=== Zhong Gong
1. U.S. Delays Asylum Hearing for Leader of a Chinese Sect

=== Takao Wakasa
2. Family dies for 'weirdo' guru

=== Catholic God's Spirit
3. Lacson, Reyes liable for killing, says Roco
4. Reyes hits Lacson on 'murder' story
5. 'Video not the entire story'

=== Scientology
6. Mysterious Ways

=== Islam
7. Pakistani Beaten for Halting Soccer

=== Wicca / Witchcraft
8. Husband sentenced in slaying
9. Witchcraft Museum Brewing

=== Rebirthing
10. Prosecutor likens 'rebirthing' session to 'torture'
11. Candace's final hour
12. 4 to stand trial in therapy death

=== Attleboro Cult
13. Ex-sect member retains custody of five children
14. All parents in sect lose custody of children
15. Former Attleboro sect member given custody of his children

=== General Assembly Church of the Firstborn
16. Parents who relied on faith healing are cleared in baby's death
17. No charge in baby's death

=== Other News
18. Cult leader prophesies an autumn of UFOs: Kazakh Commercial TV
19. Authorities conduct a quiet siege

=== Noted
20. Lieberman Balances Private Faith With Life in the Public Eye


=== Zhong Gong

1. U.S. Delays Asylum Hearing for Leader of a Chinese Sect
New York Times, Aug. 19, 2000
http://www.nytimes.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
WASHINGTON, Aug. 18 -- Immigration officials have delayed until next month a decision on whether to grant asylum to the leader of a Chinese spiritual movement after Chinese officials appealed for his return and submitted detailed charges that he raped followers, people involved in the case say.

The movement's leader, Zhang Hongbao, has been held in detention in Guam since January after arriving in the American territory carrying a false passport, the people said.

Last year, Beijing outlawed Zhong Gong, the quasi-religious group Mr. Zhang founded in 1987, along with several other groups that practice the Chinese meditation and exercise regimen known as qigong.

While human rights groups say that Mr. Zhang has a strong asylum claim, American officials now have the delicate task of assessing the credibility of the Chinese charges.

The Chinese authorities recently provided American officials with a list of alleged crimes, specifying dates and places and including testimony from followers who say that Mr. Zhang sexually assaulted them, people told of the charges said.

The United States recently has tried to elevate cooperation with the Chinese police to fight international drug trafficking, making it difficult to dismiss Beijing's allegations without investigating them. Moreover, Mr. Zhang's group has attracted little international attention and does not fit common definitions of a political or religious movement.

China in the past has brought charges of rape against people whom it considers seditious, and American officials and human rights groups say the charges have in some cases proved unfounded.

Immigration officials requested that an asylum hearing that had been scheduled for today be postponed until American officials weigh the validity of the rape charges. A new hearing is set for early September.

The delay came shortly after Yan Qingxin, who says she is the No. 2 leader of Zhong Gong, was granted asylum.
(...)

Unlike Falun Gong, which operates through autonomous cells with no clear hierarchy, Zhong Gong established an extensive organization with schools, healing centers, factories and printing houses.

People who have studied the movement say it raised millions of dollars from school fees and the sale of medical goods, books and clothing.

Mr. Zhang tailored his teachings to the needs of China's poorest people. He said those who practiced Zhong Gong could fight cancer and heart disease more effectively than by taking drugs or undergoing surgery.

Zhong Gong also says its leading practitioners have paranormal powers, including a ''thousand-mile eye'' that works like an X-ray and a telescope.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Takao Wakasa

2. Family dies for 'weirdo' guru
Mainichi Daily News (Japan), Aug. 18, 2000
http://www.mainichi.co.jp/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
SENNAN, Osaka - An elderly man and his sister apparently let her five children starve to death here as part of a bizarre religious ritual, police said Thursday.

Takao Wakasa, 66, and his 64-year-old sister, Akiko Wakasa, were found late Wednesday night in a state of near exhaustion lying down next to the badly decomposed bodies of the sister's four daughters and a son.

Wakasa apparently told police that he had allowed the five adult children to die ''so that God could purify them.''

Police are poised to lay charges on the elderly siblings once they have sufficiently recovered from their exhaustion, which is believed to have been brought on because they had starved themselves over the past 20 or so days.

However, police are also suspicious as to why the oldest of the seven people holed up in the house were the last to die of starvation and will probably probe the matter further.
(...)

A neighbor said that the reclusive Wakasa family was known locally for being a bunch of ''religious weirdos.'' Neighbors spoke of massive holes dug in the backyard of the Wakasa family home, which appeared to have some religious significance. The home was also filled with altars.

Akiko Wakasa is believed to have told a neighbor that ''God has descended to Earth and I have become a guru.''

