Kenyan doomsday cult leader charged with murder of 191 children, Former La Luz del Mundo 'cult' members protest, Ex-Olympian pleads guilty to sexually assaulting boys

 

           

 

- Kenyan doomsday cult leader charged with murder of 191 children

- Former La Luz del Mundo 'cult' members protest religious event in Houston

- An ex-Olympian pleads guilty to sexually assaulting boys

 

Kenyan doomsday cult leader charged with murder of 191 children Reuters February 6, 2024

NAIROBI, Feb 6 (Reuters) - Kenyan cult leader Paul Mackenzie and 29 associates were charged on Tuesday with the murder of 191 children whose bodies were found among more than double that number buried in a forest.

The defendants all denied the charges brought before a court in the coastal town of Malindi. One suspect was found mentally unfit to stand trial.
Prosecutors say Mackenzie ordered his followers to starve themselves and their children to death so that they could go to heaven before the world ended, in one of the world's worst cult-related disasters in recent history.

The followers of his Good News International Church lived in several secluded settlements in an 800-acre area within the Shakahola forest. More than 400 bodies were eventually exhumed.

Mackenzie was arrested last April. He has already been charged with terrorism-related crimes, manslaughter and torture. He was also convicted in December of producing and distributing films without a licence and sentenced to 12 months in jail. A former taxi driver, Mackenzie forbade cult members from sending their children to school and from going to hospital when they were ill....

https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/kenyan-cult-leader-charged-with-murder-191-children-2024-02-06/

Former La Luz del Mundo 'cult' members protest religious event in Houston
The Houston First Corporation, which manages the George R. Brown Convention Center downtown, said it has "no legal basis for denying" the megachurch to host an event. By Eric Killelea Feb 12, 2024

The leader of La Luz del Mundo, a Mexico-based Christian megachurch with 18 Houston congregations, has been locked up in a California prison since being arrested on child sexual exploitation charges in 2019. Naasón Joaquín García, the 54-year-old self-described "Apostle of Jesus Christ," pleaded guilty in 2022 to sexually abusing three minors and has been serving a nearly 17-year sentence in prison. He is now facing another 40 years after being charged in October with two felony counts of producing and possessing child pornography.

Meanwhile, documentaries on HBO and Netflix have featured stories from former church members who claim they were brainwashed and sexually abused by leaders in the Christian church.

Regardless of the church's reputation, La Luz Del Mundo—"The Light of the World"—has managed to book an event meant to attract thousands of members from Houston and across the United States and Mexico to the George R. Brown Convention Center near Discovery Green downtown, taking place Monday through Wednesday. In the past two weeks, Houston church members have been distributing digital flyers displaying animated versions of García on Facebook to promote the "Holy Supper 2024" event....

Judith Castillo is among the growing number of former members of the church's Houston congregations that have been asking state lawmakers, Mayor John Whitmire, city council members and Houston First, the government corporation that operates the George R. Brown Convention Center, to cancel the event. Castillo told them that both she and her daughter had been sexually abused by church members in Houston.

"This convention is a way the church tries to prove that they're still powerful," Castillo, a PhD student at the University of Houston, said Sunday. "We need to protect the integrity of the city and protect our kids from the members of the church who will attend this event. So, knowing all the facts, why is the city allowing this message of corruption?".... https://www.chron.com/culture/religion/article/la-luz-del-mundo-houston-convention-18662983.php

 

Unveiled: Surviving La Luz Del Mundo - HBO Documentary
This documentary series explores the horrifying, yet relatively unknown story of the Christian church La Luz del Mundo (LLDM) and the sexual abuse that scores of members, many of them minors, say they have suffered at the hands of its successive leaders, known as the “Apostles.” Told from the point of view of the survivors who met to share their stories of abuse, the series chronicles the history of one of the most powerful religious groups not only in Mexico where it was founded, but also in the United States, while giving voice to the men and women who were brave enough to stand up and call out the heinous crimes.

Under the guise of the only true church offering eternal salvation, LLDM, which claims to have congregations in over 50 countries and over five million followers, was founded in 1926 by Aarón Joaquín Gonzalez. Joaquín Gonzalez was succeeded by his son and then grandson, all three Apostles said to be appointed by “divine revelation.” Now, scores of former members have come forward to describe how the Apostles built and maintained a system to procure and groom children for abuse. The series culminates in the events leading up to the 2019 arrest of the current Apostle, Naasón Joaquín García and his present-day trial, shedding light on a story that was all but ignored by mainstream media, and illustrating the positive power of social media to unite and provide agency to the survivors.

https://www.hbo.com/unveiled-surviving-la-luz-del-mundo 

The Darkness within La Luz del Mundo 2023 Netflix Documentary

For the first time, complainants against La Luz del Mundo megachurch leaders expose the abuses they suffered through exclusive interviews. https://www.netflix.com/title/81404182 

 

An ex-Olympian pleads guilty to sexually assaulting boys – but the total number of victims ‘remains unknown,’ DA says Holly Yan and Nic F. Anderson, CNN February 10, 2024

As boys, they trusted him as a revered coach and mentor. As men, they say he’s a “monster” who used his Olympic fame to manipulate young athletes and sexually assault them.

Now, more than four decades after Conrad Mainwaring trained young athletes at a Massachusetts sports camp, the 72-year-old pleaded guilty this week to 14 counts of indecent assault and battery involving nine male victims.

In addition to the criminal cases in Massachusetts, at least seven men have accused Mainwaring of sexual assault in civil lawsuits in New York state, an attorney representing them told CNN. And there could be more victims who have yet to come forward....

Immediately after the Olympics, Mainwaring moved to Massachusetts to work at Camp Greylock – a boys’ sports camp in Berkshire County – from 1976 to 1979, the district attorney said. “While working at the camp, the Defendant is confirmed to have sexually abused nine children,” Shugrue said in a written statement. CNN has reached out to Camp Greylock for comment. For decades, the victims’ abuse was a closely guarded secret. Some accusers told CNN they had felt too uncomfortable or even ashamed to speak out....

Waxman said Mainwaring was such an “expert manipulator” that he didn’t realize he had been sexually assaulted until years later, when he was in college. Then he felt a wave of shame and self-loathing, the victim told his abuser in court Thursday.
“Over time, as I realized what you had done, I began to experience many self-damaging thoughts: ‘What was wrong with me? Why did you choose me in the first place? Why didn’t I stop you? I must be defective in some way or ways,’” Waxman told Mainwaring. “Those negative thoughts took up space in my head for decades.”

Mainwaring pleaded guilty to 14 counts – or instances – of sexual assault involving nine male victims who were between 13 and 19 years old at the time. As part of a plea deal, he was sentenced to 10 to 11 years in prison, a spokesperson for the Berkshire County District Attorney’s Office said. But more allegations of rampant abuse by Mainwaring have emerged....

After Mainwaring left Camp Greylock in 1979, he moved to upstate New York to study guidance and counseling at Syracuse University, according to a civil court filing. He was also employed as a resident adviser.

