Help OKC children get justice
A group of cult-born kids now adults & free of the grip of the sectarian drifts of a Buddhist community they were born in where physical, sexual & mental abuses enfolded for decades, are fighting against the cult founder & his organisation in court after a 20 Year long Judicial inquiry :
- 1997 – Cult wide police raid
- 1997 – 2003 Instruction of the case, first 2 cases of sexual & physical abuses
- 2003 – 2008 Lost in Limbo of the Belgian Justice system
- 2008 – New complaints of sexual abuses
- 2013 – More Limbo’s in the Belgian Justice system
- 2016 – First Trial
- 2017 – First verdict (4 year suspended sentence)
- 2018 – Appeal by Spatz-OKC of the first verdict trial (they won)
- 2019 – Counter-Appeal by the civil parties
- 2019 – Court of Appeal break the entire previous appeal verdict
(we won this round) - 2020 – New final Trial in early 2020
Our Story
We are 23 ex-adepts’ children, constituted as civil parties in the current trial against the guru Robert Spatz (alias, “Lama Kunzang”) and the sect Ogyen Kunzang Choling (OKC). Several of us have filed complaints of rape and sexual abuse of minors. Other ex-adepts have also filed complaints: Spatz is accused of manipulating OKC members for personal and criminal purposes.
OKC was created in the 1970s by Spatz with the (according to him) aim of working for the “transmission and putting into practice of the Buddhist teachings of the Tibetan tradition”. While community life was dreamed of as a utopian and idyllic alternative, it would prove to be dictated by a sadistic and pedophile manipulator.
As the trial judge established in 2016, the followers were exploited for his benefit. While they worked tirelessly on a voluntary basis – then as false self-employed under/unpaid – in Belgium, Portugal and Spain, their children, therefore us, were sent to Château de Soleils (alias “Nyima Dzong”), a place isolated from everything in the Alpes de Haute-Provence, separated from our own parents & familly.
Robert Spatz was sentenced in the first instance in 2016, following a 20-year trial (1997), to 4 years suspended imprisonment and compensation for multiple charges, including hostage-taking of children with aggravating circumstances of torture, sexual abuse and rape of young teenage girls, and more than 100 reprehensible acts ranging from the use of forgery and extortion to money laundering.
Spatz and the OKC organisation played the court into showing Spatz wasn’t leading the organisation anymore but a few days after the first sentence, both appealed the condemnation. (see below)
The brainwashing
Out of sight, we were indoctrinated with hours of daily prayers and “religious” practices specific to Spatz. Without any other reference, far from our parents who were described to us as polluted corrupted by their emotions and Western civilization, we learned to rely on him, day and night.
Physical and psychological abuses
Before the court of first instance, we described severe deprivations: emotional, nutritional, medical, educational. Physical and psychological violences were daily: beatings with sticks, confinement, running outside barefoot in the snow, deprivation of food, having to stay outside at night are just a few examples.
It was impossible for us to realize the injustice we were suffering and we were terrified at the thought of disobeying. The pain was presented as beneficial. We were told that suffering was good for us, that it would harden us and prepare us to survive to the end of the world. We grew up with the idea that the end of the world was near, and Spatz wanted to prepare us as warriors. According to Spatz, only those living on the “pure land of Nyima-Dzong” would survive.
Sexual abuses of young girls
The young girls were probably the most affected by the drifts of the guru. Spatz was taking teenage girls (raised in Nyima-Dzong) for domestic service from the age of 12 and 13, and secretly using them to satisfy his sexual needs under the pretext of practicing “Tantric rituals”.
The difficult reconstruction
When we left this organization, we all had the greatest difficulty adapting to the world and rebuilding ourselves psychologically. Some of us have the great disappointment of having parents who continue to defend Robert Spatz whom they worship as an emanation of Buddha on earth rather than taking the side of their children.
The trial...
In 2016, Robert Spatz was convicted in the first instance on multiple charges, including hostage-taking of children with aggravating circumstances of torture, sexual abuse and rape of young teenage girls, and more than 100 punishable acts ranging from forgery and extortion to money laundering. We hoped that this decision would be final but Robert Spatz, having sufficient funds allowing him to drag out the sentence which was all in all light considering the charges (4 years of prison suspended and fines), and OKC (partially acquitted because considered as victim of Spatz) lodged an appeal.