Police said the sister also regarded her brother as a mystical figure.

''Takao is a master. He commanded that we should neither eat nor drink at all because of higher religious achievement,'' police quoted her as saying.
(...)

Police said that when they discovered the bodies of the Wakasa children, the brother and sister were lying down beside them and took some time to answer police questions. Investigators believe the elderly siblings had also prepared themselves for death.
(...)

Takao Wakasa has apparently told police that he had not eaten for two months. Police added that Wakasa said his nieces and nephew had started to starve themselves 20 days before he gave up eating.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Catholic God's Spirit

3. Lacson, Reyes liable for killing, says Roco
Philippine Daily Inquirer (Philippines), Aug. 18, 2000
http://www.inquirer.net/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Citing the principle of command responsibility, Sen Raul Roco yesterday said Philippine National Police Director General Panfilo Lacson and Armed Forces Chief of Staff Gen. Angelo Reyes should also be held accountable for the killing of the 16 cultists in Bukidnon.

''There is command responsibility in the killing of these poor people who had bolos and who were shot to death like dogs,'' Roco told reporters. ''Whoever was in command of the unit--and even their superior officers--should be held accountable.''
(...)

Roco said the two top officials could be considered principals for the killings because they gave the orders and were unable to impress upon their men the necessary discipline to respect life.

But this suggestion was shot down by Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile, who said Reyes and Lacson could not be held accountable for the bloodbath.

''Crimes are personal, unless you can establish conspiracy,'' he told reporters.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


4. Reyes hits Lacson on 'murder' story
Philippine Daily Inquirer (Philippines), Aug. 18, 2000
http://www.inquirer.net/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Armed Forces Chief of Staff Gen. Angelo Reyes disagrees with the contention of Philippine National Police Director General Panfilo Lacson that the Aug. 11 killing of 16 cultists by government forces was a case of ''plain murder.''

''The video footage is not the entire story,'' Reyes said, noting that Lacson had based his verdict on the footage taken by ABS-CBN on the killings. ''It is difficult to render a judgment and later be proven wrong.''

Reyes pointed out that the footage was not the only piece of evidence that should be considered.
(...)

In a news conference at Camp Crame, the nine policemen in the team yesterday invoked ''self-defense'' in the killings, saying they were ''outnumbered, surrounded and cornered'' by the cultists.
(...)

The policemen's claim of self-defense was supported by Vice Mayor Miguel Silva and Barangay Captains Vicente Serra and Diosdado Ofngol, who both said the killings were not an ''overkill'' and were actually a result of a ''legitimate operation.''

PO3 Diosdado Valiente said there were ''more than 30 cultists as against the less than 20'' members of the composite team.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


5. 'Video not the entire story'
The Philippine Star (Philippines), Aug. 18, 2000
http://www.philstar.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Armed Forces chief Gen. Angelo Reyes said the television footage that captured the clash between members of the Tadtad cult and a team of policemen and militiamen in Bukidnon did not show the ''entire story,'' as he defended the militiamen who were involved.

Reyes disputed the findings of Philippine National Police (PNP) chief Director General Panfilo Lacson that the militiamen, who were assisting policemen in arresting a cult member, committed murder when they fired at the cultists, who were charging at them with machetes and bolos.
(...)

Reyes said the military will fully cooperate in the investigations being conducted by various government agencies such the PNP and the Commission on Human Rights.

Lacson has relieved nine of the policemen involved in the clash.
(...)

''This is not a punishment. This is to make them available for investigation,'' Lacson stressed.
(...)

After viewing the entire footage, Lacson blamed the cult, saying they provoked the clash. However, he added that the lawmen committed ''excesses.''
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Scientology

6. Mysterious Ways
What makes tuition paid for classes in one religion more deductible than tuition for classes in another?
Forbes, Sept. 9, 2000
http://www.forbes.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Los Angeles accountant Michael Sklar was shelling out $24,000 a year to send his four children to Jewish day schools in 1994 when a four-line Internal Revenue Service ruling caught his eye.

The November 1993 edict declared ''obsoleted'' the IRS' 1978 ruling barring members of the Church of Scientology from deducting the ''fixed donations'' they paid for religious education and ''auditing''--a practice in which Scientology ministers ask members probing questions to identify areas in need of spiritual work.

Sklar wondered: If Scientologists can deduct their form of religious education, why can't I deduct mine? The Orthodox Jew decided to write off 55% of his tuition bills, based on the proportion of time his children's schools said was spent on religious courses.

No dice. In April U.S. Tax Court Special Trial Judge Larry L. Nameroff ruled that Sklar hadn't shown he was in the same position as members of the Church of Scientology. He was denied all his religious-education deductions, including the $75 he paid for a special after-school class in the Talmud. Sklar is appealing.

