Turkey extradites brother of wanted drug trafficker Bolle Jos to Netherlands
Turkey has extradited the older brother of wanted drug trafficker Jos Leijdekkers to the Netherlands, the Public Prosecution Service (OM) announced. The 50-year-old Harry L. will be prosecuted in the Netherlands for laundering large sums from his brother’s cocaine trafficking network.
According to the OM, encrypted messages from intercepted Sky ECC databases reveal that Harry L. was involved in channeling millions of euros in cash and purchasing a large quantity of gold.
The man was arrested in Istanbul on May 17 and extradited to the Netherlands this week. The Koninklijke Marechaussee arrested him upon his arrival at Schiphol Airport on Tuesday. He will be arraigned on Friday.
Minister David van Weel of Justice and Security called L.’s extradition “good news for the international fight against organized crime.” Commenting on X, he wrote that Harry L. is suspected of “laundering the proceeds of large-scale international drug trafficking.”
Jos Leijdekkers, also known as Bolle Jos, is the Netherlands’ most wanted criminal. Dutch courts have sentenced him in absentia to 24 years in prison for cocaine trafficking and soliciting murder. He is also facing years in prison in Belgium.
In January last year, it became known that Bole Jos was hiding in Sierra Leone. The Netherlands has officially requested his extradition from the West African country, but so far to no avail. Leijdekkers is reportedly in a romantic relationship with the daughter of Sierra Leone’s president, complicating the extradition.
Over the weekend, Minister Van Weel said that the Netherlands was under “no illusion” that diplomacy would convince Sierra Leone to extradite Leijdekkers. He said that the Netherlands would start working to suspend European Union development aid subsidies to the country.
Last month, the Telegraaf reported that special units of the Dutch police and navy were ready to arrest Leijdekkers at sea twice in recent weeks. But those operations were called off at the last minute.
