Van Lienden face mask deal before criminal court, with a chance of prison sentence

• Ruben Eg

  economics editor

• Eva Wiessing

  economics reporter

Did former opinion maker Sywert van Lienden, together with his business partners Bernd Damme and Camiel van Gestel, defraud the State, companies and volunteers in the middle of the corona crisis? And if so, should they go to jail for their much-discussed ‘face mask deal’?

Today the three have to appear in a criminal case in the Rotterdam court. They are accused of “fraud, embezzlement, forgery and/or money laundering”. The penalties for this vary, from fines to prison terms of two to six years.

The criminal case that the Public Prosecution Service is conducting regarding the face mask deal was given the name FullSutton. That is not only a town in the English county of Yorkshire, but also the name of a high-security prison for serious criminals.

The criminal file reportedly contains 17,000 pages. Parts of this have already been leaked to the media in recent weeks. One suggests that Van Lienden, Damme and Van Gestel were conscious from the start were engaged in fraud.

But on the basis of other fragments it can be argued that this was not the case, because officials knew that the face masks were purchased through the BV of the three, instead of through the nonprofit organization.

The three entrepreneurs continue to maintain that they only wanted to help bring medical devices to the Netherlands during the corona crisis. The outbreak of the coronavirus brought the country to a standstill, partly due to a major shortage of protective materials such as face masks, insulation gowns and gloves.

Van Lienden and his partners said they would import the face masks for the Ministry of Health from China through their own nonprofit organization. But in reality this happened through a commercial company, with which they made millions of profits on the face mask deal. The three had not anticipated this in advance, they say.

In 2021, Sywert van Lienden called his corona profit “inexplicable” in Buitenhof and offered to donate part to charities:

Whether the money should be returned is part of a civil lawsuit pending in the court in Amsterdam. In addition, there are criminal proceedings that start today in Rotterdam.

The criminal case came to light after Randstad reported fraud. The temporary employment group made fifteen employees available free of charge to the Van Lienden foundation and its partners. Only afterwards did Randstad discover that millions had been earned partly thanks to the work of the staff loaned out “for free”.

Coolblue filed a report for forgery. The online store helped set up an online store and order processing, only to have an investment of almost half a million euros waived because there would be no money. Coolblue also wants that money back, Randstad does not.

The Ministry of Health announced that legal action would be taken following a report from research agency Deloitte.

Two weeks ago, the three entrepreneurs took a strong stand against all accusations in the civil case. If the case cannot be settled, the judge will make a ruling on February 5.

Van Lienden already launched one this weekend special website in which he says he “lays all the facts openly on the table”. He is convinced that he is right: “Some have filed a report, in some cases even encouraged by the Public Prosecution Service or a lawyer or comedian who has been active in the media,” he writes.

The hearing will start tomorrow with the consideration of an objection that the three have filed against the summons. They believe that they cannot be prosecuted for defrauding the Ministry of Health, because they believe that department knew what was going on. But even if they are heard, the reports from parties such as Randstad will remain standing.