DutchNews, April 14, 2017
Eight men have been arrested for scamming
tourists arriving at Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport by charging them extortionate
fees for short taxi journeys, the public prosecution department said on Friday.
Several of the eight men picked up had official taxi licences but the others
were operating illegally, the department said.
The taxis picked up foreign
tourists at Schiphol who wanted to go to Amsterdam. At the end of their journey
they attempted to charge their passengers ridiculously high fees and put
considerable pressure on them if they refused to do so.
One Swedish tourist was
charged €595 for a trip to the centre of the capital. As he only had €300 in
cash, the driver forced him to withdraw the rest from an ATM. In another case,
a tourist from Japan was held hostage in the cab because he refused to pay a
bill of €300.
The eight men come from Amsterdam and Zwanenburg and are aged
between 23 and 31. Four of them have been remanded in custody.
Police also
found a gun and two tasers at the home of one of the suspects.
Haarlemermeer
town council introduced a ban on taxi touts in February. Drivers caught
breaking the law can be fined up to €1,500.
Last year, a taxi driver tried to
charge a group of Chinese tourists €485 to take them from Schiphol airport to
their hotel in the west of the city.
When the group tried to leave the taxi
after refusing to pay, the driver drove off with them inside. In the end one of
them managed to break a window and the taxi stopped.
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