In 2019, Jelena will return to the sublet room where she previously lived for six years. She has good contact with the landlord, who also has his main residence in the house. In 2022, he also decides to accommodate three Ukrainian refugees in the house. Two of them, a couple in their 70s, initially sleep on the sofa in the living room. But Jelena wakes up almost every night from intense nightmares due to her PTSD. She then always goes to the living room, and suggests that the elderly couple sleep in her bed during her waking hours. This act of kindness grows into a habit and eventually it happens that Jelena gives up her bed at night when she stays up after a nightmare.

But. Due to the high number of registrations at the address, the municipality will start an address investigation in May 2023 into possible overcrowding. Doubts arise. Does Jelena really have her main residence in the room where she has lived since 2019? Two intense interrogations follow, and Jelena does not realize that she is suspected of fraud. There, in those interrogations, the misunderstanding arises that Jelena has permanently given up her room to the Ukrainian couple. That she herself stays with her father, who also lives in The Hague. And it is true that she often visits her father. He is lonely, sick and in need of help, and her own house is so busy with five residents. Sometimes during the day she catches up with her father, or does some laundry. In her own room there is no longer room for the drying rack. 

An accumulation of assumptions, misunderstandings and possibly prejudices follows. There remains distrust among the enforcement & Fraud officials. Jelena's entire private and lifestyle is vetted. They look at where she does her shopping, where and when she uses public transport, how much money she spends, and whether that is plausible. Pictures are taken of her room, her belongings, clothes and underwear. She is even asked about the color of her duvet cover (which she can of course name correctly). In the end, her lifestyle is ruled implausible and her primary residence in the room is definitively called into question. 

Result: her benefits will be stopped immediately on June 26, 2023 and the almost € 19,000 she received in assistance during the past year will be reclaimed. The way Jelena has to live – that's not how people live and live according to the officials in The Hague. She is declared guilty of welfare fraud without the intervention of a judge or lawyer. And now, two months later, the landlord has canceled her rent. Since the loss of her benefit, she can no longer afford it. August 27 she becomes homeless.