Justice For Jeremiah - the case

 The case | Sequence of events | Key events after his death | An inadequate Investigation | Expert forensic evidence

Sequence of events at the time of Jerry's death

1. In January 2003, Jeremiah Duggan was a 22-year-old British student at the British Institute in Paris, full of zest for learning and enthusiasm for all Paris had to offer. He was popular with teachers and students alike. For over a year he had formed a close and loving relationship with a young Parisian music student and they shared many interests. He had worked very hard in order to go to Paris to study and had many plans and dreams for the future. Outside the British Institute he bought a newspaper and his whole life changed.
2. The time was the outset of the Iraq War. The political recruiter who sold Jeremiah the newspaper was an older man called Benoit Chalifoux. Jeremiah told his mother this very impressive man was teaching him about politics and about a wide range of subjects like Plato, poetry, history, and even Jewish history!
3. Jeremiah told his mother that once he had learnt more about politics, Chalifoux had promised him a job writing for their newspaper, called "Nouvelle Solidarité". This publication is connected to the French politician Jacques Cheminade and the political party Solidarité et Progres, which is also associated with a youth sect, This youth sect is headed by an American convicted fraudster called Lyndon LaRouche.
4. Chalifoux kept Jeremiah away from the young Parisian members of the sect while he was working on him. He confessed this to another member of the group, saying that as Jeremiah was Jewish he had to treat him very differently and educate him with their reconstruction of Jewish history and bring him in slowly. It is widely known that the LaRouche group likes to enlist Jewish members so that they can mask their anti-Semitic roots by displaying their Jewish members to the public.
5. Jeremiah decided to attend what was described as an anti-war conference to be held in Germany, organized by The Schiller Institute. A week before Jeremiah left the safety of his college life and friends to venture to Germany, he was particularly targeted by a specially trained LaRouche recruiter called Jason Ross. This man had been flown in from the USA to use well-tried LaRouche techniques to help in the recruitment drive. The first step was to persuade the target to go to the conference and cadre school. In Jeremiah's case, he was persuaded to abandon his well-made plans to attend his father's 60th birthday party. He was told that the future safety of the world is more important than family celebrations.
6. A study of the group's literature shows the use of sophisticated techniques known to stir up feelings of guilt and terror and, as Jeremiah felt strongly that he had do all he could to stop the Iraq war, he was persuaded by Chalifoux to go to Germany to attend the anti-war conference.
7. Jeremiah told his mother: "I am going to find out more about how I can help solve the terrible problems in the world." Jeremiah did not realize that he was being targeted for recruitment by a political sect, hiding behind the benign name of "The Schiller Institute". This sect is headed by the convicted criminal Lyndon LaRouche and his wife Helga Zepp-LaRouche. For more than 30 years they have spread anti-British hatred and anti-Semitic conspiracy theories from their German headquarters in Wiesbaden and their American headquarters in Leesburg, Virginia to the rest of the world. They are documented by the [US] authorities as having a history of using intimidation, terror tactics and violence in their activities.
8. Witness statements document the use of emotional pressure and emotional bullying to force young people to join up. These statements were given by witnesses who attended the conference with Jeremiah. The technique of using emotional manipulation while the target is in a situation of isolation from close family and friends is well known as a method of subjugation used by sects.
9. Jeremiah was a highly intelligent and idealistic young man with a love of life. He left Paris for Germany full of anticipation of what he could learn. He told a fellow student he was looking forward to the conference to hear world-famous politicians and economists speak. He promised to tell this student friend all about it when he returned. He went away to protest against the war--and within a week he was dead.
10. Jeremiah's Parisian girlfriend saw him leave on the morning of the 21st March 2003 never dreaming that this would be the last time she would see him. She was very suspicious of Chalifoux at the time because he was not able to tell her where he was taking the group of about 10 young men. Eventually she persuaded Chalifoux to give her the name of three towns where the men may be staying. She had noticed in the last few weeks that Jeremiah had been more worried than usual about political affairs and all this seemed to be something to do with Chalifoux.
11. Jeremiah had no experience of politics and it was clear that he had no intention of going away to join a youth sect or to abandon his life for the sect. But as he went with the group of young recruits he seemed to his girlfriend somehow distant--"almost as if he was under a spell".
12. It is the firm conviction of Jeremiah's friends and relations that whatever destroyed him started in France and was completed in Germany.
13. The Night of Jeremiah's Death: 27 March 2003. Mrs Duggan received a telephone call from Jeremiah at 4.24 am (English time, 5.24am German time) , saying he was in terrible trouble. He sounded terrified. The line then went dead. Jeremiah immediately called back. He said that he was in deep trouble, that he wanted to escape from the LaRouche Organization which he called "Nouvelle Solidarité" and that he was terrified. He shouted to his mother "I want to see you NOW!". He said that he was in Wiesbaden and he was half-way through spelling the name of the town when the line went dead. Jeremiah's grandmother had picked up another extension and heard the conversation
14. Thereafter, Mrs Duggan rang Colindale police in London to report her concerns. She was given a telephone number for Scotland Yard. After telephoning that number Mrs Duggan was eventually transferred to an officer she understood to be a member of the Special Branch. This officer refused to disclose his name to Mrs Duggan and seemed more concerned as to how she had been put through to him, than with what was being reported.
