CultNEWS101 Articles: 2/4/2022 (Jehovah's Witnesses, Germany, Legal, Nazis, Brother Julius, Grenville Christian College, Sexual Abuse, Legal, Canada)

Jehovah's Witnesses, Germany, Legal, Nazis, Brother Julius, Grenville Christian College, Sexual Abuse, Legal, Canada

New York Times: Jehovah's Witnesses Sue German Museum for Archive of Nazi-Era Abuses

"The archive documents the lives and suffering of the Kusserow family, who were among many from the religious group to be persecuted by the Nazis because of their faith.

Jehovah's Witnesses, a pacifist religious group, are pursuing legal action against the German government to claim a family archive that documents the Nazis' persecution of the Christian denomination.

The archive comprises 31 files of documents relating to the Kusserow family, whose members were arrested, imprisoned and murdered by the Nazi regime because of their faith.

It has been held by the Museum of Military History in Dresden, which is operated by the German army, since 2009 when it was purchased from a member of the Kusserow family.

A German regional court rejected the Jehovah's Witnesses' claim last year, saying the museum had purchased the archive in good faith and should keep it. But the religious group is appealing that ruling, arguing that the family member who sold it was not the actual owner of the archive, which had been bequeathed to the Jehovah's Witnesses in the 2005 will of Annemarie Kusserow, the family member who had assembled and maintained the documents.

The museum's retention of the archive, said Wolfram Slupina, a spokesman for the Jehovah's Witnesses in Germany, "deprives us of a significant and invaluable part of our cultural heritage."

The archive documents the lives and suffering of the family of Franz and Hilda Kusserow, devout Jehovah's Witnesses, who were raising their 11 children in a large house in Bad Lippspringe in northern Germany when the Nazis came to power. The Jehovah's Witnesses were the first religious denomination to be banned, and the Kusserows' home was searched for religious materials by the Gestapo 18 times."

CT Insider: Man, 77, accused of killing reputed CT cult leader dies after contracting COVID in prison, attorney says

"A 77-year-old man accused of participating in the murder of a reputed leader in the Brother Julius cult died from complications of COVID-19 while he was incarcerated awaiting trial, his attorney said Thursday.

Rudy Hannon, 77, was arrested by New Britain police in July 2018 and charged with murder and murder during the commission of a felony in the death of Paul Sweetman, the second-in-command in the Brother Julius cult who went missing in Southington in 2004, according to court documents.

Julius Schacknow, known as Brother Julius, was accused of enlisting hundreds of residents from the Northeast in the 1970s and 1980s to join the cult, which discouraged education or any free thought, former followers said, according to court documents.

Schacknow died in 1996, leaving Sweetman and others to continue the cult on a smaller scale, former members said, according to court documents.

According to an arrest warrant, Hannon and Sorek Minery, another cult member, killed Sweetman in Plainville in 2004, placed his body in a freezer and then dismembered him, burying his remains at various locations in New Britain.

Hannon, however, maintained his innocence to the end, his attorney J. Patten Brown III said Thursday."

Religion News Service: Russia jails more Jehovah's Witnesses, prompting calls for 'strong measures'

More than 80 Jehovah's Witnesses are imprisoned in Russia, including some awaiting trial and some detained after being convicted.

"Despite a court ruling by Russian judges in October that seemed to endorse leniency for Jehovah's Witnesses arrested after their faith was labeled "extremist," a recent rash of sentences against members of the faith group has prompted concern among human rights advocates that the government is continuing its earlier crackdown against the denomination.

More than 80 Jehovah's Witnesses are now in confinement in Russia, some awaiting trial and some imprisoned after being convicted.

"USCIRF had hoped that a … 2021 decision by the Russian Supreme Court banning the prosecution of Jehovah's Witness group prayer signaled a shift in official policy towards the group, but this is clearly not the case," said U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom commissioner Khizr Khan in a statement to Religion News Service.

"The Russian government's persecution of the Jehovah's Witnesses has gained renewed momentum in the last week," Khan said.

On Thursday (Jan. 20), a court in Seversk sentenced Yevgeniy Korotun, a Jehovah's Witness who had been detained since July 2020, to seven years and Andrey Kolesnichenko to four. Their convictions occurred a day after Aleksey Yershov, a 68-year-old member of the religious group, was sentenced to three years in a penal colony.

Korotun, according to the Jehovah's Witnesses, was charged on the basis of hidden recordings of him conversing about the Bible. The religious group said Kolesnichenko was recorded by someone who acted interested in the Bible and turned the recording over to authorities."

