As a firm believer in judicial independence, I consider it to be a generally good thing when Courts refuse to be swayed by the capricious impulses of public sentiment. Having said that, I wonder if the Dutch judiciary are going to have cause to regret the perceived leniency they have shown towards the assassin of Pim Fortuyn:
Admirers of the assassinated Dutch politician Pim Fortuyn struggled to contain their fury yesterday when his self-confessed killer got off “lightly” with an 18-year prison term.
The killing and its overtly ideological nature had persuaded many that the only sentence the judges would dare pass was life.
Regardless of the ‘ideological nature’, I think a life sentence is wholly appropriate in cases of pre-meditated murder such as this.
Dutch convicts tend to serve only two-thirds of their sentence, and the three judges in Amsterdam made it clear that they believed he should be given a chance to reintegrate in society.
Which means that the perpetrator will actually serve about 10 or 11 years.
Comparing Fortuyn’s rise to that of Adolf Hitler, he said he had felt compelled to eliminate him as a favour to the Muslim minority and other vulnerable sections of society.
As with most ‘Hitler’ comparisons, this one is way over the top. The late Mr.Fortuyn may have had some rather strident views on immigration but nothing I have read about the man suggests that he was any kind of ‘blut und boden’ ethnic nationalist.
“This is unbelievable,” Henk Sonneveld, a member of one of Fortuyn’s political vehicles, Leefbaar Rotterdam, told the Guardian.
“We are angry and mad with this. Eighteen years is not enough. In nine or 10 years’ time this guy could be walking the streets. It should have been life. Fortuyn was killed for his ideas – think about that.”
Yes, I have thought about it and my conclusion is that the ghost of Pim Fortuyn is going to be rattling its chains around Holland for a long time to come.
Yes, I think that a short sentence is an unfortunate signal here. Right-wing Fortuyn supporters had a frustrated, paranoid sense of grievance as it is, by the nature of their politics.
The assassination had the potential to create a martyr. A short sentence could clinch it. Of course a long sentence or execution stands a good chance of creating a martyr [out of the killer] for the anti-Fortuyn fanatics.
Mark – An execution? In Holland? Excuse me?
Well yes, Liberty Belle, I was generalising a bit beyond Holland….
But I suppose we’d have said that about assassination there too until last year. My Dutch girlfriend was very relieved that a solution had been found for Fortuyn’s two spaniels – Fortuyn’s former chauffeur is looking after them.
Hi there,
If I understand correctly the judges arrived at this sentence, while acknowledging the damage done to democracy by this murder, because of two factors: punishment should not be about revenge, and life imprisonment (which is dealt out very sparingly in the Netherlands) in general is ‘reserved’ for those with large criminal records, and when there is a significant chance of re-occurence. As Fortuyns murderer was a first offender, and his acts considered a one time thing, they apparantly saw no ground for a life sentence, other then when they would take the revenge-factor on board. (A revenge cried for by some of Fortuyns followers yelling “Hang him” outside the court, and calling the wife of the murderer a whore and spitting in her direction; ah the civility of it all.) (Btw the death penalty has been abolished in the Netherlands in 1870, except in military law during war time, which was abolished in 1990)
Let’s wait and see what the appeal will bring. Prosecution has already decided to appeal, and I think defense will too.
Kind regards,
Ton
Re: Ton Zijlstra
I understand that Holland, along with the rest of old Europe, has strong pacifist beliefs..
But does he really mean that “war time, which was abolished in 1990” means that The Netherlands would not even consider going to war for any reason ?
It seems ole Saddam was counting on that political stance!
I think that cold blooded premeditated murder should get a life sentence, and I do not think the type of criminal record you have should have very much to do with the sentence for that particular crime. I do not think the “ideological nature” of the crime should have much to do with the sentence, either. (I think there should still be some room for parole after a substantial time is served, but I do not think there should be any automatic release after x years).
A man is killed because of his political and social beliefs. His killer gets, say, 12 years comfortable imprisonment. Chance to read and study.
Arithmetic says the trade is about 3 to 1 in years with the killer making the profit. Is that fair? I think its an encouragement to killers.
Would it have been the same trade if Fortyn had been killed by a right wing anti homosexual?
OK, so, maybe the courts shouldn’t react to public opinion. With ya. Mob rules and all that generally being a bad thing. And the ideological bent of the crime being separate from the sentence I can understand as well. I’m generally against hate crime legistlation after all. But, this wasn’t idealogical in that sense. It was a direct attack on the democracy of Holland. Period. It took the rights of the voters away from them. It was a direct attack on their constitution (note: I have no idea if Holland has a constitution per se). THis is beyond idealogical. It’s borderline treason.
In America, I believe any attack on a presidential candidate is good for a life sentence. Even when one of our candidates was a tried and true bigot, he was still a presidential candidate so the attempt on his life was an affront to the democracy. And the assasin was put away for a long time (though a quick google has yet to yield wether or not it was for life). This is because it is a direct attack on the democracy. Anyway, I think that’ how it should be viewed. It’s not merely a hate crime or simply an attack on an individual.
The fact that you can kill a man solely for his beliefs, and get a measly 18 years in prison as a result (significantly less when we factor in the “good behavior”) is obscene.
