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         MindNet Journal - Vol. 1, No. 29a * [Part 1 of 2 parts]
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         V E R I C O M M / MindNet         "Quid veritas est?"
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    Notes:

    The following is reproduced here with the express permission of
    the author.

    Permission is given to reproduce and redistribute, for
    non-commercial purposes only, provided this information and the
    copy remain intact and unedited.

    The views and opinions expressed below are not necessarily the
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    Editor: Mike Coyle

    Associate Editors: Walter Bowart
                       Alex Constantine
                       Martin Cannon

    Assistant Editor: Rick Lawler

    Research: Darrell Bross

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    Excerpted from:

    Psychic Dictatorship in the U.S.A.

    By Alex Constantine

    Portland, OR : Feral House, 1995

    Chapter Five

    Pages 97-111

    "What is that Odor?"

    Mystery Fumes, the Poisoning of the Los
    Angeles County Commission for Women's Ritual Abuse Task Force &
    the Los Angeles Times

    Introduction: Cults, Chemo-Terrorism and the CIA

    After the deadly March 1995 subway gassing in Japan, 1,200 police
    and military troops raided the "sixth santium" of Aum Shinri Kyo,
    one of the country's 17,000 religious cults, in the shadow of
    Mount Fuji. Sporting chemical gear, they cut their way into the
    Kamikuishiki warehouse with circular saws and oxyacetylene
    torches. On the first floor, police stumbled upon a "Perfect
    Salvation Initiation," a yogic ritual that employed electrical
    skull caps to deliver four- to ten-volt shocks to the novitiate
    in an attempt to open his chakras, the body's centers of
    spiritual energy. Among the healing rites practiced by the sect
    was the imbibing and vomiting of whole gallons of water,
    electrical jolts and the "Christ Initiation," an arduous regimen
    of enemas and scalding hot baths.
            Former members of the sect, according to a Los Angeles
    Times report, "paint a chilling picture of psychological
    indoctrination ... sleep deprivation, mind control techniques and
    enforced isolation from the outside world. Access to family and
    friends - even newspapers and TV - is prohibited"1 The cultists
    exhibited an alarming degree of mind control. Police freed a
    screaming woman from a stainless steel pod, and fifty cult
    members were found sprawled unconscious in a chapel on the second
    floor, six others in a drug-induced coma.2
            Police announced that the stockpile of noxious chemicals
    discovered at the compound was the source of the nerve gas
    released in a Tokyo subway, killing ten people and injuring
    5,000, with 70 in critical condition. Sadly enough, the
    neurotoxic effect of the gas is likely to be severe. Medical
    research has shown that acute exposure to toxic levels of sarin
    (a poison developed at chemical laboratories in Nazi Germany as a
    war gas) produces prolonged changes in brain function.3 It was
    the first use of a chemical warfare agent on a large group of
    people by a non-military group4 (though the apocalyptic sect is
    believed to have had a hand in an unexplained sarin "leak" in the
    Japanese Alps in 1994 that left eight dead and sickened 212.5
    "Birds dropped from the sky," one abashed correspondent wrote
    from Tokyo. "Dead dogs and cats lay in the gutters, and dead carp
    and yabbies floated to the surface of an ornamental pond"6).
            It was not the first time that a cult has been accused of
    waging chemical warfare on unsuspecting civilians. In Los
    Angeles, for example, a series of mysterious attacks on members
    of the local County Commission for Women's Ritual Abuse Task
    Force in 1992 led to complaints of nausea, blurred vision,
    dizziness, headaches and elevated blood pressure. Eight of these
    cases had been independently confirmed by blood tests - yet,
    incredibly, Los Angeles Times coverage made light of the victims,
    blaming the outbreak of symptoms on the fertile imaginations of
    professional paranoiacs.7 After all, allegations of abuse at
    McMartin Preschool in Manhattan Beach had been debunked. The
    expert opinions of reputable academics had shown that organized
    cult activity in southern California was non-existent, the
    zaniest of "urban legends."
            Hadn't they?
            Surely the task force was laboring under another bout of
    cult "hysteria." The Times reassured the community that, once
    again, a few fevered brains had made monsters where none existed.
    The newspaper adhered to its position even when Dr. Catherine
    Gould, chairwoman of the ritual abuse task force, fired off a
    letter of rebuttal, pointing out that the allegations were backed
    up by blood-test reports verifying that members of the group had,
    contrary to the Times report, been exposed to organophosphate
    poisons.8
            The Times did not print the letter. Dr. Gould, a licensed
    clinical child therapist, countered that she had found it
    shocking a major metropolitan newspaper would "deliberately
    bypass the available data in favor of a series of emotional
    charges which essentially amount to a chorus of 'it couldn't be
    true.'" She also bemoaned the newspaper's "pattern of biased and
    inaccurate reporting" on ritual child abuse, a tendency to side
    with perpetrators of SRA and promote the small minority of
    psychologists - only one out of ten, in fact - who deride
    recovered memory therapy and have largely succeeded at
