Cesar Chavez, a Civil Rights Icon, Is Accused of Abusing Girls for Years

 

Cesar Chavez, a Civil Rights Icon, Is Accused of Abusing Girls for Years

An investigation by The New York Times found extensive evidence that the United Farm Workers co-founder groomed and sexually abused girls who worked in the movement.  By Manny Fernandez and Sarah Hurtes

 

describes abuse allegations

The reporters interviewed several women who told their stories for the first time, as well as more than 60 other people, including Cesar Chavez’s top aides and relatives. The reporters also reviewed hundreds of pages of union records, confidential emails, photographs and other material. March 19, 2026

....Ms. Murguia and another woman, Debra Rojas, say that Mr. Chavez sexually abused them for years when they were girls, from around 1972 to 1977. He was in his 40s and had become a powerful, charismatic figure who captured global attention as a champion of farmworker rights.

The two women have not shared their stories publicly before, and an investigation by The New York Times has uncovered extensive evidence to support their accusations and those raised by several other women against Mr. Chavez, the United Farm Workers co-founder who died in 1993 at the age of 66.

The questions raised by The Times about Mr. Chavez, one of the most consequential figures in Mexican American history, immediately prompted organizations with ties to him to try to distance themselves. The U.F.W. canceled its annual celebrations honoring Mr. Chavez, a response to what the union he once led called “profoundly shocking” accusations....

The abuse allegations appear to be part of a larger pattern of sexual misconduct by Mr. Chavez, much of which has never been publicly revealed. The Times investigation found that Mr. Chavez also used many of the women who worked and volunteered in his movement for his own sexual gratification. His most prominent female ally in the movement, Dolores Huerta, said in an interview that he sexually assaulted her, a disclosure she has never before made publicly.

Many of the women stayed silent for decades, both out of shame and for fear of tarnishing the image of a man who has become the face of the Latino civil rights movement, his image on school murals and his birthday a state holiday in California.

The findings are based on interviews with more than 60 people, including his top aides at the time, his relatives and former members of the U.F.W., which he co-founded with Ms. Huerta and Gilbert Padilla. The Times reviewed hundreds of pages of union records, confidential emails and photographs, as well as hours of audio recordings from U.F.W. board meetings.

The accounts of abuse from Ms. Murguia and Ms. Rojas were independently verified through interviews with those they confided in decades ago and in more recent years. Elements of their stories were also corroborated in documents, emails, itineraries and other writings from union organizers, supporters of Mr. Chavez and historians.

The Times spoke at length with Ms. Huerta, the renowned Latina activist who helped run the farmworkers’ union with Mr. Chavez and coined the social-justice rallying cry, “Sí, se puede,” loosely translated as “Yes, we can.” She said she has held on to a dark secret for nearly 60 years.

One night during the winter of 1966 in Delano, Calif., she said, Mr. Chavez drove her out to a secluded grape field, parked and raped her inside the vehicle. Ms. Huerta, who was 36 at the time, said she chose not to report the assault to the police because of their hostility toward the movement, and she feared that no one within the union would believe her. She also described an earlier encounter in August 1960, when she said she felt pressured to have sex with him in a hotel room during a work trip in San Juan Capistrano in Southern California....

A handful of Mr. Chavez’s relatives and former U.F.W. leaders have been aware for years about various allegations of sexual misconduct, but there is no evidence that they made efforts to fully investigate the accusations, acknowledge the victims or apologize to them. Instead, many of the women say they were discouraged from speaking out in order to preserve Mr. Chavez’s public image.

Internal emails dating back over a decade show union members discussing Ms. Murguia’s claims of abuse and the impact it had on her life. One of Ms. Murguia’s relatives confronted Mr. Chavez while he was still alive, in the 1980s. According to the relative, Mr. Chavez offered no defense and responded only by clearing his throat....

Nothing has emerged publicly to back up the claims made by Ms. Huerta. Her description of assault could not be independently verified because she said she had told no one, not even her children or closest friends, until just a few weeks ago.

But the paper trail of some of Mr. Chavez’s misconduct involving young girls can be found in the very archives built to preserve his legacy.

In one handwritten letter on girlish stationery imprinted with roses, Ms. Rojas wrote to Mr. Chavez in January 1974 at the age of 13, shifting between childlike school updates and swooning devotion. She said she wrote the letter more than a year after he first kissed and fondled her in his office in 1972, when she was a 12-year-old seventh-grader. “I’m really glad I got to see you & spend time with you, well not like that, but just to know I was near you was enough,” she wrote, adding, “I think of you all of the time. Do you think of me?”
The letter is among thousands of documents and other materials in the Walter P. Reuther Library archives at Wayne State University in Detroit....

Elements of Mr. Chavez’s extramarital affairs with adult women were chronicled in at least two biographies, Matt Garcia’s “From the Jaws of Victory: The Triumph and Tragedy of Cesar Chavez and the Farm Worker Movement,” published in 2012, and Miriam Pawel’s “The Crusades of Cesar Chavez: A Biography,” published in 2014.

But neither raised issues of abuse of girls.  While Mr. Chavez had eight children with his wife, Helen Chavez, the Times investigation showed that he also fathered at least four children with three other women. Two of these children and other family members were interviewed and confirmed the relationship. Additionally, 23andMe match results were reviewed for the four children, and they confirmed Mr. Chavez’s biological ties in each case....

