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Jeremiah Duggan
We were shocked to learn of the death in disturbing circumstances in March 2003 of Jeremiah Joseph (Jerry) Duggan (Thornton A 1992-99) who had been living in Paris since 2001 as a student at both the Sorbonne and the British Institute, where he was doing a degree in English Literature. According to reports in the national press, he was opposed to the military action in Iraq and became involved with a group campaigning against it which, unknown to him, was an extreme right-wing organisation, said to have a history of intimidation and terror tactics. In March he travelled to Wiesbaden, Germany, for a conference of the group and realised its nature; in one incident he stood up when a speaker denounced the Jews and said ‘But I am a Jew,’ and was greeted by silence. In the early hours of 27 March, having told his girlfriend he’d ‘found out some very grave things’ and would take the train to Paris the next day, he rang his mother in great distress saying he was ‘in deep trouble’ and ‘wanted out’ from the group. Forty minutes later he was seen running along a road five kilometres outside Wiesbaden, where he died after being hit by a series of vehicles. He was 22.
The German police are said to have decided within hours that he had killed himself. Reportedly they took no official signed statements from witnesses, and the notes they did take were inadequate and contradictory. No autopsy was carried out, and the expert reports on the road accident were inconsistent, not corresponding to the marks found on Jerry’s body. The clothes he was wearing at the time of the accident were immediately destroyed. The conference organisers said he was psychologically ill and had ‘run off’, though he had no history of psychiatric illness and had given no indication that he might harm himself. His family have consistently denied that he committed suicide, and at an inquest in November 2003 the North London coroner agreed, explicitly rejecting a suicide verdict and instead giving an unusual ‘narrative verdict’ – literally a description of the events leading to the death – noting that Jerry had been ‘in a state of terror’ beforehand. This decision strengthened calls for Jerry’s death to be re-investigated.
A talented tennis player and poet, Jerry is remembered for his boundless energy and enthusiasm for life.
His family have set up the Jeremiah Duggan Memorial Fund, which aims to get the German authorities to conduct a full investigation into his death. Donations and offers of help (legal advice, or assistance with government lobbying) can be made to BM Jerry London WC1 3XX, or to Jeremiah_Duggan_Memorial_Fund@hotmail.com.
Some links to press reports on the tragedy and its consequences. More are being added as further information emerges. An asterisk at the end of a link indicates that you may be asked to register before viewing that page.
First day of the inquest
Result of the inquest
Shortcomings of the police investigation*
BBC report, February 2004
Foreign Office minister to meet Erica Duggan
Erica Duggan proposes ‘Cult Awareness Week’ in Jerry’s memory
Foreign Office minister offers support
Lyndon LaRouche and his organisation
More about LaRouche, Jeremiah’s involvement with him and Erica Duggan’s campaign
The student, the shadowy cult and a mother’s fight for justice: Observer, October 2004
*
In March 2004 Jerry’s mother wrote that she had been ‘receiving letters from ex members of the organization from all over the world all describing the severe treatment of attacking the individual’s identity and asking me to carry on with our campaign for Justice.’
On 1 April 2004, the day of her meeting with the Foreign Office minister Baroness Symons, the Justice for Jeremiah campaign was formally launched in the hope ‘that through this we will eventually find out what happened to dear Jeremiah.
‘Also we are requesting that the last week in March be kept as a Cult Awareness Week in the schools, colleges and Universities in memory of Jeremiah and to alert parents and students to the dangers. The hope is that parents and young people will be aware of making informed choices and not be subjected to fraud or deception by dangerous cults both political, religious or psychological.
‘Any organization that uses hidden agendas and secretive practices to unduly influence the individual should be subject to checks and examination so as to safeguard the safety of all. The rights of the individual to be protected against destructive cults should be upheld.’
In October 2004 it was reported that the British government had been told by German officials that plans were in hand to re-open the police investigation at last. But in April 2005 the prosecuting authorities in Weisbaden, having considered a file of fresh evidence compiled by the Duggans and their lawyers, ruled out a new investigation. Erica Duggan says the family will pursue the case through the European Court of Human Rights and has had another meeting with Baroness Symons seeking further British Government pressure on the Germans, while the Liberal Democrat MEP Baroness Ludford has urged the European Parliament to lend its support. ‘The European Convention on Human Rights imposes an obligation to protect life, which must mean investigating suspicious deaths.’
Jerry’s controversial, much-revised Wikipedia entry
On the Outside, the 2005 album by the band Starsailor, included a ballad entitled ‘Jeremiah’ commemorating Jerry. James Walsh, who wrote it, has said: ‘As far as I know he was a peaceful young Jewish lad who, like many people at the time, felt strongly against the war in Iraq and wanted to get involved in some way in an anti-war organisation. It was just incredibly tragic and unfortunate that the people he became embroiled with turned out to have almost neo-nazi leanings.’
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