15. He informed Mrs Duggan that even if he knew about the LaRouche Organization he would not tell her. Even when she told him that she thought that Jeremiah could be in danger from a terrorist organization, he refused to assist or to call Mrs Duggan back. Mrs Duggan immediately telephoned Maya, Jeremiah's girlfriend, in Paris. She said that she had also received a call from Jeremiah about one hour earlier. Maya reported to Mrs Duggan that Jeremiah had told her he was fearful that the people he was with wanted to do him harm or had already harmed him and that he was therefore intending to return to Paris that morning. Between Jeremiah's call to his girlfriend and Mrs Duggan’s call to Maya, someone called Sebastian (later discovered to be one Sebastian Drochon) had called Maya to say that Jeremiah had run away. Sebastian told Maya he was on his way to Berlin. Maya gave Mrs Duggan Sebastian's phone number.
16. Mrs Duggan immediately called this number but the phone was cut when Sebastian heard her speak. Mrs Duggan eventually got through to Sebastian again but he appeared not to want to speak to her and handed the phone to someone who identified herself as Frau Ortrun Cramer.
17. There was much shouting in the background during this call. Everything went quiet when Frau Cramer told everyone the mother was on the phone. Frau Cramer repeated three times that they were a news agency and they took no responsibility for the actions of their members. At this point, Mrs Duggan had not spoken about her concerns over Jeremiah's well-being. When Mrs Duggan told her about Jeremiah's telephone calls, Frau Cramer asked whether Jeremiah had any psychological problems. Mrs Duggan replied that the opposite was true and that he was enthusiastic about life. Frau Cramer then said that Jeremiah had run away and she would send Sebastian to report this to the police. She gave no further details to Mrs Duggan at that time.
18. Mrs Duggan made numerous telephone calls to the British Consulate in Germany who promised to call her back with news. She also repeatedly called Sebastian who hung up upon hearing her voice.
19. All the telephone calls referred to above are logged.
20. At 3.45pm (English time) on 27 March 2003, two police officers attended Mrs Duggan's house to tell her that Jeremiah had died at 6.10am (German time) that morning, on a road in Wiesbaden, where he had committed suicide.
21. Events of the days following Jeremiah's Death - On 28 March 2003, Mr and Mrs Duggan travelled to Wiesbaden. They met with Carole Schumann of the British Consulate and Inspector Schaecher of the German police. At that meeting, they were told that Jeremiah had jumped in front of a series of cars and committed suicide. Very little is known about how Jeremiah allegedly ran over 5 kilometres in under 35 minutes to reach the place where he allegedly crossed the road, which is 10 minutes from the headquarters of the LaRouche Organization's "Executive Intelligence Review".
22. Inspector Schaecher informed Mr and Mrs Duggan that The Schiller Institute, the venue for the LaRouche conference, was well respected, and that the people from the LaRouche Organization knew Jeremiah and had informed him that Jeremiah had been suffering from psychological problems and was a mental patient of the Tavistock Clinic in London.
23. In fact, Jeremiah did not have any psychological problems, although he had briefly attended family therapy at the Tavistock Clinic as a child with his sisters (some 15 years earlier) during his parents' divorce. Inspector Schaecher explained that he had been told that Jeremiah's girlfriend, Maya, had asked Sebastian if there was a river in Wiesbaden. The police took this to mean that Maya thought Jeremiah would commit suicide. In fact, Maya was merely trying to locate the town on a map, whilst she spoke to Sebastian on the telephone.
24. According to a witness statement, after Jeremiah's death a meeting was held at the offices of the EIR (Executive Intelligence Review). Helga Zepp-LaRouche and staff spoke to the group. She told them that Jeremiah had committed suicide and forbade them to talk to anyone, even to each other, about the matter. Others spoke about how Jeremiah was brainwashed by the Tavistock Clinic and was their enemy sent over from the UK to harm LaRouche.
25. At the meeting with the police Mr Duggan asked if there would be a post mortem. Inspector Schaecher said not, the death being a clear case of suicide. When the Duggans vehemently objected, saying,: "All you want to do is ship our son back to the UK, not carry out a full investigation and close your files' the Inspector answered in German to the Foreign Officer official: " people were coming all the time to Wiesbaden to kill themselves and it was always the same thing - the parents did not wish to accept that their children had committed suicide.". When this was translated and understood Mr Duggan said: "How many people jump in front of cars to commit suicide? I have never ever heard of one case of this method - our son rang us before he was killed and he was trying to stay alive, and we object to your not investigating this."  There was no medical examination by any doctor of Jeremiah's injuries. A doctor merely came to the side of the road and confirmed that Jeremiah was dead. No post mortem was carried out in Germany to help determine if this were in fact a suicide even though the doctor testing for signs of life had recommended one. Jeremiah's wallet, address book, and cigarette lighter were returned to Mrs Duggan by the German police. They were covered with blood as they had been removed from the body. Frau Cramer appeared to have been in possession of Jeremiah's passport, which was not with the body but strangely this too was stained with blood. The Duggan family has never received an explanation as to why Frau Cramer had the passport. No witness statements were made available from the driver of either of the cars that supposedly hit Jeremiah or from Sebastian Drochon. There is no indication in the German Prosecutor's files of any investigation into the background of the drivers [and checking up on their accounts].
