Netherlands - Dutch family living in basement 9 yrs, Ruinerwold, Drenthe Province, 15 October 2019

[Wyle_E_Coyote]

Dutch family of 7 waiting for "the end of time" discovered living in farmhouse basement - CBS News

According to Dutch media, the family had no contact with the outside world and was entirely self-sufficient, living off a vegetable garden and a few animals. The children were not registered and neighbors believed only one man lived alone on the farm.

The children had no idea that there were other people in the world, RTV reports.

Father and six children lived in basement for nine years ‘waiting for end of time’

https://7news.com.au/news/crime/dutch-family-discovered-in-farm-basement-c-505424

Man and six children rescued from Netherlands basement after nine years' 'waiting for the end of time'

Family who lived in Dutch cellar for nine years are discovered | Daily Mail Online

 

[LadyL]

but the children were ages 16-25 when discovered and only been down in the basement 9 years so at 7-16 years of age is when they started living in the basement so where were they before that? did they not see other humans in the first 7-16 years of their lives??

wow I just read that the 25 year-old had never been to school so maybe they were held somewhere else away from the rest of the world prior to the basement although he also said he hadn't been to the barber in 9 years so presumably they had some access to other people?

 

[Coppertop15]

Kind of unclear who got arrested.

 

[ZaZara]

Pictured: Man who raised alarm about family 'waiting for end of times' in Dutch house | Daily Mail Online

The first pictures have emerged of a 25-year-old man who saved his family from a life in isolation at a remote Dutch house while waiting 'for the end of time' after he walked to a nearby bar and asked for help.

Police say Jan Zon van Dorsten had been living in a 'small, enclosed space' at a house in Ruinerwold, 60 miles north of Amsterdam, for the last nine years until he appeared at a bar in the town on Sunday, ordered five beers, and said he couldn't go home.

That led officers to the remote homestead where they found Jan's four brothers and sisters, aged between 18 and 25, along with their father. The family has been taken to a safe location while a seventh person - Austrian Josef B, 58 - has been arrested.

Investigators admit they are deeply puzzled by the case and are still working to answer key questions - such as whether the family were held against their will, and what exactly their relationship was with Josef B.

The mystery is deepened further by the fact that Jan, the eldest son, had access to social media and had been active on Facebook since June this year.


BBM

Daily Mail offers a good overview about what is currently known while the case is developing.

There is no indication of a crime sofar. The family weren't self sufficient, the man Josef brought them groceries. By the look of it, they lived there by choice. Perhaps it would be better to arrest the father, but they'll find out soon enough.

Much ado about very little, if you ask me.

 

[FrostOwl]

There is no indication of a crime sofar. The family weren't self sufficient, the man Josef brought them groceries. By the look of it, they lived there by choice. Perhaps it would be better to arrest the father, but they'll find out soon enough.

Much ado about very little, if you ask me.

As the father of the children seems to have suffered a stroke "some years ago" (perhaps nine years?) and being bedridden, who knows how much say he have had about the situation, depending on how affected he is of the stroke. Family found at Dutch farm 'could have been held against their will'

 

[ZaZara]

Het laatste nieuws uit Nederland leest u op Telegraaf.nl

Five adults were found in the remote farm in Ruinerwold, plus two older men, Josef B. and Gerrit Jan. The five are children of Gerrit-Jan. A sixth child of his, Jan, had sounded the alarm and therefore was no longer there during the police raid.

Mayor De Groot: "It is very special for us. Here people still know each other. It was awful to hear what happened. Although we don't know exactly what happened. One gentleman was seen at the farm, but not all the others."

The mayor can tell nothing about the current investigation. But he does tell us that it is a difficult matter. "These people were not registered. Then you can't follow them very well." So what is their status or what will it be? The mayor admits that this is not just clear either. "I don't know yet."

This week there has been a first meeting for concerned residents. "There were 75 people there. They ask themselves: 'Could we have done something?', says the mayor.

The now suspect father was arrested after days of investigation around 7:00 p.m. Thursday night. "In the shelter where he was staying," according to Nathalie Schubart of the Noord-Nederland police force. The police do not want to say what has led to the arrest of the man. In any case, he is suspected of complicity in deprivation of liberty, mistreatment and money laundering.

