New vehement accusations against another Rammstein member

Over the weekend, the band Rammstein gave two concerts in Berlin. They are “back home,” frontman Till Lindemann told the audience. Many people came to see the musicians play. But there were also many protesters.

Because there are allegations of sexual abuse against singer Till Lindemann. After Ireland’s Shelby Lynn publicly reported her experiences at a Rammstein concert in Lithuania in late May, several women came forward and explained that sexual acts with the singer had not been consensual. The presumption of innocence remains.

A report by NDR and “Süddeutsche Zeitung” now suggests that sexual assaults by band members happened much earlier than previously thought. The focus of the investigation is not on Till Lindemann, but on keyboardist Christian Flake Lorenz.

Jasmin Stevens, then 17, whose name was changed by NDR and SZ, met Till Lindemann in 2002 at an autograph session. She was in love with him, she recalls. Later she went with friends to a bar in Berlin’s Prenzlauer Berg district. There she met Lindemann and Flake, the two were already world stars at the time. Lindemann asked the girl if she would not like to come to Flake’s country house in Brandenburg without her friends, and she agreed.

Stevens initially told the musicians she was 22 years old, but revealed her real age when they arrived at the mansion. Still, the men would have given her drink and beer. They also drank a lot, Stevens recalls.

The young woman later had a strange feeling, she explains today. Her mouth felt extremely dry. The walls gave the impression that they were moving. After Lindemann went to bed, she too lay down in one of the upstairs rooms.

Flake then lay down next to her. She was stunned and could only turn around. The musician turned his back on her and had sex with her. She didn’t want to, but she also couldn’t say no, much less fight back. You just lay there.

Flake, then in her thirties, should have realized she was at least heavily drunk. Stevens remembers that she was just crazy.

She confirmed her testimony under oath. The experience shapes her to this day. She was in therapy. Recordings of the therapist, photographs of the book signing, and statements from former colleagues and friends are available to NDR and SZ. The witnesses also confirmed their testimonies in lieu of an oath.

Flake has already responded to the allegations and has had them dismissed by his lawyers. It was about his privacy, but also about insufficiently documented facts. Till Lindemann left certain questions unanswered when asked.

Another woman reports a similar experience. They are even further behind. Sybille Herder, also her name was changed, was 22 years old when she met some Rammstein members. After a concert in Gera, the band’s big breakthrough would not come until two years later.

Herder went to the hotel with several people after the concert. The group celebrated in a swimming pool and then in the hotel room. Lindemann and Flake would have been among them. Herder lost consciousness at one point and woke up naked on the floor in the morning. Flake lay next to her.

She suffered from severe abdominal pain. She’d had sex before and then again, but her stomach never felt as “torn” as it did back then. Sybille Herder could barely walk to the tram and was in severe pain for days afterwards.

But she couldn’t remember what could have happened that night. Anyone at the party could have been responsible for her pain. She has never had a film tear in her life, explains Herder. She secured her statements under oath.

She was silent for a long time until Lindemann published the poem “When you sleep” in March 2020. She was stunned that he actually wrote publicly about the rape of a drugged woman. Sybille Herder wrote a letter to publisher Kiwi, in which Lindemann’s collection of poems appeared, but did not send it. A PDF file is available for NDR and SZ, the metadata shows the date 2020.

In April 2020, Herder contacted SWR, who had published a review of the poem. The broadcaster acknowledged receipt of the message and regrets that it never responded to NDR and SZ requests. Herder also addressed the Weisser Ring, the case documentation is available to NDR and SZ.

Both Flake and Lindemann had the allegations rejected by their lawyers while at the same time referring to their privacy. Moreover, these are insufficiently documented facts. The presumption of innocence remains in effect.