26. The German police had arranged that, following the meeting, two top officials from The Schiller Institute would come to the police office to speak to Mr and Mrs Duggan. The German police had not asked for the people last with Jeremiah. In fact they had allowed these people to flee the country before the Duggan family arrived. Frau Cramer, the Manageress of The Schiller Institute, attended by her associate, the American-born Jonathan Tennenbaum (later ascertained to be a teacher of the youth wing of the LaRouche movement). When Erica Duggan said it was terrible that her son should die in this way and that it should be the street called "Berliner Strasse" where her own father had escaped Hitler's Germany, Frau Cramer said in response:, pointing at Herr Tennenbaum, "He is a Jew.". She pointed to Herr Tennenbaum as if this were some sort of explanation. Herr Tennenbaum then said that he remembered Jeremiah because during the conference, he had been very brave in identifying himself as a Jew during a discussion in which the Jews were being blamed for the conflict in Iraq. Herr Tennenbaum stated that Jeremiah had challenged the opinion held by other delegates that Jews were responsible for the conflict in Iraq and all the problems in the world. There seemed to be a lot of questioning by Frau Cramer about Jeremiah's connection to the Tavistock Clinic; however, at the time, the Duggans had no idea about the paranoid fantasies of the LaRouche Organization about this clinic and how it fed into their conspiracy theories about the British being the evil aggressor in the world.
27. Frau Cramer prevented the Duggans from trying to speak to Rainer Apel, the owner of the flat in Helgarten Street, Wiesbaden where Jeremiah had stayed during the conference. She said that Apel was not connected with the LaRouche Organization or its publication, Nouvelle Solidarité. In fact, Herr Apel is head of Intelligence and an editor on the LaRouche publication as well as a founder member of The Schiller institute, and works in their offices with Frau Cramer. Even when the Duggans went to the street to find the flat of Herr Apel, Frau Cramer said she had no idea where the flat was and prevented the contact. In addition to these falsehoods about Herr Apel's association with the LaRouche Organization, Frau Cramer deliberately misled the German police by suggesting Jeremiah had psychological problems and was being treated by the Tavistock Clinic, which was untrue.
28. The German police investigation very swiftly concluded that Jeremiah's death was a 'suicide by means of traffic accident'. The German Public Prosecution Office halted proceedings on the grounds that the drivers had stated that Jeremiah had jumped out at the cars, and that therefore there was no indication of any third party involvement.
29. There has been a continuing effort by the Duggan family to re-open police investigations in Germany. The German authorities have consistently refused these applications. On 7 February 2005, Mrs Duggan filed an application for the resumption of police investigations in Germany, arguing that there was factual evidence of third-party involvement in her son's death. That application was rejected by the German Public Prosecution Office on 22 March 2005. On 20 April 2005, Mrs Duggan filed an appeal against this decision. This appeal was rejected by the Public Prosecution Office of the Frankfurt Regional Court of Appeal on 15 August 2005. Thereafter, Mrs Duggan filed an application for enforcement with the Frankfurt Regional Court of Appeal on 25 August 2005, with the aim of having the Public Prosecution Office ordered to re-open investigations. The Court considered that no ruling was required on the admissibility of the application. Thereafter, Mrs Duggan filed a constitutional complaint with the Federal Constitutional Court on 1 October 2006 that the decision of the Regional Court of Appeal of 19 July 2006  be overruled on the grounds of violation of the German Basic Law. It is not known when this case will be heard.
30. The fact that the German police arrived so swiftly at a  conclusion of suicide by traffic accident precluded them from pursuing any further investigations or alternative lines of inquiry as to how Jeremiah died.
31. It is recorded in an internal email between officials (senders unidentified, as their names are redacted) at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office that German Public Prosecutor Biniok stated to a British Consular Official that the German authorities would comply with an official request from their English counterparts to re-open police investigations in Germany. Mrs Duggan obtained a copy of this email when she requested disclosure of files on her that were kept by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. To date, no such official request has been forthcoming from the British authorities.
32. The Duggan family appealed immediately on the 28th March 2003 to the German authorities, to the effect that they wanted a proper investigation. They were told that they had no input in the case, that the Prosecutor was to close the case in private, and that the family would not have access to the German police report unless they used a German lawyer.
33. From that time until the present, there has been a refusal of the authorities to answer the questions: Why did Jeremiah die? From where did Jeremiah make the last phone call of his life? What were the full circumstances surrounding this very suspicious death?