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Agence France-Presse

Dutch police found a father and six adult children hidden in the basement of a remote farmhouse where they had reportedly spent years “waiting for the end of time”, officials said Tuesday.
They discovered a man, believed to be the father of the family, and his children aged between 18 and 25 near the village of Ruinerwold in the northern province of Drenthe.
Local media said that the family was found after one of the sons went to a nearby pub in a confused state, drank five beers and then asked for help, saying he had not been outside for nine years.
Police arrested a 58-year-old man at the scene for failing to cooperate with the investigation, but he was not the father.


“I have never come across anything like this before,” local mayor Roger de Groot told a news conference.
“Police investigated after receiving a tip-off from somebody who was concerned about the people’s living conditions” and discovered the adults, de Groot said.
“They lived an isolated lifestyle,” he said, adding that they had been living on the homestead for the past nine years and several of the children “had not been taken up in the birthing register” or officially registrated.
Many questions remain unanswered and police are investigating “all scenarios”, the mayor added.
The family, meanwhile, was taken to a nearby holiday park while the investigation continued, according to reports.
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Local news station RTV Drenthe, which first reported the story, said that the family “have been living in a basement for years, waiting for the ‘end of times’.” Some of those freed “had no idea that other people existed”, the station added.
Police were alerted after a man of around 25, believed to be the family’s oldest son, walked into a village bar on Sunday evening. The dishevelled man, unwashed and wearing old clothes, said “he has not been ‘outside’ for the past nine years”, bar owner Chris Westerbeek told RTV Drenthe.
“He said he’d never been to school and seemed very confused. He spoke in a childish way,” Westerbeek said.
The man told Westerbeek he ran away from home and urgently needed help, “so I phoned the police”.

Upon investigation police discovered a hidden staircase behind a cupboard leading to a cellar where a man, said to be the father, and five others, believed to be his children, were hiding.
Aerial photos showed a remote farmhouse surrounded by fields.
The family had no contact with the outside world and were completely self-reliant with a vegetable garden and a goat, RTV Drenthe said.
“The father had a stroke a few years ago and was lying in bed. There was no sign of his wife,” RTV Drenthe reported.
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Neighbours told the station they did not know the family and they only knew one man to be living on the premises.
Police declined to give further details when contacted.
“All scenarios are being investigated. At this point we cannot give further information,” local police said on Twitter.


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The Netherlands

Dutch family found hiding in cellar where they spent years ‘waiting for the end of time’

The remote farm where a family spent years locked away in a cellar, according to Dutch media reports, in Ruinerwold, the Netherlands, on Tuesday. Photo: Reuters

A general view of a remote farm where a family spent years locked away in a cellar, according to Dutch broadcasters' reports, in Ruinerwold, Netherlands October 15, 2019. REUTERS/Piroschka van de Wouw

Chinese girl grows up in secret cellar as poor family hides illegal expansion to tiny home

A cupboard in small bicycle garage reveals door to hidden underworld undiscovered for a decade until a tip-off to housing authorities

--CELLAR-- A family of four - a couple, their 18-year-old daughter and 70+-year-old father - have been found living in a 3-metre-deep self-dug cellar under a small garage space among a street of dilapidated houses in Suzhou, Jiangsu province. They have apparently been living there for eight years. The case is a reflection of the housing difficulties of low/no-income families in urban areas amid high property prices and a lack of public shelters. Photo: news.sina.com.cn

A family of four in eastern China expanded their tiny home in a bicycle garage by digging a 3-metre-deep cellar underneath it, to create an underground bedroom for a mother and her daughter. Photo: Sina.com.cn

Street preacher gets 27 years for chaining up mentally disabled people in ‘basement of horrors’

Eddie Wright, one of three people charged following the discovery of four malnourished mentally-disabled adults chained to a boiler in a locked basement in Philadelphia. Photo: AP

This combination of images provided by the Philadelphia Police Department in Pennsylvania on October 19, 2011 shows L-R: Linda Westen, 50, Eddie Wright, 51, and Gregory Thomas, 48. The three were charged on October 16 with kidnapping, aggravated assault, false imprisonment and other charges after four mentally handicapped adults were found in a filthy Philadelphia basement. = RESTRICTED TO EDITORIAL USE - MANDATORY CREDIT "AFP PHOTO / Philadelphia Police Department" - NO MARKETING NO ADVERTISING CAMPAIGNS - DISTRIBUTED AS A SERVICE TO CLIENTS =

Mentally ill woman and her daughter 'lived in slavery' in Ohio basement

L-R: Jessica Hunt, 31, Jordie Callahan, 26, and Daniel Brown, 33, were arrested in Ohio on human trafficking charges after prosecutors said a mentally disabled woman and her daughter were held by the there and forced to live in an basement with snakes and pitbulls. Photo: AFP

Man secretly digs out two-storey cellar under Beijing street

The illegal basement carved out under the street. Photo: Thepaper.cn

A Beijing resident's secret two-storey 1,300 sq ft basement has been discovered after workers started demolishing illegal constructions in Xicheng district. To ensure safety, workers have now filled the underground space - dug out over a period of five years - with cement. 07MAY18. Source: The Paper

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Father and six adult children aged 18 to 25 lived on remote farm and had no contact with outside world
Family was discovered after oldest son wandered into local pub, drank five beers and asked for help



Father and six adult children aged 18 to 25 lived for years on remote farm and had no contact with outside world.


Crime