The owners and staff of the discredited care farm in Wedde have gone into hiding after threats. “On the advice of the police, my daughter is at a hiding place,” confirms the father of a suspicious employee.
Care farm Aurora Borealis has been abandoned. There are four large installations with BauWatch security cameras around the building and at night the site is flooded with light. The farm was attacked on Tuesday by a group of angry people after the broadcast of Undercover in the Netherlands came to get a story about the abuses at the care location. After the disturbance, which also involved the police, two windows were broken.
Alfred Stenekes, who made a restart at the same location a few weeks ago, has also left. The large banner of Personal Care Westerwolde, the new company, has been removed.
Witch hunt
A witch hunt has started on Facebook. Under the title Project W was called on social media to attack the care farm. And there are calls to teach the six suspects involved in the care farm a lesson. The six were arrested at the end of December on suspicion of assaulting vulnerable healthcare clients. They may await a possible trial in freedom.
A 26-year-old employee left Gieten earlier this week because a group of angry people threatened to come to her house, her father confirms. He is deeply shaken by the situation. His daughter started on the care farm a few months ago. He has seen the broadcast and is impressed, although his daughter was barely in the frame of the secret camera of Undercover in the Netherlands.
Indoctrinated
The father: ,,I don’t know my daughter like that. She was put under pressure by her two bosses, who indoctrinated her.” He does not want to go into the matter too deeply. He wishes to remain anonymous for fear of threats. “She is afraid that she will be attacked, it is not normal what is said on Facebook and what is called for.” The personal data of the 26-year-old woman are on the street. “It is incomprehensible that this is possible. She’s already been convicted.”
The house has also been abandoned at the addresses of other employees. At the bakery in Ter Apel, they have not seen the car of the neighbor who worked in Wedde all week. “At first we had no idea it was about her,” says an employee. ,,But everyone here is talking about the conditions on the care farm.” She used to be in secondary school with owner Michel K. ,,He was not a fresh boy then. I’d rather stay away from him.”
Michel K., who ran the business together with his father-in-law Paul W., lived with his wife and their baby in the front house of the care farm. They also left with the northern sun.
Unkind people
In Wedde, the issue is the talk of the day. also at café and furniture store De Rode Jager. “In retrospect, we hear from many people that they had a strange feeling about the care farm,” says red-haired Karin Jager. Care clients regularly passed by her terrace with their supervisors. “Unkind people. They didn’t even greet us. Very weird.”
One of the employees was already back to work at another care farm, De Vossenburght in Winschoten. ,,She had told us that she had worked at Wedde”, says owner Monique Pol. “She said she had not participated in the abuses and remained in the interests of the clients.”
Not blacklisted
To Pol’s astonishment, this turned out to be incorrect. She is very shocked by the broadcast, in which she also saw her employee in a bad role. She wouldn’t say who it was. ,,But to be honest, she did a good job guiding my boys.” Nevertheless, Pol showed her the door on Monday. “I watched the broadcast in pieces. I couldn’t stand it. It was really a slap in the face to see her.”
There is a blacklist for healthcare workers, but you have to go very far to get to it, says a spokesperson for the Health and Youth Care Inspectorate. The six suspects are not listed there anyway, they have not been convicted. That is why the applicant could also show a Declaration on Behavior with her application. Pol: ,,And of course I couldn’t knock on the door of the former employers.”
Second part program
The father of the suspected employee awaits Sunday’s broadcast with fear. Then the second part of the secret recordings that Alberto Stegeman makes for his program is shown Undercover in the Netherlands . The father hopes that the bomb will not burst again. “The threats must stop. Let the judge do his job.”
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