What drives a man in his 40s to break into a residential building scheduled for demolition in his hometown in the dead of night and find himself hunting for a hidden door leading underground? The answer is likely a certain obsession and a dark secret that, despite decades of rumors, remains unexposed.
The Washington Post followed Brazilian journalist Clóvis Messerschmidt, who is convinced residents of his town have concealed secrets for decades about the escape of Nazis from Germany and crimes they committed during World War II.
Clovis, a small-town journalist for a local paper with circulation under 1,000 copies in Ibirubá, has devoted his life to finding the secret tunnel system that many town residents say lies beneath the town center and was used to smuggle Nazi war criminals and stolen property they brought from Europe. The town, where most residents have German ancestry dating to the 19th century, has been home to persistent rumors and mutual accusations among residents about Nazi collaboration.
At the heart of the investigation is Dr. Frederico Ernesto Braun, a town resident under whose house the journalist searched for tunnels and hidden chambers. According to Merschmidt, Braun faked his death in 1964 after a long life of conspiracies and crime, and maintained contact over the years with senior Nazis. An old photograph of Braun beside a man in a Nazi uniform confirms the theory for the journalist.
If the details sound somewhat implausible, it's worth noting that both contemporary newspapers and Brazilian police records show that a Nazi cell did operate in the town, gathering weapons, portraits of Hitler, and money to aid Nazi Germany during the war. Is it implausible to think the same cell mobilized after the war to help senior regime figures escape? Moreover, Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal said at the time he received evidence that senior Nazi Martin Bormann was spotted in the Brazilian town. However, so far, Merschmidt's searches have raised more questions than they have answered.
At Braun's house, he discovered a hidden door leading to an underground chamber, which was sealed by high concrete walls. In other locations around town, he discovered mysterious shafts, but nothing beyond that.
"The soil in Ibirubá is dense and thick, without rocks or gravel, which is perfect soil for growing soybeans but terrible for digging tunnels. Amazingly, no one thinks that for 60 years, no such tunnel has collapsed," Brazilian historian Rene Gertz told The Washington Post.
He believes all Messerschmidt has is circumstantial evidence and an obsession. "This is another unfortunate case of a Brazilian town trying to deal with its Nazi past and with conspiracy theories," he told the American newspaper. But Messerschmidt himself hasn't ceased his search for the Nazi tunnel system. "What began as an article marking 60 years since the establishment of the town center has become a relentless search for the truth," he said.
