How Much Is Your Daughter Worth?
Let's imagine for a moment. A call in the middle of the night. The police. Your daughter, 35 years old, has been murdered. Strangled for minutes that must have felt like an eternity. Her body was wrapped in a tarpaulin, like garbage, and thrown into the IJ like someone discarding a worthless object. A package floating in Amsterdam's cold water. That was Sara's ending.
Now let's imagine something else: What if instead of Sara, sex worker, it had been Sara, elementary school teacher? Or Sara, doctor? Or Sara, lawyer?
On November 29, 2023, Sara's body emerged from the IJ. She was 35 years old. She was Italian. She was a sex worker. She was a daughter, sister, perhaps a friend. She was a woman with a life ahead of her. But the Dutch judicial system, the one that prides itself on being progressive and tolerant, has put a price on her life: €75,000.
The Verdict: Ten Years for a Life
Bas W., 41, was sentenced to ten years in prison and mandatory psychiatric treatment (TBS) for strangling Sara to death, hiding her body, and disposing of it in the river. The Public Prosecutor had requested fourteen years, but the court considered a shorter sentence "appropriate" to facilitate psychiatric treatment.
The justification is technical, clinical, devoid of any acknowledgment of the horror: the killer suffers from a personality disorder that makes him aggressive and impulsive. He uses sex to manage tensions and "tends toward extremes." He had problems with alcohol and drugs. The court, magnanimous, decided that ten years plus TBS were sufficient.
Ten years.
That means if Sara had lived to be 80, each year of her stolen life is worth approximately eight months in prison for her killer.
The Uncomfortable Exercise: Let's Reverse the Roles
Case A - Sara, sex worker:
- Sentence: 10 years in prison + TBS
- Family compensation: €75,000
- Media coverage: limited
- Public reaction: deafening silence
Case B hypothetical - Sara, school teacher:
In 2004, a 16-year-old student murdered teacher Hans van Wieren at Terra College in The Hague. The case shocked all of Holland. The killer received 5 years in prison and TBS (due to his age), but the reaction was nationwide: Queen Beatrix sent condolences, the Prime Minister made statements, thousands signed condolence books, a minute of silence was observed in all schools across the country.
In 2023, when a man murdered a 43-year-old doctor and professor at Rotterdam's Erasmus MC, along with other victims, the Prosecutor requested 30 years in prison and TBS. Thirty years. Three times more than what Sara's killer received.
Case C - Sara, lawyer:
When lawyer Derk Wiersum was murdered in 2019, his killer was sentenced to 30 years in prison in 2021. The national outrage was immediate and resounding. The case became a symbol of organized crime. Legislative reforms were made. There was talk of the erosion of the rule of law.
Do you see the pattern? It's not just about the severity of the crime—all of these were premeditated murders—but about who the victim was.
First and Second-Class Citizens
The judicial system, that supposedly blind arbiter holding the scales of justice with blindfolded eyes, is actually looking. And what it sees determines how much your life is worth.
If you're a teacher, lawyer, doctor—"respectable" professions—your murder shakes the foundations of society. Resources are mobilized. Prosecutors request the maximum. Judges are under public scrutiny. Politicians make statements. Families receive not only substantial financial compensation but also social recognition of their loss.
But if you're a sex worker, your death becomes a footnote. Another case. A statistic. Your family receives €75,000—an amount that sounds considerable until you realize it barely covers a small apartment on the outskirts of Amsterdam. It's the price of a luxury car. It's less than what many earn in two years.
It's insulting.
The Conversation Nobody Wants to Have
How do you explain to Sara's parents that their daughter's life is worth €75,000? How do you tell them that the man who strangled her, who felt her life escape through his hands for interminable minutes, who wrapped her body and threw it into the water like trash, will walk out of prison in a decade if he behaves well?
With what face do you tell them that if Sara had been a math teacher instead of a sex worker, her killer would probably be serving double the sentence? That the public outrage would have been different? That newspapers would have published editorials? That politicians would have made statements?
Silence is the answer. Because acknowledging this disparity is acknowledging an uncomfortable truth about our society: not all lives are worth the same in our eyes.
The Hypocrisy of the "Progressive Country"
The Netherlands is famous for its progressive attitude toward sex work. Amsterdam is synonymous with the Red Light District. The country prides itself on having regulated and "normalized" prostitution. There's talk of labor rights, safety, eliminating stigma.
But when a sex worker is brutally murdered, that progressive veneer vanishes. The ten-year sentence screams what society whispers: no matter how much we say we respect sex work, deep down, we consider those lives worth less.
This isn't just a judicial matter. It's a mirror reflecting our deepest values. And what we see isn't pretty.
