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 organization in court after a 20-Year-long Judicial inquiry :
Everyone does not have the same access to justice, nor the same perversity to continue to sink, even though they see themselves partially acquitted (management of the OKC association) reimbursed (2.8M € for Spatz), 5 years suspended (76 years, supposedly “sick”, reasonable time exceeded) we hope that this appeal will be firmly rejected by the Court of Cassation.
We are now in the fourth phase of this trial which has lasted since 2016: second appeal in the Supreme Court following the judgment of December 2, 2020, if this appeal in the Supreme Court is accepted and therefore the last judgment “overturned”, it would start again for a round, it may be that in these conditions we still have to rely on the generosity of the general public to give us the means to ensure our defense. Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)
The Tree with deep roots does not weaken in the storm, we will go to the end.
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.
It is because Spatz and OKC have appealed this decision that we are asking for your help as we do not have sufficient resources to obtain justice.
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 experiencing and we were terrified to disobey. 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.
2018 Verdict: inadmissibility of the lawsuit!
Years of investigation and legal proceedings that the court swept aside with a wave of the hand. The testimonies, which these people who grew up in the cult gave after great efforts to overcome their emotions, will not even be examined in the end. Read More
2019 : The appeal in Supreme Court
The Belgian state and the civil parties decide to appeal in the Supreme Court of Appeal against the appeal won by Spatz/OKC. 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. A new trial in a new jurisdiction is going to happen. We expect a new final judgement hopefully in early 2020.
This is great news for all the civil parties and ultimately for all the victims of Robert Spatz aka Lama Kunzang, be them civil parties or not, we now have a chance to not only be recognized by the court but also we now have an advantage having destroyed 90% of the defense arguments with their inability to reuse the same technical arguments to try to evict us from the trial instead of arguing on the real issues : sexual & physical abuses on children’s minor of age.
To be continued !
2020 : the New trial
Back in February the trial started in the city of Liège. It enfolded with sworn testimonies by remaining adepts of the cult, they tried to discharge their toxic cult guru but it didn’t work out so well, it just exposed how today in 2020 there are still people under his toxic influence.
Then it was the turn of the civil parties, 3 of us exposed stories of sexual abuses at Nyima-Dzong/Château de Soleils against Robert Spatz aka Lama Kunzang, the trial twas interrupted because of Covid-19.
It resumed on the 23rd of June, during the entire week, more civil parties exposed stories of physical, mental, spiritual and sexual abuses in front of the court.
September 2020 enfolded with the pleading of the civil parties and the accused lawyers.
Next step : Judgement December 2nd 2020
Verdict : Guilty for the second time, 5 years suspended sentence.
Robert Spatz convicted of sexual abuse of minors, hostage taking and physical abuse, even indirect, of underage children’s, separation from parents, coercion and financial fraud.
Media : BX1 – LeSoir – NOS – NieuwsBlad –
It's too little, but it can be explained, in part.
Several elements have come to intoxicate a harsher judgment towards the accused:
- Reasonable delay to an outdated judgment (20 years) his age and alleged sick state of the defendant
- his age and alleged sick state of the defendant
- Sums of money seized (which will therefore be reimbursed) that no longer correspond to offenses that have been proven and therefore judged by the court.
- Collapse of part of the financial charges (due to procedural vices or time elapsed)
So What's left ?
A feature article on the content of the Judgment of December 2, 2020 is still in the making, but several points can be highlighted:
- The recognition of civil parties as victims
- The recognition of sexual and psychological abuse, even if not all of it has been judged by the court (prescription, not investigated)
- Recognition of physical and psychological abuse Torture and mistreatment, hostage-taking
- Torture and mistreatment, hostage-taking
- The recognition of the stranglehold on the adepts/parents, the indoctrination of the OKC direction, its followers, defense witnesses, parents.
