A Dead Man’s Prints

The day after eco-activist Wiebo Ludwig died, the RCMP wanted to open his coffin and take his fingerprints one final time. 

Wiebo Ludwig, who died on 9 April 2012 at his log cabin near Hythe, in northwestern Alberta, was known by his supporters as an “eco-warrior” — and by his foes as an “eco-terrorist.” The Dutch-born preacher was best-known for his run-ins with the oil and gas industry — and the police — after he took a stand against poisonous gas leaks and flares.

Ludwig died from cancer of the esophagus. He was 70.

The ink had barely dried on Ludwig’s death certificate when his casket was carried to a private cemetery in woods nearby and placed in an above-ground concrete crypt.

The previous fall I’d walked with Ludwig on a path that curves through the graveyard. At one point he stopped and, pointing with his walking stick, announced, “this is where I’m going.”

              Wiebo Ludwig showing where a new residence will be built [November 2011]

The graveyard is a stone’s throw from Trickle Creek, the small Christian community, Ludwig founded 26 years ago. Today it’s home to nearly 60 people, a sprawling complex of chalet-type homes, machine shops, greenhouses, barns, woodsheds and a dental office.

LAWYERS GET INVOLVED

Richard Boonstra, Ludwig’s long-time friend and a resident at Trickle Creek, called the RCMP’s request to fingerprint Wiebo Ludwig’s corpse “odd”, “invasive” and “a terrible disrespect and interference with human remains.” Boonstra suspects the Mounties wanted to see for themselves that Ludwig was actually dead. He says the request showed authorities’ discomfort with Ludwig because Ludwig had embarrassed the establishment.

Josh Ludwig, Wiebo’s eldest son, adds that two RCMP officers arrived at Trickle Creek to get the fingerprints.

The family’s attorney, Paul Moreau of Edmonton, said he told the RCMP that wouldn’t be happening. The Mounties then dropped the matter; the heavy concrete slab covering the crypt was never raised.

Doris Stapleton of RCMP Media Relations says, “a fingerprint is the best way to positively identify someone, and if that person has a criminal record the fingerprints are sent to Ottawa so they’re able to take the record off CPIC.” CPIC is the Canadian Police Information Center where criminal history files are kept.

Moreau, a veteran criminal defence lawyer, says he’s never heard of police lifting prints off dead criminals to close a file.

The request to fingerprint a dead and buried man came as news to recently retired correctional officer Rick Dyhm. In his 34 years as a guard at federal prisons — where numerous inmates have died  — Dyhm says police never once showed up to fingerprint a dead inmate.

The main residence and dining hall [left] at Trickle Creek

CRIMINAL CHARGES AND PRISON TIME

In 2001, an Edmonton judge handed Ludwig a 28-month prison sentence after finding him guilty of oilfield vandalism. Two well-heads in the area had been damaged; one by an explosion, the other was cemented in. Ludwig was found guilty of attempting to possess explosives and public mischief over $5,000. He was released after serving two-thirds of his sentence.

What precipitated the vandalism was a series of sour gas leaks that poisoned people and animals at Trickle Creek. The Ludwigs say they complained to the authorities, but that nothing was done. The leaks continued. The people of Trickle Creek resorted to putting duct tape around their doors and windows to keep the toxic gas at bay. Wet towels were also used.

KARMAN WILLIS SHOOTING

Two years before his conviction, tensions reached a boiling point when a local girl, 16-year-old Karman Willis, was shot and killed at Ludwig’s farm. Willis had been riding in one of three pick-up trucks that tore around Trickle Creek in the middle of the night. Drivers did doughnuts and tossed empty beer cans, with one of the vehicles coming to within a meter of hitting a tent where four of the Ludwig children, all girls, were sleeping.

What started out as a pleasant night outdoors for the Ludwig children turned into a night of terror. They didn’t know if they’d be wrapped in canvas and dragged to death under a speeding truck — driven, as it turned out — by some under-aged drinkers.

A bullet ricocheted off the frame of one of the pick-ups, striking Willis. It was a dark day for the rule of law. A weapon was never found and no one was charged with the shooting. However, not one of the intruders was charged either. They faced a number of criminal offences, including trespassing at night, impaired and dangerous driving. You can file that one under selective prosecution.

The taxpayers picked up the bill for counselling given to the drunks who nearly killed or maimed four girls that night. Instead of counselling, the Ludwig children were detained at gunpoint in a police occupation that dragged on for days.

THE 2010 POLICE RAID

In January 2010, the RCMP again occupied Trickle Creek — this time about 200 officers — to search for evidence in the bombing of a gas pipeline near Tom’s Lake, BC, about an hour’s drive away. Mounties told reporters they had proof (DNA evidence) that Wiebo Ludwig was connected to the bombings. Reporters then went with the story. Some reported the RCMP allegation as fact.

