Dutch police are being infiltrated by criminal gangs, report says

Dutch police unions have called for extra training in resisting approaches from criminal gangs after a report concluded that the recent firing of dozens of officers for corruption and security breaches could prove “the tip of the iceberg”.

The Algemeen Dagblad (AD) newspaper said the confidential police report confirmed suspicions that forces around the country were being infiltrated by organised crime, with 19 officers from the mid-Netherlands force alone found to have underworld connections.

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The paper said dozens of officers had been suspended or dismissed in recent weeks over offences and allegations of corruption in office, fraud, professional misconduct, breach of official secrecy, dereliction of duty and misuse of police computers.

In Utrecht, a senior officer was sacked and faces court proceedings after being revealed by a crown witness to have been in the pay of Ridouan Taghi, a notorious suspected drugs baron currently on trial, with 15 accomplices, accused of organising a string of underworld killings.

In the southern province of Limburg, another commanding officer and three more junior staff have been suspended for “suspected unprofessional behaviour” after an investigation into four police personnel who were taken off active duty in April.

In Amsterdam, the paper said, a 55-year-old officer was suspended and arrested last week in the seventh such incident since May. Officers in the Dutch capital have been sacked or suspended for possession of hard drugs, forgery, tampering with official computers and divulging confidential information.

The report said the series of recent sackings and suspensions was “probably the tip of the iceberg”, with sources stressing that investigators have “a large number of other live inquiries” on which they cannot currently work due to lack of capacity.

Jan Struijs, the chair of the police union NPD, told AD the police needed to do far more to improve officers’ resistance to “surreptitious” overtures from organised crime, which take place “at all levels” of the profession.

Cases of corruption “increase mutual suspicion among officers and that’s really a big problem”, Struijs said. “Officers must be able to trust each other blindly.” He demanded urgent extra training.

“Officers need to be taught how to deal with this in a proper and responsible manner,” Struijs said. “If they are approached, they need to be able to pass that information on safely to their superiors. There’s a lot more work to be done.”

A report published two years ago by the Dutch justice ministry noted that about 40% of “professional integrity breaches” in the police concerned officers with an immigrant background, who make up 7% of police personnel.

It concluded that officers from immigrant communities were more likely to be approached by criminals and more vulnerable to such offers because of the “relatively greater level of involvement of some ethnic groups” in criminal activity, and the extended networks and complex loyalties of immigrant families.