Ms. Murguia said she was 13 when Mr. Chavez began inviting her into his office. He had an obsession with alternative healing therapies, and would sometimes put her on his desk and demonstrate the “pressure points” that could relieve stress and pain, she said. That eventually led to kissing, and then fondling. And then more.
“When I was on the yoga mat is when he would try to have sex,” Ms. Murguia said. Ms. Murguia said she wasn’t attracted to Mr. Chavez, and was initially surprised by his touches, but said she felt chosen. “Part of it was, why would someone like that like someone like me?” She said Mr. Chavez told her not to tell anyone because other girls and women would be jealous of their special bond.

He took her on tour with him, having her travel in his car and stand with him at events and marches. She appears next to him in several photographs — among them one of the most iconic images from the U.F.W.’s famous 1,000-Mile March in the summer of 1975, and an earlier shot alongside the folk singer Joan Baez.
But it was also during that time, two years after he first touched Ms. Murguia in his office, that things changed.  By now age 15, she had accompanied Mr. Chavez on a trip to Los Angeles. At a fund-raiser’s home in Bel Air, she walked into the kitchen and found him kissing a woman. She left quickly. “I was disgusted,” she said. On the way back to La Paz, she rode with the guards and the dogs, refusing to share a car with him....
Several people corroborated her story. One family member said she learned of the abuse in the early 1980s, after Ms. Murguia told her about it. Another person said Ms. Murguia disclosed the abuse to him in 1989. One of the men present in the room when Ms. Murguia was kicked out of La Paz refused to comment. Another said he didn’t remember that time in his life.

For a long time, she felt she would be blamed for what had happened. That was how it worked back then, she said — girls were abused by family members, by people close to the family, and it was always kept quiet. And if anyone found out, she said, the question was never about the man. “It was always: ‘Well, what did you do? See what you did.’”  There was one person at La Paz she knew she could share her story with, and that was Ms. Rojas....

One night, Ms. Rojas recalled, Mr. Chavez told her he was sending her home for a week. She was sad and confused, and thought she had done something wrong.

She was waiting at the bus station when Mr. Chavez drove up with one of his bodyguards. He invited her into the car, and they drove to a motel on Highway 99.

In the motel room he shared with her, she said, he had intercourse with her for the first time — rape, under California law. She was a virgin, and remembers that it hurt, and she was bleeding. But she also remembers the gun Mr. Chavez had placed on the night stand next to the bed. She couldn’t help but look at it every time she turned her head, and it scared her, she said. “I said, ‘What’s that for?’” Ms. Rojas said. “Don’t worry about it,” she said he told her. He said because of the death threats he received, he and his security team wanted to make sure they were safe.

Several people and documents corroborated the accusations made by Ms. Rojas, including a relative who said Ms. Rojas first told her in the late 1990s that Mr. Chavez had abused her....

Yet many of those who look back on those years at La Paz also say that Mr. Chavez was a man who could be nurturing one moment, only to use that same emotional intimacy to manipulate and abuse the next. Ms. Huerta said he abused her not only physically but emotionally.

Union records document an argument at La Paz between the two of them over missing financial receipts during a board meeting in 1979. Ms. Huerta demanded respect and pushed back against his suggestions that she had stolen money. Mr. Chavez responded by shouting at her with curses and insults, repeatedly calling her a stupid bitch, according to the audio recordings of board meetings The Times listened to....

 

 htps://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/18/us/cesar-chavez-sexual-abuse-allegations-ufw.html 

Survivorship May Online Conference for Trauma Survivors and Clinicians

 

Survivorship May Online Conference for Trauma Survivors and Clinicians                    

Survivorship is now accepting conference registrations for their May 15 - 17, 2026 online conferences. They are extending their low prices until March 29th. CEs are available for the Friday conference. Conference topics include PTSD, trauma, dissociation, neurofeedback, DID, ritual abuse and mind control. More information is below. 

Please write info@survivorship.org if you are interested in attending their conference. Conference information is at https://survivorship.org/the-survivorship-trafficking-and-extreme-abuse-online-conference-2026/

 

Conference Speakers

Ritual Abuse as Mind Control - Wendy Hoffman

Rituals are common practice in satanic culture. This presentation explores how every moment of a ritual is used for mind control. Its purpose is to capture the minds of its victims and enforce its programs. Traumatic emotions are also an important part of mind control, and they will be discussed.

 

Wendy Hoffman has published four memoirs, two books of poetry and a co-authored book of essays. She does consultations for therapists working in the field of dissociative disorders and presentations on mind control internationally. https://ritualabuse.us/smart/wendy-hoffman/ 

 

Traces of Western Practices of Ritual Abuse in Mary Daly’s

Gyn/Ecology and Other Texts - Lynn Brunet

Mary Daly (1928-2010), born in Schenectady, New York, was a philosopher and theologian and described herself as a radical lesbian feminist, intent on exposing the extent to which the patriarchy exploits women and working towards changing this. This paper will not get into the politics surrounding radical feminism, which is multi-faceted and extensive, but instead will examine one of her key texts, Gyn/Ecology: The Metaethics of Radical Feminism (1978). In this text there are multiple references to the experience of spinning. She describes the book as “an invitation to the Wild Witch in all women who long to spin” (Daly 1978, xv).