An unknown amount of money was found in the house. "It's not about a couple of tenners and that's why we're investigating where that money comes from," says the police spokeswoman. During two searches in Zwartsluis and Meppel administration and data carriers were found. "But we can't tell how old these data are either.

The ghost family appears to be cooperating. Schubart: "There is communication with them." The group from the farm is no longer together, explains the spokeswoman, son Jan, for example, is housed somewhere else. Reportedly they are good at writing and reading and have had some form of education, it sounds in the corridors of the police station. However, the family would never have gone to the dentist or doctor, it is said.

Deputy police chief Janny Knol said on Dutch TV that the people were found in an enclosed space, containing a number of smaller 'rooms'. According to her, there have only been a few conversations with the children, but they knew "well that there was an outside world". Whether the children have been 'brainwashed' is being investigated by psychologists. "It is clear that they do not naturally exhibit the same behaviour as you and I do. What that means must become clear."

The police do not confirm whether an DNA investigation has been carried out. The young adults claim to be a family. "This is being investigated, but we can't confirm it yet," says the police spokeswoman. Nor does the police want to say anything about the father's medical condition. He is said to have had a stroke a few years ago, but he can be interrogated. It is not yet clear whether the man will cooperate in the investigation.

BBM

 

[ZaZara]

Het laatste nieuws uit Nederland leest u op Telegraaf.nl

Three children fled ghost family in 2011

The brothers and sisters of Gerrit Jan, the father of the family from Ruinerwold, have stated in a letter that three of the husband's children had fled the family eight years ago.

The three of them then contacted their father's family, who were unaware that Gerrit Jan had already had more than three children. The family expressly stated that they had not been aware of where he lived. "Mr. G.J. van D. severed all ties with his immediate family in the eighties of the last century. He urged us not to make any effort to trace his whereabouts."

Van D.'s mother died in 2017. At the time, notaries were unable to trace the man's whereabouts. Van D.'s father is still alive, but is suffering from dementia and lives in a closed institution. "The family has learned of the events in Ruinerwold with consternation. (...) We will give the regional police all the information they need to clarify the background to this tragedy."

Why the three of them no longer wanted to have anything to do with the family has not been made public. It is unclear where these children are now. On Thursday, RTL Boulevard announced that in addition to the three children who had escaped, a fourth also left the family. It would be a 40-year-old man who left in the eighties.

The father was arrested on Thursday. He is suspected of complicity in unlawful deprivation of liberty, ill-treatment in the sense of damaging the health of others and money laundering. Earlier, Josef B., the tenant of the property, was also arrested. The Public Prosecutor's Office (OM) suspects him of the same thing as the father. 58-year-old B. has now been brought before the examining magistrate and will remain in custody for at least the next two weeks.


BBM

 

[Bodhi]

Thank you for sharing the reports published in the Netherlands, ZaZara!

 

[jamjim]

Dutch father held as police unpick farm 'sect'

 

[ZaZara]

Thank you for sharing the reports published in the Netherlands, ZaZara!

Hi Bodhi, there is too much news about this family, reporters interview everyone and their old grandma who ever knew them however slightly in the past.
The reason WHY remains unclear. The man named Joseph and the father are in custody of suspicion of unlawful deprivation of liberty, ill-treatment in the sense of damaging the health of others and money laundering.
I wonder how much of this will hold in court, if the case ever gets that far. The son named Jan was able to walk away when he did, and he had been back on social media for months. I suspect the father did not trust banks and kept his savings at home. Next, they will charge him with tax evasion, for the sake of charging him with something.
I really wonder what the fascination is.

In the West of the Netherlands, the cities, non-rural areas, there are many children who live secluded in their homes, the mothers hardly ever go out, or all wrapped in black, the children are taken to places where spiritual leaders tell them to reject Western society and so on.

No one blinks an eye. Yet MSM might fill their pages on a daily basis with these cases.

Apparently, some of the children were not registered at birth when they should have been. But is this the kind of crime that would warrant worldwide attention?