In 1980, Mainwaring also started working with “high school student athletes at the nearby Nottingham High School,” another court filing says....
In a statement to CNN, the Syracuse City School District said it “has no records that Conrad Mainwaring was ever a staff member or a sanctioned volunteer at Nottingham or in the Syracuse City School District.” But the Olympian quickly earned the teenager’s trust and friendship, and the pair would speak regularly – often in a guidance counselor’s office, Kriesberg said. “We would talk about school and sports and whatever teenage boys want to talk about,” Kriesberg told CNN. “He was part counselor, part mentor, part coach, part friend, big brother, therapist.”

But later, Kriesberg said, he realized Mainwaring was actually a manipulative “monster.” “I was being groomed – sort of set up for the kill, so to speak.” In the summer of 1981, when Kriesberg was 17, he visited Mainwaring at his Syracuse University campus home.

Mainwaring then started massaging Kriesberg....” the complaint says. “Mainwaring used intimidation, fear, fraud, force and his position of power and authority over Joseph,” the lawsuit says. “Mainwaring told Joseph that this procedure was necessary so he could properly understand Joseph’s sex drive and provide proper counseling. Joseph did not consent to Mainwaring’s sexual assault.”

The lawsuit names Syracuse University as a defendant, saying it “did not conduct a background check, did not contact Mainwaring’s prior employment, including his employment with Camp Greylock, and did not collect references from Mainwaring” prior to allowing him to live on campus and hiring him as a resident adviser. A Syracuse University spokesperson declined to comment on Mainwaring and the sexual assault allegations against him, citing “still active litigation.”
Kriesberg said he could not pursue criminal action against Mainwaring for the alleged 1981 incident at Syracuse because the statute of limitations in New York state has passed. That’s why he’s pursuing civil action.

At least six other men have also accused Mainwaring of sexual assault in civil lawsuits filed in New York state, said Kat Thomas, an attorney representing those plaintiffs.... https://www.aol.com/news/ex-olympian-pleads-guilty-sexually-211219752.html   

 

Class action suit by families of those brainwashed in Montreal medical experiments gets go-ahead, Brainwashed: The echoes of MK-ULTRA

Class action suit by families of those brainwashed in Montreal medical experiments gets go-ahead

Treatments included chemically induced sleep for weeks, rounds of electroshocks
CBC News Mar 03, 2022

 

A lawsuit against the Canadian government, the Royal Victoria Hospital and the McGill University Health Centre is moving ahead.

 

About 55 families of victims who underwent medical experimentation in the 1950s and 1960s are suing for millions of dollars.

Alison Steel says her mother was never the same after undergoing brainwashing experiments at Montreal's Allan Memorial Institute.

 

Treatments included chemically induced sleep for weeks, rounds of electroshocks and experimental drugs....

Steel is one of the main plaintiffs in a lawsuit against the Canadian government, the Royal Victoria Hospital and the McGill University Health Centre (MUHC).

 

How the CIA's MK-ULTRA mind-control experiments laid the groundwork for torture methods used today
The plaintiffs allege the Government of Canada funded psychiatric treatments by Dr. Ewen Cameron at the Allan Memorial Institute between 1950 to 1964. They claim the government played a role in the supervision and control of these experiments, which were part of the CIA's MK-ULTRA program of covert mind-control.

The defendants had moved to partially dismiss the case, but Quebec Superior Court dismissed the defence's request on Feb. 23.

 

Lawyer Alan Stein says the lawsuit, seeking about $1 million per family on top of legal costs "to compensate them for their [physical and emotional] loss," can now move ahead....
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/class-action-lawsuit-families-montreal-brainwashing-mk-ultra-1.6371416

 

Brainwashed: The echoes of MK-ULTRA
During the Cold War, the CIA secretly funded mind-control experiments on unwitting Canadians in a program codenamed MK-ULTRA. The experiments laid the groundwork for modern-day torture techniques. And victims and their families are still seeking recognition and justice.

By Michelle Shephard, Lisa Ellenwood and Chris Oke

October 21, 2020

The following story is based on material from the CBC podcast Brainwashed, a six-part series co-produced with The Fifth Estate that investigates the CIA's covert mind-control experiments — from the Cold War and MK-ULTRA to the so-called U.S. war on terror.

 

But many of the details are laid out in a thick file of documents, correspondences and reports. He has news articles and pictures spanning decades, all describing what his family went through. And he has his mother's heartwrenching medical report that is still hard for him to comprehend.

 

"She had her 30th and last day of sleep on March 24th," Schrier said as he read from the 1960 hospital record.

"They gave her all the drugs … about four or five barbiturates and amphetamines at a time."

 

Esther Schrier received electroshock therapy, massive amounts of drugs and so-called psychiatric treatments that sound as if they were lifted from the pages of George Orwell's dystopian novel, Nineteen Eighty-Four.

She was a patient at Montreal’s Allan Memorial Institute in the 1960s. She had gone to "the Allan," as the hospital is known, to seek treatment for what today would be considered anxiety or postpartum depression.

But once she walked through those hospital doors and into the care of a psychiatrist named Dr. Ewen Cameron, she became an unwitting experiment subject for a massive CIA brainwashing operation codenamed MK-ULTRA.

 

And Schrier was part of this clandestine program, too, because his mother was pregnant with him at the time.

"It's crazy," said Schrier. "I don't think it was fair to do that to a developing fetus."...

 

Hundreds of relatives whose loved ones were experimented upon by Cameron are now demanding compensation for family members and an apology from the Canadian government.

 

Canada has never provided a list of the victims of the experiments that took place during Cameron's tenure from 1943 to 1964. In the decades since, no government has ever admitted liability, let alone apologized — despite the fact that part of the experiments in Montreal were funded not only by the CIA, but also by the Canadian government....

 

But the story of MK-ULTRA isn't just relegated to Cold War history. 

 

The idea of mind control — the theory that breaking a person down will make them do something against their will — has been constantly revisited by governments during other periods of fear and uncertainty, when the military and medicine collide. 

What happened at Montreal's Allan Memorial Institute laid the groundwork for torture spanning decades to follow....

https://newsinteractives.cbc.ca/longform/brainwashed-mkultra/ 

Rep. Speier looks back on surviving Jonestown, Cult victim tortured

40 years later, Rep. Speier looks back on surviving Jonestown
Nov 19, 2018

This weekend marked the 40th anniversary of the Jonestown massacre, in which more than 900 followers of Jim Jones were victims of a cult mass murder-suicide in Guyana. Among the survivors was Jackie Speier, now a Democratic congresswoman from California. She joins Judy Woodruff to discuss her new book, “Undaunted: Surviving Jonestown, Summoning Courage, and Fighting Back" and current politics.

 

Judy Woodruff:
Yesterday marked the 40th anniversary of the Jonestown massacre, the mass murder-suicide that left more than 900 followers of cult leader Jim Jones dead in the South American country of Guyana.

 

Congressman Leo Ryan was in Jonestown with a small team investigating the cult's activities, and was shot and killed by Jones' followers.

 

But one of his aides on that trip, Jackie Speier, now herself a Democratic congresswoman from California, survived, and I spoke with her recently about her harrowing experience.