 

This talk will explore Daly’s use of language throughout Gyn/Ecology to suggest that concealed/revealed in her writing may be traces of western practices of ritual abuse, practices that only began to come to public attention in the mid-1980s. It will suggest that the author’s search for the most extreme examples of ritual torture of women across cultures, coupled with the idiosyncratic metaphorical language of ecstatic spiral journeying used in Gyn/Ecology and other texts, may have been a means of expressing a deeply internalised and repressed experience of childhood ritual abuse. As the following discussion will outline, hidden cultic practices of a Druidic nature appear to have been exported to the United States alongside conservative religious practices amongst migrant groups such as the Irish, the culture that Mary Daly celebrates as her own heritage.

 

Lynn Brunet (PhD) is an Australian art historian whose research examines the coupling of trauma and ritual in modern and contemporary western art and literature. In particular, it traces the connection between Masonic and other fraternal initiation rites and complex trauma in the work of various artists and writers of the 20th and 21st centuries. https://independent.academia.edu/LynnBrunet1 

 

Remembering Wholeness: Trauma-Informed Writing in Support of Voice, Safety, and Self-Trust - deJoly LaBrier

As both a survivor of extreme abuse and a Life and Writing Coach, her work is informed by lived experience as well as years of supporting women on their healing journeys. In this presentation, she shares how trauma-informed writing practices can support survivors in reclaiming voice, coherence, and a sense of inner authorship after experiences that fracture identity and distort self-perception.

 

Rather than asking survivors to revisit traumatic material, this approach honors personal boundaries and nervous system readiness. Writing becomes a relational practice—one that allows meaning to emerge slowly, safely, and on the survivor’s own terms. This work reflects a deep belief that survivors are not broken, but adaptive—and that wholeness is not something to be earned, but remembered. This presentation recognizes dissociation and multiplicity as adaptive survival responses and offers trauma-informed writing practices that support safety, voice, and self-trust without requiring integration or disclosure.

 

deJoly LaBrier is a Life and Writing Coach, public speaker, and survivor of extreme abuse whose work focuses on trauma-informed writing practices for women impacted by trafficking, ritual abuse, and complex trauma. Drawing from lived experience as well as years of coaching, facilitation, and public speaking, she supports survivors in reclaiming voice, agency, and a sense of wholeness after experiences that fracture identity and distort self-perception. https://dejoly.com/shop 

 

Unraveling the Tangled Mind: Psychotherapy with Survivors of Mind Control - Faige Flakser, LCSW

This presentation offers a clinical roadmap for psychotherapy with survivors of Organized and Extreme Abuse (OEA), including cultic abuse, ritual abuse, trafficking, and other coercive systems. It describes how this work frequently presents with complex trauma and dissociation, with dissociative parts and self-states, often including DID. Participants will be oriented to the core psychological binds created by mind control: confrontation with profound human cruelty and the systematic destabilizing of reality-testing through confusion, coercion, and terror-based conditioning. The presentation highlights three predictable trust ruptures that shape treatment from the first contact: mistrust of helpers, including realistic fears that perpetrators may pose as helpers; mistrust within family systems where grooming and recruitment have often occurred; and mistrust of one’s own mind in the aftermath of sustained manipulation. These ruptures complicate the formation of a therapeutic alliance and require a paced, relational approach that honors the protective functions of doubt, vigilance, and withdrawal.

 

Faige Flakser, LCSW, is a trauma therapist, consultant, and educator with a clinical focus on trauma, dissociation, and DID, as well as Organized and Extreme Abuse (OEA), including mind control and coercive systems. She holds leadership roles within the International Society for the Study of Trauma and Dissociation (ISSTD), where she is the former Chair of the OEA Special Interest Group and has presented at ISSTD conferences. She is Director of the Trauma Division at the Institute for Contemporary Psychotherapy (ICP).

An Introduction to Neurofeedback for Trauma - Joshua Moore MA, LMHC, BCN

Neurofeedback is a non-invasive, evidence-based therapeutic modality that helps individuals to self-regulate brain activity through real-time biofeedback of brainwave patterns, often referred to as EEG entrainment. In the treatment of trauma, particularly post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), neurofeedback targets key neurophysiological features such as hyperarousal, emotional dysregulation, and altered brain connectivity resulting from traumatic experiences. By identifying specific neuro-markers associated with PTSD, practitioners can transform the often intangible nature of psychological trauma into visible representations on a computer screen or printout, facilitating targeted training to normalize brain function.

This approach serves as a promising adjunct to traditional trauma therapies, effectively reducing core PTSD symptoms—including intrusive thoughts, avoidance behaviors, and heightened arousal—without necessitating direct exposure to traumatic memories, which many clients find aversive. Recent systematic reviews and meta-analyses indicate moderate beneficial effects on PTSD symptoms, with neurofeedback demonstrating clinically meaningful improvements in symptom severity. Neurofeedback is also discussed for its potential utility in Bessel van der Kolk's book, The Body Keeps the Score, which highlights innovative, body-oriented interventions for trauma recovery (van der Kolk, 2014). In this lecture, key research and outcomes will be reviewed, alongside clinical principles and skills, emerging protocols, practical resources for locating practitioners, and training to become a certified neurofeedback practitioner.

