Allen & Overy partner Hendrik Jan Biemond resigns

Hendrik Jan Biemond Photo: Peter Boer/De BeeldunieHendrik Jan Biemond, one of the best-known corporate criminal law specialists in the Netherlands and a partner at Allen & Overy until recently, has quietly quit as a lawyer. “After almost thirty years, I thought it was time to think about something new. I'm doing that now,” Biemond (54) said when asked from his vacation home in Italy. Earlier this month, the counselor and former prosecutor appeared to have left as Allen & Overy (A&O)'s partner. He has also not been listed on the law firm's website since then. The company has not publicly reported his resignation. Biemond's departure is confirmed by his former colleague, A&O partner Arnold Croiset van Uchelen. “Hendrik Jan has decided to throw up his toga. Within our office, he was replaced by Patrick Ploeger, who made the switch from De Brauw early this year,” Croiset van Uchelen replies to questions from the FD. With his departure from A&O, Biemond seems to be closing the door for the legal profession permanently, as he simultaneously deregistered as a lawyer with the Dutch Bar Association.Clickfund caseAs a lawyer, Biemond defended securities dealer Eddy Swaab, suspected of stock market fraud, in the late nineties. Swaab was one of the main suspects in the Clickfonds case, an extensive judicial investigation into financial fraud on the Amsterdam stock exchange. In the end, the judiciary was only able to prove few of the suspicions in this stock market fraud case. In 2002, Biemond swapped his law gown for that of a prosecutor. In his new role, he helped the Public Prosecutor get rid of the “Clickfonds trauma” by convicting former Ahold directors Cees van der Hoeven, Michiel Meurs and Jan Andreae as case officer.After more than five years at the Public Prosecutor, he returned to the legal profession and became a partner at Allen & Overy. In that role, he assisted large companies that came into contact with justice. Recently, that was supermarket group Jumbo, after the arrest of their CEO Frits van Eerd in September 2022. In the 2018 municipal elections, Biemond was elected city council member for the PvdA in Amsterdam. Former lawyer and former Green Left senator Britta Böhler said she would like her former colleague to serve as Minister of Justice. Before the turn of the century, Biemond was Böhler's intern in the corporate law department at the law firm Loeff Claeys Verbeke, the predecessor of Allen & Overy. In response to his resignation, she says she remembers him as “a very sharp lawyer who always went his own way. This is evident again'. Read the full article: https://fd.nl/bedrijfsleven/1476918/allen-overy-partner-hendrik-jan-biemond-stapt-op