Joachim Stamp (FDP) has repeatedly called for children’s rights to be included in the Basic Law. When the grand coalition announced a corresponding constitutional change last year and then did not implement it before the federal elections, the North Rhine-Westphalian family minister and deputy head of government expressly regretted it. “I think it would have been an important, albeit symbolic, point,” Stamp said.
In practice, this point seems less important to Stamp. In August 2021, WDR and Southgerman newspaper for the first time about the abstruse treatment methods of the well-known Bonn child psychiatrist Michael Winterhoff. He had given children and adolescents diagnoses that cannot be found in any textbook and prescribed neuroleptics for them for years. Particularly common: the remedy pipamperone.
Pipamperone has a strong sedative effect, experts only recommend it for a short time in emergencies – for example in the event of violent aggression, when children and adolescents are no longer therapeutically available. Winterhoff, however, prescribed the drug almost as standard for his young patients, some of whom had to take it for up to ten years. The list of side effects of pipamperone is long. Many of those affected continue to suffer from constant fatigue, difficulty concentrating and movement disorders for years after stopping. Quite a few feel robbed of their childhood.
When the allegations became known, Stamp’s ministry promised comprehensive clarification. But to date, he and his staff have done nothing to investigate the full extent of possible crimes that could be committed by the Bonn pediatrician – and by the youth welfare organizations that cooperated with him. The ministry cannot even provide information about the number of homes in North Rhine-Westphalia where Winterhoff, who has been practicing since the 1980s, treated and possibly harmed children and young people.
Those who did not want the drug were put under pressure
Lawyers for complaining victims are disturbed by the state’s inaction. According to Seda Başay-Yıldız, who also represented the rights of plaintiffs in the NSU trial, this passivity shows how little child welfare and children’s rights count. “Otherwise a case like this, in which potentially hundreds of children are or were affected, would be properly resolved.” Kilian Wegner, who teaches criminal law and also represents a former patient of Winterhoff, recognizes “a significant systematic problem” based on the case. Apparently, the field of youth welfare “pervaded by the diffusion of responsibility and a lack of control”. The system can be abused, as the Winterhoff case has shown.
In fact, parents and legal guardians were sometimes even put under pressure by youth welfare offices or homes to agree to treatment by Winterhoff. Anyone who resisted ran the risk of losing custody of their child. Wegner criticizes that he cannot see that “any lessons have been learned from this in youth welfare”.
The Bonn lawyer Mehmet Daimaguler says he has repeatedly pointed out that even after the first reports on the Winterhoff case, the medication of children and young people in some homes continued. “I would have just expected preventive measures.” At the end of 2021, Winterhoff announced that he was closing his practice for reasons of age. “But I don’t know if he’s still working as a doctor without a practice, I don’t know what the situation in the homes is,” says Daimaguler.
The responsible ministries in North Rhine-Westphalia and Rhineland-Palatinate, where Winterhoff mainly worked, see the public prosecutor’s office and medical associations as primarily responsible for processing the case. But the efforts are limited. At the end of February, the North Rhine Chamber of Physicians published an expert opinion that assessed a course of treatment with pipamperone in children and adolescents for several weeks as “generally not indicated”. Otherwise, irreversible and life-threatening side effects could occur. Nothing new, several experts and the specialist society for child and adolescent psychiatry had pointed this out months earlier.
The judiciary is hesitant to react – and the lawyers are wondering why
The Bonn public prosecutor’s office is also slow to follow up on the complaints made by former Winterhoff patients. By the end of January, she had not heard a single person affected. When asked by WDR and SZ, a spokesman said that “preliminary questions based on the file situation” would be clarified. And: “Those affected were also approached.” The lawyers confirm that there were inquiries. But, according to Daimaguler, he does not know that he files a criminal complaint and then receives questions that he in turn has to ask his clients. “Why not ask the clients directly?”
Daimaguler is also irritated because he and his colleagues have not been able to inspect the files to date. In the case of the NSU trial, in which Daimaguler was also involved, this was possible after three months, although the file was significantly more extensive. Criminal law expert Wegner complains that the public prosecutor’s office creates a separate procedure for each individual affected. In view of the linking of the cases, this is “problematic”. In fact, Winterhoff had treated entire groups of children in care with drug cocktails. Seda Başay-Yıldız has the impression that the public prosecutor’s office wants to let time pass and “at some point calmly end the proceedings”.
It shouldn’t get that far, warns Daimaguler. “We’re dealing with children who were defenseless in many ways.” Many of Winterhoff’s patients grew up in difficult circumstances and in homes – the rule of law had to give them special protection. For a few days, a few of those affected have received summonses for interrogation for the first time. However, no one has contacted his five clients, says Daimaguler.
Stamps’ Ministry for Family Affairs in Düsseldorf states that “the allegations against Mr. Winterhoff continue to be taken very seriously”.