COURT EXPERTS
– On October 14 1999 Psychiatrist C.P.J.F. Kemperman receives from the Judge-Commissioner R.A. Dozy the assignment to write a reasoned report about the charges of Martijn Overduin and Edith Blankespoor.
For the sake of clarity, Kemperman is a neurologist and a psychiatrist and receives the question whether there are indications, information and/or arguments from a forensic/behavioral perspective about the credibility of the statements of Martijn Overduin and Edith Blankespoor.
” In the case against Gerard and Fred Blankespoor, Kemperman does not motivate how he came to his conclusions. Kemperman is lacking a scientific rationale “
Kemperman quotes literally in his report to the Judge-Commissioner what has been stated by both (false) declarants and concludes that there is a great chance that these statements of Martijn Overduin and Edith Blankespoor are credible.
He also finds no motive with both of the declarants for making a false statement.
The problem with the method used by Kemperman is not only that it is wrong (see also Crombag), but also that Kemperman has been consulted many times as an court expert in other cases and is also appointed by a Judge-Commissioner to investigate the veracity of statements made by the perpetrators.
As a result, real perpetrators have been acquitted with an probability verging on certainty, and real charges made with regard to sexual abuse were considered to be myths with all its consequences, which is duly noted!
In the case against Gerard and Fred Blankespoor, Kemperman does not motivate how he came to his conclusions. Kemperman is lacking a scientific rationale.
– Psychologist and forensic court-specialist PhD. H.J.G. Soppe thinks differently than psychiatrist Kemperman on December 18 1998, who receives the same question as Kemperman, but at that time the employer is Mr. A.L. Roerink, Public Prosecutor in Zutphen.
Soppe also uses the method CBCA (criteria based content analysis) together with the SVA (statement validity assessment) and comes to the following conclusions:
- The memories of Martijn Overduin are pseudo-memories and therefore they are constructions instead of reconstructions of the past, provided through a therapy that Martijn Overduin joined.
- The story of Martijn Overduin about sexual abuse lacks a significant number of details on relevant and essential points and contains many contradictions, improbabilities, ambiguities and impossibilities.
- In the opinion of Soppe, the declaration of Martijn Overduin has insufficient content and Martijn Overduin does not discuss actual abuse experiences.
” Soppe comes to the following conclusion: the memories of Martijn Overduin are pseudo-memories and therefore they are constructions instead of reconstructions of the past, provided through a therapy that Martijn Overduin joined “
– Prof. PhD. H.F.M. Crombag is a legal psychologist and also a legal court-expert, who was appointed on March 7 2000 by Judge-Commissioner E. Mijnsberge as a witness/expert with the assignment to give his vision on the psychological, psychiatric and neurological consultancy firm of psychiatrist PhD. C.J.F. Kemperman.
After studying the declarations and charges, he comes to the following conclusion:
1. One would expect that all persons mentioned by Edith Blankespoor and Martijn Overduin as co-victims or witnesses that they could confirm the charges made by Martijn Overduin and Edith Blankespoor.
This is not the case at all!
” One would expect that all persons mentioned as co-victims or witnesses that they could confirm the charges made by Martijn Overduin and Edith Blankespoor. This is not the case at all! “
Timo Blankespoor dismisses Martijn Overduin’s story as nonsense.
Victor Blankespoor (Fred Blankespoor’s son) and Maritza Blankespoor say they never noticed anything of sexual abuse.
The ex-wife of Gerard Blankespoor also has nothing to say that incriminates Gerard and/or Fred Blankespoor. The two parish clerks in the mentioned churches also state that it is very unlikely that something of such abuse could have taken place under their watch.
2. In the circle of evangelical christians, there are rather “neurological” opinions about sexuality.
On the one hand sexuality is difficult to discuss, on the other hand there is a more than average fascination to the subject.
Under these circumstances, suspicions and backbiting about other people’s sexual venial sins find fertile breeding ground.
The fact that both defendants, Gerard and Fred Blankespoor, played a prominent role in the denomination, both are divorced from their wives and that Gerard Blankespoor has maintained a well-known extra-marital relationship with a married other member of the denomination, makes them the perfect target for such backbiting.
3. Both with Edith Blankespoor and with Martijn Overduin, the charges are the product of recovered memories about events that took place in a distant past.
It is striking, for example, that it is noted in a letter from a psychologist and psychiatrist at the center for women’s relief in Haarlem in April 1997, that for the then 23-year-old Edith Blankespoor it is about experiences of sexual abuse, for which she was “amnestic” until a year ago.
” In the circle of evangelical christians, there are rather “neurological” opinions about sexuality “
Edith Blankespoor states that after a lesson about sexual abuse at school (a training for social-pedagogical work) she came to the conclusion that the cause of her problem had to be found in sexual abuse by her father Fred Blankespoor.
4. Through therapeutic conversations with Mrs. Spartarakis, who claims to be a body-oriented therapist (psychoanalysis based on Freud and associates), other constitutions come up, which relate to Gerard Blankespoor and Henk Blankespoor, particularly to the abortion provocatus.
This all shows that it concerns recovered memories from a distant past, where total (psychogenic) amnesia is claimed and which was gradually lifted by means of psychotherapeutic means. In the circle of psychoanalysts, the above described assumed course of events is popular.
However, there is a lack of empirical justification!
It is therefore always about pseudo memories, which are produced with the help of suggestive therapeutic techniques, conversations with alleged companions in distress and information obtained from the media, and which serve to rewrite their own past in a way that it becomes an explanation for current psychologic dysfunctioning!
5. The same story with Martijn Overduin.
Marja Priem, social worker and member of the Pentecostal Church, suspects very soon as a therapist that Martijn has been sexually abused and asks him to join a discussion group for sexually abused youngsters.
” It is therefore always about pseudo memories, which are produced with the help of suggestive therapeutic techniques, conversations with alleged companions in distress and information obtained from the media, and which becomes an explanation for current psychologic dysfunctioning “
Also Simone, Martijn Overduin’s teacher at school, asks him to write a essay about sexual abuse.
The story of Martijn Overduin is also entirely based on recovered memories and is only about pseudo-memories, as already has been described in point 3.
The report of psychiatrist Kemperman consists for the most part of a shortened representation of the statements of Edith Blankespoor and Martijn Overduin.
Kemperman refers unilaterally and without source references to the aforementioned CBCA.
This is however a method, apart from the aforementioned lack of motivation and substantiation, which is designed for the statements of children and not of adults.
Thus the statements of psychiatrist Kemperman provide a small, if any, contribution to the problem of evidence in the case against Gerard and Fred Blankespoor.
For those who wants to know more about recovered memories , the book by HFM Crombag and H.L.G.J. Merkelbach with the title “Recovered memories and other misunderstandings” is highly recommended. Publisher Contact, 1996 ISBN 90254 06793.
