# Police take 30 illegal medicine webshops offline, arrest three men

> Police seized the servers behind the sites, which sold fake sleeping pills, sedatives and painkillers to Dutch customers. They link at least three deaths to pills from the shops.

Society · published 2026-10-22 05:44 · https://nlnow.nl/a/police-take-30-illegal-medicine-webshops-offline-arrest-three-men/

Police have taken thirty websites selling illegal medicines and drugs offline. Three suspects were arrested this week: a 35-year-old man from Kwintsheul, a 39-year-old man from Rotterdam and a 66-year-old man from Den Haag. They are suspected of offering, selling and supplying illegal medicines, which led to the death of three people.

The shops targeted the Dutch market, and sometimes German or French customers. In the Netherlands, the medication is available only on a doctor's prescription, through a pharmacy. Van Brussel said customers are often vulnerable people who want sleeping or sedative pills they cannot get through regular channels. "They go looking online. Then you don't actually know what you're buying." Police ask anyone who knows someone who became seriously ill or died after using pills ordered online to come forward.

Police hold the suspects responsible for the webshop Slaappillen.net, which was shut down last year after a woman from Voorburg died. She had ordered oxycodone there; the fake pills contained nitazenes, a dangerous synthetic substance with a high risk of overdose. Police say the suspects then kept selling through new webshops.

This time police also seized the servers the sites ran on. During the week they carried out several searches and seized the suspects' crypto wallets. "We have taken down the whole technology behind the websites," said Ron van Brussel of the Landelijke Eenheid Opsporing en Interventies (the national police unit for serious organised crime). "That makes it harder to restart."

Two men who allegedly played a subordinate role in the organisation behind Slaappillen.net appear in court next week. Police have not ruled out further arrests.

Separately, the case against the webshop Funcaps continues. The Openbaar Ministerie (Public Prosecution Service) links more than twenty deaths to products sold through it, and its owners remain in custody.

Van Brussel said the trade is far from over: "Several criminal groups keep this kind of site running."

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