Pro footballer Quincy Promes guilty of drug trafficking, sentenced to 6 years in prison

Dutch professional football player Quincy Promes was convicted on cocaine trafficking charges by the District Court of Amsterdam on Wednesday. The court sentenced him to six years in prison. His co-defendant, Marylio V., was also convicted on the same charges, as well as money laundering. V. was also handed a six-year prison term.

Promes and V. played a “crucial, directing and coordinating role,” in cocaine smuggling, prosecutors argued. They were accused of organizing the delivery of two batches of cocaine, with a combined weight of over 1,350 kilograms.

The court specifically criticized Promes for flaunting wealth and trying to increase his prestige by making extra money through serious crime. According to the court, this is extra damaging because, as a professional footballer, Promes is a role model to many.

The court saw sufficient evidence that Promes played an important role in trafficking the two shipments of cocaine in early 2020. Evidence against him included messages on the encrypted messaging service Sky ECC, where Promes, using the name “Fantasma,” discussed payments and sending retrievers to the Antwerp port to retrieve the cocaine from containers.

Promes, 32, currently plays football for Spartak Moscow and has refused to return to the Netherlands for his trial. His lawyers, Robert Malewicz and Sophie Hof, informed him of the verdict, and he immediately said he would appeal, according to NU.nl.

Prosecutors had recommended Promes serve nine years behind bars. “He seems to think he is untouchable in Russia or abroad,” the prosecutor said. They wanted to know “how such a successful footballer allowed himself to be drawn so deeply into crime.”

The footballer and V., who are related to each other, were linked to drug shipments that arrived in January 2020 on a container ship that moored in the Port of Antwerp. Associates offloaded a 650-kilogram batch and brought it to a warehouse in near the port. The remaining batch of 712 kilograms was found on the same ship by Customs officials. Both consignments were hidden among bags of sea salt sent from Brazil.

Promes was alleged to have made a major financial investment in drug running. He and V. operated “under the radar” and worked “calculatingly,” convincing others to do lower-level, riskier work, like removing the cocaine from the port, prosecutors said.

Promes was also connected to 55-year-old Piet W., an Almere man suspected of running a wide-ranging cocaine trafficking ring. He was also implicated in two street-level assassinations.

In June last year, the court also sentenced the footballer to 1.5 years in prison for stabbing a cousin in the knee during a family party in Abcoude. He has appealed against that verdict.

Earlier this month, the court also ordered him to pay compensation to his cousin. He also did not appear in court during that trial.