------------------------------------------------------------------- F.A.C.T.Net, Inc. (Fight Against Coercive Tactics Network, Incorporated) a non-profit computer bulletin board and electronic library 601 16th St. #C-217 Golden, Colorado 80401 USA BBS 303 530-1942 FAX 303 530-2950 Office 303 473-0111 This document is part of an electronic lending library and preservational electronic archive. F.A.C.T.Net does not sell documents, it only lends them according to the terms of your library cardholder agreement with F.A.C.T.Net, Inc. ------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 PROFESSIONAL PROFILE: Patrick Ryan Patrick Ryan (BA in Interdisciplinary Studies, Maha- rishi International University) is the founder and former head of TM-Ex, the organization of one-time members of the Transcendental Meditation (TM) movement. His association with AFF involves frequent attendance at conferences, where he is often a speaker, work with other ex-cult members, and a book about his personal experience, Recovery From Cults, to be published this August. TM recruiters were allowed into his high school in the mid-'70s, a time when the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi was a frequent guest on the "Merv Griffin" and other TV shows. Mr. Ryan attended an informational meeting which led to a weekend, then a week, with "no privacy, end- less tapes of chanting, meditation, and lectures." Mia Farrow's sister, Prudence, was one of the teachers. She and her husband attended MIU, to which she persuaded Mr. Ryan and 250 others to go for both "academics and enlightenment." `His five years there provided "a mixed bag academically." The school was accredited through the Ph.D. in various subjects, and because courses were taught by the "block system," good faculty could be brought in briefly for good pay. Out of three months, two were allotted for academics, one for meditating, sometimes as many a 7 hours a day for 7 days at a time. There was an average of 4 hours' trance- inducing activity per day, and all for academic credit. After graduating, Mr. Ryan worked a year for a Maharishi community. A family intervention when one of his sisters joined "a cult" (The Way) began his questioning process, and he started to see parallels in his situation. He sought insights from former TM-ers, and was further disillusioned. Several lawsuits against the organization exposed hitherto secret tales of "yogic flying," adding to its embarrassment. An attorney in one such suit urged Mr. Ryan to visit Dr. Margaret Singer, who put the "crowning touches" on his liberation. She sent him to a Cult Awareness Network conference where he met many families of TM members. Thus began his exit counseling career which, after he gave up a thriving import business, soon became full - time. He works with a variety of cult members, stressing that he does "no involuntaries." The young man once trained as a "spiritual warrior" for TM (a distinction reserved for heroic meditators, not the mere 20 minutes a day kind) is now an internationally recognized cult expert, relied on by families and media in the U.S., Canada, and Australia. He is also another of those AFF associates whose advice to law enforcement officials might, had it been heeded, have helped avert the Waco debacle. 2 PROFESSIONAL PROFILE: Sandy Bargioni [SF Police Officer, Jonestown, Temple of Set, Satanism] Sandy Bargioni (AA in Criminology, City College of San Francisco), a Special Investigator for the San Francisco Police Department -- which she has served for over thirty years now--traces her professional involvement in matters cultic to the Jonestown disaster, when she became the local liaison to the FBI. The agency was concerned about potential suicides among Peoples Temple members who remained in San Francisco, and of course some of the survivors had returned to their families in the Bay area. (Even closer to home, a janitor it, the police department had lost his whole family in Guyana.) After Jonestown, Officer Bargioni recalls, the police began to scrutinize more closely the criminal activities of cult groups, and as complaints of such acti- vities increased, she began doing a great deal of research, often through knowledgeable and well-placed contacts (including AFF Board member Margaret Singer). Once, she went undercover to see first hand the recruitment style of the Muktananda group. She also took courses on cults and cultic processes. Around 1980, Officer Bargioni interviewed a young ill woman who told of involvement in a group practicing bizarre rites including sexual torture and sado-masochism (presaging by a decade the current deluge of claims of ritual child abuse). Her first actual case of a child alleging ritual abuse concerned the notorious Temple of Set, run by an army major from the San Francisco Presidio. The leader complained that Officer Bargioni violated his First Amendment rights, but she was exonerated, and in the end ex-members, as well as the famous Satanist Anton Le Vay, wrote to say that she had done a great job. In 1985, Officer Bargioni contributed significantly to AFF's Wingspread Conference on cults, in Wisconsin, and has remained an important AFF resource and advisor. In the last few years, Officer Bargioni has been investigating complaints of Satanist activity. She has consciously had to separate herself from her strong Christian background, try to approach the matter from a neutral perspective, and refrain from connecting bizarre ritual automatically with "Satan" and evil, as she once did. Having read widely and pondered these matters, she now feels able to separate the spiritual elements of a case from the psychopathological abusive practices, the former often only a cover for the latter. Apropos such cases, however, Officer Bargioni remarked that as an investigator she needs evidence, and there is precious little in most of these ritual abuse cases upon which to build a case in law. ================================================================= If this is a copyrighted work, you are acknowledging by receipt of this document from FACTNet that on the basis of reasonable investigation, you have not been to obtain a copy elsewhere at a fair price, and that you are and will abide by the following copyright warning. WARNING CONCERNING COPYRIGHT RESTRICTIONS: The copyright law of the United States (Title 17, United States Code) governs the making of photo copies or other reproductions of copyrighted material. Under certain conditions specified by law, libraries and archives are authorized to furnish a photocopy or other reproduction. One of these specified conditions is that the photocopy or reproduction is not to be "used for any purpose other than private study, scholarship, or research." If a user makes a request for, or later uses, a photocopy or reproduction for purposes in excess of "fair use," that user may be liable for copyright infringement. FACTNet reserves the right to refuse to accept an order for copying or other duplication, or delivery of copied or duplicated material if, in its judgment, fulfillment of the order would involve violation of copyright law. ------------------------------------------------------------------- CARD CATALOG ENTRY DOS FILENAME OF TEXT FILE: CO0593AF.TXT DOS FILENAME OF IMAGE FILES: CO0593.TIF ADMINISTRATIVE CODE: OK SECURITY CODE: SCO DISTRIBUTION CODE: RO DESCRIPTION FOR BBS FILE LISTING: The Cult Observer, Vol. 10 No. 5 1993. SORT TO: AFF CONTRIBUTOR: American Family Foundation (AFF) LOCATION OF ORIGINAL: American Family Foundation (AFF) NOTES: Back issues and selected reprints of the Cultic Studies Journal are available from the American Family Foundation, P.O. Box 2265, Bonita Springs, FL 33959-2265. PROFESSIONAL PROFILES | 1 Patrick Ryan [Ex-TM] | 2 PROFESSIONAL PROFILE: Sandy | Bargioni [SF Police Officer, | Jonestown, Temple of Set, | Satanism] For additional verification see the contributor of the document. This text below was produced by scanning a printed copy of the Cult Observer. Hence a few errors may have been introducted inadvertently. Please consult the printed copy if there is any question about the text. UPDATED ON: 10/18/94 UPDATED BY: FrJMc =================================================================