Dutch biodiesel fraud probe reaches company linked to convicted "Fat King" family

Six years after a Dutch court convicted the so-called "Fat King," Cornelis Bunschoten, in a major biodiesel scam case, a company managed by his relative is under investigation for a similar alleged fraud.

In November 2024, the environmental unit of the Rotterdam police raided the premises of a company in the Veluwe, a forested region in the east of the Netherlands. Police said the company was suspected of involvement in “a million euro fraud involving raw materials for biodiesel.”

Police didn’t name the company or its owner in their statement at the time. But OCCRP’s partner in the Netherlands, Follow The Money, has confirmed that the company is called Gerbuvet B.V., and it’s managed by Gerrit Bunschoten. 

Bunschoten is not under investigation. He did not respond to emailed questions about the case, and declined to comment when contacted by phone.

Gerrit is a family member of Cornelis “Cees” Bunschoten who was dubbed in Dutch media as the “vetkoning,” or “Fat King,” in reference to his business of refining cooking fats and other oils into biofuel, which reportedly made him one of the 500 richest people in the Netherlands.

Cornelis Bunschoten was sentenced in 2019 to 20 months in prison for fraud, forgery, and money laundering related to a biofuels scheme. In 2025, he repaid 5.1 million euros (about $5.9 million) to the Public Prosecution Service, a Dutch government announcement states. 

In 2023, OCCRP, Follow The Money, the Centre for Investigative Reporting and De Tijd also found that his firm was among others that had imported tens of thousands of allegedly fraudulent biofuels from a Bosnian company. Reporters revealed how the firms had purchased cheap traditional biofuels that had been mislabeled as a more expensive one made from waste. 

The scheme exploited an EU climate policy aiming to curb emissions by encouraging companies to blend these renewable fuels into gas or diesel. The EU anti-fraud office is still investigating the companies involved in that alleged illegal scheme. 

Separately, the biofuels company managed by Gerrit Bunschoten is now under scrutiny by authorities in the Netherlands.

In a video on the Youtube channel of the Rotterdam Police following the 2024 raid, officers explained their suspicions about the company, which had become a target in a wider investigation into biofuels fraud.

The unnamed company was “suspected of deliberately assigning incorrect codes and descriptions to the oils and fats they collected,” said an officer from the police environmental team. 

Follow The Money analyzed images of the raid published by police and the local media outlet De Stentor. They noticed a sticker on a barrel of fat in the video which had the name of Biodiesel Kampen B.V. 

Reporters looked up the governance structure of Biodiesel Kampen B.V. and saw that it was owned by a firm called C. Bunschoten Holding B.V.  Cornelis Bunschoten had been the sole shareholder of that firm.

Reporters then checked cooking oil and fat recycling companies in the region to see if any of them were owned or managed by a person with the surname Bunschoten. They discovered that Gerbuvet B.V. was managed by Gerrit Bunschoten.

A visit to the Gerbuvet B.V. facility confirmed that it was the same location as the site shown in the police raid video. 

Gerrit Bunschoten is also listed as the general manager of a firm called Gerbuvet Holding B.V., which owns another company Gerbuvet Vastgoed B.V. In November 2024 — the same month as the police raid — the Dutch Public Prosecution Service imposed an asset seizure on Gerbuvet Vastgoed B.V., according to a Land Registry document.

Reporters confirmed that Cornelis and Gerrit are family members. 

They cross-referenced corporate registry extracts for the businesses of both men alongside an information brochure from the Product Board for Margarine, Fats and Oils and the Association of Processors of Slaughter By-products. The brochure mentioned companies owned by the family. 

A person close to the investigation, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed all the reporters’ findings.

In their 2024 Youtube video, Rotterdam Police spoke generally about why it is important to investigate schemes in which companies pass off cheaper oils as more valuable used cooking oil: “It is fraud.

“Bad fuel is knowingly sold as good fuel that supposedly contributes to CO2 reduction. And so there are companies that earn millions of euros from this,” an officer said.

It remains unclear if the 2024 police raid will lead to formal prosecution or a settlement, and whether the case meets the legal threshold for charges. The Dutch Public Prosecution Service and the National Police Corps declined to comment as the investigation is ongoing.