THE HAGUE: On the first day of the trial following the killing of celebrity crime reporter Peter R. de Vries, Dutch prosecutors sought the maximum sentence of life imprisonment for the suspects.
The 22-year-old suspected gunman, Delano Geerman, and 36-year-old Polish national Kamil Egiert, have both been charged with murder and the possession of illegal firearms.
While Geerman refused to comment, Egiert maintains he was only a driver and not involved with the actual murder.
A verdict is expected on July 14.
De Vries was gunned down last July on a busy Amsterdam street. “(The suspects) would have known that the murder would be a great shock to society,” and that serves as an aggravating circumstance, said the prosecutor, who is not being named by the court because of security concerns.
The 64-year-old De Vries was a popular TV personality, famous for his programs in which he worked with victims’ families and pursued unsolved cases. He had received threats in the past, but refused security.
Although the trial only deals with the hit men who carried out the killing, an investigation into who ordered the murder is continuing, prosecutors said.
When he was gunned down, De Vries had been working as a counselor, but not officially a lawyer, for a suspect-turned-state witness in a case against alleged drug lord Ridouan Taghi.
In 2019, a lawyer working for the same state witness was also shot and killed on an Amsterdam street.
Taghi is currently on trial for drug trafficking and murders within the drug world.
