Two Cases for Investigation:

Something Rotten in the State of Hesse


RAISING case in Wiesbaden. Jeremiah Duggan's parents Hugo (4th from the left) and Erica Duggan (6th from left) with friends of Jeremiah and the former member of LaRouche organisation, Yves Messer (far right).

A NORTH London mother is in Germany this weekend and due to lay flowers by a roadside outside Wiesbaden, in memory of her son whose dead body was found there eight years ago on March 27, 2003.
For Erica Duggan it will be not just an act of sad commemoration, but an occasion of bitterness, reminding people of the suspicious circumstances in which her son Jeremiah died, and of what appears like a striking reluctance by the authorities to investigate.

Jeremiah Duggan, aged 22, had been studying at the Sorbonne in Paris when, troubled by the onset of the war on Iraq, he agreed to attend what appeared to be an anti-war conference in Wiesbaden, in the German state of Hesse. What he did not know was that the organisation hosting this gathering, the culturally respectable-sounding Schiller Institute, is part of an organisation led by Lyndon LaRouche, an American one-time leftist who became notorious as a right-wing cult leader. The Institute was founded by LaRouche's German partner Helga Zepp who declared "We need a movement that can finally free Germany from the control of the Versailles and Yalta treaties, thanks to which we have staggered from one catastrophe to another for an entire century."

When Jeremiah, hearing some people at the conference appear to blame the war on Jews, he protested that he was Jewish, and must have sensed some hostility. Nevertheless he agreed to stay on for a LaRouche youth movement cadre school. But then something else must have happened, because he then called his girlfiend, and his mother, in the early hours of the morning, saying he was in 'deep trouble' and sounding terrified, appealing to be rescued.

That same morning his body was found by the road, some distance outside Wiesbaden. The story accepted by the German police was that this young man had run out into the road, and been struck by two vehicles, supposedly as a "suicide".

Erica Duggan was not having it. She found out more about the LaRouche outfit and the way it operates. She hired investigators. They found that neither of the vehicles which had supposedly hit her son bore traces of his skin or clothing. They reported that the injuries sustained by Jeremiah were more like those from a good kicking than a road accident, or deliberate suicide. There was also some sand on his jeans that was not present where he was found. Had he been in a yard or on a building site, and his body then been brought out and dumped?

Why had the police in Hesse been in such a hurry to close the case, without even witness statements, and left it to the family to make this investigation? How come they seem content to accept the word of the LaRouchites, without looking further into this organisation?

For an organisation that pretends some kind of anti-imperialist credentials, and purports to be up against all sorts of conspiracies, the LaRouchites have been strangely reluctant to countenance an investigation into the death of a young man who came to their conference. They have preferred the "suicide" theory, offering in its support allegations about "drugs", family psychological problems, and finally, a supposed conspiracy involving the Duggan family with the British government.

They even came up with the explanation that Tony Blair and others had engineered a plot against them in an attempt to divert attention from the case of scientist Dr.David Kelly. Apart from the bizarre logic - Jeremiah Duggan died three months before Kelly, and why should one have to choose between investigating one death and the other? - it isn't the LaRouchites who have raised the Kelly case. The doctors who have are represented by human rights lawyer Frances Swaine - who is also acting for the Duggans in their case!

A British enquiry found that there was no evidence to suggest suicide and deemed that Jeremiah died in a state of terror. The Duggans finally obtained a fresh inquest in London last year, but this appears to have been adjourned indefinitely pending fresh evidence which the Metropolitan Police have yet to gather.

When supporters of the Justice for Jeremiah campaign visited Wiesbaden and held a meeting they found local citizens sympathetic, and anxious to know more about the LaRouche organisation and what it was up to in their area. But LaRouche, though his group in the USA gained a notoriety for violence. and he has served time for fraud, appears to have enjoyed some 'respectable' political connections in the 'States , and his European operations with Helga Zepp seem not short of funds.

On August 5, last year, Erica Duggan took the case to the European Court of Human Rights, accusing the German police of violating Article 2, because they failed to investigate her son's death sufficiently. She pointed out that no witness statements were taken, no medical examination of injuries, no post mortem, destruction of vital evidence, and a disregard for how someone in the LaRouche organisation had Jeremiah's bloodstained passport.

In a statement last week before setting off for Wiesbaden again, Erica Duggan said:
" Germany has consistently refused to properly investigate my son's death. †I have been treated in a most heartless manner. †I have asked for the Prosecutor to see me and so have my lawyers but not only does she refuse this but she has stated that she will not investigate and has never had the time to read the files. The case is still open with suspects named but they refuse to speak and the authorities continue to cover up the facts.”

For more information go to www.justiceforjeremiah.com and www.LaRouche-danger.com
Contact Erica Duggan on justiceforjeremiah@gmail.com.
Lawyers: UK>Frances Swaine Germany Serdar Kaya & Christian Noll ; Mail@kanzlei-kaya.de Mail@christian-noll.de

Also briefings in German and English go to

http://justiceforjeremiah.yolasite.com/resources/case_outline_german_final1.pdf

http://justiceforjeremiah.yolasite.com/background-long-version.php

For transcripts of the Court Hearings in the UK go to http://justiceforjeremiah.yolasite.com/legal-action-in-britain.php



Cameron warned against complicity

Medical professionals campaigning for a full inquest into the death of government weapons inspector Dr David Kelly have appealed to David Cameron to intervene on their behalf.

Dr.Kelly's body was found in woodland near his home at Abingdon, Oxfordshire,on July 18, 2003, - two days after he was questioned by the parliamentary foreign affairs select committee. The scientist had been exposed as the source for BBC reports questioning the Blair government's case for war in Iraq, saying it had "sexed up" intelligence on weapons of mass destruction.

No inquest was ever held into his death. The Blair government appointed a former top civil servant, Lord Hutton to chair an inquiry into the circumstances surrounding the death, as opposed to a full inquest in a coroner's court. The Hutton report cleared the government of wrongdoing, and also left the intelligence services unscathed, while the BBC was strongly criticised, leading to the resignation of the BBC's chairman and director-general..

The inquiry found that Dr Kelly had committed suicide and took the highly irregular step of ruling that all evidence relating to the death, including post-mortem findings, be suppressed for 70 years. But several medical experts found its "suicide" story unconvincing, even after the post mortem report was released in October last year. They say the supposed method, slashing an ulnar artery after taking pills, would not have been sufficient, and that not enough blood was found at the scene.

Attorney General Dominic Grieve is currently considering a dossier of evidence provided by the doctors, and expected to announce whether he will ask the High Court to order an inquest soon.

In an open letter to David Cameron released at the weekend the doctors warned that they would seek a judicial review if Mr Grieve decides no inquest is needed.Denouncing the Hutton report as a "whitewash" which "failed adequately to address the cause of death itself and the manner of death,"they point out Lord Hutton spent only half a day of his 24-day inquiry considering the cause of Kelly's death."No coroner in the land would have reached a suicide verdict on the evidence which Lord Hutton heard," they claim.

"The coroner is required to hear evidence which constitutes proof beyond reasonable doubt that the deceased killed himself, and that he intended to kill himself, before he may return a verdict of suicide."Lord Hutton did not hear evidence which came near to satisfying that test."

The doctors said Lord Hutton's findings had clearly been "unsafe" and warned the PM that if an inquest is denied "there is a real and grave risk that your government will be seen as continuing and being complicit in an enormous conspiracy to pervert the course of justice."

(See PM's Kelly Conspiracy Warning, by Paddy McGuffin, Morning Star, March 26

http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/index.php/news/content/view/full/102727