According to the prosecutor, security camera footage shows that VU Amsterdam student Marlon U. assaulted and attempted to cause grievous bodily harm to a fellow student during the night of 27 to 28 November at Bar Boele. His friend Reinout V. is alleged to have prevented people from intervening. He’s said to have pushed away and threatened one of those people. The prosecutor considers it proven that he, too, struck the victim.
Her version of events that night is that U. and V. sang the Erika song, popular amongst Nazis, during an inaugural drinks party in the Alma room of the OZW building, that the victim confronted the two men about it during the after-party at Bar Boele, that beer was thrown by both sides and that U. and V. subsequently assaulted the victim. U. also allegedly slammed the victim’s head against the concrete floor four times, which the prosecutor regards as attempted grievous bodily harm. Before and after the assault, the two men also made highly discriminatory remarks. When U. discovered blood from the victim on his trousers, witnesses say he shouted that he was going to beat him up a second time.
Deported
U. is willing to admit to simple assault. During yesterday’s hearing involving both him and V., he told the panel of judges that he had been provoked. He denies attempted grievous bodily harm and discrimination. Witnesses say he shouted “fucking n*ger” and “kankerhoer” (a highly offensive Dutch insult) at bystanders. V. is alleged to have told the victim, an international student, that he should be deported.
None of it is true, say U. and V. It’s all lies from the dozens of witnesses who, according to V., are motivated by their political or ideological convictions. U. repeatedly emphasises that there has been a three-year campaign against him because his political party, VSP, threatens the “dominant narrative”. He says that on the evening of the assault he merely wanted to enjoy a beer but was harassed by the victim, until he finally snapped.
Gruesome injuries
His lawyer, Theo Hiddema, reduced the entire matter to a bar fight that wouldn’t have received so much attention had it taken place in Amsterdam’s Red Light District. According to him, U. didn’t force the victim to the ground; the two simply slipped. If U. had really slammed the victim’s head against the concrete floor four times, as the prosecutor claims, the victim would have been unconscious, according to Hiddema. If he had really punched the victim in the nose, the damage would have been much greater.
Talking like a veritable forensic pathologist, he described the gruesome injuries the victim would have suffered if the prosecutor’s account had been true. As it was, the victim had suffered nothing more than a “bloody nose”, according to him.
And what about the Erika song, allegedly sung by U. and V. and once the favourite marching song of the Nazi Wehrmacht? “A little song about a flower on the heath”, Hiddema scoffed. A “student prank”, but according to him the Public Prosecution Service was “framing things” to make it seem as though a “Beer Hall Putsch” had been prepared in Bar Boele.
Provoked
And so what if someone had shouted that the victim should be deported, so what if someone had shouted “fucking n*ger”? “I have no problem with that”, said Hiddema. Because U. had been provoked; he had been called a “fascist”. That’s something Hiddema did not downplay. If you’re constantly called a “fascist” and a “neo-Nazi”, then such insults are suddenly a “cri de coeur”, he said, but not racism. “Bunch of snowflakes”, he sneered. He mocked the student who had become emotional because of the singing of the Erika song. He accused U.’s victim of “flat-out” lying.
Hiddema had not written a pleading note, but delivered his defence from memory, he said. For about an hour he mumbled, like a drunken comedian and not always easy to understand, one sneer after another. During the hearing he also walked out once, to the astonishment of one of the judges, who asked whether he should pause the hearing.
Ran off laughing
The prosecutor said she had noticed that U. and V. mainly saw themselves as victims. They complained that they had lost their part-time jobs, U. as a taxi driver and V. as a member of the university student council. They complained about the false accusations, “uncritically copied by journalists”. They complained about the media that had ruined them, especially Het Parool. U. used his right to make a final statement to point out that, because of the lengthy hearing, his dog had been home alone for seven hours already. He too regards the entire case as nothing more than a “bar brawl”.
V. said a great injustice was being done to him, that he had been more of a spectator than a participant and that it felt as though he had ended up in the wrong film, whereas he had actually acted to de-escalate the situation. Keeping bystanders away from U., who was sitting on top of the victim and assaulting him, had been intended to de-escalate. Pulling the victim away in order to push him outside had also been an effort to de-escalate. The two men allegedly ran off laughing once it became clear that the police had been called, and according to V. that too had been a de-escalating action. “De-escalation is a catchphrase for you”, one of the judges remarked. “But wouldn’t it have been more de-escalating to pull the much larger U. off the victim rather than pulling the victim away and pushing him towards the door?”
No recollection
When U. once again began talking about the three-year campaign against his person, one of the judges said that message had now been received. When he asked U. whether he had sung the Erika song, U. launched into an extensive exposition about the song’s status amongst other students and the fact that he had often heard it sung. “But I’m asking whether you sang it”, the judge insisted. U. said he didn’t recall. V. also has “no recollection” of singing the song.
The same judge noted that during his first interrogation U. frequently invoked his right to remain silent and was very selective in doing so. During later interrogations, when U. was confronted with footage of the assault, his statements suddenly gained “more colour”.
The prosecutor is demanding a six-month prison sentence for U., three months of which would be suspended. For V. she is demanding five months, three of which would be suspended. The verdict will be delivered in two weeks.