Family found at Dutch farm 'could have been held against their will' / VIDEO:Drenthe residents react after police discover family locked away for years...

Family found at Dutch farm 'could have been held against their will'

Police say family was in space that could be locked and may have been there nine years

Jon Henley Europe correspondent

 @jonhenley

Wed 16 Oct 2019 13.15 BSTLast modified on Wed 16 Oct 2019 15.54 BST

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/oct/16/family-found-at-dutch-farm-could-have-been-held-against-their-will

Dutch police are questioning an Austrian man after a family of six were found in a secret room at a remote farmhouse in the Netherlands where they are believed to have been living for nearly a decade.

The five adult siblings, said to be aged between 18 and 25, and an ailing older man they said was their father, were receiving medical treatment after police discovered them at the farm near the village of Ruinerwold, in the north-eastern province of Drenthe.

It was unclear whether the family was, as Dutch media reported, “waiting for the end of time”. Recent posts on social media by one of the children suggested they may instead have been held in the farmhouse against their will.

“We found six people in a small space in the house which could be locked, not a cellar. It is unclear if they were there voluntarily,” police said in a statement. “They may have been there for nine years. They say they are a family, a father and five children.”

The statement said none of the six people were registered with the local authorities. Their mother had apparently died before the family moved to the farm, said the local mayor, Roger de Groot, adding that he had “never seen anything like this”.

Officials would not confirm local media reports that the family was waiting for the end of days. “We understand everyone has lots of questions,” the police statement added. “So do we. We will investigate properly and carefully.”

A 58-year-old man who was renting the farm but was not the father of the children has been arrested, police confirmed, but they would not reveal his identity. Dutch media identified him as Joseph B, an Austrian odd-job man who had a small workshop on an industrial estate in the nearby town of Meppel.

The Austrian foreign ministry has confirmed an Austrian citizen from Vienna was being held in relation to the case, but said he did not want contact with officials. The ministry did not know the grounds for his arrest, it said.

One neighbour told the Telegraaf newspaper that the man, who was seen daily driving an old Volvo car, was “very sharp … You only needed to go near the place and he’d send you packing. He watched everything through binoculars”.

Dutch media said the oldest of the children, a 25-year-old named only as Jan, had a Facebook account and began posting updates in June for the first time in nine years. “Started a new job at Creconat,” De Telegraaf newspaper quoted it as saying.

The firm, affiliated to another company in Meppel, was raided by police on Monday and belonged to the Austrian man, the paper said. According to the Algemeen Dagblad newspaper, the son also wrote on LinkedIn that his parents had run a successful business until his mother died in 2004.

The group was discovered after Jan visited a local bar, the Kastelein cafe. On the first occasion, 10 days ago, he “ordered and drank five beers on his own”, the owner, Chris Westerbeek, told the local broadcaster RTV Drenthe.

When the man reappeared last Sunday, he “looked confused”, Westerbeek said. “He was unkempt, with long tangled hair. We got talking. He said he had run away and needed urgent help, and that he had never been to school. Then we called the police.”

RTV Drenthe said police had found a hidden staircase leading to the family’s hiding place behind a cupboard in the living room. The father was bedridden having suffered a stroke some years ago, it said.

Dutch media reported the family appeared to have had little or no contact with the outside world and lived a largely self-sufficient life, apparently growing their own vegetables and keeping a goat and geese.

The farmhouse’s owners, Klaas Rooze and Alida ten Oever, said the tenant had always paid his rent on time and they were flabbergasted by the news.

“We knew absolutely nothing of this,” Ten Oever said. “We rented the house for years to one man and now we learn someone was living there with children. We have no idea who it can be.”