 

Joshua Moore is a licensed mental health counselor who incorporates a variety of treatments, including talk therapy, EMDR, QEEG brain mapping, family systems work, and neurofeedback. Joshua is passionate about making evidence-based quality neurofeedback more available to the community. Joshua provides neurofeedback mentorship to several clinics and creates online workshops for beginners and advanced clinicians in the field of healthcare. Clinically, he works with difficult cases, including dissociative identity disorder, PTSD, traumatic brain injuries, and complex or unclear diagnoses. Joshua holds a Master’s degree in Counseling from Multnomah University and a Bachelor’s degree in Theology, and he is board-certified in neurofeedback through the Biofeedback International Certification Alliance (BCIA).

 

Intergenerational Occult Families, and One Father’s Fight for His Abducted Daughter - Iain Bryson

Iain Bryson’s daughter was taken fifteen years ago by his first wife and her family after his first wife told him that her family is a “cult,” and that she would be taking their daughter back to them because of “mind control.” Iain had no idea what ritual abuse and trauma-based-mind-control were until his daughter was taken. He had to reconcile that fact with what his wife had warned and the signs that his mind had refused to see. Iain tried to get help from local authorities and international authorities. Despite the fact that his daughter is a United States citizen, the only advice given by the Embassy was to re-abduct his daughter given that Poland is out of the Embassy’s jurisdiction. Having to take matters into his own hands, Iain ended up in the Polish criminal justice system. He was incarcerated for fifty months in Poland because of his attempts to make the system aware on his daughter. Iain was released in 2015.

In 2024, Iain Bryson published an evidence-based, documentary style memoir of his daughter’s abduction. He continues to fight for his daughter, and for other survivors of the horrendous atrocity we know as ritual abuse.

Clinical Discussion Group - How Ethics and History Effect Present Practice

The Survivorship Board Members will moderate a discussion on how ethics and history in the field of psychology effect present practice. The discussion will include historical events in the field of psychology, allegations of ethical lapses that happened in different psychotherapeutic settings and how historical misconceptions of the field and different diagnoses may effect present practice.

None of the material on this page, on linked pages or at the conference is meant as therapy, or to take the place of therapy.

 

 

Hidden in Plain Sight: Lessons From International Case Studies of Child Sexual Abuse in Early Childhood Education and Care Settings

 

Hidden in Plain Sight: Lessons From International Case Studies of Child Sexual Abuse in Early Childhood Education and Care Settings                           

 

Woodlock D; Olejníková L; Salter M; Singh S; Young A; Whitten T; Rouse J; Griffiths P, 2026, 'Hidden in Plain Sight: Lessons From International Case Studies of Child Sexual Abuse in Early Childhood Education and Care Settings', Child Maltreatment, http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/10775595251414844 

Abstract

Child sexual abuse (CSA) in early childhood education and care (ECEC) settings is sometimes perceived as rare or the subject of a “moral panic”. Recent high-profile cases challenge this characterisation, exposing systemic failures within contemporary childcare environments that enable the sexual abuse of very young children. This article examines six prosecuted CSA cases from high-income countries involving serial offending against children under the age of five to explore how such severe abuse can persist despite regulation and apparent safeguards, and contrary to persistent scholarly claims that child sex offenders do not target ECEC settings. Using gendered organisational theory, our analysis reveals how organisational cultures, gendered power dynamics, and failures in accountability contribute to the occurrence and concealment of abuse. By situating these cases within broader patriarchal structural contexts, the article offers a critical rethinking of institutional responsibility and proposes reforms to strengthen child protection in ECEC settings.

Early childhood education and care (ECEC) settings have long been associated with controversies over child sexual abuse (CSA). While high-profile allegations in the 1980s, such as the McMartin Preschool trial, led to widespread skepticism and claims of “mass hysteria” (Cheit, 2014; Jenkins, 1992), contemporary evidence challenges the view that such abuse is merely the product of moral panic.

Some scholars continue to frame concerns about CSA in ECEC as exaggerated (Munk et al., 2013). Others, such as Parkinson and Cashmore (2017), have argued that ECEC environments are relatively low risk for CSA as compared to those involving older children, claiming that child sex offenders are rarely interested in very young children and there is limited opportunity for abuse. Nonetheless, large-scale offending persists. Recently in Australia, over 1200 children were referred to health authorities after a childcare worker was charged with 70 sex offences (Brown & Higgins, 2025). This case, occurring alongside the prosecution of Australian childcare worker Ashley Griffith (Smee, 2024), exposes a recurring pattern of premeditated exploitation and child sexual abuse material (CSAM) production that mirrors earlier decades (Cheit, 2014), now facilitated by digital technologies.

This study presents a qualitative analysis of six prosecuted cases from high-income countries involving serial offending against children under the age of five. Collectively, these cases document the abuse of at least 245 children. The primary aim is to identify the institutional conditions that enable such abuse and undermine safeguarding mechanisms. Drawing on gendered organisational theory, our analysis seeks to understand how abuse is enabled, concealed, or disrupted by gendered organisational structures and patriarchal cultures (Acker, 1990). The article reviews existing research, outlines our gendered organisational framework, applies this lens to six international case studies, and proposes actionable recommendations for reform....

