Dutch police probing the case of a family who were locked away on an isolated farm for nine years are examining possible satanic links.
Officers have uncovered evidence which, it is believed, points to occult practices.
They will also question Gerrit Jan van Dorsten, the father of the five freed youngsters, about why he reported to Dutch immigration in 2009 that he had emigrated.
Dutch police probing the case of a family who were locked away on an isolated farm for nine years are examining possible satanic links
A large white board found pinned to a wall at the farmhouse in Ruinerwold, sixty miles north of Amsterdam, has become a key part of the investigations
Instead he stands accused of holding six of his children captive at a farmhouse in Ruinerwold, around 60 miles north of Amsterdam for nine years.
In the deed sale of the remote farm, van Dorsten is listed as a ‘psychologist’ and he wanted to take in former drug addicts and return them to nature, a son of the former landowner said.
A large white board found pinned to a wall at the farmhouse in Ruinerwold, sixty miles north of Amsterdam, has become a key part of the probe by police who are examining claims that the van Dorsten youngsters had been brainwashed into believing the end of the world was coming.
The drawing board had a series of mystery drawings and numbers.
The scribblings, in black felt ink, have been taken away by detectives for analysis and forensic examination.
Police hope it will help them establish what went on over nine years that the five youngsters, aged between 18 and 25, were held captive.
A sixth van Dorsten youngster Jan Zon alerted police to his siblings’ plight when he walked into a bar
A sixth van Dorsten youngster Jan Zon alerted police to his siblings’ plight when he walked into a bar at Ruinerwold and was befriended by the owner.
Their father has been arrested along with local carpenter Josef Brunner and both face charges connected with holding the youngsters in cells at the farmhouse and money laundering charges.
Both were former Moonies, whose members choose to live out of society and ‘programme’ followers to reject their families.
Bur a source said: ‘The drawings and numbering on the board have mystified police. There are so many different numbers on there which simply don’t add up.
‘They are not mathematics, but more likely some weird occult materials. The numbers are all over the place written in black ink.
‘They go from top to bottom, side-to-side and run across each other without making sense.
‘One possibility is that they are orders for the family members to walk around in circles. But there is also likely some other twisted truth behind them.’
Other items taken away for examining, including tens of thousands of Euros, are a set of books and records kept by the two men.
Police have brought in thermal imaging cameras to search under the soil of the fields around the farmhouse and sniffer dogs to examine underneath floor boards.
The cameras have the technology to search for human remains, but there is no suggestion that the police probe is set to become a murder or missing persons inquiry.
Police are delving into the backgrounds of Brunner, 58, and 67-year-old van Dorsten who used to live in adjoining homes at Hasslet, around five miles from the farm house.
They kept five sheep and had a circular portable pond where a duck swam around in circles, the source said.
An exterior view of the local pub De Kastelein in the village of Ruinerwold where Jan Zon befriended the owner
Vegetables were grown in the fields and Brunner would do a weekly shop at a local Lidi store.
Brunner lived a few miles away in a trailer at the back of his carpenter workshop.
The two arrested men had close business ties with Brunner paying the rent on van Dorsten’s toy craft store in Mepple and another storage unit nearby.
One of van Dorsten’s sons Endino lived above the unit with his wife and two children.
Two of his siblings, sister Marjan, 29, and brother Shin have joined him in expressing their ‘dismay’ at the fortunes of their five siblings, aged 18-25, inside the farmhouse and have promised to support them.
In a statement they said their father had broken off contact with much of his family back in the eighties and had ‘asked us not to make any attempt to find his place of residence.’
They lived with an uncle and grandparents and the family have reached out to the free five offering them support.
The rescued youngsters are said to be barely able to speak and walking around in circles as they are kept in care and provided with counselling and medical support.
Brunner tempted fate when he let Jan Zon van Dorsten out into the public to help his business.
During the summer he was busy on social media and also contacted a graphic design company in May on Brunner’s orders.
He got in touch by a WhatsApp message and then by email and said he preferred the internet to conduct business and told the company: ‘It is because I am deaf.’
But a source at the graphic design company, which asked not to be identified, said the business was ‘well communicated and always friendly’ by him.
Jan, 25, required a logo to be created for the business Creconat and paid for the work by bank transfer.
The 25-year-old , whose escape led to police arresting his father, Brunner and freeing his five siblings, also commissioned the designers to create a corporate identity and website.
The work was in progress when police took him into care and swooped on the farm house.
On June 6 he wrote in Facebook: ‘Begun a new job at Creconat.’
Creconat was a wing of the woodworking company Native Creative Economy in Meppel which was owned by Brunner.
The logo commissioned by Jan Zon on behalf of Brunner showed an isolated country house, with trees, a horse in front and a cockerel on the roof. The designer said Brunner’s company said it wanted to ‘create a better world.’