Hoofddorp local devastated after witnessing best friend’s fatal stabbing by other friend
Hoofddorp local J was in the house where a stabbing incident left two young men dead and two police officers injured. He witnessed his best friend, Said (22), get stabbed to death by another friend, who also injured two cops before the police shot him dead. J is devastated, he told NH Nieuws. “I don’t show it outside, but at home I cry,” he said.
“It’s like half of me is gone.” J and Said have been friends for ten years, since the first day of secondary school. He has memories of Said on every corner. “I literally can’t do anything without thinking about him.”
Said, a fictitious name, was stabbed to death by a 21-year-old friend in a house in Hoofddorp on May 21. When the police entered the house, the 21-year-old friend turned on the cops and injured two of them. The police shot and killed him. J (22) was the only other person in the house and witnessed all of it.
According to J, the three friends had fallen asleep after a night of chilling. He woke up to screaming at around 6:00 a.m. Said and the other friend weren’t fighting, but the 21-year-old friend seemed to have gone crazy, J said.
He saw the friend stab said with a knife. J tried to pull the friend off Said. When he wouldn’t budge, J locked himself in the bathroom and called the emergency services. He came out of the bathroom when he heard the police enter. Then he heard gunshots.
After the fatal morning, rumours quickly started circulating online, in the media, and in the neighborhood. There was talk about drugs and a fight that got out of hand. “It’s all bullshit,” J stressed. “Said never fought with anyone, everyone got along with him.”
J and Said spent almost every day together. He described Said as a joker. “I filmed him almost every day. That man did something crazy every day. He made toasties with cheese and peanut butter in the microwave. I had to shave my head once for an operation. When I came downstairs, I saw that he had shaved off his own hair too. Just because I had to go bald.”
Four days after the fatal morning, J organized a gathering to celebrate Said’s life. The youth center Studio 5 was completely full. He improvised a speech about his friend, and they held a minute of silence. “It did people good to see each other for a while. To talk about his life and what a good guy he was.”
After living in the Floriande neighborhood for many years, J doesn’t think he can go back there again. “Yesterday, I got my coat back from the police. In a plastic bag. Said’s blood was still on it.”
“Every day, I asked him: What is the word of the day? And then he always said: Be happy,” J told the broadcaster. “This man was pure joy.”