- Financial compensation for the civil parties. (still to be determined in some cases and in all cases still to be executed, depending on the maintenance of the judgment of December 2nd, 2020)
5 years suspended, yes, it is laughable and even if it can be explained, legally speaking, it is an aberration of the legal system in 2021, it must be the occasion for a reflection on Justice in Belgium as regards the prescription of crimes of sexual abuse of minors, with aggravation of authority, sectarian influence and access to Justice.
For us, too, it’s too little, too late.“, but we are busy on this case since 2016, we have a hindsight that the majority of people coming into contact with this case do not have, indeed, without understanding the background of this case, the time (20 years) it took to get to the first trial in 2016 (4 years suspended from which the sect and Spatz appealed 2018) without understanding the judicial and human case behind it all.
It is indeed incomprehensible
In fact, the craziest part of this story is how the main accused, armed with the best lawyers in the capital, has since 1997 sometimes benefited from the time taken by the justice system to carry out its investigation and its instruction, sometimes he has provoked the delays and at the end of the game he benefits from a lighter sentence, because his “rights to a judgement within a reasonable time” have not been respected…
Not to mention the procedural flaws that have further weakened the case over the +20 years that have passed between the searches, the investigation of the case, the first judgment at the end of 2016 and the second appeal judgment of December 2, 2020.
The OKC still exists, even if moribund, even if its heart has moved to Spain, there remains a band of diehard fanatics, living directly with Spatz in Spain.
In the OKC, acquittal is confused with ” stop the prosecution “, which is absurd, especially if the recognition of the de facto coercion prevails and benefits all the management and responsibilities are transferred to its founder, Robert Spatz.
but even indirectly (ir)Responsible does not mean Innocent.
And yes, it’s valid for parents too.
It is a complicated, old case, a labyrinth of witnesses in no less than 80 paper boxes, followers, civil parties and defendants, a case that Belgium was not equipped to handle, while at the same time the Dutroux case was breaking out… in Short
So many things to say, which do not justify, but which perhaps gives another glance on this Justice which it is necessary to preserve, to improve, to reinforce, of the laws which it is necessary to change (the prescription) of the sentences which it is necessary to harden, of the means to the Justice which it is necessary to materialize to equip our democratic societies with a true accessible justice and to the services of the populations.
Timeline :
- 1997 – OKC Cult, european wide police raid
- 1997 – 2003 Instructionof the case, first 2 cases of sexual & physical abuses
- 2003 – 2008 Lost in Limbo of the Belgian Justice system
- 2008 – New complaints for sexual abuses
- 2013 – More Lost in the Limbo’s of he Belgian Justice system
- 2016 – First trial
- 2017 – First judgement : 4 years suspended sentence
- 2018 – Spatz/OKC appeal of first judgment.
- 2019 – Counter-Appeal by the civil parties and the Belgian state.
- 2019 – Court of Appeal break the entire previous appeal verdict (we won this round)
- 2020 – new trial in Liège (paused due to covid19)
- 2020 – 8 months of judicial proceedings + Covid-19
- 2020 – Judgement December 2th 2020
- 2020 – Spatz is guilty of pedocriminality, torture and kidnapping, condemned to a 5 years suspended sentence (no jail time) OKC is largely recognized as indoctrinated and under the direct influence of Spatz, hence acquitted.
- 2021 – Spatz launch an appeal in the high Court of Cassation, depending on the outcome it will either enforce the 2nd December 2020 judgement or if accepted, a new trial will have to take place.
2021 – Still Ongoing (to be followed) - 2021 – Reopening OKC-Spatz judicial case in France – Instruction in progress
Table of Contents
Media / TV
2021 LouieMedia / Passages
2021 Vews - RTBF
2019 NRJ12
2018 France 2
2017 Mixe RTL OKC/Autre
2015 doc RTBF
To stay updated about the next steps :
Newsletter
Origin of OKCinfo Justice Initiative
OKCinfo was launched at the end of 2015 as a desperate last minute attempt in a 20 year long existing trial launched by the Belgian state against the OKC cult in 1997.
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 his surrounding clique 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. We’re here to restore the truths.
History will remember another truth.
