Justice has requested acquittal on Monday in the case of the so-called Rosmalense flat murder. According to justice, there is no evidence against suspect Rob B. (64), who was convicted years ago. The Supreme Court ordered the court to reconsider the case. And with that, the Rosmalense flat murder immediately reminds us of another infamous case that was handled almost three times by the court: the Breda Six.
The Rosmalense flat murder took place in 2000. The 37-year-old Regie van den Hoogen, Rob B.’s girlfriend, was found with a slit throat at the time. She was lying in the hall of their shared flat in Rosmalen. Rob B. found her, sounded the first alarm and was arrested the same day as a suspect.
B. has always denied that he had done anything to her. He said it was suicide. Yet he was convicted of manslaughter: TBS with compulsory treatment. That TBS measure ended in 2017. The Bossche lawyer Pieter van der Kruijs continued to fight for Rob B after his retirement. He maintained all the while that his client could not have killed his girlfriend.
And not without reason, it turns out. Van der Kruijs seems to be right now that the Public Prosecution Service has asked for acquittal. This could happen because the Arnhem Court of Appeal had to reassess the case on behalf of the Supreme Court. In turn, this was done on the advice of the Advocate General, the representative of justice at a court of appeal.
Breda six
The case is reminiscent of another infamous case: the Breda Six, also known as the ‘Breda restaurant murder’.
Both cases were reopened after many years by order of the Supreme Court, the highest criminal court in the Netherlands. But there is also a big difference between the two cases. For a long time it seemed that the case around the Breda Six would be heard by the court for the third time, but that did not happen in the end.
The case revolves around the robbery murder of 56-year-old Tim Mui Cheung, also known as ‘Grandma Mok’. In July 1993 she was killed in the kitchen of Chinese restaurant Peacock in Breda, owned by her son. The slot machine appeared to have been emptied.
Police located three men and three women. The six from Breda were convicted of the murder in 1994. A year later, they appealed, but were found guilty again.
In 2012, doubts arose about the evidence. That is why the case was resubmitted in 2015 by the Court of Appeal in The Hague. But the court again ruled that they had committed the murder.
No third chance
For a while it looked as if the case would be heard again by the court. The Advocate General advised the Supreme Court in 2017 because he had doubts about the statements of the three female suspects, which were later withdrawn. According to him, supporting evidence was lacking, while there are “indications that their statements cannot be correct”.
Usually the Supreme Court adopts the advice of an advocate-general. That would mean that the case would have been heard in court three times, which is unique in Dutch case law. But it never got to that point. To everyone’s surprise, the Supreme Court decided not to follow the Advocate General’s advice.
The Supreme Court found that the Court of Appeal had correctly ruled that there was sufficient well-motivated evidence. This made their prison sentences final and the six did not get a ‘new chance at acquittal’, as Rob B. now seems to get in the Rosmalense flat murder. All six have already served their sentences.
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