The driver of the tractor that was shot at by the police near Heerenveen last night was the 16-year-old farmer’s son Jouke from Akkrum. According to his mother, he was on his way home with his brother. “Jouke is now detained at the police station, we are very sad.”
For the first time since the farmers’ protests began a few weeks ago, police fired at participants in such a protest yesterday. This happened at an entrance to the A32 in Heerenveen. According to the police, “tractor drivers tried to run into officers and service vehicles.” Because a ‘threatening situation’ then arose, the police fired warning shots and targeted them. “A tractor was hit. A tractor drove away from the incident and was stopped shortly afterwards on Jousterweg.”
The tractor that was shot at was driven by 16-year-old Jouke. Footage shows a bullet hole in the frame of the vehicle. The tractor has been confiscated and Jouke is detained at the police station in Leeuwarden. His 17-year-old brother, who was driving behind the tractor in another vehicle, has not been arrested.
,,The boys worked all day yesterday, after that they were a bit in doubt: are we going to the protests or not?’, says Jouke’s mother Tjitske. ,,I said: do you have to go? Because the atmosphere is quite aggressive. But they are 16 and 17, hey, so they had an evening meeting with Thialf.” Finally, a group of farmers went to the distribution center of the Spar near Heerenveen. Around ten o’clock the brothers decided to stop by the nearby McDonalds and then drive home. “Because the alarm goes off again at five in the morning.”
At the entrance to the A32, the brothers encountered a police barrier. According to mother Tjitske, her son did not run into officers. ,,He wanted to drive around it, over the slope. I don’t understand why they shot the trigger, really. And if you’re shooting, why not the tires? The bullet hole is near the cab, he could have been dead.”
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‘Attempted manslaughter’
Images on social media show how a cop shoots at a tractor and trailer that steers around the slope around police cars and then drives away. The vehicle does not hit the officers at that time. The police in the Northern Netherlands are not going into the incident at the moment, but say they will come up with an extensive response later today. According to his mother, Jouke is incarcerated for ‘attempted manslaughter’, but the police do not want to say anything about that yet.
Meanwhile, the boy’s family is “very sad.” “My son has just graduated from secondary vocational education in agricultural livestock farming. We are livestock farmers ourselves and that is what Jouke wants to do. But we are in an area where we need to reduce our nitrogen emissions by perhaps 87 percent. Can the company continue? Because of those questions, the boys are protesting.”
Watch our videos about the farmers’ protests below:
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