News item | 11-25-2022 | 4:15 pm
Seizing criminal assets is an important key to breaking criminal power structures. In order to intensify the hunt for criminal money and thus promote legal restoration, the Council of Ministers has decided, on the proposal of Minister Yeşilgöz-Zegerius of Justice and Security, to submit a bill for confiscation without prior conviction for a crime for advice to the Council of State.
Minister Yeşilgöz: “If the police search a building or car and find a bag with cash or expensive items, it is not always possible to establish a connection with the suspects. With the new law, it does not matter whose name an asset is in, or whether the owner is unknown. Even without knowing this, their criminally obtained money, premises, luxury cars and other expensive items can be seized. In this way we prevent criminal assets, which are often obtained through violence and over the backs of victims, from infecting our society and economy. And we prevent the illegal money from being used to commit new criminal offenses.”
With the removal of illegally obtained goods from society, the legal status is restored and criminal reinvestments are prevented. It is important in the bill that the Public Prosecution Service can make it plausible to the court that goods originated from a crime. It can be money, but also other valuable goods with a value of at least 25,000 euros. Tricks with concealing ownership constructions, where criminals, for example, put cars and properties in the name of others, no longer make sense. Inspiration for the procedure, also referred to as Non Conviction Based Confiscation (NCBC), was acquired in Italy and also looked at the British and Irish model. Elements from the procedures in these countries have been adopted that fit well into the Dutch legal system.
The power of the new procedure lies in the overturning of the current working method: not the suspect person, but the suspicious property is central to the confiscation. Due to the infringement of property rights, confiscation is only possible after a final judicial decision. To this end, the government must make a plausible case that the property was obtained from crime or was paid for from the proceeds of crime. Interested parties can report in this procedure if they have a claim to the seized object. They may be expected to be able to state about the legal origin.
Need more
According to Minister Yesilgöz, the criminal revenue model for organized crime is still much too big. More is needed to break down criminal power structures that thrive on huge sums of criminal money. In addition to the bill for confiscation without a criminal conviction, various measures are therefore being developed to ensure that all government services involved can intervene more quickly. Cooperation with other countries – both within Europe and beyond – will also be strengthened. After all, the majority of criminal assets leave our country and are laundered elsewhere through concealed flows of money and goods that travel all over the world. International cooperation is therefore crucial to prevent criminal money from slipping through our fingers across national borders.