NSW Police uncover human remains at Twelve Tribe’s remote property
Source: The Daily Telegraph
For the past week, NSW Police have been digging for human remains at two properties owned by the controversial Sydney Christian sect, the Twelve Tribes. The results have been grim.
Exclusive: The remains of at least one baby have been found on a NSW property owned by members of controversial Christian sect, the Twelve Tribes, police sources have revealed.
Detectives found the remains in a shallow grave at the remote tract of land at Bigga in the NSW Southern Tablelands during a search on Wednesday afternoon.
Sources say it is too early to confirm whether the remains belong to one infant or two. It is understood the remains, which were in a coffin-like box structure, were found about 3pm.
The painstaking removal operation was delayed due to heavy rain and the fragility and age of the remains.
NSW Police have refused to comment officially, saying the “planned police operation” involving detectives from the Blue Mountains concluded yesterday.
“There are no further updates in relation to Strike Force Nanegai at this time,” police said in a statement.
Officers had been digging since Monday at the Tribe’s 78.5ha Bigga property and at its Peppercorn Creek farm in Picton in Sydney’s southwest, opposite its popular Common Ground Bakery. The search was suspended on Thursday.
NSW Police executed crime scene warrants at both properties on Monday as part of an investigation by Strike Force Nanegai into the high number of stillbirths and medical neglect within the community.
The raid comes after former member Rosemary Cruzado said her late-term stillborn baby was buried at the Bigga property. She believes her baby’s death could have been avoided if she had seen a doctor earlier in her pregnancy.
Ms Cruzado and other former members alleged the group’s lack of medical and prenatal care had contributed to the loss of multiple pregnancies in its communities, which consist of about 90 members living communally at the Picton farm, as well as properties in Katoomba and Coledale near Wollongong.
“I’d just love for them to find my baby so I could give him a proper burial,” she said. “And I’d love to see some accountability from the leaders, they really scared us away from using doctors and hospitals, it is not even an option.
“I would love to see ladies get proper pre-natal care because I really believe if I got proper pre-natal care, it could have been preventable. I’d like to see the (lack of) medical (care) come to light so they could change their ways.”
The Bigga site has no running water or electricity. Surrounded by thick bushland, the property was originally intended to hold large religious festivals for the community. Ex-members allege stillborn babies were disposed of on the Tribe’s properties without registration with NSW Health, a requirement of all births after 20 weeks.
The strict religious sect, which claims to live by the “First Testament”, shuns modern medicine.
It has repeatedly denied allegations of child abuse.
A gathering at the Picton property where members of the strict religious community live.
Police officers dig on a twelve tribes property near the NSW town of Picton. Picture: ABC
Rosemary Cruzado is haunted by the loss of her son who was born stillborn while she lived with the Twelve Tribes. Picture: Sam Ruttyn
How tragic for any mother to go through this.i pray for the innocents involved with the evil ways of the twelve tribes community. Allegedly there are ” hidden graves” on many other properties and law enforcement in many states and country’s have been notified of this since the onset of the Australia raid and operation. They have dodged many things but it all comes out in the wash. I urge anyone who has any information on this high control group to contact their law Enforcement. They will not think you are crazy. They are aware of all things going on.now we need to bond together to be the voices of the children and innocent victims of this destructive group. I know how traumatic this is for many of us. I am here for anybody who needs to talk. I was connected to them for 26 yrs… God save them. Kim
Well enough, Kimberly,
however one might put it into context.
Dying is a part of life, also infant deaths.
So, to have a cementary for misscariages is IMHO more humane than e.g. European Social Democrats demand for the legalization of 3rd trimester abortion.
I don’t want to give the Twelve Tribes a free-ride on the issue, but a bit of healthy context to what happens in the fallen world around them would be helpful sometimes…
Best regards from Switzerland, Dan
So in a world where stillborns and aborted babies are dumped in the trash, the Twelve Tribes give their stillborns a decent burial, let the poor babies rest in peace don’t go and dig up their bodies,
When I lived at one of the communities in America, two of the teenagers told me that a dead baby had been burned up the in the basement heating furnace at the community in Sus France so that no one outside the commune would have any evidence of the babies premature death.
On another occasion, an adult male member who I was friends with described how he temporarily eluded and ran from police in a car with his dead baby daughter. In order to quickly bury her before the police could find out where her grave was. From what I understood, the Vermont police caught him before He was able to do this secretly.
What I’ve come to learn is that certain forms of religion can mess up a person just as bad as drugs or alcohol or crime.
I cannot agree Dan. Most of these stillbirths were due to Eugene spriggs ( yonaques) twisted teachings that a woman facing trauma in childbirth could not rcv medical care.had they been able to..many of these baby’s would have lived. This is totally off topic from abortion. Furthermore these deaths should have been reported and examined before burial.and to not tell the mother where her stillborn was taken??? Are you serious?
Well, Kimberly, I am not here to judge.
Of course, I am hoping that with time passing by and maybe a successor of Yoneq things ease out a bit so that members themselves can make a doctor’s appointment if they need so.
I don’t think that abortion is off topic here. Outside TT they have pro-abortion laws (and pro-abortion hearts) is western society these days. This isn’t a 3rd world issue. Numbers figure close to 100k/years in a central European country like Germany and much more even in the US.
Socialists, who endorse “rights for children” appearently don’t care one bit about children inside the womb, just proclaim to care when they’re outside the womb, the discrimination being ridiculous as neither children are able to survive without a caring mother.
A totally skewed way of viewing new life. Where is the outcry, the scandal of the 100s of thousands of dead babies per year in a wealthy western society when at the same time TT is being accused for those tragic full term pregnancy miscarriages? One might for instance put everything in context.
I’d like to be buried rather in a Twelve Tribes or an Amish or jewish cemetary because they take care of the important things. I just had two deaths to mourn in our family, but e.g. the spirit of my unbelieving family “elders” is so off bible: They let my grandparents be burnt to ashes, so it is “easier” to maintain the tiny city grave. AFAIK, jews/Amish never maintain any grave, they don’t care about the beauty of the grave and what neighbours might think about the grave, but (at least Amish) don’t burn the dead to ashes, instead let them rest in Yahweh, so that when Yeshuah returns, the dead may rise again!
Just look again how skewed non-TT society has become on the issue of death.
If you think that the TT cares about anything other than $$$ and the appetite of their egos, then you are dead wrong. You are talking about a school of sociopathy, here. They literally teach their members that empathy is not allowed.
Add on
These were full term pregnancys not miscarriages.
Potential Central Intelligence Agency tactics of mind control would include some type of implant. This would be covered up while administering drugs simultaneously. To confuse their victims
this group are pure evil searching out the weak and vulnerable manipulating ang brainwashing them into shutting out all friends and family and signing over all their belongings bank accounts unemployment benefits properties and inheritances they steal identities baiting them with a new name the women are denied birthcontrol after joining they are match mated and sent to a satellite farm with her selected mate and impregnated in Australia the mothers pension is getting stolen too if you are girl who suddenly decides to leave well you now have no car no bank cards or money your in the middle of nowhere no phone and you’ve shut out all friends and family your litterally been manipulatively kidnaped and are now part of their slave trade and your identity has been sold as an investment identity to rinse the slave profits earnt and off cause they want lots of babies so women must be totally submissive to the elders and the males of the tribe
how in this modern age with so much evidence of so many crimes can this group still be under a christian banner and benefit from the tax avoidance and the benefits of a religious standing when it is obviously pure evil