 

[Amonet]

Hi Bodhi, there is too much news about this family, reporters interview everyone and their old grandma who ever knew them however slightly in the past.
The reason WHY remains unclear. The man named Joseph and the father are in custody of suspicion of unlawful deprivation of liberty, ill-treatment in the sense of damaging the health of others and money laundering.
I wonder how much of this will hold in court, if the case ever gets that far. The son named Jan was able to walk away when he did, and he had been back on social media for months. I suspect the father did not trust banks and kept his savings at home. Next, they will charge him with tax evasion, for the sake of charging him with something.
I really wonder what the fascination is.

In the West of the Netherlands, the cities, non-rural areas, there are many children who live secluded in their homes, the mothers hardly ever go out, or all wrapped in black, the children are taken to places where spiritual leaders tell them to reject Western society and so on.

No one blinks an eye. Yet MSM might fill their pages on a daily basis with these cases.

Apparently, some of the children were not registered at birth when they should have been. But is this the kind of crime that would warrant worldwide attention?

One of the BBC articles said that Jan had gone to the pub and had five beers, and then he told the barman/publican that the family needed health attention (paraphrasing).

Would it make a difference if the siblings had had health issues that weren't treated? It's reminding me of the case in California with the 13 children, and one of them had a social media account, but the siblings were definitely victims of abuse.

 

[ZaZara]

One of the BBC articles said that Jan had gone to the pub and had five beers, and then he told the barman/publican that the family needed health attention (paraphrasing).

Would it make a difference if the siblings had had health issues that weren't treated? It's reminding me of the case in California with the 13 children, and one of them had a social media account, but the siblings were definitely victims of abuse.

That was an awful case in California. I am not sure that these children (young adults already) in Ruinerwold were in bad health. It was first said that the father was ill due to a stroke, but no actual hospitalization was mentioned and it did not stop Dutch LE from arresting him later on.
The children have not been admitted to a hospital either, they are staying in a holiday park. They were not locked up at the farm, they came outside in the garden and the vegetable garden. They all know how to read and write, and son Jan - who started to walk away months ago and went looking for a job (!) - writes in near-perfect English too. On SM he is very aware of climate change, and busy with nature and trees.

Not your usual locked-up person IMHO.

I will try to find the time to translate some more, but at the same time the hype irks me and I wonder how much will turn out to be a real crime at the end of the day.

 

[Bodhi]

It sounds alarming to me. And so extreme that I understand why people are curious. I am.

Jan is 25 and the oldest of the siblings at the farm, meaning they were all children when the confinement began in 2010. Children are below the age of consent so their confinement as children may not be kidnapping/false imprisonment. But it was child abuse. Some early reports mention some siblings having difficulty speaking. Jan told the bartender about health issues. There are likely other medical, developmental or psychological effects from the confinement.

The confinement continued for each sibling after he/she became an adult. The only way onto the property--the bridge--was monitored by Josef B with binoculars and by video. Their living quarters were hidden inside the house. The entrance to it was behind or under a cupboard. They were reportedly locked in. The father consented to this, apparently, but at least one of the young adult children did not. If they'd all consented, the entrance would not have been locked from the outside and the bridge would not have to be monitored.

The number of people hidden away, the large amount of cash on hand, and the cult/sect history make this an unusual story. It's why it interests me.

 

[ZaZara]

Het laatste nieuws uit Nederland leest u op Telegraaf.nl

"My wife is dead, don't ask for her.

Hasselt - The wife of Gerrit Jan van D. from the Ruinerwold ghost farm, also appears to have led a bizarre life.

The former neighbours of the woman in Hasselt tell the Austrian media that she tried to live as inconspicuously as possible with her family of nine children. When she walked down the street, it was always with her head deeply bent. She hardly ever spoke in public, probably because she was not allowed to, writes the Kronen Zeitung.

Around 2004 she died of cancer. To the astonishment of the neighbourhood, there was a note on the front door saying: 'my wife has died, don't ask for her'. Until that day, the neighbourhood had no idea that she was ill. "We never saw a doctor at the door either. From one day to the next she was dead and gone. That's crazy, isn't it?"

