Netherlands / District Court Amsterdam / Case no. 13-650167-13 ECLI:NL:RBAMS:2014:693

Country

Netherlands

Title

Netherlands / District Court Amsterdam / Case no. 13-650167-13

ECLI:NL:RBAMS:2014:693

View full Case

Year

2014

Decision/ruling/judgment date

Saturday, February 08, 2014

Incident(s) concerned/related

Other forms of hate speech

Related Bias motivation

Race/Ethnicity

Groups affected

Black people or of African origin

Court/Body type

National Court

Court/Body

District Court Amsterdam (Rechtbank Amsterdam)

Key facts of the case

The moderator of a website opened a thread in which internet users were invited to vent their racist opinions. The owner and moderator of the website placed racist cartoons on this thread. Subsequently, internet users placed racist texts on this thread. The Dutch Complaints Bureau on Internet Discrimination reported this thread to the police. The Public Prosecution Service decided to prosecute the owner and moderator for making public statements or disseminating statements of which the perpetrator should have known that they are insulting to a group of persons because of their race or that they incite discrimination because of their race.

Main reasoning/argumentation

To disseminate images or cartoons which are very insulting and hurtful to black people on an Internet forum is forbidden under Dutch criminal law even if the suspects did not have the intention to offend people.

Is the case related to the application of the Framework Decision on Racism and Xenophobia, the Racial Equality Directive?

Key issues (concepts, interpretations) clarified by the case

Disseminating racist statements (cartoons in this case) publicly on a website constitutes incitement to discrimination as prohibited by Article 137e of the Dutch Criminal Code. It also constitutes insult of a group of persons because of their race as made criminal by Article 137e of the Dutch Criminal Code. Even when the perpetrators had no intention to insult people because of their race or to incite discrimination because of their race, and tried to show the stupidity of racist statements, their actions are criminal under the Dutch Criminal Code.

Results (sanctions, outcome) and key consequences or implications of the case

Owners or moderators of websites are not allowed under Dutch criminal law to make public any discriminatory or insulting statements about racial or ethnic groups, even when their intention is to demonstrate the stupidity of these statements. The suspects in these case have been sentenced under Article 137e of Dutch criminal code to a fine of 500 Euro. Thus both owner and moderator were ordered to pay a fine of 500 euro. The verdict described here concerns the moderator.

Key quotation in original language and its unofficial translation into English with reference details

“De rechtbank heeft bij de keuze tot het opleggen van de straf en bij de vaststelling van de hoogte daarvan laten meewegen dat verdachte op zijn internetforum voor negroïde personen zeer kwetsende afbeeldingen heeft geplaatst. Door deze op een openbaar internetforum te plaatsen, waren ze voor een ieder toegankelijk. Hoewel de rechtbank, meer dan de officier van justitie, rekening houdt met de omstandigheid dat verdachte niet de uitgesproken bedoeling had negroïde personen te beledigen, had hij beter moeten weten. Verdachte had zich moeten realiseren dat met het plaatsen van deze onnodig grievende afbeeldingen de waardigheid van negroïde personen in grote mate wordt miskend.”

"In its decision to impose a penalty and in its decision to determine the severity of the penalty, the court has taken into consideration that the suspect has put on an Internet forum images which are very hurtful to black people. By placing these images on a public Internet forum, they were accessible to everyone.
Although the court, more than the public prosecutor, takes into account the fact that the suspect did not have the intention to insult black persons, he should have known better. The suspect should have realized that by placing these unnecessarily hurtful images he denied to a large extent the dignity of black people."

The Netherlands, District Court Amsterdam (Rechtbank Amsterdam) (2014), Case No. 13-650167-13, ECLI:NL:RBAMS:2014:693, 18 February 2014, available at: http://deeplink.rechtspraak.nl/uitspraak?id=ECLI:NL:RBAMS:2014:693

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