Case Study Analysis

This case study analysis draws on six contemporary, prosecuted cases of CSA in ECEC settings, spanning the period from 2009 to 2024. Each case was selected based on its alignment with the study’s inclusion criteria and capacity to reveal broader institutional patterns. By analysing these cases through the lens of gendered organisational theory, the study identifies recurring dynamics that allowed abuse to persist across varied settings. A detailed account of each case follows, highlighting the organisational conditions that facilitated harm....

Offender Networks and the Lone Offender Myth

These case studies challenge the prevailing view of CSA offenders as isolated individuals, revealing instead the existence of networks that facilitate the sharing of CSAM, the exchange of strategies, and mutual encouragement. The evidence in these cases demonstrates that offenders commonly operate within online communities, facilitated and camouflaged by encryption technologies, that normalise and reinforce abusive behaviour and share CSAM of children in their care. McCoole, for example, was a central figure in The Love Zone, a forum on Tor hidden services (the so-called “dark web”) dedicated to the exchange of CSAM, which also included Griffith (Staff Writers, 2023). McCoole later had his sentence reduced for assisting international investigations, including cases in Denmark (Opie, 2018). Once dismissed as the product of moral panic, claims about organised CSA offending have now been substantiated through forensic evidence (Salter, 2012). Indeed, organised offending has been a consistent theme in allegations and investigations of CSA in ECEC for over forty years (Cheit, 2014). However, the proposition that ECEC may be targeted by organised offender networks for the purpose of CSA has not been taken seriously in child protection frameworks and measures. This oversight can be understood through Acker’s (1990) concept of cultural symbols. The persistence of the “lone offender” myth serves a protective function for the institution; it allows ECEC providers to treat abuse as the result of a singular “bad apple” rather than interrogating how the gendered structure of the workforce might attract and shield organised abuse networks....

Internal Safeguarding Failures

In each case study, internal safeguarding mechanisms within the ECEC context failed to detect or respond adequately to CSA, and the abuse was discovered only after CSAM investigations or, in one instance, sexual assault of a child in public. As seen in the cases of Griffith, Doyle, George, McCoole, and Robert M., it was the discovery of CSAM that compelled institutions and authorities to take action. In the case of D.N. in Sweden, abuse only surfaced after a separate police investigation unrelated to institutional safeguards. Some institutions repeatedly dismissed or downplayed concerns raised by mothers and female staff, until external, undeniable evidence emerged. This systemic dismissal of female voices points to gendered workplace interactions (Acker, 1990), where the professional status of the male worker is privileged over the evidence provided by mothers and female colleagues. These patterns underscore how institutional responses often depend on proof rather than trust, suggesting that ECEC safeguarding systems may be structured to respond only when abuse becomes irrefutable, rather than working to prevent it.

Tolerance for Grooming Behaviour

Most of the offenders in the six cases were well-regarded by colleagues, trusted by families, and liked by the children in their care. Simply presenting as professional and caring often proved sufficient to gain the trust of colleagues, management, and parents, which often continued even after concerns were raised. In some instances, offenders socialised with management and parents, offered private babysitting, and were welcomed into families’ homes. For example, sentencing remarks in the case of Griffith noted that he was often cruel and mocking towards children during the abuse, as revealed in CSAM he produced (The King v Griffith, 2024). Despite this, he was invited to children’s birthday parties and formed close relationships with their families. The case studies corroborate previous research on how offenders often actively groom not only children, but also co-workers, parents, and the institution itself (Briggs, 2014)....

Poor Oversight and Cross-Institutional Tracking

The case studies demonstrated how weak regulatory structures, including a lack of oversight of staffing and hiring practices, enabled offenders to move between services without adequate scrutiny or shared information. In a context where child safety should be the central concern, these failures in information sharing and employment vetting reflect a lack of institutional accountability. Across the case studies, offenders gained access to ECEC roles through informal networks, as in the case of McCoole, or without standard hiring procedures, as was the case with George. In other cases, long professional experience led to misplaced trust. Even when concerns were formally raised, such as McCoole being deemed unsuitable to work with children, this did not prevent further employment with children. These vetting failures expose a dangerous organisational logic (Acker, 1990). By treating applicants as abstract, gender-neutral units of labour, the system failed to account for the specific risk profiles associated with the glass escalator phenomenon, where scrutiny was lowered to facilitate the rapid entry of men into the workforce.....

Conclusion

Our case analysis challenges prior claims that ECEC settings are a low risk for CSA or that concerns about child maltreatment in ECEC are a moral panic or otherwise exaggerated. It is perhaps timely to reflect on the legacy and consequences of such claims, which have received broad scholarly and media support in previous decades, given the cumulative evidence of serious and serial CSA offending in ECEC settings. Patterns across the case studies reveal the same institutional weaknesses: failure to act on concerns, over-reliance on external investigations, and a reluctance to question those in trusted roles. The development and evaluation of proactive safeguarding strategies tailored to the unique vulnerabilities of preverbal and very young children in ECEC environments, including the effectiveness of institutional grooming prevention, the promotion of institutional courage and workplace cultures of accountability and transparency, is needed.

This article has highlighted the paucity of research into the prevalence and characteristics of CSA in ECEC. There is a clear need for research into rates of suspected, reported and substantiated CSA cases in ECEC, the response of educators, institutions, regulators and the criminal justice system, and the impact of such abuse upon children and their families. Forensic studies of offenders targeting preverbal children would help to elucidate their specific motivations and strategies.... 