CBC News: New sex abuse allegations target son of former headmaster at now-closed Christian boarding school

Former students of a now-shuttered Christian boarding school are coming forward with allegations of sexual abuse.

"More former students of a now-shuttered Christian boarding school in eastern Ontario are coming forward with allegations of sexual abuse against a son of the former headmaster, fearing he continues to be a danger to children.

The two former Grenville Christian College students told CBC's The Fifth Estate they were abused by Robert Farnsworth as children in the 1980s.

"I'm [speaking out] today because I know that someone who sexually assaults little kids … who doesn't hesitate to take away their innocence at the age of six or seven, or eight … will never stop," one former student said.

"Not until he's … locked up."

The CBC is protecting her identity because of the nature of the allegations.
Watch "School of Secrets: New revelations from inside the cult" on The Fifth Estate on Thursday at 9 p.m. on CBC-TV or stream on CBC Gem.

Robert Farnsworth hasn't responded to repeated requests for comment from CBC News.

The new allegations are in addition to those of two other former students who say they, too, were abused as children by the same man. Those allegations were revealed as part of an investigation by The Fifth Estate into Grenville Christian College in November."

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Man, 77, accused of killing reputed CT cult leader dies after contracting COVID in prison, attorney says

Lisa Backus
CT Insider
January 20, 2022

A 77-year-old man accused of participating in the murder of a reputed leader in the Brother Julius cult died from complications of COVID-19 while he was incarcerated awaiting trial, his attorney said Thursday.

Rudy Hannon, 77, was arrested by New Britain police in July 2018 and charged with murder and murder during the commission of a felony in the death of Paul Sweetman, the second-in-command in the Brother Julius cult who went missing in Southington in 2004, according to court documents.

Julius Schacknow, known as Brother Julius, was accused of enlisting hundreds of residents from the Northeast in the 1970s and 1980s to join the cult, which discouraged education or any free thought, former followers said, according to court documents.

Schacknow died in 1996, leaving Sweetman and others to continue the cult on a smaller scale, former members said, according to court documents.

According to an arrest warrant, Hannon and Sorek Minery, another cult member, killed Sweetman in Plainville in 2004, placed his body in a freezer and then dismembered him, burying his remains at various locations in New Britain.

Hannon, however, maintained his innocence to the end, his attorney J. Patten Brown III said Thursday.

“He was going to trial,” Brown said. “The tragic thing is that because of COVID, he sat there for years.”

Brown was notified last weekend by Hannon’s family that he had died with COVID-19 while being held on $2 million bond. His case had been essentially stalled by the pandemic and no trial date had been set, Brown said. During a routine court date next month, the case would have likely been continued again, Brown said.

New Britain State’s Attorney Brian Preleski said Thursday he will dismiss the charges on Feb. 1, which was Hannon’s next scheduled court date.

Minery pleaded no contest to a single charge of conspiracy to commit murder in the case. He is expected to be sentenced in the next few months, Preleski said.

Hannon became ill after contracting COVID-19 while incarcerated and later died at a local hospital on Jan. 15. He is the 27th Connecticut inmate to die from complications of the virus.

Officials at the state Department of Correction declined to confirm that Hannon had died.

A press release issued by the agency on Wednesday said that a 77-year-old inmate being held on $2 million bond on murder charges had died from COVID-19 complications. The inmate had entered the DOC system on July 31, 2018, the agency said. It was the same day that Hannon was arraigned in Sweetman’s murder.

Hannon’s arrest and death brings mixed emotions, said Lisa O’Neil Guerci, who was raised in the cult, but escaped with her young daughter more than 30 years ago.

“Nothing good comes from a cult except the insight you gain when you leave,” O’Neil Guerci said in an interview Thursday. “I look back and feel sorry for everybody. With Hannon’s death, unless Sorek comes to justice, justice has not been done.”

O’Neil Guerci fled the cult when she was 26 years old, she said. By that point, she had never held a regular job unless it was within the financial empire Schacknow and Sweetman had built and never graduated high school because she was forced to leave, she said.

Although she is now an accomplished writer and has a job and a regular life, she is in the process of obtaining her GED to make up for being forced to drop out of school at 17.

“I wanted to be a writer, but cult leaders don’t want people to be free-thinkers,” she said.

According to his arrest warrant, Hannon lured Sweetman to Minery’s construction shop in Plainville in July 2004.

