The police judge in Haarlem yesterday sentenced a woman to 60 hours of community service for forging official documents in order to use them for loan and mortgage applications. Her husband, who was tried as a co-suspect, was acquitted.
The two now live separately in Badhoevedorp and Amstelveen, but when the couple was still living under an Amstelveen roof with two daughters in 2019, they were involved in an accident. While her income plummeted, he started working more. And because she said she had been promised compensation of around 15,000 euros, she decided to borrow that money in advance.
Carrying capacity
Anyone who wants to borrow money must often demonstrate that they have sufficient financial resources. Since that wasn’t enough for the loan they wanted to apply for, she decided to falsify bank statements and pay slips. If the couple wants to move to a home costing 365,000 euros at some point, those false documents are also used for the mortgage application.
The ball starts rolling when an employee of a mortgage lender becomes suspicious in early 2022 and his employer advises an investigation into the documents. It soon turns out that the application was made with forged documents, and that the salary on the pay slips and bank statements is therefore fictitious and manipulated. She is arrested and immediately confesses.
Insecurity
The public prosecutor shows guilt that the case will only come to trial two years later, but still demands a community service order of eighty hours against the woman. Her lawyer believes that a suspended sentence is sufficient. The woman has lived in uncertainty for years about the progress of the case. “She sleeps poorly and has a lot of stress,” says her lawyer, as she is overcome with emotions. “I see that it affects you a lot,” the judge says to her,
The timid woman also shows guilt in the courtroom. She says little, and when she does, her words are translated by an interpreter sitting next to her. Yet she seems to speak Dutch sufficiently to answer herself, which the judge also notices. “If you can answer for yourself, I would rather you do so, because your interpreter is not an interpreter for shyness.”
“Sorry,” she says as the judge gives her the option of a final word. Ultimately, the woman, who recently started her own business, was sentenced to sixty hours of community service. “If the probation department does not contact you, you should call the probation department and find a way to fit that sentence into your life.”
The man says he cannot remember a lot, but claims that he never had any doubts about the amount of the loans and the mortgage that his wife applied for. “She started earning less, but I worked eighty-hour weeks,” he tries to convince the judge that his lack of suspicion was not feigned.
If all is well in a relationship, it is logical that you rely on your partner when making such important decisions, the judge acknowledges. She does find it remarkable that he has never had the urge to pull the emergency brake. “There is a lot of smoke in the file,” she tells him. “But it is not punishable that you missed it.” The judge acquits him.