The former neighbour Sandra Van de Kamp Soer from Hasselt spoke earlier with De Telegraaf. She said that the children played inside and hardly ever went out on the streets. "They were very much on their own. Nobody came there."

The family left on Sundays, probably to the church. "It seemed to me to be a bit of a cult. He had a long Jesus beard. The children also had long hair, you could hardly see who the boys or the girls were."

"No doctor was involved in the birth of the children. Apparently he took care of it all by himself."


BBM

 

[ZaZara]

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The farm in Ruinerwold: what do we know and who is who?

After the discovery of a family in a farm in Ruinerwold, Drenthe, last Monday, an infinite stream of new facts, stories and rumours comes out. What is true? And who is who? A summary, based on the most important protagonists in this bizarre case.


Josef B. A 58-year-old carpenter. Worked with furniture and yachts. Was known to fellow entrepreneurs as an absolute craftsman. Grew up with four siblings on a farm in Waldhausen im Strudengau, some 150 kilometres west of Vienna. Moved several times, moved in with an aunt and came into contact with the Moon sect. He had two daughters (twins) with an Asian woman whom he met in the cult. The couple came into contact with Gerrit-Jan van D. and his wife through the cult. Josef regularly went to the Netherlands from the end of the 1990s on and lived there in various places. In 2010 he had himself deregistered in Austria and settled down in the farm on the Buitenhuizerweg in Ruinerwold.


There he lived and was busy working on projects. Neighbours thought he was staying there on his own. On Monday, however, the police discovered a father and five children in the farm. A sixth child had made contact with the outside world and ended up with the police. Josef B. refused to cooperate with the investigation and was arrested. Meanwhile the authorities suspect him of having held the family, or at least the children, against their will. The examining magistrate decided yesterday that Joseph should remain in custody for another 14 days.

Gerrit-Jan van D. : The father of the family that was found on Monday in Ruinerwold. 67 years old. According to the first reports that came out after the discovery, he was in bed as a result of a stroke that he would have had a few years ago. After a few days of investigation he was identified as a suspect. The Ministry of Justice suspects him of having been complicit in the same facts as Josef, and also put money laundering on the list of suspicions against Gerrit-Jan.

Has a very turbulent history. Born in 1952 in Herxen, the province of Overijssel. In the 1980s he and his brother Derk joined the then controversial Moon sect, a movement that is now called the Verenigingskerk. The brothers do this against the will of their parents. Gerrit-Jan becomes involved with the Dutch part of the sect, and attends meetings of the religious movement in Germany, more specifically in Munich. There or later in Austria he would have met his later wife. There are signs that he attributed supernatural powers to himself at that time.

In the meantime, he broke off all contact with his family, including Derk. He had at least nine children in total. Over the years he practised many professions, including running a small shop in Zwartsluis. His wife dies in 2004, when the family lives in Hasselt in Overijssel.

Disappeared from the face of the earth in 2010. When his mother dies in 2017, his family tries to find him, but he turns out to be untraceable, to the great sorrow of his father, a well-known regional author. Former villagers think he is long dead. Until he is found this week in the farm in Drenthe.

The Ruinerwold children: The farm in Ruinerwold is home to six of Gerrit-Jan's children, all of whom are now adults. They are four girls and two boys, between 18 and 25 years old. The children are currently cared for at a recreation park. The eldest son got the ball rolling in recent weeks. According to the information of the owner and visitors of the village pub De Kastelein, he goes out on foot a number of times, and ends up in the pub. There he tells his story piece by piece. Strikingly enough, this Jan (25) is very active on social media this year. He twitters about climate change. On LinkedIn he explains his plans in almost perfect English for the companies of Josef B., for which he says he works.

Very little is known about the other children. They grew up in the towns of Hasselt and Zwartsluis in the province of Overijssel. A former neighbour from Hasselt says that the children were born at home there, without the help of a midwife. They play a lot outside, in the backyard. As far as we know, they don't go to school. It is possible that the children receive home schooling. The school attendance officer visited once, reported the mayor of the municipality of Zwartewaterland yesterday, but didn't discover anything that was not right. Their mother dies in the same house in Hasselt, in 2004.