 

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/10775595251414844 

Survivorship Notes - March/April 2026 https://survivorship.org/notes-and-journal/

 

Survivorship Notes - March/April 2026
https://survivorship.org/notes-and-journal/

 

 

Articles: 
Survivorship Conference Speakers: Wendy Hoffman, Lynn Brunet, Joshua Moore, Iain Bryson, Faige Flakser, deJoly LaBrier
The Survivorship Trafficking and Extreme Abuse Online Conference will be in May 2026 https://survivorship.org/the-survivorship-trafficking-and-extreme-abuse-online-conference-2026/
Survivor Conference - Saturday and Sunday May 16 - 17, 2026
Clinician's Conference - Friday May 15, 2026
Low prices until March 15th – as low as $50 per person.

 
Jeffrey Epstein murder evidence
Jeffrey Epstein trafficking allegations
'Satanic' paedophile ring
Living with Dissociative Identity Disorder

SMART Ritual Abuse Newsletter - Issue 187 - March 2026, Survivorship Online Conference May 2026 Speakers

 

SMART Ritual Abuse Newsletter - Issue 187 - March 2026, Survivorship Online Conference May 2026 Speakers 

 

The new SMART Newsletter is available online at

https://ritualabuse.us/2026/02/issue-187-march-2026/ To subscribe, please write via email: smartnews@aol.com  

 

Articles include:

The 2026 Online Annual Ritual Abuse and Mind Control Conference August 2026

The Survivorship Trafficking and Extreme Abuse Online Conference 2026 Conference Speakers 

    The mounting evidence Epstein was murdered... the doctor who says he was strangled

    60 Minutes investigates the death of Jeffrey Epstein 

    New Epstein files reveal he may have trafficked girls to others despite official denials

    Epstein survivor Juliette Bryant says she was trafficked from South Africa and soon realized it was "not a modeling opportunity, I've been kidnapped"

    Sydney property manager with alleged ties to 'satanic' paedophile ring denied bail

    What It’s Like to Live With One of Psychiatry’s Most Misunderstood Diagnoses -  dissociative identity disorder

    A Randomized Controlled Trial Assists Individuals With Complex Trauma and Dissociation in Finding Solid Ground 

    

 

The Survivorship Trafficking and Extreme Abuse Online Conference 2026 https://survivorship.org/the-survivorship-trafficking-and-extreme-abuse-online-conference-2026/   

Prices as low as $50 until March 15th. Survivor Conference – Saturday and Sunday May 16 – 17, 2026   Clinician’s Conference – Friday May 15, 2026  Please write info@survivorship.org  if you would like to get on their conference mailing list. 

Speakers: Ritual Abuse as Mind Control - Wendy Hoffman, Traces of Western Practices of Ritual Abuse in Mary Daly’s Gyn/Ecology and Other Texts - Lynn Brunet, Remembering Wholeness: Trauma-Informed Writing in Support of Voice, Safety, and Self-Trust - deJoly LaBrier, Unraveling the Tangled Mind: Psychotherapy with Survivors of Mind Control - Faige Flakser, LCSW,  An Introduction to Neurofeedback for Trauma - Joshua Moore MA, LMHC, BCN  

 https://ritualabuse.us/2026/02/issue-187-march-2026/

What It’s Like to Live With One of Psychiatry’s Most Misunderstood Diagnoses - Dissociative Identity Disorder

 

What It’s Like to Live With One of Psychiatry’s Most Misunderstood Diagnoses - Dissociative Identity Disorder

 

- What It’s Like to Live With One of Psychiatry’s Most Misunderstood

- Diagnoses- A Randomized Controlled Trial Assists Individuals With Complex       Trauma and Dissociation in Finding Solid Ground 

- Finding Solid Ground program

 

 

What It’s Like to Live With One of Psychiatry’s Most Misunderstood Diagnoses - Spurred by her past struggles with dissociative identity disorder, she has devoted her professional life to studying it. By Maggie Jones

Maggie Jones interviewed more than two dozen people who have been diagnosed with dissociative identity disorder along with nearly 20 experts.  Jan. 30, 2026.... Experts in trauma have long argued that D.I.D. is an ingenious survival tool born in childhood. It typically begins by the time a child is 5 or 6 as a response to repeated abuse, often by a caregiver. Before about 6 years old, children generally have not yet formed a coherent sense of self. They may have imaginary friends or displace their own thoughts or feelings onto stuffed animals. (“My bunny is sad. He hates school.”) They may believe they will become a princess or Superman. It’s all psychologically typical, and over time, most children develop a unified self.

But for a small subset of abused children who have a capacity to dissociate — which experts theorize is in part genetic — developing a unified self becomes disrupted. To endure the physical and emotional pain, their mind makes it seem as if it is not happening to them but to someone else, someone inside them. “When it’s too overwhelming to feel such fear, too dangerous to feel what is happening to their body, they feel like that’s not me,” Kaufman says, noting that the phrase “me, not me” captures a core feeling for people living with D.I.D. And because children frequently don’t tell anyone about the abuse, the feeling of having inside people can be soothing.

Often people with D.I.D. unconsciously create an angry “part” as a protective mechanism, which tries to silence other parts that bring up traumatic memories. Many girls create boy parts, explains Richard Chefetz, a psychiatrist who treats people with complex post-trauma and dissociative disorder, because they believe if they were male, the abuse would not have happened. Other parts — like Kaufman’s nice lady who helped her speak in class — have certain skills that keep children engaged in school and in the larger world and help them experience humor, joy, hope.

