2015
PETER CAME BY. HE HAD THE FRED ROS STATEMENTS WITH HIM. THEY revealed that Ros had heard who it was that had spoken about the whereabouts of Cor to his killers. A video made of the moment right after Cor’s death had appeared on the Internet. According to Ros, the informant could be seen in the footage. Apparently he was one of the two people seen running around.
Sonja and I have always wanted to know who the informant was. We knew this footage and started watching immediately. There were indeed two people running around: Adje, Cor’s half brother, and Bassie, a friend. Could it have been one of them? And which of the two? Ros gave no definite answer. We found it hard to imagine.
Adje was out of the question, but with Bassie, something awkward was going on. It was Bassie who was driving Cor around that day. He picked up the car just at the moment Cor was shot on the pavement. Bassie said getting the car out took a bit longer because two other cars blocked it.
We’d stopped thinking Bassie was a suspect after Wim once told me smilingly that he’d given him a hiding in public because he “had betrayed Cor.” This display was a typical diversion on Wim’s part. By publicly blaming him for “giving Cor away,” Wim proved his own innocence. We assumed Bassie was innocent, too, a victim of Wim’s manipulation tactics.
But now we were in doubt again.
“If we want to know who the informant was, we’ll have to get it from Wim,” I said. Sonja and Peter nodded in agreement.
If Wim would tell us, it would mean that he knew the killer. But then, it wouldn’t be enough just to talk to him. How could I prove what we had discussed during that visit? Wim could easily deny the contents of that conversation.
The only solution was to record the conversation. But how? Wim was in a guarded prison: how could I smuggle my bugging equipment in? To enter the Penitentiary Institution in Alphen a/d Rijn, you have to pass through a metal detector, and there was metal in the recording equipment, even if only a little.
“How will you do it?” Sonja asked.
“I’m going to remove as much metal as possible,” I said, and I stripped the equipment. I bought a handheld metal detector to check whether the remaining metal would set off the detector. It did. I had to hide the last bit of metal in a place that wouldn’t get noticed.
“Son, get us some condoms.”
Sonja came back, and I wrapped the stripped device in toilet paper and put it in the condom.
“Here, put it in your vagina and we’ll see if it still goes off.” Sonja went to the bathroom, and when she came back, I moved the metal detector in front of her crotch to see what would happen. There wasn’t a sound! I made the same tampon for myself and tested it. It remained silent again.
“That’s a good sign, at least,” I told Sonja, “but I don’t know how they’ve adjusted the metal detector at the prison.”
In my experience as a criminal lawyer, I knew conditions could vary. In some prisons, I pass the detector with keys in my pocket without setting it off, while others react to the underwire in my bra. I had some experience with this prison, but they could adjust the scanner any day and there would be no way to tell. We couldn’t afford to be involved in a riot at the entrance in case they found metal on us.
“We have to wear pants with an iron button near the crotch,” I said. “That way if the scanner goes off, we can tell them that’s the cause. But there shouldn’t be too many buttons, or the pants will set it off for sure; then we won’t get in. Look in your closet.”
We tried on all the pants and tested them with the manual metal detector.
“I’m wearing these,” said Sonja.
“Yeah, those are good. I’ll wear these, then.” They were jeans. I wasn’t too happy about them, because I don’t like jeans and never wear them.
“You think he’ll notice me wearing jeans all of a sudden?” I asked Sonja.
“I guess, but we don’t have many options. They’ll have to do.” Okay, so much for the pants. Now for the shirt to stick the equipment on or in. Finding a shirt that could disguise the equipment wasn’t easy; for days I had been experimenting with various items of clothing. I was used to going outside with him to talk, and I always wore a coat. This time I could hardly sit there wearing a coat; it would be too conspicuous.
During the summer, I sometimes wore a dress I had rigged up, but it wasn’t a thing to wear on a prison visit. And he knew me through and through. He knew exactly what clothes I always wear, because he and I share the habit of wearing the same outfit every day. A clean version every day, but always the same outfit. If I were to suddenly wear something different, he would be immediately suspicious.
Furthermore, I knew from all the earlier visits that we would be whispering and would be seated very close together. A situation where I couldn’t walk away or turn away if I thought he was looking at something.
In the bright light of the visitors’ area, any discrepancy would stand out, every bulge in my shirt would be magnified. If he were to see anything at all “off,” he would discover the equipment at once.
And then there was the issue of the whispering. If I stuck the device under my bra strap, it wouldn’t be close enough to my ear to catch his whispering. It had to be hidden near my shoulder.
I had tried various shirts, cut them up, sewn the stuff in, and eventually I found a shirt that would have to do. But recording the whispering would still be really difficult, so I looked for an alternative. I found one in a spy shop in southeast Amsterdam: a watch that could record. I got one for myself and one for Sonja.
If I dared to wear it, it just might work. I know from experience that when I’m whispering to him in prison, I usually have my arm around his neck. My wrist would be near his mouth, so I’d presumably catch the whispering clearly. The only problem was that those watches are strikingly large, and he knew I never wore one.
I took a gamble: that his trust in me added to the stressful situation would make him blind to the minor wardrobe changes. When he saw me, he would be counting on my support and not aware of even the possibility that I would betray him that day.
The moment had come to enter the prison. Wim’s latest flame would be there, too, and we’d given her a head start. She was already in and couldn’t be witness to anything that might go wrong with us at security. I was very nervous. Theory is totally different from reality. I couldn’t afford to get caught, so Sonja, who had already lost Wim’s trust, served as a guinea pig. She passed through security without a beep. That was good. The watch also passed. Security had no idea that this was bugging equipment. Now me. Phew! Not a sound! We went upstairs to the visitors’ room.
