The Public Prosecution Service is appealing against the verdict in the sedition case involving Willem Engel. The Public Prosecution Service is of the opinion that the acquittal is unjustified in parts.
The court in Rotterdam freed Engel on 20 January of 5 suspicions of sedition. He was convicted for a call to participate in a banned demonstration. The court sentenced Engel to a suspended prison sentence of one month with a probationary period of 2 years.
This criminal case concerned 6 statements made by Engel on social media that were said to be inflammatory. Engel was convicted of only one offence: in June 2020, Engel – in a live stream on Facebook – called on everyone to come to a banned demonstration on the Malieveld in The Hague. A similar demonstration previously got completely out of hand.
By deliberately calling for participation in the demonstration, Engel showed that he has no regard for the authorities.
For five other cases of sedition, the former foreman of Virus Truth was acquitted. It was about drinking coffee with chairman of the Security Council Hubert Bruls, calling a nursing home, ensuring as many infections as possible and photographing GGD employees. The latter group complained bitterly about this, but according to the court, the ‘criminal border of sedition’ was not crossed.
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