That’s the adaptable aspect. But the flip side is that if a child has D.I.D. their mind doesn’t follow the usual developmental pathway to form a coherent self. “It’s like a jigsaw puzzle, where the pieces have never fully been put together,” explains Richard Loewenstein, a pioneer in dissociative research and treatment and the founder of the trauma program at Sheppard Pratt, a psychiatric medical center in Baltimore. While we all have self-states — a work state, a social state, a family state and so on — “most people who are well integrated can move among their different parts” without feeling unstable, says Frank Putnam, an expert on child abuse and dissociative disorders and a professor of psychiatry at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine.

Most people, too, experience some dissociation — when they drive from the grocery store to home with little memory of how they got there, or they lose track of time while immersed in a video game. But for those with dissociative disorders, the experiences are more pervasive, intense and disruptive. They may regularly feel disconnected from their thoughts, feelings or bodily sensations, a psychological phenomenon known as depersonalization. They may also experience derealization, in which the world seems blurry, dreamlike or unreal.

People with D.I.D. have both, along with fragmented self-states, which often cause them distress and can make daily functioning difficult: Among other things, one self-state can be unaware of actions taken by another state....

But in contrast to the 1980s and 1990s, neuroscientists now have more clues about how severe dissociation appears in the brain. In the late 1990s, Ruth Lanius, a psychiatrist and neuroscientist who is the director of the PTSD research unit at the University of Western Ontario, was running a PTSD study using a standard approach for measuring responses to trauma memories: A person narrates a memory, which is recorded and then played back during an fMRI scan. Typically, the subject’s heart rate, blood pressure and activity in their amygdala — which facilitates the fear response — increases.

One subject had been so horrifically abused as a child that Lanius expected the narrated memory would trigger a flashback and the woman would feel as if she were reliving her trauma, causing her heart rate to spike. Instead, to Lanius’s surprise, as the woman lay in the scanner, her heart rate dropped. Lanius had her listen to her trauma narrative two more times with the same result. When she interviewed the woman afterward, the subject said she felt numb and completely disconnected from her body. In further studies, Lanius was able to pinpoint areas of the brain that suggest subjects like her have a dissociative subtype of PTSD. In response to trauma, their brains — unlike classic PTSD patients’ — blunt arousal: Activity in their amygdala decreases, while processing in a part of the frontal lobe, where emotions are controlled, increases..... 

 

More recently, Simone Reinders, a neuroscientist at King’s College in London, has published multiple imaging studies about D.I.D., including those in which actors were told to mimic different dissociative states. The actors could not match the neural responses of those diagnosed with D.I.D....
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/30/magazine/dissociative-identity-disorder-mental-health.html?smid=url-share

A Randomized Controlled Trial Assists Individuals With Complex Trauma and Dissociation in Finding Solid Ground - Brand, B. L., Schielke, H. J., Putnam, K., Pierorazio, N. A., Nester, M. S., Robertson, J., Myrick, A. C., Loewenstein, R. J., Putnam, F. W., Steele, K., Boon, S., & Lanius, R. A. (2025). A randomized controlled trial assists individuals with complex trauma and dissociation in Finding Solid Ground.Psychological Trauma: Theory, Research, Practice, and Policy, 17(8), 1717–1727. https://doi.org/10.1037/tra0001871

Objective: Evidence-based treatments are urgently needed for individuals with trauma-related dissociation (TRD), including severe dissociative disorders, the dissociative posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) subtype, and complex PTSD (International Classification of Diseases-10). TRD is strongly associated with severe trauma, a more refractory treatment course, and high suicidality and nonsuicidal self-injury. We evaluated changes in symptoms and adaptive capacities in individuals with high TRD through participation in an adjunctive online program based on the Finding Solid Ground (FSG) psychoeducational program. Method: We provide an interim report on an ongoing, randomized controlled trial of FSG on an international sample of 291 outpatients with dissociative identity disorder, dissociative PTSD, other specified dissociative disorders, complex PTSD, or dissociative disorder, unspecified (International Classification of Diseases-10). Outpatient therapists continued to provide psychotherapy. Participants were randomly assigned to either receive immediate access to FSG or be on a 6-month waitlist before accessing FSG. We did not exclude for suicidality, nonsuicidal self-injury, recent or concurrent hospitalization, or substance abuse. Results: Although initially comparable on outcome measures, at 6 months into the study, the Immediate FSG group showed significant improvement in emotion regulation, PTSD symptoms, self-compassion, and adaptive capacities in comparison to the Waitlist group. At 12 months, the Immediate group showed large effect size changes in these areas compared to study entry (tra_17_8_1717_math1.gif s = 0.95–1.32). The Waitlist group showed comparable improvements after accessing the FSG program for 6 months. Conclusions: This randomized controlled trial demonstrates that adding FSG to psychotherapy of individuals with TRD results in improvements in emotion regulation, PTSD symptoms, self-compassion, and adaptive functioning.

