Niels van der Laan LL.M. focuses on (corporate) criminal law and acts in high-profile cases and investigations. His clients are publicly traded companies, banks, trust offices, and other businesses in the financial and private sector. He advises on criminal defence and criminal liability and directs internal fraud investigations.
In addition, he is active as a defence lawyer for CEOs, chairpersons, non-executive directors, managers and advisors who are involved in corruption cases, market abuse cases (insider trading, market manipulation), money laundering cases, criminal tax cases and (other) White Collar cases.
Van der Laan has a great deal of experience with technically complex transnational litigations and maintains good contacts with defence lawyers abroad, especially in the U.S. He is considered an expert in the field of international criminal law and also litigates before the Dutch Supreme Court.
Van der Laan further specializes in the field of cybercrime (hacking, phishing and spamming). He also advises various internet service providers such as search-engines, forums and blogs, as well as hosting and access providers about their rights and obligations concerning (digital) investigations and regarding criminal liability for (user-generated) content.
Van der Laan gained notoriety by representing the (former) President of the Centrale Bank of Curaçao and Sint Maarten, who was fully acquitted in first instance as well as in appeal on a suspicion of tax fraud.
Next to his work as a criminal defence lawyer, Van der Laan works as an interim-judge at the criminal court of appeal in ‘s-Hertogenbosch.
Van der Laan gives lectures both at home and abroad and teaches at several educational institutions. He mainly lectures in the fields of money laundering, confiscation procedures and pre-trial detention. Additionally he regularly publishes articles in professional journals. In the past, Van der Laan was one of the erstwhile founders of the Dutch Association of Young Criminal Defence Lawyers.
Since 2018, Van der Laan has been identified every year as a ‘thought leader‘ in the category business crime defence by Who’s Who Legal. He is part of the top 10 of ‘most highly regarded lawyers who received the highest number of nominations from peers, corporate counsel and other market sources‘. Hij was also nominated ‘as one of the world’s leading practitioners’ in the categories ‘corporates’, ‘investigations’ en ‘individuals’. De Who’s Who wrote: Niels van der Laan is “very hands-on and to the point” and he “has a nuanced understanding of the law and people”.
Legal 500 described Van der Laan as ‘very approachable and an expert in his field’, stating he has ‘a sophisticated grasp of white-collar defence’. He is considered ‘an expert in international criminal law, with a particular specialism in cyber crime’. Van der Laan ‘acts in high-profile cases and investigations, defending HNWIs, publicly traded companies, banks and private sector clients before the Dutch Supreme Court’ (Legal 500 2023).
Van der Laan is recommended by Chambers for his ‘strength defending individuals in fraud and corruption cases’.
Van der Laan has registered the following principal (and secondary) legal practice areas in the Netherlands Bar’s register of legal practice areas (rechtsgebiedenregister): criminal law and cassation. Based on this registration, he is required to obtain ten training credits per calendar year in each registered principal legal practice area in accordance with the standards set by the Netherlands Bar.