Former IRS commissioner Sheldon S. Cohen doesn't give him much chance, in part because his kids went to a school that mixed religious and secular education. But the case does point out a glaring inequity that has existed since 1993, when the IRS cut a controversial deal with the Church of Scientology, a 46-year-old Los Angeles-based religion that claims 3 million U.S. members, including actor John Travolta and composer Isaac Hayes.

The agreement made the group tax-exempt and allowed its members to deduct fees not just for auditing, but also for such religious courses as ''Success Through Communication'' and ''The Anatomy of the Human Mind.''

Note that in 1989 the Supreme Court had upheld the IRS' refusal to allow deductions for auditing and Scientology classes. In that decision the Court even noted that if these deductions were allowed, it could open the door for taxpayers to claim deductions for parochial school. Big dollars are at stake, since Americans pay an estimated $11 billion a year for parochial schools and religious education.

After the Scientology deal Cohen appealed to the IRS to issue clear rules about what religious education was now deductible. It never did.

''The IRS realizes that giving in to Scientology was a mistake, and they don't want to extend that mistake,'' says former IRS commissioner Donald C. Alexander. ''The result is most taxpayers are unfairly treated.''
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]

» See follow-up

=== Islam

7. Pakistani Beaten for Halting Soccer
Associated Press, Aug. 19, 2000
http://beta.yellowbrix.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AP) -- Hundreds of angry tribesmen armed with stones attacked more than 100 hard-line Muslims who had halted a soccer match on religious grounds, police said Saturday.

Witnesses said several people were injured in the brawl Friday, which began after the hard-line Muslims called the players' dress a violation of Islam.

The group of more than 100 Taliban, or students of Islam, forced their way into a sports stadium in the tribal town of Landikotal on the border with Afghanistan, demanding that the match be stopped, said Sahibzada Anees, a senior government official. Hundreds of tribesmen responded by beating them, some with assault rifles, police said.
(...)

The Taliban say shorts and short-sleeved shirts violate Islam's dress code, which forbids even men from exposing any part of their bodies. Ultra-orthodox Islamic clerics say athletes also must properly cover their bodies and must not shave or trim their beards.
(...)

The Pakistani Taliban involved in Friday's clash are members of a religious school adjacent to the stadium. They also were complaining that spectators' loud cheers and shouts disturbed their prayers and religious studies, Anees said. Earlier Friday, the same group of the Taliban set fire to a house where a private musical performance was held 10 days ago.

''The Taliban have no right to interfere in other peoples' lives in the name of religion,'' said Ibrahim Shinwari, one of the organizers of the soccer match.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Wicca / Witchcraft

8. Husband sentenced in slaying
Detroit News, Aug. 16, 2000
http://detnews.com:80/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
DETROIT -- A Garden City man was sentenced to 15-30 years in prison for killing his wife -- the daughter of Metro Detroit's most famous witch.
(...)

Cox also noted that Peter Raub had a history of verbal and physical abuse against his wife, Veronica Kuclo-Raub. Kuclo-Raub, who ran an occult store in Garden City, is the daughter of the late Gundella the Witch, a local celebrity who wrote a book on local hauntings.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


9. Witchcraft Museum Brewing
ABC News/AP, Aug. 4, 2000
http://www.abcnews.go.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
N E W O R L E A N S, Aug. 4 - Crystal balls, broomsticks, black mirrors, torture devices, trident wands and pentagrams - it's not Halloween, an occult shop in the French Quarter or a scene from the movie The Craft.

This is the Buckland collection of witchcraft and magic. It contains about 500 artifacts tracing the history of witchcraft from the caveman era to the present and may soon be opened as a museum in New Orleans.

Raymond Buckland, author and recognized expert on witchcraft, began collecting artifacts in the mid-1900s in England, where he was part of a coven headed by Gerald Gardner - one of the first published authorities on witchcraft.
Artifacts in Storage in Ohio

Buckland came to the United States in 1962 and has since written several books on the religion and related subjects.

His collection was open in New York about 20 years ago as the Buckland Museum of Witchcraft and Magick. It was closed and the artifacts put in storage in Ohio when he began traveling to lecture and promote his books.
(...)

Fear of witches stems from misinterpretations of the religion, Plaisance said.

An old ritual used by witches to encourage crop growth was to grab a pitchfork, broom or shovel, whatever was handy, and leap through the fields to show the crops how high to grow, Plaisance said. The ritual led to the myth that witches were able to fly on broomsticks and spread evil, he said.
(...)