At this moment it looks like the children left with father Gerrit-Jan for Ruinerwold in 2010. The police have found indications that they did not stay there voluntarily. Police chief Janny Knol said yesterday in on Dutch TV that the children were getting outside, but only in the garden around the farm. Inside, they were in 'one enclosed space, which in turn was divided into small compartments'. According to Knol there was enough room for six people.

The other children: Yesterday it turned out that Gerrit-Jan has at least three other children. At a certain moment they, two sons and a daughter, fled the parental home in Zwartsluis, where Gerrit-Jan had settled after his stay in Hasselt. The family revealed the existence of the other three children in a press statement yesterday. In Zwartsluis they reacted to the story with great amazement. In this village the three (runaway) children were the only ones of the family who were known. No one knew anything about the other six.

The three were known as very nice children, who also did sports and went to school. After the break with their parents, at least one of the sons tried to build his own life in the region. He married, and is now divorced. This week he informed his colleagues about his link with the family found in Ruinerwold in an emotional story.

Gerrit-Jan may have even more children. The family's statement states that the three runaway children sought contact eight years ago. They ended up with 'a brother from a previous marriage of their father', grandparents, uncles and aunts. Who that half-brother is and who Gerrit-Jan was married to before, is not known.

The farm in Ruinerwold: The building at Buitenhuizerweg in Ruinerwold has undergone a major transformation in the nine years that Josef B. rented it. Outside, a huge vegetable garden has been laid out, with a number of covered areas. Wood is stored and a large fence has been placed around the garden. Also inside, B. was working hard, local residents and people who have spoken to him before know that he was doing a lot of work. In the building a sum of money was found this week, ranging from a few tens of thousands of euros to a ton. Josef B. was officially the tenant of the farm.

The farm is owned by the Ruinerwold couple Klaas and Alida Rooze, two prominent inhabitants of the village, actively involved in church and politics. Klaas is a prominent VVD politician. The couple has a lot of real estate in the region. Eight large farms stand out, including those on Buitenhuizerweg. A number of these buildings have a monumental status and have been beautifully renovated. The couple borrowed money from the National Restoration Fund for the renovations. The building at Buitenhuizerweg served as collateral for a loan. According to the owners, however, their involvement with this farm was limited.


BBM

 

[ZaZara]

Het laatste nieuws uit Nederland leest u op Telegraaf.nl

Colleague about Josef B.: 'They wanted to build their own Utopia'

The Austrian woodworker Josef B. wanted to isolate himself from the world, but achieved the opposite: he now is world news.
His closest colleague Jorit from Meppel knows him well. He certainly doesn't see B. as a cult leader, but as a man with different ideas. "They wanted to build their own Utopia there."

52-year-old Josef B. will be detained even longer. The Ministry of Justice suspects him of deprivation of liberty and denial of medical care. From his rented farm in Ruinerwold, the police took away this week a father and five adult children who were not registered anywhere.

Two weeks ago the printer Jorit from Meppel was still at B.'s studio. Both men have known each other for thirteen years, since they rented commercial space next to each other in a collective building. Both of them work eighty to one hundred hours a week. "Then you get to know each other intensively. He taught me how to make ends meet and built carts for me, for example."

Jorit is astonished by the image of the cult leader that rises this week of the bearded Austrian. "He is portrayed as a cult leader who held the family prisoner or oppressed them. Maybe they were imprisoned in some way", he thinks, "but not with the door locked." The 25-year-old son simply worked in Josef's large workshop, Jorit said. He thinks it was the other way around: that the father had power over Joseph. Still during the conversation, he seems to be right: the news comes in that the father has also been arrested.

Jorit admits that the residents of the farm had unusual ideas. The Austrian and the Dutch family had found each other in certain views on what society should look like. "Josef had been to America and saw how one company had the grain production in its hands. He thought that was wrong. The government shouldn't decide for the people what they ate or drank. Grain was genetically engineered to keep it fresh. He wouldn't eat that."

"He wanted to take care of his own food as well as his own water, because he thought there might be chemicals in it. He only drank bottled water. There may have been poison in the air as well, from industry. They believed that the government was controlled by a power that was behind it. He said: there is no point in voting. In the end of time he didn't believe as far as I know. But he did want to protect his world, so that he wouldn't need anyone. He wanted to make the farm self-supporting."

