Prescott, AZ (GlossyNews) — Captain Dudley Engelbrook, 91, of Chino Valley, Arizona is seeking asylum in Greece, Iceland, and several other European countries. Years of shoddy health care combined with the loss of veterans’ benefits, says the proud veteran of the Battle of the Bulge, “made life hell” for him.
Tired of living in subsidized housing, where he was afraid to come and go and was “surrounded by psychos, thieves, druggies, racist gangsters and murderers” — and even offered child prostitutes — he decided in 2003 to rent a small, dilapidated barn from a girlfriend. She was also the head of the local American Legion outpost, and Engelbrook later came to realize she was the daughter of Adolf Hitler. “I kept seeing all these skinheads come and go, and then I recognized the similar facial structure in her and her family‘s faces,” he said, “and there were family photos with certain faces cut out. Maybe he (Hitler) was secretly brought to Arizona after WWII? I don‘t know.”
Kind and humorous, soft-spoken yet determined, he said “I just can’t take it anymore. After 15 minutes, you’re talkin’ to the doctor’s back. They got me on fast-track.”
That was the least of his worries, he says. To make ends meet, he rented out a converted outhouse (on the same property as his landlord’s) to six Mexican immigrants in 2006. In return, they grew food, cooked for him, bathed him, cared for his pet cats, cleaned his barn, taught him Spanish, took him to the Post Office, doctor’s appointments and other errands, as well as on extended walks twice a day. Crossing the highway, however, proved to be a harrowing experience.
“This is basically a highway with some corporations attached, you see, and there aren’t enough traffic lights or sidewalks. There’s no center to it — it’s all spread out, poorly planned and pretty ugly. There’s a Safeway and that’s it! If you’re not feeling social, you go to one of the fast food joints. Most of the people living here don’t work here–they commute. There are two or three intersections for 15,000 people plus all the people just passing through. Sometimes it takes 15 minutes of waiting for a clearing so we can just cross the damn thing. People are getting in accidents all the time.”
In his walks, he began noticing the numerous roadside memorials dotting the highway, and began photographing them, citing that “there’s sixteen in a two mile stretch alone — most of them teenagers.” An avid photographer in his youth and during the war, he said it brought back painful memories for him.
He was so dismayed at the situation that he compiled an album of his photographs and sent it along with a detailed letter to Governor Jan Brewer. It took six months of repeated letter writing before an agent of the Department of Economic Services showed up at his door. He was interviewed briefly and told that, due to his unorthodox living arrangement, a building inspection would have to be performed. He was then asked for proof of citizenship, which he could no longer provide–having lost his passport during one of his moves. Police arrived, cuffed him, and took him to an outdoor prison facility “in the middle of nowhere,” where he was forced to wear pink underwear, sleep in 120 degree heat, and was repeatedly raped by members of the Aryan Brotherhood gang, apparently for speaking Spanish to other inmates.
After three weeks of hell, in and out of consciousness and “half-dead,” his citizenship was finally confirmed and he was released. He took a Greyhound bus to Prescott and hitched a ride to Chino Valley, where he discovered that both his barn and the outhouse had been razed to the ground. “They were just piles of rubble,” he said, wet-eyed, “and I never saw those Mexicans again–even the crops were tore up.”
His landlord wouldn’t answer her door and just when he was about to either hitch a ride back to Prescott or “collapse from dehydration,” a Mexican man came out of nowhere and offered him his residence in Mexico. A relative of one of his former renters who had made it back to Mexico, he said he had crossed the border (illegally) to offer him assistance. Deeply touched but unwilling to give up the fight just yet, Mr. Engelbrook thanked the gentleman profusely and told him he would instead pursue legal action to secure asylum in one of the countries he had helped liberate in WWII… “perhaps even Germany, some place that‘s kinder to their elders and their youngins, where people don’t just read their Bibles because of some fear of far-right authorities. When the only reason to stay is the absence of martial law, and even that‘s questionable, I need to reevaluate my options. I just hope they (in Europe) recognize what I did for them, at least for my part, and might accommodate me for a few more years. I can still walk and contribute what I can to their society. I know a lot of good jokes.”
Englewood is awaiting a decision while living in a commune in Chino Valley with a group of Salvadoran refugees. He earns a living helping out in their sheet rock business.