A portion of the Buckland collection has been posted on the Internet.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Rebirthing

10. Prosecutor likens 'rebirthing' session to 'torture'
Denver Post, Aug. 18, 2000
http://www.denverpost.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Aug. 18, 2000 - Wrapped from head to toes in a sheet as part of a ''rebirthing session,'' 10-year-old Candace Newmaker pleaded for help about 50 times, a Jefferson County prosecutor said Thursday in court.

Candace told four adults holding her down that she couldn't breathe and was going to die, but pressure to keep her inside the sheet was increased in a ''monstrous'' act ''tantamount to cruel torture,'' Deputy District Attorney Steve Jensen said.

Therapists Connell Watkins, 53, and Julie Ponder, 40; business manager Brita St. Clair, 41; and intern Jack McDaniel, 47, were all bound over to face arraignment on the charge of reckless child abuse resulting in death.

Joan Heller, Julie Ponder's attorney, told the court that her client did not ''consciously disregard'' Candace's safety. Ponder, who headed the session because of her experience, expected a struggle, Heller said. Candace's struggle was interpreted as the girl being uncooperative with the therapeutic session.
(...)

Based on videotape of the 70-minute session, which included audio, Jensen said Candace could be heard gasping for breath several times. During a 16-minute span, the girl said that she couldn't breathe seven times. She said she was going to die six times. Just short of 17 minutes into the session, Candace declared: ''OK, I'm dead.''

''These people chose to ignore what was obvious to anyone,'' Jensen said. ''They all had assumed a duty to protect the child and not hurt her. They failed miserably.''
(...)

The four defendants will be arraigned on Sept. 18. Jeane Newmaker, of Durham, N.C., faces a Sept. 6 hearing on the lesser felony charge of criminal-negligence child abuse resulting in death.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


11. Candace's final hour
Denver Rocky Mountain News, Aug. 18, 2000
http://www.insidedenver.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Here is a timeline of the videotape that documents 10-year-old Candace Newmaker's death during a ''rebirthing'' therapy on April 18 in Evergreen, based on statements made Thursday by Jefferson County Deputy District Attorney Steven Jensen:

Times are indicative of elapsed time of the 70-minute session and all quotes are from Candace unless otherwise indicated.

10:45: ''I can't do it, I can't do it. I can't breathe. I can't breathe.''

11:21: ''Somebody's on top of me.''

11:35: ''I'm going to die,'' then crying.

12:05: ''I'm going to die. No, no, I don't want to die. ... Please let me have some air.''

12:28: ''Please, please.''

12:55: ''Please quit pushing on me.''

13:58: ''OK, I'm dying. I'm sorry.''

16:05: ''I want to die.''

16:49: ''Can you let me have some oxygen? ... OK, I'm dead.''

17:07: ''I can't breathe.''

19:48: ''Please, you said you would give me some oxygen.''

21:21: Sounds of Candace vomiting and gagging. ''I'm throwing up. I just threw up. I gotta poop. I gotta poop.'' Therapist Julie Ponder replies, ''Go ahead.''

23:25: Therapist Connell Watkins says, ''Stay there with the poop and vomit.''

27:19: ''I can't breathe.''

31:15: The therapists order her to scream; Candace whimpers. Ponder repositions her body and grunts twice while pushing on Candace with her hands and body. She says ''she needs more pressure over here ... so she really needs to fight if she wants air.''

40:00 (approximate): Candace's mother, Jeane Newmaker, asks, ''Baby, do you want to be reborn?'' Candace weakly responds, ''No.''

40:01: Ponder says, ''She's stuck there in her own puke and poop.''

1:08:30: Candace is unwrapped from blue flannel sheet. Watkins says, ''Oh, there she is. She's sleeping in her vomit.''
[...entire item...]


12. 4 to stand trial in therapy death
Denver Rocky Mountain News, Aug. 18, 2000
http://www.insidedenver.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
GOLDEN - Lying in her own vomit and excrement, 10-year-old Candace Newmaker pleaded with four adults for help more than 50 times during the ''rebirthing'' therapy that resulted in her death.

Instead, prosecutors said, describing a video of the fatal treatment, the four ignored the child's cries that she would die. They said two responded with taunts, telling Candace to ''stay there with the poop and vomit.''
(...)

The attorneys for Watkins and Ponder, who are psychotherapists, said their clients practice the ''rebirthing'' procedure to help children suffering from attachment disorder to bond with their parents. It's difficult for lay people to understand the complicated therapy that's intended to heal difficult children, the attorneys said.

Candace was known to fight the many therapies her mother, Jeane Newmaker of Durham, N.C., had placed her in, said Joan Heller, Ponder's attorney. The four knew, the attorney said, that Candace would play along for a while, then say ''No, it's too hard. I'm not going to continue.''