Prospective and retrospective cross-cultural studies in clinical and general population samples of children, adolescents, and adults find that dissociation is a partially genetically mediated, transdiagnostic psychobiological process related to trauma (American Psychiatric Association, 2022; Loewenstein, 2018). Studies demonstrate that high levels of dissociation are linked to multiple types of severe trauma, most commonly childhood maltreatment and/or neglect. Dissociation is associated with earlier age of onset, greater severity, and longer duration of maltreatment and, particularly, maltreatment by primary attachment figures (Dutra et al., 2009; Lyssenko et al., 2018; Vonderlin et al., 2018). The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, fifth edition, text revision dissociative disorders (DDs) are strongly linked to antecedent trauma, particularly the most symptomatically severe and complex DDs (CDDs), dissociative identity disorder (DID), and other specified dissociative disorders....

These findings indicate that FSG offers an evidence-based method to assist dissociative patients and the therapists that work with them. Such materials may also be of particular help to clinicians learning how to better serve these populations (Kumar et al., 2022; Nester, Hawkins, & Brand, 2022). A major strength of FSG is its systematically structured, sequential approach to psychoeducation and skill-building that emphasizes individualized pacing. This program allows for repeated access to educational materials and appears to help both patients and therapists to conceptualize and work systematically on basic goals of trauma treatment: stabilization of severe symptoms and development of safety and recovery-based ways to self-regulate. This is the antithesis of the approach proposed by researchers who advocate rapid, intensive focus on trauma processing (e.g., van Minnen & Tibben, 2021) and who aver that stabilization is unnecessary for trauma treatment. In our model, stabilization is defined as developing recovery-oriented self-regulation that reduces reliance on high-risk behaviors, including NSSI and substance abuse. These behaviors drive treatment at more restrictive levels of care and may disrupt therapy; increase treatment costs; and reinforce a sense of failure, shame, and demoralization.
Stabilization of dissociative symptoms is another defining aspect of stabilization. Dissociation declined over time for participants in both groups....

This RCT shows that FSG is an evidence-based stabilization-focused program for individuals demonstrating high levels of trauma-related dissociation and substantial comorbidities. The effect sizes were large for symptom improvements after 1 year of FSG. In view of the challenges and high health care costs associated with trauma and dissociation, it is promising that this program is associated with amelioration of severe symptoms, adaptive capacities, and self-compassion. The inclusion of patients irrespective of the severity of their symptoms, safety issues, or other comorbid conditions suggests broad applicability of this program.  https://psycnet.apa.org/fulltext/2025-86664-001.html

EASY-TO-UNDERSTAND SUMMARY: FINDING SOLID GROUND PROGRAM
What is the Finding Solid Ground program, and how is it unique?

Finding Solid Ground is a program that Ruth Lanius co-developed with Bethany Brand and Hygge Schielke, and they co-authored the book for clinicians and workbook for clients on this innovative approach for helping people with dissociative disorders. Finding Solid Ground is the first research-backed program for trauma-related dissociative disorders.  Finding Solid Ground is a program that Ruth Lanius co-developed with Bethany Brand and Hygge Schielke, and they co-authored the book for clinicians and workbook for clients on this innovative approach for helping people with dissociative disorders. Finding Solid Ground is the first research-backed program for trauma-related dissociative disorders.
Unlike trauma treatments that focus solely on narrative or exposure-based work, Finding Solid Ground begins by helping clients build the foundational skills needed for emotional and relational safety. The book and workbook guide therapists and clients through the program, which provides an evidence-informed, practical, and accessible approach for the stabilization and treatment of patients with complex trauma and dissociation. You can learn more about the book and workbook on our Books page.

The Finding Solid Ground program teaches 4 crucial skills:
    Grounding
    Separating past from present
    Healthy ways of regulating emotions
    Getting healthy needs met safely

Complex trauma refers to repeated and prolonged exposure to traumatic events - often during childhood, and at the hands of parents and/or other early attachment figures.  Dissociative disorders, including the dissociative subtype of PTSD, involve feelings of significant disconnection, including disconnection from one’s body, emotions, memories, surroundings, and/or personal identity.  Typically, this type of disconnection begins as a way to endure terrifying events when physical escape is not possible, for example during physical abuse, military combat, or a horrific car accident.

At its core, dissociation is a survival response, and one that can become automatic whenever a threat, or perceived threat, is present or approaching.  While this response can help someone get through horrible experiences, it is difficult to “turn off”, even after the person is safe and the threat is long gone.  Dissociation can really disrupt people’s lives by interfering with their ability to emotionally connect with family and friends, to notice sensations in their own body (hunger, pain, etc.), to know who they are/what they want, and to navigate their environment, to name just a few examples.  For this reason, it is important for us to find an effective treatment for dissociative disorders.  https://www.ruthlanius.com/finding-solid-ground-summaries

 

Survivorship Notes January/February 2026

 Survivorship Notes January/February 2026        

          
Information on Jeffrey Epstein, International satanic child sex abuse material ring, Trauma-based Mind Control, Clergy Abuse Settlements, Difficult Dates for 2026 https://survivorship.org/notes-and-journal/

 
Sex Crimes Squad charge four men for involvement in an international satanic child sex abuse material ring
Knesset hears harrowing new testimony of alleged ritual sexual abuse
Trauma-based Mind Control 
Thousands of new Epstein documents released
New York archdiocese seeks $300m to settle claims by clergy abuse survivors  
New Orleans Catholic clergy abuse survivors in line to collectively be paid $305m 
Difficult Dates - 2026