New Britain police investigated the discovery of a human leg found in the area of Shuttle Meadow Golf Club in August 2004, an arrest warrant said. The state medical examiner determined the leg had been severed with a sharp object likely during a homicide, police said. But the case remained open for years without an identity of the person.

Although Hannon had told federal investigators about his role in the homicide in 2006, the information was never provided to New Britain police, according to the warrant. A decade later, a lieutenant who had been part of a team of detectives who solved homicides of unidentified people found in New Britain, was checking NAMUS, a national database for missing persons, when she discovered that Sweetman had disappeared around the same time the leg was found, an arrest warrant said.

DNA provided by Sweetman’s son confirmed the leg belonged to his father, the warrant said. New Britain police interviewed Hannon and Minery in 2016 and 2017 who provided conflicting stories about who committed the homicide, blaming each other for the crime, the warrant stated.

Both men said after Sweetman was beaten and incapacitated, they stuffed his body into a freezer, the warrant said. Minery later used a saw to cut off Sweetman’s arms, legs and head, and buried the remains in at least two locations, the warrant stated. Sweetman may have been alive when he was placed in the freezer, Minery told police, according to the warrant.

Detectives found Sweetman’s torso buried under a garage in New Britain that at one time belonged to Minery after they reviewed Federal Bureau of Investigation documents in 2016, the warrant said.

https://www.ctinsider.com/news/article/Man-77-accused-of-killing-CT-cult-leader-dies-16791935.php

Brother Julius follower pleads no contest in killing, dismemberment of cult's 'chief apostle'

DAVID OWENS
HARTFORD COURANT
November 21, 2019

One of two men charged in the 2004 killing of the self-proclaimed “chief apostle” of the infamous religious cult known as “The Work” that was led by the late “Brother Julius” pleaded no contest Thursday to conspiracy to commit murder and is expected to cooperate in the prosecution of his co-defendant.

Sorek Minery, 43, of Burlington, faces a maximum of 20 years in prison at his sentencing, which will not occur until after the trial of Rudy Hannon, 74, who prosecutors say conspired with Minery to kill Paul Sweetman, who was second in command of the cult and called himself its chief apostle. Cult leader Julius Schacknow, who called himself Brother Julius, died in 1996 at age 71.

New Britain State’s Attorney Brian W. Preleski told New Britain Superior Court Judge Maureen M. Keegan that following Schacknow’s death, “there was a struggle within the cult for power between Joanne Sweetman and the victim.” Joanne Sweetman and Paul Sweetman lived as husband and wife, but there is no evidence they ever married. She conspired to have Paul Sweetman killed so that she could control the cult’s businesses, Preleski said.

“Mrs. Sweetman enlisted co-defendant Rudy Hannon, who is the biological son of Brother Julius, to eliminate Paul Sweetman,” Preleski told the judge. "That was in large part motivated by profit.” Joanne Sweetman died in 2011.

Minery and Hannon, who were both cult members, agreed in July 2004 to kill Paul Sweetman, Preleski said.

Minery, in a confession to New Britain detectives, said that Hannon worked for months to convince him that Paul Sweetman “needed to be killed because he was hurting his wife, Joanne Sweetman and that God would have wanted them to kill [Paul] Sweetman.” according to the warrant for Minery’s arrest.

During those conversations, Minery told police, he and Hannon decided the “murder should not involve a gun or knife because it was too messy,” according to the warrant.

Minery said he respected Joanne Sweetman and “looked up to her as a high religious figure” and that “because of this, he began believing Rudy Hannon and believed Paul Sweetman needed to die.”

On or about July 21, 2004, Paul Sweetman, who was 70, was beaten to death inside Blue Ridge Construction, Minery’s Plainville-based business. Police say both men worked together in killing Sweetman, but each has pointed the finger at the other in statements to New Britain detectives.

The case was dormant until 2016, when New Britain police were able to link a human leg found 12 years earlier at Shuttle Meadow Country Course to the Sweetman missing persons case in Southington. Detectives identified suspects and obtained warrants for Hannon and Minery. Both were arrested July 31, 2018.

Minery told police he arrived at the business to find Hannon standing over Sweetman’s body. Minery said Hannon, who had a key to the shop, asked for his help in disposing of the body.

They stripped Sweetman down to his underwear then loaded him into a freezer. Three to four days later, Minery told police, he returned to the shop to dismember the body with an electric saw.

He then put the body parts in garbage bags and placed them back in the freezer, he told police. He said he buried the head and legs in a shallow grave on land near the New Britain reservoir, and buried the torso and arms beneath the shed of his New Britain home, then poured concrete over them.