''This is a therapy session, and based on her past behavior ... they believed she was continuing her course of conduct,'' Heller said.

But prosecutor Steve Jensen said the session, far from helping Candace, killed her. The four kept Candace ''forcibly restrained'' for 70 minutes, pushing so hard with their cumulative 673 pounds on the ''diminutive'' 70-pound girl that they mechanically asphyxiated her, he said.

''This is monstrous and far exceeds any doubt to recklessness,'' Jensen said. ''They call it therapy ... this is tantamount to cruel torture.''

The therapists also controlled Candace with drugs, Jensen said, recounting that the girl was on both antidepressants and a psychotropic drug that calmed her. Even so, Candace told them six times that she would die, and begged seven times for air to breathe, he said.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Attleboro Cult

13. Ex-sect member retains custody of five children
Bangor Daily News, Aug. 18, 2000
http://beta.yellowbrix.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
ATTLEBORO, Mass. - A judge awarded a former member of a fundamentalist Christian sect custody of his five children Thursday but determined that an infant daughter of parents still in the sect should be put up for adoption.

The decisions ended two days of hearings about the custody of 13 sect children.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


14. All parents in sect lose custody of children
The Providence Journal, Aug. 18, 2000
http://beta.yellowbrix.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
ATTLEBORO - Six more children were permanently taken away from parents who are members of an Attleboro religious sect after hearings in Juvenile Court yesterday.

After two days of hearings, all sect members who are parents of minor children have been declared unfit and have had their children taken away.

In all, 13 children are involved. In the cases of seven of the children, custody was awarded to their fathers, who are not members of the sect. Plans are being made for the other six children to be adopted by aunts, with whom they have been living since the state took custody of the children in November.

The sect has been under investigation since the death of Samuel Robidoux, the 10-month-old son of sect members Jacques Robidoux and Karen Daneau Robidoux, in November.

Dennis Mingo, a former member of the sect, tipped authorities that Samuel might not be well after finding a 10-page diary that described the infant growing weak from hunger after being switched to a breast- milk-only diet. The police were unable to locate Samuel and now believe that he died last year from malnutrition. The diary does not make it entirely clear why breastfeeding, which is normally sufficient for a child of that age, was apparently inadequate for Samuel.

Five of the six children in court yesterday were those of Dennis Mingo and his estranged wife, Michelle Robidoux Mingo, who is still a member of the sect.

Judge Kenneth P. Nasif terminated Michelle Mingo's rights as a parent and awarded custody of the children, ages 3 to 10, to Dennis Mingo.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


15. Former Attleboro sect member given custody of his children
Boston Globe, Aug. 18, 2000
http://www.boston.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
ATTLEBORO - Outside the courthouse where he won custody of his five children yesterday, former cult member Dennis Mingo recalled how difficult it had been to escape the tight grip of the obscure sect that, authorities believe, allowed a 10-month-old baby to starve to death.

When he left the Christian group in November 1997, Mingo said, he had to leave behind his wife, children, and ''family members'' in the fundamentalist sect.

''I hung in there as long as I could,'' said Mingo, 36, a member for nearly 11 years. ''I didn't want to leave my family, but I couldn't live with what was going on.''

''It began as harmless Bible study,'' he said. ''But before you knew it, you're caught in something that you would never have imagined in a million years.''

The group home-schools its children, bases its lifestyle on Old Testament Scriptures, and says it does not have to answer to the government. Some members believe they communicate directly with God, said Mingo, who initiated a police investigation last fall when he discovered a member's diary which Mingo has said describes how God willed the starvation of Samuel Robidoux, the child of cult leader Jacques Robidoux.
(...)

Mingo's children have been under his supervision since the DSS probe began. However, his wife, Michelle, whose parental rights were terminated in yesterday's proceedings, is among those in jail for not cooperating with the Bristol County grand jury investigating the disappearances of Samuel Robidoux and Jeremiah Courneau.

Michelle has not talked with Mingo since God instructed her not to do so early last year, Mingo said.
(...)

Mingo said his wife is so brainwashed that she does not understand that she has lost all legal right to their children.

''Today didn't mean anything to her. She's rationalized in her head that this is just temporary,'' Mingo said. ''I'm sure she thinks it is just a test from God. These people don't believe in time and chance - everything in their life is mandated by God.''

Mingo added, ''Michelle loves her children to death, and at some point, it's going to hit her hard.''

The group rejects legal counsel and has kept to its code of silence. In court, Robidoux has told Juvenile Court Judge Kenneth P. Nasif that the fate of his son is between him and God.

Other cult members, Mingo said, have probably considered leaving the group, but feel trapped, not wanting to leave their family.

