Dutch Court of Appeal condemns "independent" fraud investigation by Dutch lawyers
Stefan Vermeulen & Hugo Rasch (www.ftm.nl)
4/23/2021
The Amsterdam Court of Appeal ruled that fraud investigations in the Netherlands as carried out by Dutch lawyers are not independent investigations. If law firms pretend this is the case, this is “at the very least potentially misleading and therefore undesirable”.
Fraud investigations in the Netherlands as carried out by Dutch lawyers are not independent investigations. If law firms pretend this is the case, this is “at the very least potentially misleading and therefore undesirable”. This was established by the Amsterdam Court of Appeal in a case against former De Brauw Blackstone Westbroek lawyer, Jaap de Keijzer.
The case against lawyer Jaap de Keijzer was initiated by the Jonathan Taylor, whistle-blower of large-scale fraud by the billion dollar offshore company, SBM Offshore. Taylor wants access to the internal company investigation into this fraud, which SBM commissioned from the law firm De Brauw Blackstone Westbroek in Amsterdam.
This corporate investigation, which took place in the period 2012-2014, was the basis for a settlement of US$ 240 million between SBM and the Dutch Public Prosecutor, but according to whistleblower Taylor, because of the investigation by the law firm De Brauw Blackstone Westbroek, all kinds of incriminating information remained undisclosed. All the findings that SBM shared with its general counsel remained secret thanks to the “legal advice privilege” or ”attorney-client privilege”, which stipulates that everything that happens between client and lawyer is in principle confidential. Read further at www.ftm.nl.