Dead Student's Mother to Meet Foreign Office Officials

The Scotsman/April 1, 2004
By Pat Hurst

The mother of a British university student who died in mystery circumstances in Germany is to meet top Foreign Office officials to discuss his death.

Jeremiah Duggan, 22, was found dead after apparently running into the path of two cars in Wiesbaden, Germany in March 2003.

He had become involved in a political cult and on the night he died telephoned his mother Erica Duggan back home in London to say he was in "deep trouble."

German police decided he had committed suicide but a British coroner investigating the death concluded Jeremiah had been in a "state of terror" before he died.

Erica Duggan, from Golders Green, north London, had asked officials from the Foreign Office for a meeting to discuss her son"s death.

She does not accept the suicide conclusion given by German investigators and is campaigning to get more information.

Today she will meet Baroness Symons, head of Consular Services at the FO. She will also help launch the "Justice for Jeremiah Campaign."

At the inquest into Jeremiah Duggan"s death Hornsey coroner Dr William Dolman said he was unable from the outset to accept the German investigator"s conclusion that Mr Duggan intended to take his own life.

The inquest heard that Mr Duggan, who was Jewish, had travelled from Paris where he was studying to attend a meeting of the Lyndon LaRouche Schiller Institute, described in court by his family as a "dangerous and political cult with strong anti-Semitic tendencies."

Dr Dolman said there were a lot of unanswered questions but the Wiesbaden public prosecutor had closed the file on the case.

He recorded a narrative verdict in which he said Mr Duggan received fatal head injuries when he ran into a road in Wiesbaden and was hit by two private cars.