Hannon tells a different tale. Initially, he told police he delivered Sweetman to Minery’s shop and that Minery killed him. He claimed he thought Minery was only going to beat Sweetman, but admitted he helped put the body in the freezer.

Hannon, in an interview with New Britain police at the Nevada prison where he was serving a violation of probation sentence, eventually admitted that he watched Minery severely beat Sweetman until Sweetman vomited a large amount of blood, then fell back flat on the floor and folded his arms across his chest.

He said he then helped Minery load the body into the freezer. He said he believed Sweetman was still alive. Minery then placed a heavy bag or box of tools on top of the freezer to prevent Sweetman from climbing out, Hannon told police.

Joanne Sweetman reported her husband missing on July 24, 2004 and told police she’d last seen him on July 21. She explained her husband’s disappearance, according to a former cult member, by saying he had received a vision from Brother Julius to travel the world and to proselytize.

Sweetman’s killing might never have been discovered, but for a coyote that dug up one of his legs and dragged it onto Shuttle Meadow Country Club, where it was found Aug. 27, 2004.

New Britain police worked to determine whose leg it was, but got a break in April 2016 when they learned Southington police had an open missing persons case for Paul Sweetman. A detective obtained DNA from Sweetman’s son and the state lab determined the leg was from Paul Sweetman.

New Britain police searched the ground beneath the shed at Minery’s former home in New Britain and found a headless torso and arms. The medical examiner noted the extremities had been removed with clean cuts. The state lab determined the torso and arms were Sweetman’s remains.

Schacknow called himself the “sinful messiah," saying he had to sin to know what it was like. He was accused of having a voracious sexual appetite and of grooming girls and young women in the cult for sex.

Schacknow’s description of himself progressed from prophet to the reincarnation of Jesus Christ and finally to God almighty.

He operated in central Connecticut for more than a quarter-century, ever since he moved from New Jersey and proclaimed at an outdoor revival in Trumbull in 1970 that he was Jesus Christ reincarnated.

Several hundred idealistic young people, hungry for spiritual direction, flocked to the guidance of the long-haired, bearded preacher who wore a white robe and had mesmerizing green eyes.

He set up a base in Meriden and commanded national attention as a cult leader until, in 1976, he stopped making public appearances and turned to commercial enterprise.

Driven by what they saw as a holy mission to advance what he called The Work, Schacknow’s followers, numbering perhaps 300 at the cult’s peak, oversaw the building of an expanding, multimillion-dollar real estate and construction business.

The businesses all collapsed with the real estate downturn at the end of the 1980s, leaving behind a financial shamble and desertion by scores of followers.

Schacknow reportedly died at the home of one of the seven women in central Connecticut who he said were his unofficial wives

David Owens can be reached at dowens@courant.com.

https://www.courant.com/news/connecticut/hc-news-brother-julius-cult-murder-plea-20191121-vemkaho62vdadbbgz5deo33ray-story.html

Self-Proclaimed 'Sinful Messiah' Sexually Abused Dozens While Leading Polygamist Doomsday Cult

People Magazine Investigates: Cults: The Sinful Messiah airs on Investigation Discovery on Monday, June 24, at 8 p.m. ET.

Chris Harris
People
June 21, 2019

For three decades, a man who was born to a Jewish family in Brooklyn led an apocalyptic polygamist cult in Connecticut with hundreds of followers who helped him build an ill-fated multimillion-dollar real estate empire.

A convert to Christianity, bearded Brother Julius Schacknow declared himself the second coming of Jesus in 1971, and subsequently used these claims to beguile his female followers into sexual liaisons, calling the carnal acts “God’s work.”

Before his death in 1996 at the age of 71, Schacknow was the father of five, the husband to seven, and had shattered the lives of dozens of his acolytes — many of whom lodged sexual assault allegations against him.

Schacknow’s unlikely rise to power, punctuated by the murder and dismemberment of his faithful “chief apostle,” is the focus of the next episode of People Magazine Investigates: Cults: The Sinful Messiah, which airs on Investigation Discovery on Monday, June 24, at 8 p.m. ET.

Based in the Connecticut suburbs, Schacknow’s group was known as The Work.

According to former members, Schacknow arranged marriages between many of his followers, and systematically brainwashed members into believing they had to sever their relationships with those outside the insular group.
Slave labor was pervasive in The Work.

Having sex with the “Sinful Messiah,” Schacknow preached, was the only way one could achieve eternal salvation.

