Management

Leo Zaal, Chief Executive Officer

Mr Leo Zaal assumed his role as CEO of the Netherlands Forensic Institute (NFI) on 1 October 2018. 

Leo Zaal has been CEO of the NFI since 1 October 2018. Prior to this, he spent six years as CEO of the Institute for Safety, the centre of expertise in the Netherlands that supports the Security Council and the Security Regions in their approach to disaster relief and crisis management.

From 1995 to 2012, Leo was Managing Partner at the Twynstra Gudde consultancy firm and was responsible for the Public Order and Security advisory group, which he himself founded.

Following his studies at the Dutch Police Academy from 1975 to 1979, he started work with the Municipal Police in Amsterdam. In 1995, while superintendent of the Amsterdam-Amstelland Regional Police, he moved to Twynstra Gudde.

Annemieke de Vries, Chief Scientific and Technology officer

Ms Annemieke de Vries assumed her role as Chief Scientific and Technology Officer on 1 October 2018. She is also the Deputy CEO. 

Annemieke studied Health Sciences at Maastricht University from 1987 to 1992. She was awarded her PhD by Utrecht University in 1997 for her thesis on the development of cancer following exposure to chemical substances.

She then spent three years as a research fellow of the Dutch Cancer Society (KWF) conducting scientific research into the development of breast cancer at the Center for Cancer Research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Boston, USA.

Following her return to the Netherlands, she started work at the National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM) in 2000 as Senior Scientific Officer in the Toxicology domain.

From 2006 she held various management positions at the RIVM, as Head of the Centre for Health Protection from 2013, a significant responsibility being the major laboratory infrastructure for the Public Health domain. During her final year at the RIVM she was also Deputy Director for Public Health and Health Care before moving to the NFI.