 

Rep. Jackie Speier, D-Calif.:
Congresswoman Ryan was the congressman that I worked for at the time. He made that trip to Jonestown because many of his constituents had young adults who had gotten involved in this church in San Francisco called The Peoples Temple, and was led by a man by the name of Jim Jones.

 

As more and more criticism started to come out about sexual abuse and physical abuse and money laundering, he then took about 900 of his members to Jonestown, where he had been building a commune for about two years.

And concerned relatives came to Congressman Ryan. There were defectors who also came and told him of really untoward things happening at that compound. And the congressman wanted to find out what was really going on.

The State Department was basically telling us there really wasn't a story there, there really wasn't anything to talk about. And, unfortunately, we found out something very different.

 

Judy Woodruff:
You went there. You sensed in a very short period of time that something was terribly wrong.

And then, as you were leaving with some people who were ready to defect, some of the followers of Jim Jones came and shot to death five people. And you were badly wounded, shot five times.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/40-years-later-rep-speier-looks-back-on-surviving-jonestown

 

 

'Rot in hell': Cult victim tortured, forced to commit bestiality, brutally murdered
21 Nov, 2018

WARNING - DISTURBING CONTENT

The ex-partner of a father-of-two who was tortured to death by a sadistic cult ....

 

Vulnerable Jimmy Prout suffered months of abuse at the hands of a group led by wheelchair bound Zahid Zaman, before his body was discovered in wasteland just yards from his home in North Shields, North Tyneside....

 

Chilling CCTV footage shows Mr Prout in the days before he was murdered, looking gaunt and frail as he is dragged along a street by his killers.

Now his ex partner of 14 years has spoken of the horrors that Mr Prout was subjected to during his final few months alive, and how she hopes his killers will die in jail.

 

Ms Carter is interviewed for Cults, Taboos and Twisted Faith UK on Crime and Investigation tonight, telling of her disbelief at why Mr Prout was never able to escape the clutches of the group before he was killed.

Ms Carter, who split with Mr Prout before he was brainwashed, said she regrets ever leaving him....

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=12163725

 

 

Lawyers release the names of 212 alleged priest sex offenders in Bay Area, Kenyan widows are fighting against sexual 'cleansing', Memoir ‘The Burn Zone’ former cult member tells all

-  Lawyers release the names of 212 alleged priest sex offenders in Bay Area

-  These Kenyan widows are fighting against sexual 'cleansing'

-  In memoir ‘The Burn Zone,’ former cult member tells all 

Lawyers release the names of 212 alleged priest sex offenders in Bay Area

By: Lisa Fernandez , Cristina Rendon Oct 23 2018

SAN FRANCISCO (KTVU) - As dioceses around the country are disclosing names of priests accused of misconduct, a law firm on Tuesday released a report containing the names of 212 Catholic Clergy members accused of sexual misconduct in the Bay Area.

The report, compiled by lawyers from Jeff Anderson and Associates based in St. Paul, Minn., accuses 135 offenders from the Archdiocese of San Francisco, 95 from the Diocese of Oakland and 33 from the Diocese of San Jose. A total of 130 of these priests are dead....

Anderson and his team are seeking to compel Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone in San Francisco, Bishop Patrick McGrath in San Jose and Bishop Michael Barber in Oakland to release the names of all clergy accused of sexual misconduct in all three dioceses and request the federal court to release files that show the participation and complicity of top church officials in the handling of clergy sexual abuse cases. There are at least 133 priests who are alive, but whose whereabouts are not immediately known to the public, the lawyers said.

KTVU reached out to all the dioceses on Tuesday. Oakland Diocese spokeswoman Helen Osman said in an email that Barber announced earlier this month that he would release a full list of credibly accused clergy within 45 days. "We have nothing to hide," Barber said at the time....

Dioceses across California and the U.S. have been disclosing names as part of an effort by church leaders to reassure parishioners following a stunning August report by Pennsylvania authorities.

The report detailed extensive efforts to cover up decades of abuse involving clergy and children.

https://www.fox26houston.com/news/lawyers-release-the-names-of-263-alleged-priest-offenders-in-bay-area

These Kenyan widows are fighting against sexual 'cleansing'
Across Women's Lives GlobalPost October 23, 2018 
By Louise Donovan and Hannah O'Neill

When Esther Atema’s husband died, she was treated like dirt. People suddenly looked at her funny — villagers shouted, "Witch!" as she walked past. The local boys in Siaya County, southwest Kenya, would get drunk and chase her down the road. If they caught her, they’d beat her to a pulp.

At 35 years old, she had become a widow. And, in some rural parts of Kenya, widowhood means you’re of little value. Culturally, widows are considered impure, and tradition dictates that they must be cleaned — or “cleansed” — of their partners’ death. The aim is to chase away the demons; the ritual requires women to have sex — either with a relative or stranger.

Sure enough, one year after his death, Atema’s late husband’s family forced her to go through the cleansing process....

The order can vary slightly but the ceremony typically goes like this: You begin by having sex on the floor. In the morning, you burn your clothes and the sack you slept on, and the man shaves the widow’s hair. Sometimes, it happens outside, in front of the house — where the whole neighborhood can see. Together, you slaughter a chicken (a staple in the diet here), which you cook and eat. The ceremony lasts three days but can be drawn out for up to seven.

“I felt humiliated,” said Atema. “But I was told my children would die if I didn’t go through with it.”

If you refuse to be cleansed, you’re shunned from society. Women, like Atema, believe their children will be harmed, and that going uncleansed will block any chance of future marriage. But in a society rife with HIV and AIDS, despite improvements, accepting means you run the risk of disease — using a condom doesn’t complete the ritual properly so people go without.

After the cleansing, the widow is traditionally inherited, whereby she marries another man (usually a brother-in-law). Yet, she still has no rights — and millions of widows across Africa are kicked out of their homes by their in-laws, robbed of their property and made vulnerable to rape.

“Why don’t women have a choice?” said Atema, now 40. “You don’t know who this person is; they could hurt or kill you. No one checks if they’re HIV-free.”....

Ritual cleansing has been reported in 17 countries in sub-Saharan Africa. The stigma stems, says Karen Brewer of Widows Rights International, from the notion that men are stronger than women.

“If a man dies, it can’t just be because he’s old,” she said. “The woman must have done witchcraft against him. It’s superstition but people who are educated in these communities realize things can be done differently.”

One of those people is Roseline Orwa. She’s among a growing number of widows’ rights activists in Kenya pushing for change. In the fishing village where she grew up, on the windy shores of Lake Victoria, she heads up a women’s group that is fighting the practice.

By 32, Orwa had been divorced and widowed. Educated in Nairobi and economically independent with her own textiles business, she refused to be cleansed or inherited and escaped the usual stigma that stalks widows’ lives....

In 2015, she helped outlaw widow cleansing in the country under a domestic offenses bill, though few in rural areas know it exists (or they do and adhere to the tradition anyway, out of fear of being ostracized). So, today, the practice still persists in rural Kenya. Having firsthand experience of widowhood puts Orwa in a unique position — she’s able to understand the challenges that many women around her face. At the same time, she’s powerful enough to do something about it.

