If the other party in your legal dispute twists agreements, withholds information or keeps escalating the conflict, your answer is a well-documented file, not a diagnosis. Dutch courts decide on facts that are stated and proven, and the law has specific tools against a party that conceals documents or refuses to cooperate, from an order to produce documents to the loss of a share in a hidden asset.
Below we explain how manipulation shows up in a case file, how you document it, which procedural instruments Dutch law offers, and what you can do when behaviour crosses the line into unlawful or criminal conduct.
One point first. We do not label opposing parties. Narcissism is a clinical term, and whether it applies to someone is a question for a qualified professional, not for a law firm or a court. In a legal file the term has no meaning of its own. What counts is conduct that can be shown, and the consequences the law attaches to it. For the wider family law context, see our article on narcissists and the law; the specific question of hidden assets is covered in narcissism and asset division.
How do you recognise manipulation in a case file?
You recognise it by its effect on the file, not by the other person’s psychology. Typical signs are agreements that are later denied, information that arrives late or incomplete, and procedural steps that mainly cause delay.
Agreements made orally are denied or reinterpreted afterwards. Roles are reversed, so that the accusation you intended to make is made against you first. Financial information arrives incomplete, late or not at all: a bank account that is not mentioned, a bonus described as a loan, a business that suddenly makes no profit in the year of the divorce. Communication alternates between a flood of messages and complete silence, and requests from your lawyer go unanswered until a deadline has passed.
In proceedings the same pattern shows up as procedural friction. Think of repeated requests for postponement, new points raised at the last moment, documents produced in fragments, complaints to third parties, and serious allegations that are never made concrete. Where children are involved, it often takes the form of shifting handover arrangements, informing the other parent late, or presenting the child as unwilling without any verifiable reason.
None of this is unusual, and none of it is unmanageable. It does require a different way of working. An ordinary dispute can be run on the merits; a case like this is run on the record. Every agreement is confirmed in writing, every deadline is noted, and every allegation is answered with a document rather than with emotion. That is file management, and it is the part you control.
Why does evidence matter more than a label?
Because Dutch civil procedure is built on what parties state and prove. A statement about the other party’s character does not shift the burden of proof; e-mails that show an agreement was made and later denied do.
Under Article 150 of the Dutch Code of Civil Procedure (Wetboek van Burgerlijke Rechtsvordering, Rv), the party who relies on the legal consequences of certain facts must prove them. The court is free to assess the evidence, unless the law provides otherwise.
Article 21 Rv requires parties to present the facts relevant to the decision completely and truthfully. If a party does not, the court may draw the conclusion it considers appropriate. The reform of the law of evidence that took effect on 1 January 2025 has reinforced the expectation that parties gather the information they can reasonably obtain at an early stage and put it on the table. This is the provision to invoke when the other party gives an incomplete picture, and it is far more effective than an argument about motives.
The same reform improved access to documents held by the other party. The right to inspect specific documents is now set out in Articles 194 to 195a Rv, and the threshold has been lowered from a legitimate interest to a sufficient interest. Our articles on the new evidence rules in Dutch civil litigation and on the reformed right to inspect evidence explain how to frame such a request.
How do you build a record that holds up?
Assume that what is not written down did not happen. Confirm agreements in writing, keep communication in one channel, keep a factual log and secure the financial documents you can lawfully obtain.
Confirm oral agreements the same day by e-mail, in neutral terms, and keep the reply, as well as the absence of a reply. Use one channel for communication. Where children are involved, consider a parenting app or an e-mail address used only for that purpose; it produces a chronological record that nobody can edit afterwards. Keep a log with dates, times, what was agreed, what happened and who was present. Write it as you would want it read out in court: facts, not adjectives.
Apply the same discipline to financial documents. Secure copies of joint bank statements, mortgage documents, pension statements, annual accounts and tax returns while you still have lawful access to them. Note which documents exist even if you cannot obtain them, because a specific description is what makes an inspection request succeed. A request for all correspondence over five years will fail; a request for the annual accounts and current account statements of a named company for a named year has a real chance.
Where are the limits?
