Boy Forced to Live in Forest with Father for 5 Years Found in Germany

[sapphi_snake]

ArnoldRimmer said:

After reading more about this, I'm getting a strong feeling that at least parts of the boy's story are made up.

- While his tent and his sleeping bag indeed showed signs of camping outdoors, his clothes and fingernails were clean and the boy's overall appearance was well-groomed and well-fed. Quite extraordinary for someone living in the forest for the last five years.
- The boy says he neither remembers his last name, not even the country he came from (he speaks English fluently but hardly any word of german) nor anything else that happened more than five years ago. Yet he remembers his date of birth, his and his mother's first name and the fact that she died five years ago in a car accident.
So according to his story, he lived a rather normal life until the age of 12, but he remembers absolutely nothing about that time yet he perfectly remembers everything since?

Of course I'm not an expert on amnesia, there are probably some really strange cases - but I'm nevertheless sceptic about this story - as are the policemen in Berlin where he turned up. Remember the "piano man" who had a somewhat similar amesia story that turned out to be fake.
And as far as I know, most "real" amnesia people provide a rather confused impression, while this boy doesn't.

The other possibility I see is that maybe his father had a criminal past and was therefor hiding. Since his mother's death, having amnesia and living in the forest all happened pretty much at the same time (five years ago), it seems very plausible that all three incidents are connected. Maybe the father actually killed the mother and then started hiding from the police in the forest. In this case, his seemingly absent memory might be real but rather denial than amnesia.

This is an interesting possibility you've brought up here.