Mingo tries to remain optimistic about his wife. One day, for the children's sake, he hopes she returns to her real family. But he knows that day may be far off.

''In a group like this, you always feel like there is something wrong with you,'' he said. ''I'm still healing.''
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== General Assembly Church of the Firstborn

16. Parents who relied on faith healing are cleared in baby's death
Denver Rocky Mountain News, Aug. 18, 2000
http://www.insidedenver.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
GRAND JUNCTION - No charges will be filed against the parents of a 2-day-old boy who died of complications from a heart defect without ever seeing a doctor, though the district attorney suggested their refusal to seek medical care was ''a remnant of the Dark Ages.''
(...)

''I strongly favor the right of individuals to pray for the sick and infirm,'' Mesa County District Attorney Frank Daniels said Thursday. ''But the use of prayer to the absolute exclusion of medical care is a remnant of the Dark Ages. This practice endangers children.''

Mesa County Coroner Rob Kurtzman ruled earlier this month that the manner of death was undetermined, saying the evidence did not warrant a ruling of homicide.

Daniels agreed with Kurtzman that the death could have been prevented had Billy Ray received routine medical care or been monitored by doctors. But both said the boy's caregivers may not have known how severe Billy Ray's problems were before he died.
(...)

The Reeds belong to the General Assembly Church of the First Born, a close-knit Christian sect that believes God has the sovereign power to heal.

Billy Ray was born and died at home with church members praying around him.

The Reeds could have been charged under Colorado child-abuse law, but an exception can be made for members of faith-healing sects.

However, that exception also includes a clause saying a parent's religious rights should not limit a child's access to medical care in life-threatening situations.

Daniels has lobbied to repeal the faith-healing exception and has called the statute unclear.

''In my opinion, the current statutory scheme is seriously flawed and should be changed,'' he said Thursday.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


17. No charge in baby's death
Denver Post, Aug. 18, 2000
http://www.denverpost.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Aug. 18, 2000 - GRAND JUNCTION - To prosecutor Frank Daniels, ''the use of prayer to the absolute exclusion of medical care is a remnant of the Dark Ages.''

The Mesa County district attorney has come by that opinion after agonizing over evidence in the deaths of two newborns whose parents belong to the General Assembly Church of the Firstborn. In the most recent case, Daniels announced Thursday that he will not charge Billy and Barbara Reed, members of the church, with homicide or child abuse because it would be impossible to prove the Reeds knew their 3-day-old son, Billy Ray Reed, was dying from a hole in his heart before he turned blue and suffocated on July 9. The defect is a common, treatable childhood malady.

''The right to practice religion freely should not include the right to expose children to ill health or death,'' Daniels wrote in a lengthy explantion detailing the reasons behind his decision not to prosecute the Reeds, and also spelling out his belief that what the Reeds and other Firstborn members are doing to their children is ethically wrong.
(...)

Daniels made what he called ''a tough decision'' after reviewing evidence in the case for several weeks, even going into his office on weekends to study the details of Billy Ray's death.
(...)

Billy Ray Reed was the second infant of Firstborn parents in the Grand Junction area to die in the past 18 months - and the second case Daniels has had to grapple with under what he calls flawed Colorado statutes.

In February 1999, 18-day-old Warren Glory died of meningitis and pneumonia while church elders prayed over him.

Daniels charged Warren's parents, Joshua and Mindy Glory, with homicide. The Glorys pleaded guilty to child abuse resulting in death and are serving 16 years of probation.

Mesa County Coroner Dr. Rob Kurtzman, who along with Daniels has been wrestling with the issues of religious freedom vs. the fundamental right to life in these cases, declared Warren Glory's death to be a homicide. He ruled that Billy Ray Reed's death was due to ''undetermined causes'' because he could not determine with certainty that the child's symptoms would have alerted his parents to his fatal condition.

Daniels, Kurtzman and a growing number of child-welfare advocates and legislators have been prompted by these two cases to call for a change in Colorado law relating to parents who withhold medical treatment from seriously ill minors on religious grounds.

Daniels said the Children's Code needs to be clarified and that a murky faithhealing exemption that prohibits prosecution of those who use ''recognized methods of religious healing'' must be repealed.

An organization called Children's Health Care is a Legal Duty that has been tracking Church of the Firstborn childhood deaths reports that there have been more than 35 documented deaths across the country since 1975.
(...)

