May 26, 2019, 12:25 PM
English translation (very rough)
[Sorry for the random title capitalisation, the text box was being weird.]
Translation of article below, see Wikipedia link for what "Reichsbürger" are.
"Reichsbürger" lived in a hole in the ground with two children
In the area of Lichtenfels, police has arrested a "Reichsbürger".
They had been searching for the 50-year-old for a while. Now he was tracked down in a hole in the ground.
He had apparently been living there with his two minor children for months.
One believes one can discern a kind of screen. There are definitely technical devices, various systematically sorted dishes, also a thermos bottle, water canister and plastic box, additionally towels, boots, various clothes. All of this was underground until this Saturday, in a kind of dwelling in the earth in a quarry in the Lichtenfels region.
A "Reichsbürger" who was being searched for with a warrant had apparently been hiding from police there for months. And not only that. His two minor children must have spent their time in the dungeonlike hole as well. The hatch-like opening to the chute was almost completely covered with earth. After half a year of searching, police managed to arrest the man six days ago. They went public with this only this Friday.
Police assume that the man, who had been looked for since November 2018, had built the dwelling himself. It was hidden "very, very well", says Anne Höfer, speaker of the police district Upper Franconia. Police don't want to reveal in which quarry in the Lichtenfels area they arrested the man.
There were minor children involved, so restraint is being asked for, says Höfer. Both children, that much one could say, are well and have meanwhile been given into the care of Youth Protective Services. As for why they waited this long to go public, police name "organisatory reasons". They say that there were more pressing events in Upper Frankonia.
The search for the 50-year-old "Reichsbürger" was complicated. After putting out an enforcement arrest warrant [translation note: those are put out when someone doesn't surrender for a prison sentence, or when they don't pay a court fine] - for now, police doesn't reveal the reasons for it - investigators could no longer find the man at home. They merely succeeded in determining that he had left his family environment with his children. The investigators could not dismiss the possiblity that he might be abroad with the children.
Only at the beginning of May did the investigators find a trail. There were indications that the missing persons could be in a quarry. This could be confirmed, even though the hole was hard to find. Only a small opening at the surface pointed to there being something below ground that went beyond a quarry shaft. And indeed, investigators fould a provisorial dwelling for three persons.
Police struck at dusk, with help of the police helicopter unit; the 50-year-old did not resist. His dwelling has already been cleared in the past days and has already been filled with soil again. The arrested person has so far not given any information to police. So there may well remain questions open about the details of this case for now.
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