Actions Bolle Jos also ensure better armament Belgian customs

“War weapons and hand grenades are in the hands of criminals. It should not be that our customs officers are taunted and attacked. Our customs officers must be able to work without a shock,” says the Belgian Deputy Prime Minister Jan Jambon.

At a considerable distance from him is a team of Belgian customs officers that follows shooting training. With the permanent service weapon of Belgian origin. They have been wearing that gun since the 1990s. But it is replaced by a different and better type of a German weapon factory.

Violence
That is necessary, thinks the highest boss of customs. “We are more and more confronted with violence, also orally,” explains Kristian Verwaeren, the administrator general of Belgian customs. He does not mention the incidents with the date and he does not mention names of suspects. “Two years ago, three attempts were made to recover drugs from customs,” he says.

Customsmen were even tied by armed criminals who wanted to pick up Coke. Sometimes incidents only came to light afterwards in Belgian lawsuits. In almost all cases, the events in the port of Antwerp were. And the perpetrators were very often Dutch criminals. Not all thefts succeeded.

Bolle Jos
Police and justice think that Jos Leijdekkers from Breda, aka Bolle Jos, played an important role in one of those incidents. On October 16, 2023, Belgian customs found coke between a load of soy flour. The stuff was worth 250 million euros. Customsmen brought the container to a shed to remove the drugs. But what they didn’t know was that criminals followed the load with hidden trackers.

When two armed men reported to the shed, the police were called in. Moments later, seven armed Dutch people were stuck in a delivery van and arrested. They have been sentenced to ten years in prison. Jos Leijdekkers later came into the picture as a possible client.

In the court case that followed, he was also convicted of that. Leijdekkers had 13 years old. Earlier he received 24 years in prison for large -scale drug smuggling. There are even more lawsuits. The born Bredanaar is on the run. The last sign of life came from Sierra Leone.

Martien R.
Incidentally, it is not something of the last years that criminals seize coke stealing. The gang around Martien R. from Oss already managed to steal a freight years ago and bring it to Oss. Without violence. Once in Oss it turned out that almost all drugs had already been removed.

It is clear that customs took measures after the violence. The use of units of the army became visible. In the background, customs also made an emergency purchase of machine guns. There were not many, but it was something to use if the need was the man.

There is more to the more than five hundred armed customs officers that Belgium now has. The 9 millimeter-carabine makes way for a machine gun with heavier caliber. “It is not to kill, but for legal self -defense. We must be able to compete on the same footing,” emphasizes Deputy Prime Minister Jambon.

On the shooting range in the middle of the forest, everyone has to set up headphones. It is hearing protection. Because it’s going to pop. The customs officers stand in a row with an instructor. The red flag indicates the distance that bystanders must take. Then the signal sounds. All customs officers open the fire on goals close by. Bullets fly straight through the cardboard goals and plop in a huge pile of sand.

Handcuff
Customs also shows the other new equipment. New handcuffs, a better medical help kit and a shooting vest (‘bulletproof vest’) with a higher protection rate and more wearing comfort. All with the explanation that there are extensive new training courses and periodic psychological tests of employees.

Belgian customs have been training on defense areas for some time, such as the Groot Schietveld in Brasschaat. But always in silence. Never before they left the media. It is also a signal. Because it is emphasized that Defense helps customs. And not just defense, the collaboration is international.

Belgian customs also looks at the Dutch colleagues. From Rotterdam, among others, our customs helps Belgians with knowledge and equipment, but sometimes also with the diving team. The Zeeland-West-Brabant Seaport Police founded in 2023 also works closely with the neighbors. A team of special assistance, as the Netherlands knows, is not there. The Belgians do it with a specialized monitoring team. That is primarily a matter of money.

Because the budget of Belgian customs is not infinite, so making choices, the shooting range sounds between the bangs.