“I will not allow you to come into my house at night and rape me in the name of cleansing,” she said. “Why do we tell women: Don’t do anything, sit pretty and wait until we molest you, until we make you lose your dignity and value?”.....

https://www.pri.org/stories/2018-10-23/these-kenyan-widows-are-fighting-against-sexual-cleansing

In memoir ‘The Burn Zone,’ former cult member tells all
Andrew Travers October 8, 2018

Snowmass Village resident Renee Linnell’s new memoir “The Burn Zone” recounts her experience being brainwashed and joining a cult.

Late in her new memoir, "The Burn Zone," Renee Linnell recounts a night out where she dances on a bar, meets a guy and tells him immediately that she had been in a cult for the past seven years.

He responds, "You are the most interesting person I've ever met!"....
But after attending what she thought was a meditation seminar in 2006 in California, led by a charismatic guru in a business suit, Linnell was slowly brainwashed and sucked into a Tantric Buddhist cult. Seven years later — suffering under the emotional, financial and sexual abuse of the University of Mysticism cult's two leaders — she'd lost her money, burned everything she owned, cut herself off from her family and friends and found herself in a form of domestic slavery in New York.

As she woke up to the fact that she was a cult member, Linnell broke free and began a long process of healing. That process brought her to Colorado, where she settled in Snowmass Village and began writing what would become "The Burn Zone."....

The book's roots were in Linnell's journals, where she sought catharsis by writing out her story and purging her emotions.

"I felt I had to get it out of me," she recalled. "There was a lot of shame around the fact that I had let myself get brainwashed and let myself get in such a bad business relationship and lose so much money. And when I was healing, I got fat for the first time in my life. So I was just this fat, broken, lost, confused and broken person who had totally ruined her life."

But as she started opening up to new friends about what had happened to her, they encouraged her to write a book. She realized then that she'd already begun writing it.

As a culture, we don't afford people who have been brainwashed and joined cults the same compassion that we offer victims of other forms of abuse. Linnell, too, had such prejudices until it happened to her. She hopes that her book can help de-stigmatize victims and also help readers see warning signs themselves.

"I had this belief that people who join cults are crazy," she said. "And when you've never been in one, you think, 'The signs are obvious and why would you do that?' You read these things about people committing mass suicide or whatever. I know from experience that it happens so slowly, so insidiously."

She compares the brainwashing process in a cult to being in any toxic relationship, where a partner builds another up and makes them feel loved and cherished, then dismantles their support system and introduces increasingly abusive behavior.

Linnell hopes other victims will follow her and open up about their pasts....

https://www.aspentimes.com/entertainment/in-memoir-the-burn-zone-former-cult-member-tells-all/

Brainwashed : The Secret CIA Experiments in Canada, Disinformation and DID: the Politics of Memory

Brainwashed : The Secret CIA Experiments in Canada

 

It sounded like a bad Hollywood horror movie. Patients at a psychiatric hospital subjected to intensive shock treatments, LSD and drug-induced comas. But for hundreds of Canadians, it was an all-too real nightmare. They were brutal experiments on human guinea pigs -- funded by the Canadian government and the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency.

 

Concerned about the brainwashing of U.S. soldiers who had been Korean prisoners of war, the CIA funded mind-control experiments across North America. They turned to Dr. Ewen Cameron and Montreal’s famed Allen Memorial Institute.

 

In the 1950s and 1960s, patients committed to the hospital for something as simple as post-partum depression were subjected to chemically- induced sleep for weeks and continuous rounds of electroshocks. Many emerged broken and destroyed, their memories erased and minds permanently damaged.

 

The fifth estate first investigated this story in 1980. And for two decades, we kept on the story… following the victims who successfully sued the CIA. And questioning why the Canadian government was so reluctant to admit its responsibility. Never has the federal government apologized for funding those experiments.

Now as result of our reporting, more and more victims and their families are coming forward.

 

An estimated 90 patients were eventually compensated, but hundreds more who tried to get compensation were rejected because the Ottawa said they hadn't been "de-patterned" enough or didn’t have the necessary documents to warrant compensation. Newly unearthed documents reveal how Ottawa kept files secret, misplaced vital documents – and forced victims to keep compensation agreements confidential.

http://www.cbc.ca/fifth/episodes/2017-2018/brainwashed-the-secret-cia-experiments-in-canada

 

Disinformation and DID: the Politics of Memory
Brian Moss, MA, MFT

 

....Ability to discern disinformation

Quality disinformation must contain a high degree of truth or it will be rejected outright. The real value of disinformation is to present pieces of the truth in a way that leads to the wrong conclusions. A secondary purpose being obfuscation in general. There is an overwhelming amount of disinformation on the internet and in our media. Who would have guessed that when Orwell’s “Ministry of Truth” finally arrived, we would embrace it as “Wikipedia.”

 

....In March of 1992 the False Memory Syndrome Foundation was formed claiming to have discovered a new syndrome. “Syndrome” is a clinical term that requires certain agreed upon signs and symptoms indicative of a disorder. The FMSF definition of “false memory” does not meet these criteria

 

....But the foundation was a great deal more than that. Pamela Freyd, the Executive Director and founder of the FMSF, functioned much as Shelly dePue, the “Susquehanna County mom, dairy farmer and teacher” did in our example above. Martin Orne, M.D., Ph.D., and Harold Lief, M.D., were responsible for gathering the respectable appearing advisory board that allowed the foundation to claim it was a scientific organization – and they were the true force behind it. We know that Martin Orne had good reason to be – he was deeply involved with mind-control research at the University of Pennsylvania and many of the survivors coming forward were remembering things that they were never supposed to remember. Better that their memories were false.

 

....One such survivor, Claudia Mullen, R.N., gave testimony to the Presidential Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments on government sponsored mind control and ritual abuse
MKULTRA victims - Claudia Mullen Testimony https://vimeo.com/26846581

 

....Claudia’s fellow survivor (Christine de Nicola) and their therapist (Valerie Wolf) also provided testimony at the same Congressional hearing MKULTRA victims - Valerie Wolf & Christine deNicola Testimonies https://vimeo.com/26848915

 

....Lifton, who is often cited on the atrocities of the Nazi doctors, should be very familiar with “Faustian bargains” – he was a cofounder of the Human Ecology Fund, the CIA contractor that showered both Martin Orne and Ewen Cameron (psychic-driving studies) with research grants in the 1960s. Originally formed in 1955 as the Society for the Investigation of Human Ecology, it changed its name in 1961 to the Human Ecology Fund and was a CIA controlled funding mechanism for studies and experiments (often illegal and unethical) in the behavioral sciences. Lifton was also a project leader for early mind-control research for the Air Force.

