A Tuesday morning in October, the police judge in Utrecht. A young man with a goatee sits opposite the judge. Ayoub (22) wears an immaculate cream-colored sweater, his voice sounds nervous. It happened about a year ago, he says, “I didn’t know what to do with my life. Friends worked at a daycare center. They indicated: you can also get started there, we know someone who can arrange a diploma. Without thinking about it, I thought: I’ll just do it. I started arranging everything I needed. A diploma, a CV – I had copied and copied them from friends. My resume says I was a manager at a New York Pizza. I actually did that. But from there it doesn’t make sense anymore.”
The judge: “Was it a daycare center or an after-school care center?”
Ayoub: “I don’t really know the difference exactly.”
“Out-of-school care is for children who already go to school.”
“Oh yes, then I worked at an after-school care center.”
Ayoub continues: “It seemed like a great opportunity. But the reality was different. After two days I discovered that the work was actually not as easy as I thought. I suddenly understood why a diploma was required. I felt guilty. You are working with a vulnerable group. Then I stopped again.” Ayoub no longer showed up and did not answer the phone, but was later exposed when an investigation revealed that his diploma was forged. He confessed everything to the police.
The judge looks at the file. “The after-school care center later received a fine of 8,000 euros from the municipality because they had someone who was not qualified. What do you think of that?”
“I understand, of course, that there are consequences to these kinds of things. So yes, that’s why we’re here.”
“And now?”
“I install solar panels. There really is a gap in the market, so…”
“I also saw that you were once convicted of possessing weapons.”
“Beats. I went to the fair with my fiancée, she is sitting here in the back of the room. It was in Paris. We had a bb gun [een balletjespistool dat amper van een echt pistool te onderscheiden is] won. He was found during a car check, and I was fined for that.”
His lawyer, Minke Greeven, interrupts him. “For the image. What does your fiancé do for work?”
Ayoub: “She works at a daycare center, she is a pedagogical employee. We met later, when all this had already happened. She also explained to me what such a training course looks like and what you learn there. Then you will realize that it is bigger than you all think.”
The public prosecutor is strict. “If I followed the guideline, he would have to sit for a month. I’m not going to ask that, I don’t want to disrupt the good path he’s taken. But as far as I am concerned, it sends a clear signal in the form of 180 hours of community service.”
That’s quite something, says his lawyer Minke Greeven. “The client took responsibility in his own way after two days. What should he have done then? Have to go to the police? There was no body anywhere.” The lawyer has read other guidelines, which describe 90 to 120 hours of community service. “I would like to ask you to sit at the bottom.” The shelter passed on the fine to the employment agency that gave Ayoub a contract. “I think it is quite an amount, I don’t know how many more people were employed without a valid diploma.”
The judge agrees with the officer that it is “serious”, but the guideline she adheres to “dentists and doctors” are mentioned. “You attended an after-school care center for two days under supervision.” So as far as the guideline goes, he follows the lawyer. Moreover, the judge says, Ayoub now has a job in a sector “where the need is great.” He receives a community service order of ninety hours.