ritual abuse – the Wewelsburg, Paderborn (Germany)

translated transcript from a part of the German documentation "Höllenleben – Ritueller Missbrauch in Deutschland/hell of a life – ritual abuse in Germany" by Liz Wieskerstrauch, 2001

- Starts at 57:34
  https://youtu.be/-PRPwAbY-Fc?t=3454
– victim always talks about herself in plural and has many different names because of her multiple personalities. For reading simplification I call her [VICTIM] in this transcript.


CAR SCENE 57:34 - 58:39

[OFF-VOICE]
On the way to Wewelsburg, a tourist attraction near to Paderborn. Gina [VICTIM] and others suspect that sacrificing cults take place there.

[THERAPIST]
What kind of feeling do you have approaching the Wewelsburg?

[VICTIM]
on one hand we are a little frightend and on the other hand it's to deal with that what has been there … maybe has been there.

[THERAPIST]
So you're not sure by now?

[VICTIM]
No.

[THERAPIST]
What would be the worst?

[VICTIM]
That something happened there, ehm, what some of us (her personalities) are telling and saying and that, yeah maybe, it will become visible again, like a movie …

[THERAPIST]
To experience it again?

[VICTIM]
Experiencing again (nodding). With all the pain.



58:40 - 58:50
painting by the victim showing a castle with the devil standing in front of it and a blindfolded woman with a candle and an upside down cross. The image fades into the Wewelsburg today. dramatic music.


58:51 - 1:01:44

[OFF-VOICE]
The medieval Wewelsburg, today a youth hostel, has been a cult place for the SS during the third empire. Here we experience Tony [VICTIM] for the first time, a youngster who seldomly comes forward.

[VICTIM]
That is the way!

[THERAPIST]
This everything here?

[VICTIM]
It has been here (nodding).

[OFF-VOICE]
Tony heavily reacts to this place. He has speaking dificulties and suffers from asthmatic attacks.

[VICTIM]
(pointing to a path in the woods) and this is where we came up here!

[THERAPIST]
This way you came up?

[VICTIM]
(coughing) Yeah. (coughing)

[THERAPIST]
Are you sure?

[VICTIM]
We are totally sure (asthmatic attack).

[OFF-VOICE]
Tony unerringly leads us to one of the cult rooms. First into the so called crypt. The dead of the SS were  honoured in here.

[VICTIM]
(coughing and showing the centre of this site) Here we have been standing in the middle for example and they stood around us.

[THERAPIST]
Here?

[VICTIM]
Yeah.

[THERAPIST]
And what happened then?

[VICTIM]
Then they gave us an injection and then we saw some animals (has a hard time breathing)

[THERAPIST]
Which probably weren't real –

[VICTIM]
Which weren't real, yes.

[THERAPIST]
– but a hallucination from the injection.

[VICTIM]
Yeah. And then we went to another room.

[THERAPIST]
So no abuse happened here?

[VICTIM]
No, the just the preparation.

[THERAPIST]
That happened here?

[VICTIM]
Yes, that happened here.

[THERAPIST]
Has the echo in this room been the same back then?

[VICTIM]
Yes. It's just that they had sheets in here, black sheets with symbols.

[THERAPIST]
What kind of symbols?

[VICTIM]
An upside down cross and tripple six.

[THERAPIST]
Do you know how old you were when you were here, the body?

[VICTIM]
(shakes her head) We have a lot of problems with that.

[THERAPIST]
For how long have you been to such rooms?

[VICTIM]
We don't know but it always appeared to us as very long.

[THERAPIST]
Would you like to look at this room for any longer or should we be leaving instead?

[VICTIM]
Better leave. There must be another room where there are pillars … there it has …

[THERAPIST]
Can you take it any longer?

[VICTIM]
Yes.

Camera shows the top of the tower hall with the swastica in it.

1:01:45 - 1:12:12
We see some images of the castle from outside.

[OFF-VOICE]
Only since 1982 the tower and the two ritual rooms builded by the Nazis has been giving public access. Hints to rituals still taking place today are rare and inofficial. After a break-in sheets and candles were found.

1:12:14 - 1:03:03
Interview with Wulff E. Brebeck, curator of Wewelsburg.

[WULFF E. BREBECK]
It has been between christmas and new years eve, in 1990 I believe. Ehm, they broke through the external door and through this grid.

[REPORTER]
Could you imagine, when the Wewlsburg wasn't accessable for the public in the eighties, –

[WULFF E. BREBECK]
The northern tower was closed, the castle wasn't.

[REPORTER]
The northern tower, alright, (could you imagine) that there were any backdoors to enter however?

[WULFF E. BREBECK]
You can't suspend it. There are some people who boast about having corrupted the porter. And that they would have got the key, … , ehm, with money … I don't think that money would have reached something. What I believe they missed back then was the kind of sensation these rooms produce. And that it would
have been a gesture of kindness to someone who would have liked to see it and then you would go like: I'll open it for them. This certainly happened. I would lie (facing the ground) to say that didn't happen.