Years ago, Jorit came to the farm a few times, but actually only saw the father there. That is remarkable, Jorit says. But he doesn't think they were locked up. "I can imagine that they had the idea that the outside world did not have much good in store for them... And when you're raised this way from an early age, you start to think that way. Maybe they had the same idea about doctors and medical care as they had about manipulated grain and wanted to stay out of the system."

The farm grounds were still a wilderness when Jorit came to visit them. "Josef was busy with a water well, a vegetable garden and he had a wood stove. Everything inside was made of wood, all made by himself together with the people from that family. The father was already elderly."

He spoke little about personal matters with Josef. He did tell us that he had left Austria after an argument with his family. His wife and two children still lived in his native country. "He was no longer interested in women, he did not want any hassle."

They hadn't paid Josef for jobs. "Josef's appearance went against him, he looked like a biblical figure with a large bunch of hair and a thick beard. When you saw him at first sight, you thought: what a weirdo. People shunned him. It was indeed difficult to get in touch with him, you had to know him. But he had seen a lot of the world. He believed in God, but never tried to convince me. He didn't go to church, he believed in his own way. I didn't get the feeling they were looking up to him either. They worked more together, like a big family."


BBM

 

[ZaZara]

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Public Prosecutor: We cannot confirm the death of the mother of the ghost family in Ruinerwold.

The Public Prosecutor's Office has no idea where the mother of the ghost family from Ruinerwold is, a spokesman tells broadcast Hart van Nederland. According to the family, the woman died in 2004, but this was never reported to the authorities.

"As it looks now, the mother died in 2004, but we cannot confirm that," the Public Prosecutor's Office says.

The police also inform Hart van Nederland that they have no idea. Before the family moved into the farm in Ruinerwold, they lived in different places. During the time that the family lived in Hasselt, the mother would have died.


BBM

 

[Filly]

tYou just can't make this stuff up! I'd have had a six pack of beer if I was that "escaped" guy.

Special thanks ZaZara for all the information. At first I thought "Preppers" then saw the Moon sect. Light, and healing to all involved. Ya never know. Ya just don't.

 

[ZaZara]

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Ruinerwold-father Gerrit Jan van D. 'emigrated' in April 2009.

Gerrit Jan van D., the father of the family found at Ruinerwold, disappeared from the radar in the Netherlands on 27 April 2009. He deregistered from the municipal personal records database and reported that he had 'emigrated'.


The police try to speak with the young people with the help of psychologists. They do not have any serious conditions, a doctor has found. They are heard to find out to what extent they were voluntarily in the farm or whether there was any form of coercion. Initially this happened on a bungalow park between Ruinen and Pesse, but now they have been moved elsewhere. Jan has been moved to another location.

Although Van D. had had a stroke a few years ago, according to the police he still seemed to have a lot of authority over the young adults. The two men are currently not suspected of sexual abuse. Both men are suspected of money laundering tens of thousands of euros in cash, which was also in the farm.

Five years before he 'emigrated', Van D. opened a toy shop in a building in Zwartsluis, which he rented together with B.. On the shop's website, which has not been updated since 2010 and is no longer active, there were texts about living in communes, in harmony with nature and about building houses out of straw.


BBM

The toy shop must have been a delight. Almost all toys were made of wood. Items (like the little rocking chair) can still be seen in the upper windows. No one has rented the place since the family left suddenly. I read somewhere that the rent was still being paid.

So far, the only remaining mystery that I see is the disappearance of the mother. She would have died, but apparently her death was not registered. This registration is obligatory for the official permission to bury or cremate someone. Without it, no undertaker will arrange the burial. Was she buried illegally somewhere on a plot of land? Did she die at all?

 

[beatrixpotter]

When I first read an article about this it portrayed the children as locked in a basement unaware that anyone else in the world existed. I'm not sure if it's translation or just horrible sensationalistic reporting. But at this point I'm taking it all with a grain of salt. The oldest had a FB account and was easily able to go to a pub for beer. And now none of the kids have any serious psychological problems according to psychologists? These things just totally contradict each other.