Amsterdam court, police clashing over data gathering on protesters
The Amsterdam court and police are clashing over the police's failure to provide information they had gathered about protesters. In several proceedings, the court has ordered the police to provide more information. The police, in turn, are questioning the Amsterdam judges’ impartiality, saying they’re taking “career activists” too seriously and giving them too much wiggle room, Parool reports.
It all revolves around a banned protest against the coronavirus restrictions and a counter demonstration on the Museumplein in Amsterdam on 16 January 2022. Left-wing activist Frank van der Linde appealed to the Open Government Act in May 2022, requesting all the information on which the police based their intervention in that protest.
The police produced 465 pages of documents early in 2023. After more court cases, the police supplemented the package to 1,123 pages of documents at the end of 2023. Van der Linde again appealed to the court.
The police state that there is no more information. But Van der Linde is convinced that the police are withholding documents from the police intelligence service Public Order Information Team (Tooi), for example. The Tooi is responsible for gathering information with a view of potential serious disruptions of public order.
In a remarkable interim ruling, the administrative court has now given the police six weeks to provide these documents or explain why it would be impossible to do so. If the police fail to do so, the court will call the head of the Tooi as a witness. The judge agrees that the service must have gathered more information than the police have provided. The judge wants to assess for himself whether the police are rightly withholding these documents.
According to Parool, the Amsterdam courts increasingly feel that the police in Amsterdam are delaying cases by initiating procedures that have little chance of success. Conversely, the Amsterdam police believe that the courts are taking “career activists” too seriously and giving them too much leeway.
