Trier, Germany - German state prosecutors said on Thursday that they had dropped a probe into lurid claims of ritual killings and cannibalism by an alleged Satanic sect because they appeared to have been made up.
The claims were made by a woman who said she had been a victim for 18 years of sexual abuse by members of a Satanic and cannibalistic cult, including relatives.
She said she was repeatedly forced to undergo abortions at "procreation ceremonies," while at other rituals victims were killed, their corpses sawn up and parts of them eaten.
In a statement to police in April 2002, the then 33-year-old woman claimed the ceremonies took place in and around Trier, western Germany, and once in Belgium.
However, state prosecutor Horst Roos said investigations had found nothing to substantiate her allegations, and many of them had been proved to be untrue.
Roos said in a statement that psychiatric and medical experts who examined her found her allegations "highly unlikely to be based on actual events."
The findings tallied with police investigations which showed that not only were her claims doubtful, but many had been successfully contradicted.
In some cases, police found that the events could not have taken place, in others that her claims were so inconsistent that it was impossible to find any basis for reality.
"In sum, nothing remains of the alleged actions that were still able to be investigated," he concluded.
The development comes amid the continuing murder trial in Kassel, central Germany, of a man who has admitted killing, carving up and eating another man he had met on the Internet, apparently with his victim's consent.