Jan Huzen of Support Group Boeren en Burgers has also been sentenced to sixty hours of community service, but conditional, on appeal for incitement via Facebook. If Huzen does not commit a criminal offense in the next two years, he does not have to go to work. He still has to pay a fine of 500 euros.
The police judge in Assen found that Huzen had to work 60 hours and also fined him 500 euros for dangerous driving during a demo tour on the A28.
The protest tour of the Support Group Farmers and Citizens on November 15, 2020 was intended as a farmers’ protest and for the preservation of Dutch culture. In a long caravan, the activists drove slowly from Harderwijk on the highway towards Hoogeveen in cars and a camper.
One fought for the preservation of traditions such as Zwarte Piet and the other did not agree with the corona rules or supported the farmers. According to the higher judges, Huzen was in charge of this whole. By suddenly moderating the speed on the public road, he endangered the other road users, who drove towards the back of the procession and did not have enough time to adjust the speed.
A truck driver saw the slow-moving procession too late and swerved. At that moment he was overtaken by a car, containing a family with a few months old baby. It came to a collision. No one was injured. The judge did not find that these two caused the accident, but it was related to the slow-moving procession.
“The truck driver had to avoid a protest procession initiated by you,” the judge told Huzen. The support group leader was also on trial for inflammatory texts on Facebook. He had his wife write: “This coming Sunday evening demo tour from 9 p.m. to 11 p.m. A curfew!!! Now look how much power Rutte has.”
The curfew had just gone into effect a few days before. With this text, Huzen called on people to break the law and disturb public order by taking to the streets, despite the curfew.