The document that decides the case.
The 'cassatieschriftuur' is the mandatory written document in which the cassation lawyer formulates the grounds of cassation. Its quality determines whether the Supreme Court will consider the complaints at all.
Precision is a condition of admissibility.
A ground of cassation must state, clearly and specifically, which rule of law was breached and why. A general complaint that the judgment is unjust or that the sentence is too severe does not qualify as a ground of cassation and leads to the appeal being declared inadmissible.
The complaint must be traceable in the case file: in the record of the hearing, in the judgment, in the reasoning of the evidence or in the response to defences and requests made by the defence. Everything the grounds of appeal assert must be verifiable from those documents.
The Supreme Court has repeatedly refused to consider grounds of appeal that did not meet these requirements. In such cases the defendant loses the cassation proceedings not on the merits, but because the document was drafted incorrectly.
Reading the file, then writing.
The work starts with a full study of the file: the judgment, the records of the hearings, the written pleadings and the reasoning of the evidence. That study determines whether there are prospects of success at all — and a candid answer to that question is part of the advice.
The lawyer then formulates the grounds of cassation, supported by the case law of the Supreme Court. After the opinion of the Procurator General has been received, a written response (a 'Borgersbrief') may be filed within two weeks.
Fellow lawyers regularly instruct our office for a cassation assessment or to file the grounds of appeal in a case they have conducted themselves at first instance and on appeal.