Dutch police are liable for a mass shooting because the gunman should never have been granted a firearms licence, a court has ruled.

Tristan van der Vlis killed six people and injured 16 others when he unleashed a hail of automatic gunfire in a packed shopping mall in April 2011.

The 24-year-old later died after turning the gun on himself. In a letter to his parents before the attack, Van der Vlis said he was unhappy and wanted to kill himself.

The Netherlands was left in mourning after the attack in Alphen aan de Rijn - with one witness describing it as the day the country "lost its innocence".

An appeals court has now concluded that the police were negligent in granting Van der Vlis a licence to own guns, as a previous application by the attacker was rejected because he had illegally fired an airgun.

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Van der Vlis also suffered from psychological problems dating back to 2006, which should have raised a red flag with the police.

The appeal court's judgment quashes a 2015 ruling by a lower court which concluded that the police had merely made mistakes in the case.

As a result, the judges have ordered the police to pay compensation to the families of those killed and wounded - in addition to the court costs of 51 plaintiffs.

The surprise ruling comes as the issue of gun control is high on the global agenda following a series of deadly shootings in the US.</s>Dutch police were liable for a 2011 mall shooting in which six people were killed as the gunman should never have been granted an gun licence, an appeals court ruled Tuesday.

The surprise ruling comes as the issue of gun control is high on the global agenda following a series of deadly armed assaults in the United States.

The Netherlands was thrown into mourning after Tristan van der Vlis went on a Saturday lunchtime shooting spree in the town of Alphen aan de Rijn in April 2011.

Six people died and 16 were wounded as Van der Vlis fired three weapons, unleashing a hail of automatic gunfire in the packed mall, before turning the gun on himself.

A member of a shooting club, the 24-year-old had been given a gun permit in 2008. He said in a letter to his parents before the attack that he was unhappy, and wanted to commit suicide.

"The police are liable for the personal injury and the deaths caused by the shooting at the De Ridderhof shopping centre," the court said in a statement on Tuesday.

"The standard that a gun licence must be refused if there are any concerns about abuse is there precisely to protect citizens from the damaging consequences of such abuse," it said.

The appeals court in The Hague overturned an earlier 2015 ruling by a lower court, which merely said the police had made mistakes.

Instead, Tuesday's ruling found that police had been negligent in granting Van der Vlis a licence to own guns after his previous application in 2005 had been turned down because he was found to have illegally fired an airgun.

It had also emerged that Van der Vlis suffered from psychological problems, dating back to 2006, which should have raised a red flag with police.

The judges therefore "ordered the police to pay compensation to the families of those killed as well as the wounded", and to pay the court costs of the 51 plaintiffs.

For the normally peaceful Dutch, unused to large-scale violence, the shooting came as a shock. One witness called it the day the country "lost its innocence."</s>After a few weeks in our ridings meeting with constituents, Members of Parliament returned to Ottawa and with great fanfare Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale introduced the Liberals’ new firearms legislation.

As I have said before, I support legislation that will keep guns out of the hands of violent criminals. However, what the Liberals have proposed does very little to make our communities safer. Instead, this bill targets law-abiding firearms owners by adding more red tape to lawful firearms ownership and to people buying non-restricted firearms in Canada.

Unfortunately, as my Conservative colleagues and I predicted, this legislation also includes the return of the long-gun registry. They have not only gone through the back door with a new reference system where every non-restricted firearm is going to need a reference number and be tracked by the registrar, but also deliberately handing, through the front door, a copy of the old long-gun registry data to the Quebec government.

This is despite the fact that during the election campaign the Liberals promised that they would not re-introduce a long-gun registry. With this legislation it is clear that the Liberal government does not believe the rights of law-abiding firearms owners should be protected, or that they need to keep the promises they made to rural Canadians.

It is important to remember that Canada already has a rigorous firearms safety system. Firearms owners must hold a valid firearms licence in order to acquire and possess a firearm. They must also pass the required Canadian Firearms Safety Course and undergo a thorough screening process as well as police background checks.

I was surprised to see the Prime Minister’s tweet following the introduction of the Liberal firearms bill that said, and I quote:

“…if you want to buy a gun, by law you’ll have to show a license at the point of purchase. Right now, that’s not a requirement.”

The Prime Minister is giving the false impression that an individual can easily walk into a firearms store and purchase a firearm without showing their licence. Canadian firearms law Section 23 states that an individual must hold a firearm licence in order to purchase a firearm. And further, anyone who has recently purchased a firearm or ammunition (or even wants to simply look at a firearm at a local store) knows they must verify that they hold a licence by showing it to the salesperson.

Keeping firearms out of the hands of violent criminals should be the number one priority of any new firearms legislation. This Liberal bill falls well short of that. As a firearms owner myself, I will continue to push for common sense legislation that focuses on the criminal element behind firearms violence, instead of targeting Canada’s law-abiding outdoor community.
A Dutch court rules police are liable for a mass shooting at a shopping centre that killed six and wounded sixteen because the gunman should not have been issued a firearms licence.