yet been found.

On Thursday, the court also reduced the sentences given to the two co-defendants, Xionel B. and Jurandy T. They were each sentenced to 27 years in prison, where B. had previously been sentenced to 30 years and T. to life behind bars. T. confessed to firing the fatal shots. B. was behind the wheel during the chase, which lasted several hundred meters.

The two made were given sentence reductions because of the amount of time it took before the appeal was heard.