Large security presence at Amsterdam courthouse for major organized crime trial verdict

There was a large contingent of security personnel in and around the highly-secured courthouse in Amsterdam-Osdorp a few hours before judges were set to read their verdict in the extensive Marengo criminal procedure on Tuesday morning. The court has heard arguments for six years in the extensive organized crime case regarding a series of assassinations, failed murder attempts, and plots to commit more killings. There are 17 suspects in total, including the prime suspect, 46-year-old Ridouan Taghi.

The wide-ranging case, given the "Marengo" name at random by the District Court of Amsterdam, involves a total of six murders and four attempted murders. The verdict was to be read during a hearing set to begin at 10 a.m. in the courthouse, known as The Bunker.

Very strict security measures were in place at the court on Tuesday morning. There were several police cars in the vicinity of The Bunker, and heavily armed police officers stood guard in front of the building. Two holding areas were set up for members of the media in attendance.

Over the past six years, the trial has been conducted on a total of 142 hearing days. Prosecutors have demanded life sentences against Taghi and five other defendants, Saïd R., Mohamed R., Mario R., Mao R., and Achraf B. The hearing is expected to last several hours, with the sentences expected at around noon. Taghi has already indicated that he will not be present at the ruling.

The case involves six murders and several murder attempts, but perhaps the most striking incidents are the three murders that took place during the course of the trial. A week after it became known in early 2018 that the Public Prosecution Service (OM) had cut a deal with Nabil B. as a key witness in the case, the informant's brother was shot dead. B.'s lawyer, Derk Wiersum, was murdered in Amsterdam in September 2019. Then in July 2021, assassins killed his confidante, the journalist Peter R. de Vries. Partly because of this, the lawyer for Nabil B. called Marengo "the most diseased and poisoned trial ever."

A sentence of ten years has been demanded against key witness B., a significant reduction in exchange for the incriminating statements he made about his fellow suspects. In addition to this testimony, the prosecutors have relied heavily on decrypted messages which had been protected with a PGP communications system. Those chat messages contained blunt conversations about the murders.

Taghi managed to evade police capture for several years, just like his alleged accomplice, Saïd R. Taghi was arrested in Dubai at the end of 2019, and was quickly brought to the Netherlands and handed over to Dutch authorities.

Since then, he has been held in the Extra Secure Institution (EBI), the country's most secured prison in Vught. Taghi has been in restricted custody, meaning he is forbidden from maintaining contact with anyone other than his legal representatives.

Two of Taghi's lawyers were arrested during the trial on accusations they shared messages between Taghi and his connections in the outside world after his incarceration. Youssef T., one of Taghi's lawyers and cousins, was sentenced to 5.5 years in prison in early 2023. The other lawyer arrested was top criminal defense attorney Inez Weski. The criminal case against her has not yet taken place, and it is not known when it will occur.

R. was arrested in Colombia at the beginning of 2020. It was not until the end of 2021 that he was extradited.

The first of the murder victims was Ronald Bakker. The 59-year-old, who worked in a espionage device shop in Nieuwegein, was shot in front of his house in Huizen on September 9, 2015. The Public Prosecution Service (OM) thinks the murder was meant to send a warning as the criminal organization suspected the spy shop of working with the police.

Samir Erraghib was killed in IJsselstein on April 17, 2016. Allegedly, Taghi saw viewed him as a traitor. Erraghib was 37 years old at the time. He was shot in a car in front of his house. His seven-year-old daughter was next to him, but she remained unharmed.

The subsequent murder happened in Amsterdam-Zuidoost on May 9, 2016. Abderrahim Belhadj, 29, was suspected of stealing two blocks of cocaine from Taghi's organization. Investigators have decrypted messages which allegedly said that Belhadj had to receive "three headshots."

Ranko Scekic was found in front of his home in Utrecht at 45 years of age on June 22, 2016. His wife and child were inside the house at the time. Twenty-seven bullet casings were found after the attack. The reason for the murder is said to be that Taghi feared that Scekic intended to make incriminating statements about him.

Crime blogger Martin Kok was shot on December 8, 2016 in a sex club in Laren. An attempt to shoot Kok in the head was made a few hours earlier in Amsterdam. This was not the first assassination attempt, as the organization allegedly tried to kill him with an explosive months earlier. It was alleged that the organization believed the 49-year-old had to be eliminated because he had posted messages about Taghi and his accomplice Naoufal "Noffel" F. on his website.

There was a case of mistaken identity in the murder on January 12, 2017, where Hakim Changachi lost his life. Changachi was shot in his flat on the Faustdreef in Utrecht-Overvecht. He was 31 at the time. Khalid H. was the intended target. The murder of Changachi is said to have prompted Nabil B. to become a key witness in the Marengo trial.

The court presiding over the case has been challenged six times by defense attorneys who no longer had confidence in the independence of the judges hearing the case. All challenges were rejected.

There were also harsh exchanges between defense attorneys and prosecutors, with some court analysts saying they had not seen such rancor during a criminal trial. Prosecutors accused the defense attorneys of leaking information to Taghi's organization during a trial that is considered to be the precursor to Marengo.

Defense attorneys were also secretly followed and spied on when they visited a client in Dubai, because it was suspected that they were meeting with Taghi while he was still a fugitive. That rumor turned out to be false.

The first public hearing took place on March 23, 2018. The criminal case will not actually be finished after the verdict, because it is almost certain that one or more defendants will file an appeal.