Two leaders of Chile cult infamous for torture and child sex arrested, another convicted of child sex abuse wanted by Interpol

BBC News   -   May 24, 2011

Colonia Dignidad cult suspects arrested in Chile

Police in Chile have arrested two suspected members of the secretive sect, Colonia Dignidad.

Rebeca Schaefer and Peter Schmidt are accused of kidnapping, manslaughter and membership of an illicit organisation.

They handed themselves in after a judge ordered their arrest on Monday along with five others.

The judge issued a warrant for the arrest of Hartmut Hopp, the deputy leader of Colonia Dignidad who is thought to have fled to Germany.

Ms Schaefer is the adopted daughter of the former cult leader and Nazi sympathiser, Paul Schaefer, who died in prison in April 2010.

He was serving a 20-year term for sexually abusing children at Colonia Dignidad.

The Baptist preacher founded the commune in 1961 in a remote area about 390km (245 miles) south of the capital Santiago.House arrest

Ms Schaefer and her husband Peter Schmidt were detained after travelling to a police station together.

The justice ministry told the BBC that Chile had filed an international warrant via Interpol for the arrest of Hartmut Hopp.

Hopp, 66, disappeared last Friday while on bail awaiting trial.

"We are aware of press reports that he may have fled to his native Germany," justice ministry spokesman, Hector Cruzac, said.

The Chilean authorities are currently investigating how the German national managed to flee from house arrest.

Hopp, who is a medical doctor by profession, was convicted by a court last year of child sex abuse.

However, the authorities had not yet jailed him as they wanted to put him on trial on additional charges, including membership of a banned organisation.

The fugitive's daughter-in-law, Baerbel Schreiber, told a Chilean investigative website that he had arrived in Germany several days ago and was still there.

Colonia Dignidad served as a torture centre during the military rule of Gen Augusto Pinochet.

The colony was taken over by the Chilean government in 2005.

A subsequent investigation showed how it operated as a state within a state, with children forced to live separately from their parents.


This article was found at:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-13535187

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Sydney Morning Herald - July 12, 2008


Paul Schaefer, the founder of the notorious former German religious commune Colonia Dignidad in Chile, has been sentenced to three years and a day in prison for torturing children.

The sentencing is the latest in a series of cases that have condemned Schaefer to at least 30 years in Jail in 25 cases of sexual abuse of minors and violations of legislation over the possession of firearms.

The victims in the current case were eight children who were given psychotropic medication and electroshock therapy from 1970 to 1980 in the settlement hospital, the court said in Santiago.

Moreover, the children were separated from their parents and prevented from developing a normal sexuality through the use of physical violence, the court added.

A former corporal in Adolf Hitler's army, Schaefer started the commune in southeastern Chile with other German emigrants. While preaching rigid morality, he sexually abused children and teenagers at the sealed-off complex, authorities have said.

Schaefer, 86, also faces charges of human rights abuses.

Prosecutors allege that the dreaded secret police of former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, who ruled from 1973 to 1990, killed and tortured political opponents at Colonia Dignidad and that Schaefer took part.

In the 1950s, Schaefer was under investigation by German authorities over an alleged sexual abuse of German minors. In the early 1960s he convinced hundreds of Germans to emigrate to Chile, founding his commune near Parral in southern Chile.

Hundreds of people lived there, in complete isolation from the outside world and unallowed to leave the commune.

In Colonia Dignidad, children were taken from their parents.

Marriages and relationships between the settlers were forbidden, and many former residents have only recently dared to speak of their experience.

In addition to electric fencing and camera surveillance, the commune procured weapons to protect their compound. Schaefer disappeared in 1997 as investigations began, but was arrested in Argentina in 2005 and extradited to Chile.

The settlement lost its legal status and tax-free privileges after Pinochet fell, and renamed itself "Villa Baviera."

This article was found at:

http://news.smh.com.au/world/commune-head-sentenced-for-child-torture-20080712-3dx1.html