 

....Psychic-Driving
I have never worked with a mind-control survivor that was not subjected to repeated psychic-driving. This procedure is based on two concepts: the breaking down of personality, originally referred to as depatterning32, combined with the introduction of new ideas or beliefs – psychic driving. Depatterning is an assault on the personality using any combination of electric shocks; drug states; sensory deprivation; and sleep deprivation. The stated purpose for the original research in this area was for the purpose of interrogation but further investigation extended the possibilities into the area of mind control and manipulation of personality states. The goal is to overwhelm the personality for the purpose of introducing new behavior, thoughts and feelings. After the erosion of one’s sense of self, messages are repeated in a continuous loop over long periods of time and can be further paired with pain or pleasure to generate conditioned responses. When combined with dissociated states new personalities with separate belief systems and behavior can be established.

 

....In August 1977 Canadians reacted with horror and revulsion when they learned that in the 1950’s and early 1960’s, one of the most eminent psychiatrists in the country had used his vulnerable patients as unwitting guinea pigs in brainwashing experiments funded by the CIA and the Canadian government…Dr. Ewen Cameron, the director of Montreal’s Allan Memorial Institute, exposed dozens of his own patients to barbaric treatments from which some never fully recovered.

 

Cameron was not alone in his desire to reprogram the human brain. The U.S. intelligence establishment found in him an eager collaborator, and funded his work substantially and covertly. Eventually, after years of stonewalling by the CIA, nine of the dozens of victims were at last given a chance to claim restitution for Cameron’s “treatments” by taking the powerful U.S. intelligence agency to court.

 

....Sensory deprivation has a devastating psychological impact and can lead to the complete dissolution of the personality accompanied by hallucinations, delusional thinking and general incoherence. It is presently acknowledged as a form of torture; in fact, it is one of a group of “enhanced techniques” that are entirely psychological in nature and unique in that they do not conform to the general public understanding of what torture is.

 

Covert research on DID

The fact that Intelligence and Military sponsored doctors and researchers had intentionally created and used multiple personalities – this was the story that had to remain veiled and silenced and these disinformation efforts go well beyond the FMSF.0

 

....Understanding the true etiology of DID

Complex DID systems are not simply a response to trauma – even horrific trauma such as ritual abuse, though it does have a role to play. Nor is it caused iatrogenically by well-meaning therapists attempting to treat trauma survivors as Wikipedia would have us believe. DID is mind control, intentionally practiced and requiring a great deal of effort and conditioning over a period of many years. To develop an elaborate DID system is to endure an ongoing medical procedure throughout childhood, one that requires clinical settings with access to extensive equipment and pharmaceuticals.

 

....Nazi research continues in the U.S.

General Reinhard Gehlen, the most senior German intelligence officer on the Eastern front…derived much of his information from his role in one of the most terrible atrocities of the war: the torture, interrogation, and murder by starvation of some 4 million Soviet prisoners of war…the success of this interrogation program from the German military’s point of view became, in fact, the cornerstone of Gehlen’s career. It won him his reputation as an intelligence officer and his Major General’s rank.

But these same interrogations were actually a step in the liquidation of tens of thousands of POWs. Prisoners who refused to cooperate were often tortured or summarily shot. Many were executed even after they had given information, while others were simply left to starve to death. True, Gehlen’s men did not personally administer the starvation camps, nor are they known to have served in the execution squads. Such tasks were left to the SS, whose efficiency in such matters is well known.

 

....Yet Gehlen did not suffer the same fate as his victims after the War – most people are stunned to discover that he was working for the U.S. within months of surrendering to American Counterintelligence in May of 1945. Of even greater concern – he brought his entire network of collaborators and Nazi military and intelligence contacts with him.

 

Intelligence networks were just one of the groups exploited after the war. Nazi doctors, chemical warfare specialists, weapons systems developers – scientists in every imaginable field – mind control research included, all found protection and work.

....Waldheim was clearly not a psychopath like Dr. Josef Mengele nor a hate-filled racist like Adolf Hitler…His very ordinariness, in fact, may be the most important thing about him. For if history teaches us anything, it is that the Hitlers and the Mengeles could never have accomplished their atrocious deeds by themselves. It took hundreds of thousands of ordinary men – well-meaning but ambitious men like Kurt Waldheim – to make the Third Reich possible.

 

....The goal of the disinformation campaign was to reframe the dynamics surrounding the abuse of power in ways that made the powerful the victims – those accused of abusing others would become the victims. A secondary goal was to intimidate therapists – making them afraid to listen to survivors. Suing therapists in court was an initial strategy that proved unsuccessful in the long run but still managed to put a chill on the field. How to proceed?

 

What better way than to take the backlash and denial that happens in families when their wounds are acknowledged and amplify it at the societal level – to play out in the media what usually plays out privately in families when hidden trauma is suddenly acknowledge – the rawness, the retaliation, the deep woundedness on all sides, the polarization that does, more often than not, tear families apart.

....Screen memories can be intentionally installed using hypnosis or by manipulating experience. Hypnosis is especially good for screen memories designed to account for lost time. The screen memory is flat and without great detail yet fills in for the missing time and creates a plausible explanation to account for the period when other alters were out.

 

A S [subject] who is able to develop good posthypnotic amnesia will also respond to suggestions to remember events which did not actually occur. On awakening, he will fail to recall the real events of the trance and will instead recall the suggested events. If anything, this phenomenon is easier to produce than total amnesia, perhaps because it eliminates the subjective feeling of an empty space in memory.

 

This from Martin Orne, a founder of the False Memory Syndrome Foundation, and who is heavily implicated in mind-control research.
https://ritualabuse.us/research/did/disinformation-and-did-the-politics-of-memory 

Donald Trump's Authoritarian Politics of Memory, Religious Cult Leaves Minnesota, The Cult Next Door

- Donald Trump's Authoritarian Politics of Memory
Driven by opportunism, pragmatism, or fear, many begin to forget that they used to think certain things were unacceptable.

- Sex Abuse Victim Speaks Out After Religious Cult Leaves Minnesota

- The Cult Next Door: The Moaist Cult Leader Who Kept His Followers Imprisoned In Brixton For Decades
He brain-washed them into thinking he had God-like powers.
- The Cult Next Door

Donald Trump's Authoritarian Politics of Memory

Driven by opportunism, pragmatism, or fear, many begin to forget that they used to think certain things were unacceptable.
    Ruth Ben-Ghiat Jan 22, 2017

President Donald Trump’s journey to the pinnacle of American power has offered the opportunity to study these processes in real time. Although we cannot yet know what kind of president he will be, from his June 2015 declaration of candidacy to his January 2017 inauguration, Trump has undertaken two parallel projects aimed at unsettling the mental habits and moral foundations of American democracy. First, he has cultivated a political persona that inspires adulation and unquestioning loyalty that can be mobilized for action on his behalf. Second, he has initiated Americans into a culture of threat that not only desensitizes them to the effects of bigotry but also raises the possibility of violence without consequence.

The founding moment of this era came one year ago, when Trump declared at a rally, “I could stand on Fifth Avenue and shoot someone and not lose any voters.” Trump signaled that rhetorical and actual violence might have a different place in America of the future, perhaps becoming something ordinary or unmemorable. During 2016, public hatred became part of everyday reality for many Americans: those who identify with the white supremacist alt-right like Richard Spencer openly hold rallies; elected officials feel emboldened to call for political opponents to be shot (as did New Hampshire and Oklahoma State Representatives Al Baldasaro and John Bennett, among others); journalists reporting on Trump and hijab-wearing women seek protection protocols and escorts. The bureaucratic-sounding term many use for this, “normalization,” does not fully render the operations of memory that make it possible. Driven by opportunism, pragmatism, or fear, many begin to forget that they used to think certain things were unacceptable.

