The court in Zutphen has convicted a taxi driver for committing lewd acts with 2 of his passengers. The suspect has been charged with forcing a passenger to tolerate one or more indecent acts on or around 9 July 2019 within the municipality of Rheden. With his taxi bus, in which he transported the passenger, he drove to a parking lot along the A348 where he parked his taxi bus and forced his victim to tolerate one or more indecent acts.
In March 2020, the same taxi driver again made the mistake on the route between Sleeuwijk and Aalst in Aalst, municipality of Zaltbommel, by forcing a victim to commit and/or tolerate one or more indecent acts with violence and/or threats. The public prosecutor has stated that it can be legally and convincingly proven that the accused was guilty of the charge.
According to the position of the defence that the files contain insufficient supporting evidence to be able to arrive at a proven fact. Nor can the statements of both declarants serve as supporting evidence. The GPS data of the taxi ride shows that the taxi drove over the Wilhelminasluis in Andel and shortly afterwards over the van Heemstraweg. The court first establishes that the statement of one of the victims is sufficiently supported by other evidence. After all, the statement of the second victim is supported by the findings of the investigation into the DNA traces found.
The public prosecutor has demanded that the suspect will be zal convicted to a prison sentence of 7 months, of which 3 months probation with a probation period of 3 years. She has also demanded a ban on the transport of young people and persons with physical and/or mental disabilities for a period of 3 years. With regard to the claimed professional injunction, the defense counsel stated that the suspect enjoys his work as a taxi driver and has asked the court to take this into account when determining the sentence.
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