Dutch Bonus Hunter Gets 180 Hours of Community Service and Forfeits €2.1M

Dutch prosecutors have imposed 180 hours of community service on a 46-year-old man who used more than 400 online casino accounts under false and third-party identities to repeatedly claim welcome and reload bonuses.

The activity ran from 2007 through 2016, before the Netherlands opened its regulated online gambling market in October 2021. The casinos involved were operating in the country without Dutch licences at the time.

The Public Prosecution Service also ordered the man to relinquish €2.1 million in assets already seized by authorities. Prosecutors attribute the amount to financial benefits generated through the offences.

The case was resolved through an OM-strafbeschikking, a penalty order that allows Dutch prosecutors to impose certain sanctions without taking the case to court.

180 Hours Is Maximum Community Service Under Penalty Order

The 180-hour community service requirement is the maximum that prosecutors can impose through this type of out-of-court procedure.

The man was accused of document forgery and possessing and using false identity documents.

A prosecutor can issue a penalty order for qualifying offences when criminal responsibility has been established. Available sanctions include fines and community service of up to 180 hours, but prosecutors cannot impose imprisonment without court proceedings.

The Public Prosecution Service said an out-of-court resolution was appropriate after considering both the seriousness of the conduct and the defendant's circumstances.

He voluntarily stopped the activity in 2016, has not committed further offences since then, cooperated with investigators, has a job and performs volunteer work.

More Than 400 Accounts Used to Collect Casino Bonuses

The scheme relied on repeatedly obtaining promotions that online casinos intended to restrict to individual customers.

The man created more than 400 accounts using fictitious identities and the names of other people to access welcome bonuses and reload offers.

According to prosecutors, using the promotions on such a large scale increased his average probability of finishing with a profit to above 50%.

Casinos could close accounts and refuse to pay balances when they suspected one person was operating multiple accounts to obtain bonuses repeatedly.

To avoid detection, the man falsified documents requested during identity verification.

He also maintained a technical setup in which each gambling account used its own IP address.

Winnings Were Split Across Payment Services and E-Wallets

The operation also used multiple payment channels.

Casino winnings were withdrawn through different payment service providers and electronic wallets, making it more difficult for operators to identify connections between accounts presented as belonging to different customers.

The case illustrates an early form of large-scale bonus abuse combining identity fraud, multi-accounting, technical infrastructure and fragmented payment flows.

Modern operators increasingly use device identification, linked-account analysis and payment monitoring to identify this type of behaviour, but the scheme ran for almost a decade before ending in 2016.

Defendant Must Mortgage Home to Cover €2.1M

The financial consequence substantially exceeds the community service component of the penalty.

The defendant must give up the full €2.1 million seized in connection with the case.

According to prosecutors, he will need to take out a mortgage secured against his home in order to satisfy the amount.

The Public Prosecution Service cited that financial impact as one of the circumstances considered when deciding to resolve the case without additional court proceedings.

The fact that the casinos were unlicensed in the Netherlands at the time did not prevent prosecution. The criminal case focused on the defendant's use of forged documents and false identities to induce operators to pay gambling winnings.