The True Cost of Inequality Before Justice
Sex workers already face disproportionately high rates of violence. They are frequent victims of assault, rape, and murder. The reason is simple: criminals know they can get away with it. They know these crimes will receive less police attention, fewer investigation resources, less severity in courts, less public outrage.
When the judicial system implicitly confirms that a sex worker is worth less—with lighter sentences, smaller compensations, scarce media coverage—it's sending a dangerous message: these crimes are less serious. These victims are less important.
And criminals hear that message.
The Questions We Should Be Asking
1. Why did the Prosecutor only request 14 years?
In murder cases of "respectable" professionals, they regularly request 20, 25, even 30 years. Why only 14 for Sara? Did the prosecutor consider her life worth less from the start?
2. Why did the court reduce the sentence to 10 years?
The justification—facilitating psychiatric treatment—rings hollow when in other cases long sentences are imposed WITH TBS. Would they have given the same "benefit of the doubt" to a killer who murdered a judge? A police officer?
3. Why is the compensation so low?
€75,000. In a society where compensations for bodily harm in traffic accidents regularly exceed that amount. The implicit message is clear: your daughter, mother, sister, is worth less than someone's chronic back pain.
4. Where is the public outrage?
When a journalist, politician, or prominent professional is murdered, there are protests, editorials, parliamentary debates. For Sara, there was barely a murmur. Is it because her profession makes us uncomfortable? Because it's easier to look the other way?
The Humanization She's Denied
Sara wasn't her profession. She wasn't just "an escort." She was a 35-year-old woman with dreams, fears, joys. She had a family in Italy who loved her. She probably had friends who miss her laughter. Perhaps she liked morning coffee, or walks along the canal, or a particular song.
She had a complete, complex, valuable life.
But in the headlines, in the judicial sentence, in the public conversation (or lack thereof), she's reduced to her work. "Escort murdered." As if that explained everything. As if that somehow mitigated the horror of what happened to her.
This dehumanization is deliberate. It's easier to accept a light sentence if we don't think of Sara as a complete person. If we don't imagine her terror as she felt herself suffocating. If we don't think about her parents receiving the news. If we don't consider all the years she'll never live.
The Change We Need
We can't keep pretending we live in an equitable society when justice weighs differently depending on your profession. We need:
1. Uniform judicial standards:
Clear guidelines ensuring that murders of sex workers receive the same severity as any other premeditated murder.
2. Proportional compensations:
Families of sex work victims deserve compensations comparable to other victims of violent crimes.
3. Responsible media attention:
Media must humanize all victims equally, not reduce them to their occupation.
4. Institutional recognition:
Public officials, from prosecutors to legislators, must actively acknowledge and address this disparity.
5. Public education:
Confront the social prejudices that allow this systemic inequality.
An Imaginary Letter
Dear Sara's parents:
I'm sorry that justice has failed you. I'm sorry that the system that should protect and value your daughter has reduced her to numbers—10 years, €75,000—as if any figure could compensate for what you've lost.
I'm sorry you have to live knowing that if Sara had had another profession, her killer would be serving double the sentence. That the outrage would have been different. That her life would have "mattered more" in the eyes of a system that claims to treat us all equally.
But I want you to know this: Sara mattered. Her life had infinite value. Not because of her work, nor despite it, but because she was a human being with inherent dignity. The system may have failed to recognize this, but it doesn't change the truth.
Your daughter deserved to live. Deserved to grow old. Deserved all the joys and sorrows the future would have brought her. And she deserves that her death not be in vain—that it forces our society to confront its hypocrisy, its prejudices, its cruelty codified in laws and sentences.
I'm sorry. We're all sorry. And we should be ashamed.
Conclusion: The Mirror We Don't Want to Look At
Bas W.'s sentence isn't just about one man and his crime. It's about us. It's about what kind of society we are and what kind of society we want to be.
We can keep lying, saying all lives matter equally while our courts say otherwise. We can keep celebrating our "progressivism" while allowing this inequality to persist.
Or we can look straight into the mirror and acknowledge the uncomfortable truth: we have first and second-class citizens. And when those second-class citizens are murdered, our outrage is proportionally less.
The question is simple: are we okay with that?
Because if the answer is no, then we need to change. Not with empty words about dignity and human rights, but with concrete action. With prosecutors requesting the same sentences. With judges imposing the same penalties. With compensations that reflect the true value—incalculable—of a human life. With a society that becomes equally outraged regardless of who the victim was.
Sara deserved more. Her family deserves more. And all the sex workers who live with the implicit knowledge that their lives are less protected, less valued, less mourned—they deserve more.
The Dutch judicial system has just announced, with cold, hard numbers, how much a sex worker's life is worth: 10 years in prison and €75,000.
It's time for us, as a society, to say out loud: That's not enough. It will never be enough. Because no human life has a price.
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