The risk is that the parameters of thought and action will be nudged to align with those of the leader, easing the retrofitting of history to suit his personalization of the land’s highest office. Trump’s success at this in a country known for individualism, and with no history of living under an authoritarian ruler, shows how susceptible people are to such approaches....

Authoritarianism needs that predator edge;  that shared understanding that the leader’s body carries within it the potential for violence– and the power to make it difficult to prosecute him. Trump’s attacks on women; his targeting of Muslims, Mexicans, immigrants, and others as dangers to the nation; and the threats from his supporters against the lives of ordinary citizens that follow his criticisms of them on Twitter (such as the union leader Chuck Jones and the college student Lauren Batchelder) all go into the category of things it’s safer not to talk about. Normalization is actually decriminalization, a willingness to forget that such things were once thought of as lawless behavior....
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/01/donald-trumps-authoritarian-politics-of-memory/514004/ 


Sex Abuse Victim Speaks Out After Religious Cult Leaves Minnesota
January 25, 2017
SPOKANE, Wash. (AP) — A victim of sexual abuse by the leader of a religious sect in Minnesota spoke out Wednesday amid concerns that its members have relocated to the state of Washington.

Lindsay Tornambe, 30, and two of her attorneys held a news conference and urged any other possible victims to come forward.

In October, Victor Barnard, 55, longtime leader of the River Road Fellowship, was sentenced to 30 years in prison after he pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting two teenage girls, including Tornambe, who were members of his sect in Minnesota.

Tornambe has filed a lawsuit in Minnesota against leaders of the sect for failing to protect her when she lived as a young girl at the River Road Fellowship near Finlayson.

“Our concern is that children are at risk today because of this cult,” said Leander James of Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, an attorney for Tornambe.

Barnard was the only sect member charged in Minnesota with sex crimes. Lawyers for Tornambe said they were not aware of any abuse occurring in Washington.

They did not know why members had moved to the Spokane and Bellingham areas....

The women said they were among about 10 girls and young women chosen to live in a camp apart from their families as part of Barnard’s “Maidens Group.”

Barnard kept the girls secluded, using religious coercion and intimidation to maintain his control over them, authorities said....
http://minnesota.cbslocal.com/2017/01/25/sex-abuse-victim-speaks-out-after-religious-cult-leaves-minnesota/


The Cult Next Door: The Moaist Cult Leader Who Kept His Followers Imprisoned In Brixton For Decades
He brain-washed them into thinking he had God-like powers.
25/01/2017 
Sara C Nelson Senior Editor, The Huffington Post UK

The 75-year-old cult leader who raped two of his followers and kept his daughter a “slave” for three decades sat impassive as he was jailed for 23 years.

A slight, grey-haired pensioner, there was little hint of the charismatic, arch manipulator Aravindan Balakrishnan truly was.

But since the 1970s Balakrishnan had successfully brainwashed a group of women into thinking he had God-like powers, effectively keeping them psychological prisoners as he subjected them to decades of abuse....

He ran his tiny south London cult, the Workers’ Institute of Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought, with an iron fist – banning his daughter from leaving the house or mixing with other children and sexually assaulting two of his followers.

To keep his devotees in check, Balakrishnan invented an invisible war machine called Jackie which he said could kill or trigger earthquakes if anyone went against his will....

Acclaimed director Vanessa Engle tells the extraordinary story of Balakrishnan’s cult in a BBC2 documentary on Thursday at 9pm.

The Cult Next Door features interviews with two of the women who escaped: Aisha Wahab, a 72-year-old Malaysian woman who was part of the cult for 40 years, and Katy Morgan-Davies, Balakrishnan’s daughter, who was born and raised in captivity....
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/the-cult-next-door-the-moaist-cult-leader-who-kept-3-women-prisoner-in-brixton-for-30-years_uk_5887517be4b0f94bb304fded

The Cult Next Door

This documentary by acclaimed director Vanessa Engle tells the extraordinary story of a strange cult, which came to light in 2013 when a sensational news story broke about three women emerging from a small flat in Brixton in south London after decades in captivity. Tracing the group back to its roots in the 1970s, the film describes how its leader Aravindan Balakrishnan, a student of Indian origin, believed in an international communist revolution and created a tiny political sect that followed the teachings of China's Chairman Mao.

The film features exclusive interviews with two of the women who escaped - Aisha Wahab, a 72-year-old Malaysian woman who was part of Balakrishnan's group for 40 years, and Katy Morgan-Davies, Balakrishnan's daughter, who was born and raised in captivity. The film documents how this left-wing collective evolved into a bizarre pseudo-religious cult, where members were controlled, threatened and brainwashed so that they were too terrified to leave.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08c3vrx

Charles Manson's cult left 7 dead and killed a dream, too, Killer Charles Manson's failing health renews focus on cult murder saga

Charles Manson's cult left 7 dead and killed a dream, too                            
Jan 04, 2017

By JOHN ROGERS and SCOTT SMITH
Associated Press

LOS ANGELES (AP) - The seven grisly murders carried out by Charles Manson's disciples during the summer of 1969 did more than turn the hippie cult leader into the leering face of evil on front pages across America.

To many, the bloodbath exposed the scary underside of the counterculture movement and seemed to mark the end of the peace-and-love era that burst upon the country just two years earlier during San Francisco's Summer of Love.

"The 'Summer of Love' was more a media event than anything else," Todd Gitlin, one of the nation's foremost historians of the 1960s, told The Associated Press in an email Wednesday. "But if hippie paradise was a myth, it was a myth that a lot of people believed in. Manson damaged it gravely."....

A petty criminal who had been in and out of jail since childhood, Manson reinvented himself during the Summer of Love as a long-haired, Christ-like guru spouting Bible verses and Beatles lyrics.

After attracting a few dozen followers from San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury district, many of them young women, runaways or other lost souls, he took them to an old movie ranch on the edge of Los Angeles that he transformed into a commune of sex, drugs and music.

On Aug. 9 and 10, 1969, he sent some of his devotees out on a murderous mission to two of Los Angeles' wealthiest neighborhoods, where they killed pregnant actress Sharon Tate, several of her society friends and others. Most of the victims, including coffee heiress Abigail Folger, were stabbed.

Tate's husband, Oscar-winning director Roman Polanski, was out of the country at the time.

Authorities would learn that Manson had hoped the killings would touch off a race war. He had apparently gotten the idea from a twisted reading of the hard-rocking Beatles song "Helter Skelter."

The slayings shocked the country with their savagery. Messages like "Pigs" and a misspelled "Healter Skelter" were scrawled in the victims' blood on their walls and doors, and the city was paralyzed in fear. Residents of Los Angeles' nearby Laurel Canyon neighborhood, then a haven for musicians, began locking their doors.

