by Marcel Beijer
“Are you really an American policeman?” Mattijs Goede from Almere often gets to hear. Not surprising: he drives an American police car that seems to have been taken straight out of a Blues Brothers movie.
In the Netherlands – where the police drive modest white automobiles – the Ford Crown Victoria is therefore a curiosity. Mattijs has put stickers on it with a police emblem, and the Blues Brothers.
He goes all out in his role. For example, he wears a black police uniform, a badge on his sweater and even carries handcuffs in his pocket. All toys, but the Almeerder doesn’t care.
HOME EQUITY
Mattijs had quite a bit of home equity on his house and wanted to do something fun with it. “Ten years ago I suffered a stroke that changed my life dramatically. There are things that I can’t do anymore, but I learned to look at what I still can do. So I decided to buy this car. Just because I deserve it.”
The police car was used for years in California by a K9 squad. It guzzles gasoline. One gallon of gasoline gets it 17 miles. With Dutch fuel prices the way they are, that would quickly become an unaffordable hobby. That’s why he had a propane tank built into it. “It still runs 17 MPG, but a lot cheaper,” Mattijs says. “Many people turn around when they see me and my car. Sometimes they ask if I’m really from America. It’s really fun.”
* Marcel Beijer is a journalist in Almere and winner of the Dutch News Magazine Journalism Prize 2023.
* Photo: Almere DEZE WEEK/Fred Rotgans
