His act was part of a plan, the ex-employee of the online payment company Adyen said in the Amsterdam court on Friday afternoon. “I was kicked out of my house and had nowhere to go,” he says. “I wanted to go to jail. I thought: if I threaten anyone, I will be arrested.”
And so on August 1 last year, the man entered the office of his former employer on Rokin in Amsterdam with a knife. There he jumped on top of the entrance gates, spread his arms, waved his knife and shouted 'Allahu Akbar' (God is great).
Dozens of Adyen employees, who were sitting on white benches at the window drinking coffee, ran into the street and into meeting rooms in panic, according to camera footage during the hearing. One of the baristas at the coffee bar near the entrance 'froze', his testimony showed. He only ran out of the building when his colleague “run, run, run” shouted.
After the office was empty, the former employee, whose name remains undisclosed for privacy reasons, calmly took off his jacket, waited for the security guards and surrendered without resistance. He was taken to prison while awaiting trial. “It's fine there. Just like a hotel,” he said during the hearing. “I like being alone in a room. I am always one loner been.”
In court, the suspect, with his lawyer next to him, speaks for almost the entire hearing. His gray hair is combed tightly into a parting. He has lost weight and looks tired, with sunken cheeks and eyes. Behind him over his chair hangs the same black leather jacket that he wore during his act at the Adyen office.
The man worked for Adyen for several years as a manager in a high position. There he earned “three hundred thousand a year,” he tells the judge. A salary for which he secured “major deals” for the listed company fintech-company.
Shit happens
He had absolutely no intention of attacking any of his former colleagues that day in August, the man says. He only hoped, he says, that he might be able to get help for his psychological problems in prison. After a burnout at Adyen, he no longer always took his medication. After that his situation deteriorated noticeably.
He is now suspected of serious assault and threatening two employees. What does he think about the fact that his former colleagues were terrified that morning? The fact that they were in the office on the day in question “is just bad luck,” he says. “I had no choice. Shit happens.”
Sometimes, in the middle of a story, the man suddenly starts screaming. About the “cunt, cancer police” that would chase him. “I am a business professional,” he shouts at the judge, with his index finger raised, at one point. “I am not fucking criminal.”
The man has had psychological problems for some time. He has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and struggles with psychosis. Problems that worsened after he was “summarily dismissed” by Adyen, he says. “I wasn't psychotic. They made me psychotic.”
Things go wrong after the man hears from Adyen's human resources department on a Friday afternoon that he has to leave the company permanently. He ends up in a psychosis and “signs his entire house,” the man says. Drawings about “the end of the world,” he says. “I was cuckoo.”
In the period that followed, the man came into contact with the police several times. He kicks someone off his bike. And when he walked out of Albert Heijn at Schiphol in May last year with a sugar waffle clutched under his coat, he was stopped by security. “I'll stick a knife in your head. Stick a knife in your eye. Stick a pen in your neck,” he shouts at the military police who arrest him.
'Judgment day'
After his dismissal, he sent dozens of emails to Adyen's directors. With topics such as 'Last chance', 'judgment day' (judgment day) or 'burn down the house'. He also visits the Adyen office and demands to speak to the board. During the police interrogation, the man says that he “hates” Adyen and will stab someone “next time”. “Let me tell you that the board fears you,” the judge tells him.
The judge wants to know how he is doing now. The man is in a Penitentiary Psychiatric Center, a department for detainees with serious psychological problems. He doesn't feel like exercising or watching television, he says. “Other than that I feel good.”
Noise disturbance
The fact that he talks to himself a lot, even at night, causes a lot of noise pollution for fellow detainees. He does this in English and Dutch, because “at Adyen everything was done in English,” he says. “I have an analytical one mindset. I talk to myself to keep my brain active.”
His daughters would like to see him, but he would rather not receive them in prison. He hopes that the judge will allow him to live in assisted living in the short term. “So I can get my life back on track. Can work again.”
After a short adjournment at the end of the hearing, the court decides to adjourn the case for the time being. There is a great risk of recidivism, the court fears. First, additional research must be done to determine whether TBS (provision) would be a good treatment measure for the man.
The case will continue in March.
#baristas #39froze39 #testimony #exemployee #entered #Adyen #building #knife