I am troubled that people still seem to think that Fortuyn was some kind of right-wing ideologue. He was a conservative only in the sense that he wanted to conserve the liberal Dutch culture. If he were to run in the US, he’d be to the left of Dean or even Nader. I admired Fortuyn for his principled defense of Dutch liberal culture (which I have many problems with) against the onslaught of radical Muslim immigration, but the guy certainly wasn’t a fellow traveller of the right.
Ton
How is life imprisonment for a premeditated murder revenge and as opposed to justice?
Are there any reliable studies to suggest that because a person committed ‘only’ one murder, they will never murder again, once released from jail? And any reliable studies to suggest that we can predict who will and who won’t act this way once they are back in society?
Judges, like any other government institution, do need to be somewhat responive to public opinion, or they will lose their legitimacy in the public eye. Let’s not lose sight of the fact that judges are government functionaries doing the government’s work. In the US, the jury serves the function of making sure that the “independent” judiciary doesn’t get too far out of touch, as does the fact that many judges are elected, and the rest appointed by elected officials. There is a balance to be struck, even in the judiciary, between independence and a certain accountability to the public.
I daresay the Dutch judges who handed down this sentence just sacrificed a good deal of the legitimacy of Dutch courts in the eyes of Fortuyn’s supporters, and likely others as well.
Russ Goble – I loved your point that Fortuyn’s murder took the rights of the Dutch voters away. This was direct and true. Yes. So this killer had set himself up as a one-man dictatorship by deciding who could run for the Dutch parliament. And it is against the inclination of the pacifist Dutch to enlighten him. How sickening. But you’re right: it was an assault on democracy.
Blindside asked whether it would have been the same if the murderer had been a right wing anti-homosexual, and this is a fair question. No fair! We all know the answer!
Ton said Fortuyn’s murderer was a first-time murder, so no huge deal as his assassinating Fortuyn was regarded as a one-time thing. Why? Why did the judge (judges) think that, once free, the next time this assassin disapproves of a Dutch candidate, he won’t take it upon himself to eliminate the candidate again?
Michael Jennings speaks up: “a cold-blooded, pre-meditated murder should get life.” Why? What’s wrong with death?
I think “comfortable imprisonment” is a bit emotive. Has anyone contributing to this thread spent even a couple of weeks inside?
We all know the various stations of the chair in this debate, and trying to balance the differing claims of retribution/deterrence/public-safety gets a lot of people angry regularly.
People in their fifties rarely murder a second time, unless they are gangsters, and if there is one group to be marked out, I would rather discriminate to give higher sentences to organised criminals who work in groups to intimidate and kill witnesses (the Mafia and the IRA being similar in this respect) than to single attackers.
I’ve noticed that whatever kind of murder has just happened (murder of a child, murder of a politician, murder of a nun, murder of a milkman etc etc) part of public indignation is to want that category of horror to be punished (honoured?) above all others.
Intriguing, though sad, that both Fortuyn and his killer believed sincerely they were each protecting Holland’s liberal tradition.
As a normal, conservative, American pig, it sure looks like Europe has developed a luxurious lifestyle which needn’t worry about all those nasty inconveniences most societies face.
For instance, they don’t have to recruit armed forces with the intent to fight….just jobs for the boys (in uniforms) and thanks to the US for the heavy lifting.
They don’t have to compete in business anymore, why they just create a huge, amorphous state/industrial class which doles out economic benefits to the chosen. Looks like this EU expansion is similar to WorldCom’s acquisition strategy – “pay no attention to the numbers, watch for the synergy!”
And now we see they don’t even have to punish crime.
To me this sentence smacks of politics. Seems the judges symphatized with the murderer’s political motives. I do not know the judges or their beleifs, but the lenient sentence sends this message. It’s like the judges are saying: this wasn’t really a criminal, just a missguided idealist.
I have a feeling that the murderer would have got a harsher sentence if he were a mafioso, murdering a rival gagster.
Jacob, regarding the politics of the sentence, I swear I read somewhere that one of the 3 judges is a known member of their labor party and a partisan advocate for multiculturalism. Sorry, I can’t remember where I saw that.
To John J Copal: I meant that the death penalty was in 1990 taken out of military law that would be applicable during wartime. Not that we had abolished war, which would be nice if it were possible of course.
MLD: Uhm I don’t know. I merely tried to sketch the judges deliberations.
regards,
Ton
Mark, you say that people in their fifties rarely murder a second time. I don’t know whether that’s true or whether you have any statistics to prove it, but I do know that crimes like burglary, robbery and mugging are young men’s crimes. This brings up an idea I have never seen mentioned: If it were mandatory to send second offenders to prison until their 35th birthday, the crime figures in Britain would plummet within six months. Within a year, the crimes of burglary, robbery and mugging would have shrunk to insignificant figures.
Since you ask mark, yeah I have been inside. Deprivation of freedom is about boredom and fear. There are two types of prisoners, the innocent ones (most), who are very frustrated, and the guilty ones, who accept that they have been put inside for a reason and are somehow calmer. Some prisons are better than others, the more privileges and distractions the better. I have heard that the best place in the world to serve a stretch is in holland.