CultNEWS101 Articles: 9/23/2019

Sep 23, 2019

CultNEWS101 Articles: 9/23/2019

Grenville Christian College, Exorcism, Canada, Legal, Tajikistan, Jehovah's Witnesses, Religious Discrimination, NXIVM

Toronto Sun: Systemic abuse at defunct private Christian school: Lawsuit

"A group of former students are set to take the private Christian school they attended to court next week, alleging in a class-action lawsuit that they were subjected to psychological abuse designed to erode their sense of safety.

The certified class action, which has spent more than a decade winding its way through the legal system, will see five plaintiffs represent former residential students who attended Grenville Christian College in Brockville between 1973 and 1997.

"The conduct of the defendants … was calculated to produce harm and did, in fact, produce physical, emotional, psychological and spiritual harms," the students' statement of claim reads. 'The defendants fostered an atmosphere of fear, intimidation, anxiety and suspicion.'"

Global News: Class action lawsuit alleges 'exorcisms,' 'light-sessions' as abuses at private Ontario school

" .... 'The conduct of the defendants … was calculated to produce harm and did, in fact, produce physical, emotional, psychological and spiritual harms,' the students' statement of claim reads. 'The defendants fostered an atmosphere of fear, intimidation, anxiety and suspicion.'

The plaintiffs are suing the school and the estates of two of its former headmasters — Charles Farnsworth, who died in 2015, and J. Alastair Haig, who died in 2009 — along with some family members who also worked at the school for $200 million in damages for allegedly breaching their duty to take care of the students.

The students allege they were cut off from communicating with their families, kept under constant surveillance and subjected to 'exorcisms' and so-called 'light sessions.'"

The Sun Daily: Tajikistan jails Jehovah's Witness

"A court in Tajikistan has sentenced a Jehovah's Witness to seven-and-a-half years in prison on extremism charges, triggering a condemnation from the religious group on Wednesday.

Police in Tajikistan detained Shamil Hakimov on suspicion of extremism in February this year, according to the independent Tajik news agency Asia Plus.

The prosecution accused him of propagating the group's ideas in the small northern Tajik town of Buston where he moved in 2016 after previously living in the capital Dushanbe, the news agency said.

The Tuesday ruling of a court in the northern city of Khujand also prohibits Hakimov from working in religious organisations for three years after his release, the report said.

Authorities in majority-Muslim Tajikistan banned the Jehovah's Witnesses in 2008."

WSJ: I Left the Cult Next Door

"For the past five years, I have received a daily email filled with stories about those who succumb to extreme religious ideologies. Whether it's the Nxivm sex-cult trial in New York earlier this year or the Netflix documentary series "Wild Wild Country," Americans have shown an expansive appetite for cult stories. While my interest in the topic isn't unique, it's personal: I grew up in a cult."

Radar Online: BRANDING BODIES & FILMED NUDITY: EX-NXIVM MEMBER EXPOSES ALLISON MACK'S CORRUPT BEHAVIOR IN NEW TELL-ALL

"Allison Mack is currently awaiting prison sentencing for her racketeering crimes in the NXIVM sex cult, months after she pleaded guilty. Now, former member Sarah Edmondson is ripping the lid off of the former Smallville star's corrupt actions in the disgraced organization for the first time – and RadarOnline.com has exclusive details of the revelations.

In Scarred: The Truth Story of How I Escaped NXIVM, the Cult that Bound My Life, out on Sept. 17, Edmondson bravely comes forward about the horrific abuse she both witnessed and endured at the hands of the organization's highest executives, during the 12 years she was a member.

Edmondson, a Canada native, wife and mother of two, tells the story about how she abruptly left NXIVM in 2017 after learning that the "women's empowerment group" known as DOS that she joined was actually an inner sex ring, where women were branded with cult leader Keith Raniere's initials."