Ludwig was tricked into thinking he was meeting with Mounties in nearby Grande Prairie, but when he got there he was arrested and locked up for 24-hours. Ludwig was never charged with the Tom’s Lake bombings. That’s because Crown prosecutors in British Columbia didn’t think the evidence was as strong as RCMP believed.

Boonstra finds it odd the Mounties didn’t get around to meet with Ludwig in his final days. If police believed Ludwig shot Willis, or was behind the BC bombings, he wonders why investigators wouldn’t want to talk with him one final time in the hope they might get a deathbed confession.

Here’s the audio of the interview with Richard Boonstra. It runs about 7 minutes.

Download: boonstra-aug-26_12.m4a

Ludwig, a carpenter, built his own coffin in February 2012 when he realized his battle with cancer was going south. In his final media interview published by the Toronto Star and The Dominion [http://www.dominionpaper.ca/articles/4396], a weakened Ludwig revealed he was looking forward to “crossing over.”

“[Death] doesn’t bother me. It is apparent to everyone there is an afterlife, even though we repress that in our anxieties. I am eager for redemption, eager to see what’s there. I just hope I die without too much pain.”

Ludwig got his wish, thanks to a combination of herbal medicine, oxycontin and morphine. Right up to the day he died, Ludwig went for walks, arm-in-arm with Maime, his wife of 43 years.

Ludwig’s Coffin

WIEBO LUDWIG’S FINAL WORDS

During the morning of 9 April, 2012 residents of Trickle Creek made their way to the log cabin where their leader, frail and lying on a couch, blessed them one by one. Wiebo Arienes Ludwig took his final breath at 11:30 a.m. on Easter Monday. “Think I’m afraid of dying …?” he said. “Hardly.” His last words were a request that family members not quarrel and that they keep the faith.

No outsiders were permitted at the funeral service, held in the family’s large dining hall. I first learned of Wiebo’s death when one of his sons phoned late that afternoon.

Family members wept openly when I played recordings of my final interviews with Wiebo. I had called Trickle Creek on 2 April 2012 for an update on his condition. Ludwig, his voice clearly weakened, managed to get to the phone. “Why are you calling?” he asked. I said I was curious to see if he’d died on April Fools Day. It was the last time we spoke.

LIFE AT TRICKLE CREEK AFTER LUDWIG’S DEATH

What has changed at Trickle Creek since Wiebo Ludwig’s death? Plenty, yet much remains the same. Trickle Creek continues to be managed by a council of eight family members, its spiritual core essentially the way it was when Wiebo was alive. Residents are nearly free of distractions from the outside world, allowing them to focus on projects and getting things done. Women don’t spend time or money on make-up, and no one takes an interest in the lives of movie stars, or follows the soaps on TV.

Trickle Creek remains a strong Christian community, bordering, if you will, on Old Testament-like values. Meals are followed by readings from the Scriptures.

As far as I could tell, no one at Trickle Creek is addicted to cigarettes, drugs, alcohol, gambling … or television. The adults put in 25-hour work-weeks, working every day except Sundays. Sundays at Trickle Creek remind me of Sundays from the 1950s, when life came to a standstill.

Food and herbs are homegrown, and no one in the community suffers from obesity. The children have chores; they pick berries, babysit, help with the harvest, feed the chickens, shovel snow, do the dishes and milk the goats and cows. For kicks, the youngsters ride bikes, collect cattails, play volley ball, soccer, hop-scotch and learn crafts. They don’t spend time following regular TV programs, although they do watch educational DVDs, such as documentaries on nature and travel.

There are no video games at Trickle Creek. Put it this way: the apple products they admire hang on trees and the twitter comes from birds.

That’s not to say the small Christian community doesn’t have its challenges. It does, and they’re no different from problems people in the “outside world” face … whether it’s coping with freezing weather, vehicle repairs, dental and other health issues, the threat from gas leaks, pesticides and so on.

Some changes have taken place since Wiebo died. His log cabin — the first structure at the complex — has been moved closer to the forest; a second floor has been added and the inside is being refurbished. The flooring will be tongue-and-grooved wood cut locally and milled on site.

Trickle Creek gazebo with Ludwig’s relocated log cabin in the background

Plans are underway to build another multiple-story building, complete with a turret, an elevator — and an aerial walkway; the idea is that in cold weather people can travel between buildings without having to don extra clothing.

A huge barn was recently constructed to store five thousand bales of hay and to give livestock shelter on cold winter days.

         Salome Ludwig beside new barn at Trickle Creek.                                                                          

Before I pulled out of Trickle Creek to return to Edmonton I chatted with beekeeper Fritz Ludwig. “Sorry if I seem out of place here,” I explained, “I don’t go to church.” Holding a young child in his arms and swaying from side to side, the bearded Fritz smiled and replied, “neither do we.”

To hear Wiebo Ludwig’s final interview — recorded in his log cabin in late February, 2012 — click on the right-pointing arrow. The interview runs just over 17 minutes.