The death of a child during his birth at a rural Olathe home last month has been officially ruled a stillborn death even though there is some disagreement about whether the child drew a breath before dying.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Other News

18. Cult leader prophesies an autumn of UFOs: Kazakh Commercial TV
BBC Monitoring, Aug. 19, 2000
http://beta.yellowbrix.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
September will see 1,356m UFOs flying over Almaty, according to the prophesy of the founder of the Alla-Ayat mystic and occult sect in Kazakhstan. The cult, which has been proscribed by the authorities, is now facing criminal proceedings on the grounds that its adherents carry out illegal medical practices and lead followers to suicide. In an interview with a Kazakh Commercial TV correspondent broadcast on 18th August, the leader of the sect, Farkhat Abdullayev, did not comment on reports that a 30-year old male follower of the sect had committed suicide in Almaty after hearing him preach.

''I do not believe in religion. There is no God for me. God is my son... There are no earthly laws for me,'' Farkhat Abdullayev, or Farkhat-ata as he is widely known, told the TV correspondent. ''I gave you the light for you, the people. I govern the light.'' Apart from maintaining ''that he is the Sun all the time'', the correspondent went on, ''he discourses rather chaotically on space, his teaching and the planet Icarus, which he has invented and where he promises to take his followers.''

Farkhat-ata, a former bus driver, founded his sect 10 years ago ''when he called himself the messiah'', the report said. ''The man virtually never parts with a cigarette, rejects all religions, laws and, above all, modern medicine and doctors.'' He is now studying at the centre for popular medicine in Almaty and ''has taken out a licence for private medical practice''.

The TV correspondent went on: ''As a rule, those who become Farkhat- ata's disciples are people whom he first undertakes to cure. Then the followers, who are turned into zombies, recruit others. He says himself that he communicates with them through the stars.''
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


19. Authorities conduct a quiet siege
Dallas Morning News, Aug. 19, 2000
http://dallasnews.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
TOOL, Texas - John Joe Gray, an anti-government fugitive, and more than a dozen heavily armed members of his family are holed up on their 47-acre homesite in rural Henderson County.

Law officers say the last thing they want is ''another Waco,'' alluding to the deadly 1993 standoff with the Branch Davidians, but the defiant, hand-painted signs posted at the driveway leading into the property are clear and unambiguous.

''We are the militia and will live free or die!''

''No trespassing. ... Survivors will be prosecuted.''
(...)

Mr. Gray, 51, is the family leader. He's charged with assaulting two state troopers during a traffic stop last Dec. 24. Court records say he was carrying a pistol in a shoulder-holster and refused to get out of the car. When troopers tried to remove him, the charges allege, he resisted and tried to grab one of their pistols.

Mr. Gray was arrested, jailed and released on bond. An Anderson County Grand jury in Palestine, Texas, indicted him on two felony charges. When he failed to show up for subsequent court hearings, the court issued arrest warrants in May.

So far, the Texas Rangers and the Henderson County Sheriff Department have chosen not to enter the property to serve the arrest warrants. They believe as many as 10 adults and six children live in two houses nestled deep in the Trinity River bottoms just west of Cedar Creek Lake.
(...)

But Keith Tarkington is tired of waiting. He believes Lisa Gray, his ex-wife, is holding his two pre-school sons on the property. Ms. Gray is one of Mr. Gray's six grown children. No one is quite sure how many of the children are living on the family property.

Mr. Tarkington said he last saw his two sons, 4-year-old Joe and 2-year-old Samuel, on April 9, 1999. His wife had taken them to live with her parents.

Three weeks later, Mr. Tarkington filed for divorce.

Ms. Gray never attended court hearings. Last August, the couple were finally divorced and the court awarded custody of the boys to Mr. Tarkington.

When Ms. Gray did not respond to the court's order, state District Judge Carter Tarrance of Athens, Texas, signed a new order commanding the sheriff to bring the boys into the custody of the court.

Chief Deputy Brownlow said officers tried to serve the court order at the Gray property by leaving it on a fence post. Since it is a civil matter, officers had no legal authority to enter the property, he said.
(...)

John Joe Gray has undergone a spiritual and political transformation in the last five years, according to Mr. Tarkington.

Mr. Gray and his wife wanted to join a church but could not find one that they believed taught the Bible properly, Mr. Tarkington said.

''They ended up sitting at home reading the Bible to each other on Saturday night and watching R-rated movies on the VCR,'' he said.

Then, sometime in 1996, Mr. Gray became active in the Texas Constitutional Militia, an anti-government group. Neighbors said they often heard gunfire coming from the Grays' property during militia training exercises.

''They bragged about not paying taxes and tearing up their social security cards and that kind of stuff,'' Mr. Tarkington said.

Mr. Gray and his family also began professing membership in the Oregon-based Embassy of Heaven, an off-beat Christian group that issues fake driver's licenses, car tags and ID cards to its members.

The Embassy of Heaven movement maintains that each member is a church unto himself and, as such, is free of government regulation.