1:03:04 - 1:03:44
[VICTIM]	 strolling around the castle, passing some children playing Ping Pong. She walks straight to a stairway like being pulled.

[VICTIM]
It's not possible here.

[OFF-VOICE]
Tony is searching for the hall with the pillars he recalls so exactly.

[VICTIM]	 (facing a grille, shaking head)

[THERAPIST]   Here you don't remember anything?

1:03:45 - 1:03:57
[OFF-VOICE]
It's more than 30 years ago. Her memory finally leads her to the Obergruppenführersaal (room for the highest leaders of the SS).

1:03:58 - 1:08:37

We see the 'Black Sun' on the floor.
[VICTIM]
This is where they tortured us. You can even see it (maybe refering to the Black Sun). Here they layed us down …

[THERAPIST]
Here, on the ground or elsewhere?

[VICTIM]
Yes.

[THERAPIST]
And you're absoloutely sure that it's this room with the pillars?

[VICTIM]
Yes, one hundred percent.

[THERAPIST]
What happened back then?

[VICTIM]
They wanted to punish us because we didn't do something and so they layed us down there and he, Mango, has jumped on us and hurt us. And then (heavy breathing) there was Peter and (CENSORED) and they did it as well. And then they smeared us with blood and painted signs on our bodies.

[THERAPIST]
But this happened long ago. You know that, right?!

[VICTIM]
I know that. And then they brought a child in here, a baby. Then I was ought to kill it. And I didn't want to do it but I had to. (Coughing) And then they covered my mouth (heavy breathing and coughing) Then the baby was killed and the heart pulled out. Then everybody hummed and you had to eat the heart, piece by piece, because it gives you power.

[THERAPIST]
You won't forget that?

[VICTIM]
You can't forget this because the baby cries.

[THERAPIST]
Have you been here often?

[VICTIM]
(nodding)

[THERAPIST]
Often?

[VICTIM]
To this room we haven been often, yes (keeps nodding).

[THERAPIST]
Do other personalities recall something around here?

[VICTIM]
Yes. Susie for example.

[THERAPIST]
Is she telling you right now what she remembers?

[VICTIM]
Yes, with her baby …

[THERAPIST]
Her own child?

[VICTIM]
Yes, her own child.

[THERAPIST]
And Susie remembers this happened here?

[VICTIM]
Yes, that this happened here.

[THERAPIST]
That her child was born here?

[VICTIM]
Yes and got killed.

[THERAPIST]
Have you (Tony) have been here as well while this happened?

[VICTIM]
Yes, in the meantime. Because Susie had to kill her own child?!

[THERAPIST]
She had to kill her own baby?

[VICTIM]
(nodding) and then the ruler, rather Mango, took her and (breathing)

[THERAPIST]
… leaded her?

[VICTIM]
(nodding)

[THERAPIST]
with a knife?

[VICTIM]
(nodding) with a dagger.

[THERAPIST]
Do you think Mango is the ruler or are there two persons?

[VICTIM]
It is one and the same, but you never wittnessed him with his face.

[THERAPIST]
Why not?

[VICTIM]
Because he was always wearing that horned mask.

[THERAPIST]
A horned mask?

[VICTIM]
(nodding) where sometimes blood was dripping from the sides.


1:08:38 - 1:08:57
pictures painted by the victim in a mix-up with images from inside the cult room where the killing took place.

1:08:58 - 1:09:27
[VICTIM] is sitting on a blanket in a field flipping through some papers.


[OFF-VOICE]
The search for clues has exhausted Nicki [VICTIM]. She would like to finish this journey with a report to prosecution. Infinticied and abetment to infinticied are capital offense that never lapses. But Nicki isn't alone. Gina, Burkhard, Tony, Susie and all the others are scared that people won't believe them. They are affraid of sceptical questions by states officials and of their offenders and their revenge.

1:09:28 - 1:10:23
Interview with lawyer Heidi Saarmann in her office.

[HEIDI SAARMANN]
I think, if a woman would manage to go through judicial proceedings, this would have a snowball effect. We would have many proceedings of this kind. What I think is fundamental for victim wittnesses in general is that they have to face that in the end it's not about expiating – you can't do this anyhow, you can't make it unhappen – but it is about standing up and naming the wrong that has happened to oneself. And this is something that you can do even if it doesn't result in any conviction. But you can say: "I stood up for myself, I said it. I faced the whole procedure. It's not my responsibility what jurists will make of it." This is an attitude you could have … just saying verry classical "Stand up for your right!"

1:10:24  -
[VICTIM] and Attorney [HEIDI SAARMANN] walking towards a police building.

[OFF-VOICE]
Nicki did stand up, wants to fight for her right. All together with her attorney [HEIDI SAARMANN] she files charges. She's got an expertise with documents like criminal charges against her stepfather, the memories of her teacher and her foster mother and a diary about her own suffering – psychich and physical. More, she doesn't have. No proof for her pregnancy, for infinticied, for all the abuse. At this saturday morning, at 11 o'clock she takes the key step to break the circle of violence, syncope and anxiety.

We see her entering the office of a chief inspector. She sits down, the door closes.