The youngest member of the original Manson Family, Leslie Van Houten, a teenage runaway and former homecoming princess from a Los Angeles suburb, said he had brainwashed her and others with sex, LSD, constant readings from the Bible, repeated playings of the Beatles' "White Album" and rambling lectures about triggering a revolution....
http://www.wgem.com/story/34178332/charles-mansons-cult-left-7-dead-and-killed-a-dream-too 

Killer Charles Manson's failing health renews focus on cult murder saga
By Richard Winton, Matt Hamilton and Hailey Branson-Potts  
January 4, 2017

The long saga of Charles Manson, the cult leader whose murder spree more than four decades ago made him a subject of hate, fear, revulsion and fascination, moved to a hospital in downtown Bakersfield this week.

Inside Mercy Hospital, Manson was being treated for gastrointestinal bleeding related to his colon, and according to one source with knowledge of his condition, was seriously ill. Manson was rushed there Sunday from Corcoran State Prison, and it remains unclear when his medical treatment will end....

Manson and other members of his so-called family were convicted of killing actress Sharon Tate and six other people during a bloody rampage in the Los Angeles area during two August nights in 1969. Prosecutors said that Manson and his followers were trying to incite a race war that he believed was in the Beatles' song "Helter Skelter."

Tate, the wife of director Roman Polanski, was 8½ months pregnant when she was killed at her hilltop home in Benedict Canyon on Aug. 9, 1969. Besides Tate, four others were stabbed and shot to death: Jay Sebring, 35; Voytek Frykowski, 32; Abigail Folger, 25, a coffee heiress; and Steven Parent, 18, a friend of Tate's caretaker. The word "Pig" was written on the front door in blood. The next night, Manson rode along with his followers to the Los Feliz home of Leno and Rosemary LaBianca, then left three members to kill the couple.

Manson has incurred more than 100 rules violations since 1971. Over the years, he has been cited for assault, repeated possession of a weapon, threatening staff and possessing a cellphone, Terry Thornton, a spokeswoman for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, said in an email Wednesday.

“Suffice it to say that he cannot be described as a model prisoner,” she said....
http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-manson-bleeding-20170104-story.html

Leah Remini’s Series Could Be Scientology’s Church Abuse Scandal, How an Accused Child Rapist Allegedly Brainwashed an Entire Family as His Cult, Burke Ramsey Sues CBS and Several Experts for $750 Million Over JonBenét Series

- Leah Remini’s Series Could Be Scientology’s Church Abuse Scandal
What makes Scientology a cult instead of just an extreme religion?
- How an Accused Child Rapist Allegedly Brainwashed an Entire Family as His Cult
- Burke Ramsey Sues CBS and Several Experts for $750 Million Over JonBenét Series

Leah Remini’s Series Could Be Scientology’s Church Abuse Scandal
What makes Scientology a cult instead of just an extreme religion? The two latest episodes explained the difference better than any of the previous episodes.
By Bethany Mandel December 27, 2016

....The first new episode was an aired edition of a Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything) in which actress Leah Remini answered viewers’ questions about the cult. She sat opposite the former International Spokesman of Scientology and one of its most famous defectors, Mike Rinder, and interviewed a series of the most famous foes of Scientology, including the subject of a groundbreaking book, entitled “The Unbreakable Miss Lovely.” It’s from perhaps the most famous contemporary Scientology chronicler, a journalist who first exposed the group.

....The video is of a pep rally. In it, Cruise introduces his friend and religious leader, telling the booming audience present for the 2004 award ceremony for the “IAS Freedom Medal of Valor”: “I want to tell you something. I have never met a more competent, a more intelligent, a more tolerant, a more compassionate being. I have met the leaders of leaders. I have met them all. So I say to you COB [Chairman of the Board], we are lucky to have you, thank you.”

Miscavige’s official title in the Church of Scientology is chairman of the board of the Religious Technology Center. But who is he really? Rinder described him another way: “the undisputed dictator of Scientology.”

Miscavige executed a takeover of Scientology’s leadership after the death of its founder, L. Ron Hubbard. What makes Remini’s series unique from other shows on Scientology, such as the HBO documentary “Going Clear,” is that it is from the perspective of former Scientologists and focuses on their experiences exclusively. It explores what it is like being part of a religion at the upper echelons with Miscavige at the helm.

Remini and Rinder interviewed Jefferson Hawkins, the former chief propagandist for the group, who says he left after Miscavige assaulted and terrified him. During this interview, Remini explains to her fellow defectors the desperation she feels about exposing and taking down Scientology by any means necessary, including flooding its headquarters with airplane-dropped pamphlets and bringing in law enforcement....
http://thefederalist.com/2016/12/27/leah-reminis-series-scientologys-church-abuse-scandal/


How an Accused Child Rapist Allegedly Brainwashed an Entire Family as His Cult
By Harriet Sokmensuer December 28, 2016

To his neighbors, Lee Kaplan was quiet and aloof. His three-bedroom Pennsylvania home was hidden behind overgrown shrubbery and at times almost seemed empty. However, behind closed doors, authorities allege Kaplan was living with 12 young girls who considered him a prophet of God as he repeatedly sexually abused them.

To Kaplan, six of the girls were not only his followers but also his “wives,” Bucks County authorities allege....

In June the girls were rescued by Lower Southampton police, and in November Kaplan pleaded not guilty to more than a dozen charges including rape of a child and involuntary deviate sexual intercourse.

He allegedly not only fathered two children with the eldest girl but also sexually abused five of her younger sisters over the course of years, with the consent of their parents, Bucks County District Attorney Matthew Weintraub said.

“This guy set up a virtual feeding ground of victims,” Weintraub told PEOPLE in a previous interview, calling the situation “cult-like.”....

Authorities say Kaplan went unnoticed for years because the girls’ parents also believed Kaplan was a prophet.

The children were raised Amish, born with no birth certificates and home schooled together, officials say, but the Stoltzfus family left the Amish community after they met Kaplan, a former business partner of Daniel’s....
http://people.com/crime/lee-kaplan-child-rape-pennsylvania-sex-cult/


Burke Ramsey Sues CBS and Several Experts for $750 Million Over JonBenét Series
By Chris Harris December 28, 2016

Burke Ramsey has filed a second defamation lawsuit over a recent CBS docuseries that advanced the theory he killed his younger sister, JonBenét, more than two decades ago, PEOPLE confirms.

After suing forensic pathologist Dr. Werner Spitz in October for $150 million in damages, lawyers for Burke on Wednesday filed another civil suit — this one, naming CBS as well as Critical Content LLC, the production company behind The Case of: JonBenét Ramsey, and seven experts and consultants featured in the special, which aired over two nights in mid-September.

PEOPLE obtained a copy of the second suit, which seeks $250 million in compensatory damages and $500 million in punitive damages.