    discrediting therapists who work with children abused by mind
    control cults.9
            This small but unremittingly "skeptical" school
    constitutes the pool of academic psychologists available to
    defense attorneys. They have received much play in the press,
    champions of the false memory theory of ritual abuse - though
    most are not licensed to practice child therapy. Ubiquitous in
    the media, this clutch of academic psychologists includes
    Drs. Richard Ofshe, Margaret Singer and Elizabeth Loftus of the
    False Memory Syndrome Foundation, all of whom have made lucrative
    careers testifying on behalf of accused pedophiles. The
    therapists who actually treat the young victims are not sought
    out by reporters. This inequity, biased in favor of the false
    memory brigade, amounts to blanket censorship of all qualified
    professionals on the subject of ritual abuse. The press has thus
    become the sole domain of a small minority of defense
    psychologists.
            Lopsided media coverage of ritual abuse amounts to a
    virulent form of disinformation. The perpetrators and their hired
    guns in academia have a monopoly on the molding of public
    opinion. They are not representative, but they are quoted time
    and again by the press.
            Their bona fides are often in CIA mind control
    experimentation. These include UCLA's Louis Jolyon West (LSD
    experiments) and Berkeley's Margaret Singer (brainwashing
    studies), both "experts" on cults. Dr. Ofshe, who turns up
    constantly in the newspapers to call recovered memory therapy a
    "quack" science, writes monographs on mind control strongly
    influenced by Dr. West's academic writing. Dr. Martin Orne, an
    original board member of the False Memory Syndrome Foundation,
    studied hypnotic persuasion at the University of Pennsylvania for
    CIA and Naval Intelligence paymasters.
            What the Los Angeles Times neglected to tell its
    readership is that CIA behavior control scientists and the cults
    have formed an alliance.
            The Agency uses the cults to further the techniques and
    technology of mind control.10 In exchange, the CIA provides
    behind-the-scenes legal assistance and public relations. A
    perpetrator of ritual abuse, when nabbed, is often treated to
    friendly press coverage. In contrast, ritually abused children
    and their therapists have been targeted for harassment because
    they threaten perps, cults and the Agency alike with exposure.
    Competent psychologists are, in the public print, made to appear
    greedy, incompetent opportunists practicing a medieval science
    based on quack theories of memory. Stories critical of those in
    the field of ritual abuse often bear an uncanny resemblance to a
    CIA disinformation campaign - and that, if the truth be known, is
    no accident.
            Despite public pronouncements to the contrary, the CIA is
    still very actively engaged in mind control research. Communities
    around the world have been converted into laboratories. Cults in
    their midst are led by operatives trained in the techniques and
    technology of behavior control. And media disinformation conceals
    the work of this mind control fraternity. In January of 1992, Dr.
    Gould recalled in her letter to the Times, "I became aware of a
    strange pattern of illnesses [affecting] both Los Angeles
    therapists treating ritual abuse patients, and individuals
    engaged in support and advocacy work on behalf of ritually abused
    children and adults." The afflicted complained not only of a
    general malaise that might be expected to accompany a demanding
    career, but also such unusual symptoms as numbness in the face
    and extremities, blurred vision, muscle tremors and weakness,
    memory loss and even "incontinence."
            The first to complain of symptoms saw a physician, who
    diagnosed her as suffering from diazinon poisoning. (Diazinon,
    like the sarin unleashed in Japan, is an organophosphate.11)
    Independently, another member of the task force had a blood test
    performed at Kaiser Hospital in Los Angeles and was handed the
    same diagnosis. A third member of the group, an SRA survivor, was
    examined at the Glendale Adventist Medical Center and told that
    she had "organophosphate poisoning." Yet another member, a
    therapist suffering a constellation of toxic symptoms, bought a
    pesticide detection kit. She tested samples of food from the
    kitchen one evening when she discovered that her home had been
    broken and entered. A half dozen of the food samples proved
    positive for pesticide poisoning.
            The therapist (requesting anonymity) claimed in a letter
    to the task force, "our home has been broken into several times,
    even during the day when witnesses were on the property.
    Neighbors inform us of continual nighttime surveillance. We have
    been followed several times by a variety of vehicles. On at least
    three occasions the interior of our home has been splattered with
    blood, and two birds have mysteriously died."12
            Concerns were raised at the panel's March 1992 meeting
    that some people engaged in helping ritual abuse survivors escape
    cult influence might be victims of pesticide poisoning. By that
    time, a number of therapists suffering from symptoms of
    organophosphate poisoning had contacted their physicians.
            Satanic cult survivors on the task force also exhibited
    symptoms of toxification, including a young woman and incest
    survivor - referred to here as M - who received the following
    recorded message from her sister shortly after taking a blood
    test:

