Martijn N. again denies rape on appeal: Public Prosecution Service demands 7 years in prison

He has had offers for interviews, books, a feature film “with a very big fairy”Martijn N. said in court on Wednesday. It was the first day of the appeal against the now 37-year-old founder of Moam, a foundation that linked young fashion designers to big names from the fashion, art and culture world. “But I’m telling my story here.”

Eighteen months ago, he stood trial at the court in Amsterdam for eleven criminal offences: six rapes, two attempted rapes, indecency with two minors and one attempted serious assault. He was convicted of indecency with two minors and one assault: eighteen months in prison, eight of which were conditional. The remaining cases were acquitted or the judiciary was declared inadmissible.

The Public Prosecution Service found that the court had been too cautious in its assessment of signals of coercion and appealed. Many of the men who went to the police were young when they met N., two were only fifteen years old. The ten cases that were heard on appeal on Wednesday and Friday took place between 2011 and 2021.

‘Ego too big’

N. said he was “a lot quieter” in the room on Wednesday, because according to him the case had generally gone ‘well’. Once again he talked extensively about his sex life. During the first trial he spoke of 1,900 sex partners; this week he gave a number of 2,200 to 2,300 men.

According to him, sex during dates was often obvious from the context: kissing, touching, going to a hotel room or home. He stated that his “ego is too big” to have sex with a “rag doll.” He called sex “a double play” and “a dance” where his front door “was not locked” and boys were not tied up. “You see what the other person does. He goes along with it, kisses back, says no, says yes.”

The chairman of the court questioned this several times. The boys with whom N. dated were young, often still lived at home and had little or no sexual experience, she told him. Some were students who were dating a man for the first time. Some stated that they froze during sex, did not dare to say anything or only realized afterwards what had happened to them.

When asked by the court whether N. could imagine that boys felt intimidated by him or did not dare to set boundaries, he replied that he could “not see into their heads”.

N. repeated several times, as in the previous lawsuit, that he liked hard anal sex, fast switching and submissive sex partners. “It is clear as day that I have been too dominant,” he told the court. In retrospect, he should have “thought more” about his behavior, he said. But also: “I understand that someone is overwhelmed by my dominant behavior, but if there is no response, that is the way things are.”

And coercion? According to him, that was never the case. “If it is clearly said no, then it is no.”

No longer access to Facebook

The criminal case against N. grew into one of the largest Dutch cases involving sexual violence between men. The case started after investigation of Het Parool and NRCfor which the newspapers spoke to more than a hundred people. In March 2021, first 28 and later another 8 men accused him of violent and sexual misconduct. After the publications, eighteen men reported to the police.

The Public Prosecution Service outlined a pattern in which young men were mainly approached via social media and were intimidated during meetings or no longer felt room to indicate their boundaries. The Advocate General stated that N. “overwhelmed” them for years and “completely disrupted” their sexual development.

N. often made the first contact via Facebook, but shortly before his arrest he said he no longer had access to his accounts, and therefore no longer to old conversations.

As a result, he could no longer trace memories and contact moments. He denied that he deliberately selected young boys via Facebook. “It was a hodgepodge of everything.” Also “designers, older journalists, people who helped me at school.”

Old versus new moral law

The case still falls under the old moral law from before July 1, 2024. For a conviction for rape, it had to be proven at the time that there was coercion, violence or threat. Since the introduction of the new moral law, explicit consent has become more central. According to the justice department, the court last year looked too much at physical resistance and not enough at situations in which complainants froze, stopped responding or went along with the sex out of fear.

Gerard Spong, one of N.’s lawyers, asked the court on Friday for an acquittal in all cases. According to him, there was no coercion under the old moral law. “The naked truth was clear: sex, and even more sex in the picture.” And, he repeated as in the previous case: “After all, you don’t take your sleeping gear to a place with an older, experienced man for nothing.”

He also pointed to a boy who took the train from Zeeland to watch a Disney film with a “complete stranger.” According to Spong, the denouncers are almost all regrettable.

‘Short skirt argument’

The appeal also considered N’s personal situation. Since 2021, he has been voluntarily undergoing treatment for a personality disorder. According to recent reports, he is functioning more stable and “great progress” has been made in his treatment. The probation service therefore no longer recommends a mandatory treatment process.

The Public Prosecution Service says it will take this into account in the sentence and speaks of a suspect who now reflects more on his behavior, but considers the seriousness of the facts to be more important. The Advocate General calls the lawyers’ defense “a form of victim blaming that in my opinion is really no longer possible and is really no longer accepted in our society” and compared it to the “short skirt argument”.

The Public Prosecution Service therefore demanded seven years in prison on appeal for ten sexual offenses, one year less than in the first trial. The Advocate General called that requirement “certainly mild.”

The court will give its ruling on June 8.

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