Crossing certain lines damages your own position. Recording a conversation in which you take part yourself is not a criminal offence in the Netherlands, and such a recording can generally be used in civil proceedings, although the court weighs how it was obtained. Recording conversations between other people without their knowledge is a criminal offence under Article 139a of the Dutch Criminal Code (Wetboek van Strafrecht, Sr).
Reading someone else’s e-mail, logging into an account that is not yours or installing tracking software on another person’s device can amount to computer trespass under Article 138ab Sr and to a serious breach of privacy. Evidence obtained that way can turn a case about the other party’s conduct into a case about yours. When in doubt, ask your lawyer before you act, not afterwards.
How do you obtain documents the other party will not provide?
You can ask the court to order the other party to produce specific documents, and you can request preliminary measures such as a witness hearing. In divorce cases, a spouse who hides a joint asset can lose his or her share in it.
An inspection request under Articles 194 to 195a Rv obliges a party to make specific documents available, provided you have a sufficient interest and identify the documents precisely enough. Before or outside proceedings, you can ask for preliminary measures: a preliminary witness hearing, an expert report or an inspection on site. Since the 2025 reform, several of these can be requested in a single application.
In matrimonial cases there is an additional and sharper rule. Spouses must give each other full information about the assets in the community of property. Under Article 3:194(2) of the Dutch Civil Code (Burgerlijk Wetboek, BW), a spouse who deliberately hides, conceals or misappropriates an asset belonging to the community forfeits his or her share in that asset to the other spouse. That is not a symbolic sanction: the whole asset goes to the other party. Proving intent requires evidence, which is why bank statements, transfers to family members and the timing of transactions matter more than any description of the person.
Maintenance cases have their own dynamic. A party who does not provide income details cannot expect the court to assume the most favourable figure. The court can decide on the basis of the information available and draw conclusions from a refusal to supply the rest. If income is deliberately reduced, or a business is used to make the capacity to pay look smaller, the court can base maintenance on earning capacity rather than declared income, provided you substantiate this. Our overview of child custody law in the Netherlands deals with the related questions about children.
How do you keep the conflict away from the children?
Make the parenting plan as concrete as possible and enforce it through the court if necessary. Vague arrangements leave room for reinterpretation; fixed days, times and procedures do not.
Where parents cannot agree, the court decides on the arrangements. The parenting plan (ouderschapsplan) is the starting point, and the more concrete it is, the less room there is for reinterpretation: fixed days and times, a handover location, a holiday schedule for each year, rules on informing each other and a procedure for changes. Vague wording such as “in mutual consultation” is where future conflicts are stored.
If an arrangement is not complied with, you can enforce it. A court order can be backed by a penalty payment (dwangsom) for each breach, and in urgent cases summary proceedings (kort geding) can produce a decision within weeks. Where the dispute is really about the child’s position rather than about the parents, the court can appoint a special guardian (bijzondere curator) for the child under Article 1:250 BW. It can also ask the Child Care and Protection Board (Raad voor de Kinderbescherming) to investigate and advise. A change of parental authority or of the child’s main residence is possible but exceptional, and requires a substantiated picture over time, not a single incident.
Claims that one parent is turning the child against the other are common in these files and are taken seriously, but they need support: a record of cancelled contact, messages, what the child was told and when, and preferably an observation by a professional who has actually seen the family. An unsupported claim tends to backfire, because it invites the same scrutiny of the person making it.
When does the other party’s conduct become unlawful or criminal?
Persistent unwanted contact, threats, false accusations and spreading damaging untruths can be criminal offences and unlawful acts. In civil proceedings you can then ask for a contact ban or an order to remove publications.
Persistently seeking contact, following, watching or repeatedly approaching someone can amount to stalking (belaging) under Article 285b Sr. Stalking is prosecuted only on complaint, so you must file a formal complaint (klacht), not just a report. Threats are a separate offence under Article 285 Sr, and knowingly making a false accusation to the authorities can be an offence under Article 188 Sr. Spreading a false statement that damages your reputation can be punishable as defamation or libel (smaad or laster, Articles 261 and 262 Sr), and the same conduct can be an unlawful act under Article 6:162 BW that gives rise to damages.