            I talked to mom this morning - she's very upset! She said
    she had a phone call yesterday about a meeting and that she
    wanted to tell you that any files, any medical reports that you
    go or that anyone else goes looking for will not be found. We
    know what you're up to and you're not going to get away with it.
    I repeat, anything you look for - medical files, reports - will
    not be found. Don't do this.... I'm telling you this to beware -
    you're treading on thin ice - mom told me to tell you'd better be
    careful.
            You'd better watch who you talk to. Watch what you say,
    because you're marked and you know that. We know what school
    [your child] goes to. You'd better be there for him. You'd better
    watch out for him. Anything can happen.
            Have a nice day!

            Medical reports from clinics across the county vouch for
    members of the task force who reporting toxic effects. Still, the
    L.A. Times took the position that they were suffering paranoid
    aberrations.
            The adamant editors of the Times turned up their noses
    not only to the medical reports, but also to a number of letters
    from other therapists of ritually abused children in Los Angeles
    - they, too, exhibited symptoms of organophosphate poisoning.
            One mother of two, after leaving a local cult, contacted
    Gould's task force in November, 1992 about the L.A.Times story:
    "I was alarmed, since I had all the symptoms last year, as had my
    children." Another mother wrote to say that in February, 1985 she
    discovered that her youngest daughter had been sexually abused in
    a daycare center in the San Fernando Valley. Her daughter's
    intense emotional trauma persisted, though she frequented a
    therapist for over a year. Then the toxic siege began ...

            In 1988 I started to experience physical problems. I was
    severely tired much of the time. It felt as if I had been
    drugged. Soon after that I started to have occurrences of
    tachycardia (rapid heart beat), headaches, shortness of breath,
    loss of memory, blurry vision, sweats, and at times I noticed a
    strange odor in my clothing, not to mention the female problems I
    was having. Doctors tested me every which way and yet every test
    was negative.
            They told me I was suffering from stress. I argued that I
    felt drugged, that I had some kind of chemical imbalance. They
    insisted it was stress, and I was referred to various stress
    programs, given tapes to listen to and forced to leave a very
    lucrative job.
            In July 1989, I was put on disability. Today I am
    considered permanently disabled.
            Early in 1992 it was suggested to me that I might be a
    victim of pesticide poisoning. Truth is I didn't believe it. I
    was afraid my doctor would think I was crazy. I eventually did go
    to him and asked his opinion. I was surprised at what he told me
    in a phone conversation the next day. He had consulted with two
    other doctors, and it was their opinion that I was suffering from
    chronic pesticide poisoning.13