In addition to listing Spitz as a defendant, the suit filed Wednesday names retired FBI Supervisory Special Agent and criminal profiler Jim Clemente; criminal behaviorist Laura Richards; Jim Kolar, a former lead investigator in the JonBenét Ramsey murder investigation; forensic linguistics expert James Fitzgerald; statement analyst Stanley Burke; and forensic scientist Dr. Henry Lee....
http://people.com/crime/burke-ramsey-jonbenet-cbs-series-lawsuit/

What's going to happen at first Bill Cosby criminal hearing?, UK: Cult Leader Sentenced to 23 Years for Abuse, Rape

What's going to happen at first Bill Cosby criminal hearing?
Maria Puente, USA TODAY   February 1, 2016
Will the criminal sexual-assault charges against Bill Cosby ever go to trial?  A hint may come Tuesday in a courthouse in Montgomery County, Pa., outside Philadelphia.

Assuming no delay, Cosby faces his first hearing on criminal charges that he hopes to persuade a judge to dismiss.

And some legal analysts say Cosby may succeed.

"I feel that, unfortunately, the current prosecutor has overstepped his bounds," says New York lawyer Jerry Reisman, who's been following the case. "A former prosecutor made a representation on behalf of his office ... that he would not prosecute (Cosby), so unless they can find some new circumstance, such as fraud, I feel that the case should be dismissed."

If that happens, he says, the likelihood of Cosby being tried in this case is probably nil....
http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/people/2016/02/01/whats-going-happen-first-bill-cosby-criminal-hearing/79526974/ 

UK: Cult Leader Sentenced to 23 Years for Abuse, Rape
By The Associated Press LONDON Jan 29, 2016

A cult leader was sentenced to 23 years in prison Friday for raping and sexually assaulting his female followers and keeping his daughter imprisoned in a secretive Maoist commune in London for three decades.

Prosecutors said 75-year-old Aravindan Balakrishnan, known as "Comrade Bala," abused and brainwashed his followers into believing he had God-like powers, ensuring they were too scared to leave the tiny radical communist group he ran in south London.

His victims included two women and his daughter, 33-year-old Katy Morgan-Davies, who was born into the commune and was almost never allowed to go out in 30 years. Describing Balakrishnan as a "narcissist and a psychopath," Morgan-Davies told British media he emulated people including Mao Zedong, Joseph Stalin and Saddam Hussein.

Sentencing Balakrishnan, Judge Deborah Taylor said his treatment of his daughter from her birth to the age of 26 "was a catalog of mental and physical abuse."

"These are grave and serious crimes conducted over a long period of time and you have shown no remorse whatsoever," she said.

Balakrishnan was convicted in December of rape, indecent assault, false imprisonment and cruelty to a child....
http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/uk-cult-leader-sentenced-23-years-abuse-rape-36596744 

Christian Assemblies International: Former members detail abuse, Official campus statistics for sexual violence mislead

Christian Assemblies International: Former members detail abuse handed out by CAI leader Scott Williams ABC By Caro Meldrum-Hanna July 29, 2014

A four-year investigation by the ABC has uncovered shocking claims of abuse and torment in relation to NSW-based registered charity and religious group Christian Assemblies International (CAI).
Four Corners has revealed that self-styled religious guru Pastor Scott Williams was using his warped brand of evangelical Pentecostalism to run a clandestine homosexual sex ring while allegedly misusing vast amounts of member donations for personal use.

Courageous former members broke their silence and told of their torment living inside the group, which they said is not a Christian church but a horrendous cult run by one man.
The ex-members have remained in the shadows until now out of fear and shame. They detailed shocking acts of abuse ranging from spiritual abuse, financial abuse, verbal and physical abuse, and the sexual abuse of adult men.

They said bizarre sexual rituals were carried out in secret by Williams, who described himself as "The Anointed One" with the Lord's authorisation to sidestep biblical commands against homosexuality and sexually train his male members into submission and obedience....

Former members say they were recruited by Williams as teenagers and young adults, with many still at school. They say they were brainwashed into believing Williams was The Anointed One, filled with the Holy Spirit and gifted with the divine power of healing.....
Katja's husband, Steve, says women were treated as less than men.
"Women were second-rate citizens," he said. "They were there to have children and stand in the kitchen and make food."

Using biblical scripture, Williams also preached that children were born evil and that the evil had to beaten out of them with an iron rod.

Four Corners spoke to many children who were born into the cult who are now adults. They detailed disturbing policies of punishment, including children being publically beaten for making any noise during a Sunday sermon or for moving off a mat laid out at the front of the Assembly....
https://au.news.yahoo.com/nsw/a/24564053/christian-assemblies-international-former-members-detail-abuse-handed-out-by-cai-leader-scott-williams/


Official campus statistics for sexual violence mislead
A school with a lower rate may just be better at discouraging students from reporting assault
July 14, 2014  by Jennifer J. Freyd

Last month, The Washington Post released a compilation of reported rates of campus sexual assault nationwide. Such reports, which colleges and universities are required to release each year, are generally thought to be useful to the public. Parents of college-bound high school students who read that School A has a higher rate of reported sexual violence than School B can make more informed decisions about where their children will be safest. And they might very reasonably think that School A is a more dangerous school. However, the higher rate of reported sexual violence at School A likely indicates the opposite: that it is actually safer than School B. It means that School A is making it possible for — even encouraging — students to report sexual violence.

As a social scientist researching campus sexual violence, I know that even the highest rates of official reported victimization on campuses are substantially lower than what social science data suggest are the real rates of sexual assault. The best national estimate is that approximately 1 in 5 women experience sexual violence in college. But the reported rates are nothing like this, even at those colleges with the highest rates.

Why? Victims of abuse are often reticent about making official reports because they fear the consequences, including being stigmatized or not being believed. This tendency to remain silent is then amplified by institutional barriers to reporting. Colleges and universities have a perverse incentive to discourage sexually victimized students from reporting assault, due to the reputational hit colleges experience if their reported rates of violence are higher than those of their competitors. It’s a profoundly dangerous status quo, because encouraging reporting is one of the key ways colleges can make campuses safer.

Institutional cover-ups
Part of the challenge of tackling campus sexual assault is that sexual abuse typically starts in adolescence, prior to the beginning of college. Perpetrators have often been victimized themselves. Many college victims also have a prior history of abuse. These are important factors that my laboratory has studied for years. Ultimately we must address the underlying society-wide problem of child sexual abuse that contributes to college sexual violence. But in the meantime, college campuses offer a remarkable intervention point for sexual assault: They have resources. They are limited in number (thousands of institutions of higher education versus millions of families, for instance). They influence young people on the cusp of adult responsibility.  

But only when such violence is reported can victims access services and colleges hold perpetrators accountable. For most colleges and universities, however, discouraging reporting appears to remain the norm. Colleges can make it difficult to determine how to report; they can also make life harder for students who do report by shaming, invalidating and even punishing them. This is why the reported rates likely tell us more about the campus climate than about underlying rates of sexual violence.
When schools discourage reporting, they collude with many societal forces to cover up sexual violence. Sexual violence thrives on secrecy; if students do not feel they can safely report, the assaults will continue unchecked....
http://america.aljazeera.com/opinions/2014/7/college-campus-sexualassaultsafetydatawhitehousegender.html