In summary proceedings you can ask the court for a contact ban, an area ban or an order to remove online publications, backed by a penalty payment. In cases of domestic violence, the mayor can impose a temporary restraining order (tijdelijk huisverbod) on the person causing the threat, which creates immediate breathing space regardless of any divorce proceedings. Veilig Thuis, the national advice and reporting centre for domestic violence and child abuse, is the point of contact for advice and reports.
If the other party uses proceedings themselves as a weapon, a claim that is manifestly unfounded can amount to misuse of procedural law. The court can then order that party to pay the actual legal costs instead of the usual fixed amounts.
A practical warning applies to both sides. Posting about the other parent, the case or the children on social media can be unlawful, can be used as evidence and can affect how the court sees your judgement. The safest rule during proceedings is to publish nothing about the conflict at all.
How do you deal with delay, mediation and costs?
The court has tools against delay, and provisional measures can settle urgent matters quickly. Mediation only helps if both parties genuinely want an arrangement, and it pays to decide early which points really matter.
Delay is the tactic clients complain about most, and it is also the one the court is best equipped to handle. The court sets the deadlines for a defence, extensions are not unlimited, and documents produced too late can be disregarded. If a decision cannot wait, provisional measures (voorlopige voorzieningen) in divorce proceedings can settle the use of the home, the children’s residence and provisional maintenance within a short time. In other disputes, summary proceedings serve the same purpose. Asking for those measures early is usually cheaper than absorbing months of uncertainty.
Mediation is valuable when both parties genuinely want a workable arrangement and can negotiate on a reasonably equal footing. If one party uses the process to gather information, to postpone, or to reopen points that were already settled, mediation becomes an expensive way to lose time, and the court route is more suitable. Make that assessment deliberately at the start and review it once, rather than letting it drift.
Discuss costs realistically at the outset. A file that has to be built document by document takes more work than one that runs on agreement, and the standard costs order in Dutch proceedings covers only part of the actual costs. That is a reason to be selective: pursue the points that change the outcome, record the rest, and resist the temptation to answer every provocation with a letter.
What should you do now?
Put your file in order first, then decide with your lawyer which two or three points determine the outcome. Look after yourself as well, because a long procedure is demanding.
Start with a factual log, written confirmation of every agreement, a single communication channel and a complete set of the financial documents you can lawfully obtain. List precisely which documents you know exist but do not have, because that list becomes your inspection request. Then build the file around the points that actually decide the case, not around everything that has happened.
Keep a professional you trust involved for your own wellbeing, such as your GP or a counsellor. In situations of violence or intimidation, Veilig Thuis and the police are the right places to turn, and a lawyer can act quickly alongside them. Ask someone you trust to read important messages before you send them. None of this is a legal instrument, but it keeps a long procedure manageable and keeps your correspondence usable as evidence.
In summary
- In a legal dispute, conduct that can be proven counts, not labels such as narcissism.
- Confirm agreements in writing, keep a factual log and secure financial documents lawfully.
- You can ask the court to order the production of specific documents under Articles 194 to 195a Rv; a spouse who hides a joint asset can lose his or her share under Article 3:194(2) BW.
- Stalking, threats and defamation can be criminal offences; a contact ban can be obtained in summary proceedings.
- Ask for provisional measures early and be selective about the points you pursue.
Frequently asked questions
Can I use a recording of a conversation with my ex-partner?
Recording a conversation in which you take part yourself is not a criminal offence, and a civil court will usually accept it as evidence. The court does weigh how the recording was made and whether it was necessary. Recording conversations between others is a criminal offence.
What can I do if my ex-partner hides assets during a divorce?
You can ask the court to order the production of specific documents, such as bank statements or annual accounts. If a spouse deliberately hides an asset belonging to the community of property, he or she loses his or her share in it under Article 3:194(2) BW.
Is calling someone a narcissist in court documents useful?
No. A court decides on facts, not on psychological labels, and an unsupported label can harm your credibility. Describe specific conduct and support it with documents.
Law & More assists clients in family and civil disputes in which the other party withholds information, denies agreements or uses proceedings to exert pressure. We act for Dutch and international clients from our offices in Eindhoven and Amsterdam. Unsure where you stand? Tell us about your situation. We will let you know your options within one working day.