            Having amassed a bulky file of medical documentation to
    establish that members of the task force had been poisoned, Dr.
    Gould was still reluctant to contact the local press until she'd
    gathered enough evidence to convince even the most obstinate
    skeptic. In Los Angeles, the legal victory of Ray Buckey on
    molestation charges, after a five-year travail of public debate,
    had prompted a heated backlash against child therapists.
            The task force was still collecting medical evidence and
    discussing possible courses of action when Stephanie Sheppard, a
    cult survivor, broke ranks and phoned the L.A. Times and a local
    television station to "blow the lid" off the group's "psychotic"
    belief they'd been poisoned.
            Ms. Sheppard's admission was made to therapist David
    Neswald prior to a meeting of the panel. Dr. Neswald recalls that
    Sheppard "apparently mistook me for Dr. Papanek and called me out
    to the hallway to speak privately."14 The agonizing irony in the
    confusion of identity is that Dr. Paul Papanek has long been a
    medical champion for the spraying of technical-grade malathion
    (an organophosphate and known neurotoxin) in densely-populated
    Southern California neighborhoods, a practice he commends as
    safe and effective to rid the region of periodic medfly
    infestation, despite growing evidence that the insecticide has
    adverse, often severe effects on human health.
            A mother of two, referred to here as N.R., once sought
    advice from the task force when she suspected her two daughters
    had been abused. She struggled with an undiagnosed illness for a
    year before it occurred to her that the cause might be a poison.
    She phoned the task force office and was referred to Stephanie
    Sheppard, then acting "contact person" on questions concerning
    toxins. Sheppard, the woman complained, "proceeded to question me
    at length," and gave several "lectures about how all of these
    symptoms I was having could be from other causes, including
    'getting old' (I am forty)." N.R. became "very suspicious of her
    intentions and did not wish to talk to her again."15
            After a routine blood test, Ms. R.'s physician received
    not one, but three phone calls from Stephanie Sheppard. She asked
    how the tests had come out, and informed him that she seriously
    doubted anyone on the task force had been poisoned. When
    Stephanie rang N.R., "I told her that I had found out that she
    had called my doctor and that I was very angry. Her voice took on
    a tone that was obviously aimed at shaming me for questioning
    her. I told her in a strong voice not to call again and I hung
    up." Alarmed, she called the clinic, only to discover that
    Stephanie had called there repeatedly for a copy of the blood
    test results. (As it happens, the test proved negative. This
    means little, though, because Mrs. R. learned later that it was a
    test capable of detecting only high levels of toxicity from
    recent exposure.)
            Ms. R. complained to the task force that her doctor had
    "no experience with ritual abuse. Now she certainly has a
    first-hand experience of cult attempts to sabotage all exposure
    of their violent harassment techniques. I am totally outraged."
    She characterized Stephanie Sheppard's intrusions as "a total red
    alert" to "infiltration."
            But the quickest cuts, the harshest treacheries, were yet
    to come - from the Los Angeles Times.
            British journalist Piers Brendon, in The Life and Death
    of the Press Barons, found in the course of researching the book
    in 1983 that "as an integral part of the country's power
    structure, the Times tends to overlook its public
    responsibilities."16 But then, dodging responsibility is
    something of a tradition in the press, Brendon observed: "The
    First Amendment was drafted on the understanding that newspapers
    would be voices crying in the wilderness. It did not matter how
    raucous or even how deceitful they were."
            The very paragon of this principle is the L.A. Times.
            Catherine Gould is cautious of the press. She and other
    therapists working with ritual abuse victims have been repeatedly
    besmirched for shattering the spell of public denial woven by the
    media around any mention of ritual child abuse or cult mind
    control.

    [Continued to part 2]
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