Man stabbed to death after argument

Alaatin Kilic, a 40-year-old man from Amsterdam, was stabbed to death on Saturday evening, 11 November 2017, on Admiraal Helfrichstraat in Amsterdam-West, close to Mercatorplein. The area was crowded that evening because many people were celebrating around Mercatorplein after the Moroccan national football team had qualified for the World Cup. According to the investigation, the stabbing was not directly connected to those celebrations. Shortly before the fatal incident, Kilic had been involved in an argument or verbal confrontation with a group of men near a car. At around 23:40, he was stabbed in the chest. Despite his serious injuries, he was still able to approach a passing motorcycle police officer. He said he had been stabbed and pointed towards several men standing near a car. One of those men, Jamal S., then 27 years old, ran away when police came closer, but he was arrested shortly afterwards. Kilic quickly lost consciousness, had to be resuscitated and was taken to hospital. He died later that night from his injuries. During the investigation, police found a folding knife on Jamal S.’s escape route and later also a dagger in a sheath. Blood from Kilic was found on the sheath, and DNA from the victim was found under the fingernails of Jamal S.’s right hand. A friend of Jamal S. also stated that shortly after the stabbing the suspect had said, “ik heb hem gedjoekt,” street slang meaning that he had stabbed him. In addition, Jamal S. allegedly admitted while being transported in a police car that he was responsible for stabbing Kilic. The Public Prosecution Service argued that Jamal S. was guilty of manslaughter and demanded an eleven-year prison sentence. Murder was not considered proven, because there was no evidence that Jamal S. had planned in advance to kill Kilic. The court ultimately sentenced Jamal S. to eight years in prison for stabbing Alaatin Kilic to death. The case was therefore legally treated as manslaughter: a fatal street stabbing after an argument, in which Kilic was still able to point police towards the group from which his attacker came. That was not the end of it. On 23 May 2019 the Amsterdam court of appeal raised the sentence to eleven years, finding that S. had stabbed the victim once in the chest with a knife.