Rachael Gray Dempsey, Lisa Gray's sister, was arrested in November 1998 for driving without a valid license, car tags and vehicle registration. At the time of the traffic stop, she was using Embassy of Heaven license plates and driver's license.

The Southern Poverty Law Center, an Alabama-based civil rights organization that tracks anti-government extremists, estimates that between 300 and 400 people are loosely affiliated with the Embassy of Heaven.

Mr. Tarkington, who is Catholic, said his wife left him because he would not join the group with her and her father. In a telephone conversation after their break-up, she criticized him for belonging to a religion that ''places the Pope between God and the people.''
(...)

The specter of the 1993 standoff between the Branch Davidians and the FBI hangs over the Gray case like a looming storm cloud. Law officers say they fear that anything can happen when you mix religious zealotry, anti-government sentiment, firearms and children.
(...)

More troubling, they said, is the constant drumbeat about the case on the Internet and on short-wave radio broadcasts favored by a subculture that believes Americans are victimized by too many secular, anti-Christian government regulations.

The internet postings and shortwave broadcasts are filled with rumors that the U.S. military and the FBI are poised with tanks and soldiers to attack the Gray property.
(...)

Rumors about an imminent attack may be fueling what officers called the family's already-paranoid anxiety.

''To tell the truth, I think the only ones who want another Waco are the Grays,'' said Chief Deputy Brownlow. ''I don't know his [John Joe Gray's] mental state, but his actions indicate he wants to be a martyr.''
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Noted

20. Lieberman Balances Private Faith With Life in the Public Eye
New York Times, Aug. 18, 2000
http://www.nytimes.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
By watching Senator Joseph I. Lieberman carefully, Americans may receive a lesson in the rituals and the realities of living as an Orthodox Jew in America.
(...)

Mr. Lieberman refers to himself as an ''observant Jew,'' not Orthodox. It is an intentional distinction that his staff laments has been overlooked in all the coverage, including that in The New York Times, devoted to the first Jewish politician to run for vice president.

''He refers to himself as observant as opposed to Orthodox because he doesn't follow the strict Orthodox code and doesn't want to offend the Orthodox, and his wife feels the same way,'' said a Lieberman press officer who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
(...)

Despite his hesitation to embrace the label, Mr. Lieberman is by practice, heritage and synagogue membership best described as a modern Orthodox Jew.

Orthodox Jews try to live according to Halakha, the vast body of Jewish law, and so practice a stricter form of observance than those who belong to the other Jewish denominations -- Conservative, the next most traditional, followed by Reform and Reconstructionist. For every prohibition in the Halakha, however, there are exceptions argued over by generations of rabbis.

Mr. Lieberman's form of observance makes clear that Orthodox Judaism is a continuum that ranges from lenient to stringent interpretation of Jewish law.
(...)

While the Orthodox world is complex, there are two basic distinctions. The ultra-Orthodox, or haredim (meaning ''those who tremble'' before God), have traditionally kept an arm's length from secular society. They include the Hasidic Jews who replanted their Eastern European communities in America, retaining visible signs of their separateness like black hats and side curls.

Modern Orthodoxy, by contrast, tries to integrate the observance of Jewish law with participation in contemporary life. ''Modern means we see it as a religious imperative to engage the modern world, the secular world,'' said Rabbi Barry Freundel of Kesher Israel, the temple where Mr. Lieberman worships in Washington, ''and to take that which is of value in that world and make it part of our world.''
(...)

Many of Mr. Lieberman's most basic religious rituals are intimate acts. He prays three times a day. At morning prayer, Rabbi Freundel said, the senator lays on tefillin, the small leather boxes that contain four biblical passages written on parchment, binding the boxes to one arm and his forehead with leather straps.

He and his wife, Hadassah, keep kosher, adhering to the Jewish dietary laws. They do not mix milk products and meat, and keep separate sets of dishes for each. When he is traveling, aides say, he eats tuna sandwiches, or fruit and vegetables.

Most important, Mr. Lieberman keeps the Fourth Commandment to observe the Sabbath as a day of rest and delight in God's creation, from sundown on Friday to sundown on Saturday. Observant Jews are supposed to refrain from writing, using electricity, driving and talking on the telephone.

Mr. Lieberman, with the help of his two rabbis, Rabbi Al Feldman in New Haven as well as Rabbi Freundel, has derived a way to reconcile the requirements of Jewish law with his responsibilities as an elected official. Jewish law teaches that one may break the Sabbath if the matter involves ''concern for human life.'' Mr. Lieberman and his rabbis have interpreted that by drawing a line between governing and campaigning. That means he will not break the Sabbath to campaign, but he is required to break the Sabbath to cast a Senate vote or take crucial action on public policy.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]