...and the appeal
It is because of this appeal that we need help to fund our defence costs. We have reduced these costs to a minimum – two lawyers for 23 civil parties, while Spatz and its organisation have 7 lawyers!
We are fortunate to have talented lawyers who believe in our cause, despite our inability to pay them properly for their service.
This is a complex appeal that must take place over a minimum period of six months and will require them to work long hours.
We need your support in order to be able to carry out our defence and restore justice
As a result of our stolen youth, few of us have sufficient resources to pay these two lawyers. We can only count on the generosity and solidarity of those who believe in our fight to carry out our defense and restore justice…
2018…and the verdict of the Appeal
Inadmissibility of proceedings! Years of investigation and judicial proceedings that the court dismissed with a wave of its hands. The testimonies that these people who grew up in the cult made great efforts to overcome their emotions after growing up in the sect were not even examined. Read More
2019 : the counter-appeal
The Belgian State & the civil parties decided to counter-appeal the appeal verdict.
After months in the limbo of the Belgian Justice system on the 12th June 2019 the Cassation court reversed the previous court decision : the entirety of the previous judgement is now nullified.
2020 : the New trial
We expect the new trial to enfold in early 2020, perhaps February.
more information very soon, follow us on social media, newsletters or crowdfunding to get the latest news about our fight for Justice.
Media / TV
2019 NRJ12
2018 France 2
2017 Mixed RTL OKC/other
2015 RTBF docu
Follow on Twitter
Follow on Facebook
Our Blog/Archives
- Untitled
- Untitled
- Archive Presse OKC-Spatz-secte 93-2016
- Audiences, plaidoiries et répliques du procès #SPATZ #OKC terminé.
- C’est émouvant de vous lire, de vous retrouver au détours de ces verbes… même si l’on aurait aimé se voir dans des conditions plus joyeuses
- Presse : OKC: organisation criminelle ou association de malfaiteurs? @ogyenkun #secte #nuisible #bouddhisme
Testimonies
“ Often because we would nod during the prayer, chat during the meal, forget the umpteenth letter of the Tibetan alphabet or display intolerance, in short everything was a pretext to get a blow in the back, to get our ears pulled in which we would whisper with a horrible accent: “wait tonight you will see”. ” read more by J.P.
“ It took me years to break through the spell of secrecy and speak up about Spatz, but I finally brought criminal and civil complaints against him in 1998. I found out later that three other women had done the same. ” read more by C.K.
“ They were going towards the end of time, preparing for violence. That was our perspective for the future. (…) Why study, why develop the slightest personal ambition when the only perspective constructed was the end of time, this fantasized background? ” read more by J.C.
In the Media
4 choices to donate to OKCinfo Crowfunding
1) Donate directly from our website
How the funds will be used
- Pay our lawyers
- Pay medical expenses (mainly psychological support)
- Pay transportation costs for civil parties living abroad
- Pay the communication costs of the OKCinfo initiative
Any surplus will be donated to organisations fighting against sectarian drifts and sexual abuse.
3) Paypal
4) Bank Transfer (no fees)
it is also possible to make a bank transfer directly.
Name: OKCinfo
BE81 3775 1971 5024
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We thank you from the bottom of our hearts for every contributions. #ffffff; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.39); font-size: 13px; background-image: none !important;" draggable="false" src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/11/svg/2764.svg" alt="❤" />
About OKCinfo
OKCinfo was launched at the end of 2015 as a desperate last minute attempt in an existing trial launched by the Belgian state against the OKC sect nearly 20 years earlier.
The 23 of us – supported by more than 40 other former OKC-born young children – have since been supported by talented lawyers ready to champion our cause.
The initiative was born from the realization that if we, children of the first, second and third generation, did not speak, the sect guru and the clique around him would manipulate the trial and the court to establish that there are no victims, no complaints, nothing, that it is not a sect but a “community of Tibetan Buddhist inspiration” persecuted by the Belgian state.
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Who knows, perhaps we (OKCinfo initiative) finish this year with a victory and a certainly long deserved closure to keep moving forward in peace. One day I should write down this story. I’m looking for a writer by the way!