We were inside.
I knew there was a toilet by the entrance near the visitors’ room. There I would have to get the rest of the equipment from Sonja, inconspicuously. Cameras are everywhere and the two of us in there at once would be too conspicuous. So she went in first, took the device out of her vagina, and left it on top of the toilet cistern. I went in after her to get mine out and to attach the equipment as invisibly as I possibly could.
Of course Wim has his own room to receive his visitors in private. We say hello. He could strangle me on the spot.
He grabs me by the shoulder, and I feel his hand trembling. I feel his fear about the message I have come to deliver to him. How terrible. I feel so mean. To extract from someone—in his deepest misery—information about who really set Cor up: such treason. How can I be so evil? I feel like throwing up.
Sonja sees my doubt; she blinks her big eyes and looks at me firmly. It means, Go on. She’s right: We’ve come this far.
I take a deep breath and try to act naturally.
W: “How are you?”
A: “Good.”
W: “Yes?”
A: “Yes. So here we are.”
I start about Ros’s statement at the door, before we even sit down.
A (whispering): “That Ros guy, he is pointing to someone.”
W: “Yes.”
A: “He pointed to someone in the footage, and now they’re busy with the informant, to finally arrive at…”
We are sitting next to each other. He puts his arm around me, whispers in my ear.
W: “One more time.”
A: “The informant, who told on him…in Amstelveen.”
W: “Yeah, but how?”
A: “Well, Ros says that the guys in the footage—”
W: “Yes.”
A: “On TV, okay, what you can see is…the guy who is really running up and down…he’s the informant.”
W (softly): “The informant of what?”
Wim has no idea what informant I’m talking about. I put my arm around his neck and whisper in his ear:
A: “Of Cor’s murder.”
W: “Can’t be.”
I don’t understand. I repeat what Ros has said. I let him see my doubt, but he is adamant.
W: “No.”
A: “This is his [Ros’s] statement; he got it from Danny.”
Wim shakes his head.
W: “I don’t have a problem there.”
A: “I don’t know that?”
W: “No.”
A: “No? [Whispering] The moment it happened…”
W: “No.”
I ask him three times, but he says no, three times. He’s sure about it. He has no problem with Ros’s statement.
Wim turns to Sonja and the girlfriend.
W: “Why don’t you just talk a bit, you two?”
As always, when Wim wants to talk with his visitors unimpaired, the others have to make some noise, ambient noise that covers our conversation and ruins the recording.
Wim explains to me why it’s not an issue—because between the “lurer” and him, there was a middleman. He doesn’t know the lurer, so he can’t name him. He calls the informant the lurer: I hadn’t used that word.
W (whispering): “There was a person in between but I don’t know him…”
A: “Sure?”
W: “Sure.”
Wim wants to know how many people were seen running in the video.
A: “Two of them, that’s all.”
W: “Well, then.”
Neither of them—not Adje or Bassie—was the lurer, according to Wim.
Wim wants to know if the guy next to Cor during the shooting was visible in the video. “No,” I tell him.
The one next to Cor was also hit and was lying on the ground, invisible in the footage. I’m surprised at his question.
I make up that Sonja will also be interrogated about Cor’s murder. We had agreed on that beforehand. I’m still not sure who the informant or “lurer” is and steer the conversation to one of the guys running around in the footage. I indicate that I’m afraid that if Bassie is the informant and is questioned, he’ll crack.
A (whispering): “Because Sonja was also asked to come in…Bassie…that he started talking…”
W: “No.”
A: “No?”
Wim whispers into my ear. The way I think it happened, with Bassie, is not the way it happened.
So it’s not Bassie. Or Adje. But then who gave Cor away? I steer the conversation back to Bassie.
A: “He is a nutcase, isn’t he?”
W: “Yes, but he’s peanuts. Really.”
But he still hasn’t told me who it is. I give it one more try.
A: “Last one, and then I’ll go—”
Wim wants to know again what can be seen in the footage.
A: “I looked at the footage and saw Bassie running around.”
W (whispering, then loud): “I was really scared.”
A: “Yeah, me, too.”
W: “I’m thinking: What are you on about.”
A: “I was also scared because I’m thinking: Well, that…umm.”
I explain to him again that I’m scared the lurer will start talking.
A: “Afraid that—”
Then Wim explains why that’s impossible. The lurer was next to Cor, and he’s dead. It’s ter Haak.
Now I understand why Wim at first didn’t get which informant I meant.
Now I understand why Wim knew that what Ros said was impossible.
Now I understand his question about whether the one next to Cor was visible in the footage.
Now I understand why he was so sure that Bassie was innocent.
Now I understand why he knew that neither of the two people running around was the lurer.
Wim conceitedly looks around the visitors’ room, as if he’s proud that they can’t hurt him with a dead informant, and I immediately get the feeling that ter Haak was deliberately killed. I see Sonja looking at Wim, then at me, inquisitively.
I nod inconspicuously; I know who did it.
I don’t want to talk inside the prison, afraid that someone will record us on the security system.
We walk outside. “And?” Sonja asks.
“It’s not who we think it is. It’s somebody else.”
Back in the car safely, I tell her what she has wanted to know for years: “It was ter Haak.”
That Robert ter Haak was the lurer, according to Wim, doesn’t mean that he was aware of the role. I wasn’t able to ask Wim that question, because it would arouse his suspicion at once. It’s feasible that he was trapped, maybe by a middleman. One thing is for sure, and that is that justice has to be done for his brutal assassination. He had died in the hospital a few hours after Cor, mowed down by the same spray of bullets.
That night Sonja says to me, “As, you shouldn’t feel guilty about Wim. He is a monster. He wouldn’t hesitate one second to do this to you.”