The Dutch branch of French fashion house Louis Vuitton has agreed to pay a €500,000 fine for failing to do enough to prevent large-scale money laundering at its stores and avoid a trial, the public prosecution service said on Thursday.

The department said last summer it intended to prosecute the luxury brand, following revelations in the AD newspaper.

The investigation centres on three suspects, including a 36-year-old woman from Lelystad. Prosecutors believe she used criminal funds to buy luxury goods such as handbags in order to launder money originating from a convicted “banker” to crime gangs.

The woman is suspected of laundering more than €2 million in cash between August 2021 and February 2023. She allegedly shipped the handbags to China in removal boxes to resell them there. Police found boxes at her home, along with chat messages, receipts and CCTV footage.

Two other suspects remain under investigation: a Chinese woman who allegedly assisted her, and a former Louis Vuitton sales assistant. He is suspected of helping the Lelystad woman with her purchases, alerting her when expensive bags were back in stock and warning her if she spent too much cash through her accounts.

Prosecutors said the woman shopped at several Louis Vuitton outlets. The brand has four sales points in the Netherlands: at Schiphol airport, in Amsterdam’s PC Hooftstraat, and in the Bijenkorf department stores in Amsterdam and Rotterdam. Handbags typically retail for between €2,500 and €3,000.

Until 1 January 2026, Dutch businesses were required to report unusual transactions including cash payments of €10,000 or more. The threshold has since been lowered to €3,000.

The Lelystad suspect used different names when paying at Louis Vuitton and was not challenged by the company, prosecutors said.

Under so-called know your customer rules, companies are legally required to verify that clients are bona fide in order to prevent money laundering and terrorist financing. The public prosecution service said Louis Vuitton should have taken a stricter approach to large cash payments.

The criminal case against the three suspects is ongoing and no date for their trial has yet been set.