He’s said to have preyed on all of the women within his secretive sect, and Schacknow was even accused by a stepdaughter of sexual molestation: She alleged it started when she was 11 and didn’t stop until she was 18.

Brother Julius’ closest confidants were married couple Paul and Joanne Sweetman, who assumed control over the group soon after his death. In 2004, Paul vanished — allegedly murdered and dismembered by two longtime members of The Work.

• Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? Click here to get breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases in the True Crime Newsletter.

It wouldn’t be until 2014 that police would find one of Sweetman’s leg bones buried at a golf course. Four years later, Rudy Hannon, 72, and Sorek Minery, 42, were charged with the killing.

Both have pleaded not guilty and are awaiting trial.
Their lawyers were unavailable for comment.

Court records indicate that Minery told police that, in the months leading up to the killing, Hannon tried convincing him Sweetman “needed to be killed because he was hurting his wife, Joanne Sweetman, and that God would have wanted them to kill Sweetman.”

People Magazine Investigates: Cults: The Sinful Messiah airs on Investigation Discovery on Monday, June 24, at 8 p.m. ET.

https://people.com/crime/self-proclaimed-sinful-messiah-sexually-abused-dozens-while-leading-polygamist-doomsday-cult/

Second man charged in homicide of Southington cult leader pleads not guilty

Lauren Sellew
Record-Journal
October 25, 2018

The second man charged in the 2004 homicide and dismemberment of a Southington cult leader has pleaded not guilty.

Sorek Minery, 42, of 225 Covey Road, Burlington, was charged with murder and felony murder in the homicide earlier this year. He appeared in New Britain Superior Court on Wednesday and pleaded not guilty to the charges, according to the state judicial website. 

Rudy Hannon, 72, was also charged with murder and felony murder. He pleaded not guilty to the charges in August. 

Southington man Paul Sweetman was “the chief apostle” in the religious cult “The Work,” which was led by Brother Julius and based in Meriden. 

He was reported missing by his wife on July 24, 2004, according to Hannon’s arrest warrant. On Aug. 27, 2004 New Britain police responded to the Shuttle Meadow Country Club for a report of human remains found. 

On April 20, 2016, New Britain police linked the 2004 missing person report to the remains found at the golf course, noting that Sweetman lived about 10 miles away from where the leg was found. Local police learned that the FBI had previously developed information that Sweetman was killed and dismembered in New Britain.

Police also learned that in 2006 Hannon was interviewed by FBI agents and shared intimate knowledge of the killing.

Police interviewed Minery on Oct. 20, 2016. He told officers that he, Sweetman and Hannon were all members of the same religious organization. In the months leading up to the homicide, Hannon was trying to convince Minery that Sweetman “needed to be killed because he was hurting his wife.”

Hannon and Minery remain held on $2 million bond. Minery is due back in court on Dec. 6 and Hannon is due back in court on Nov. 9. 

http://www.myrecordjournal.com/News/Southington/Southington-News/Second-man-charged-in-cult-murder-pleads-not-guilty.html

Suspect In Slaying Related To Brother Julius Cult Pleads Not Guilty

David Owens
Hartford Courant
August 28, 2018

One of the men charged with murder in the 2004 slaying of the self-proclaimed “chief apostle” of an infamous religious cult led by Brother Julius Schacknow on Monday waived a preliminary hearing and pleaded not guilty.

Rudy Hannon, 72, is charged in the killing of Paul Sweetman, who was the No. 2 in the cult known as “the Work,” which was active in central Connecticut from the 1970s through the 1990s.

Schacknow parlayed his claim of divinity into a multimillion dollar business and real estate empire that crumbled in the late 1980s. He also was accused of sexually abusing female members of the cult, including those who were under the age of consent. Although no criminal charges were ever filed, Schacknow paid a civil court settlement. Schacknow called himself the ”sinful messiah,” telling followers he had to sin to know what it was like.

Sorek Minery, 42, of Burlington is also charged with murder and felony murder in the death of Sweetman, who was 70 when he was killed.

Defendants who face the possibility of life in prison are entitled to a probable cause hearing, where the state must present enough evidence to convince a judge that it is more likely than not that the defendant committed the crime. It is not unusual for defendants to waive the hearing.

According to the warrants for their arrest, both men worked together in killing Sweetman, but each has pointed the finger at the other in statements to New Britain detectives. Sweetman had been reported missing by Joanne Sweetman, who purportedly was his wife, on July 24, 2004. She reported having last seen her husband on July 21, 2004.

Joanne Sweetman was also a top cult leader and was known to members as the “holy spirit.”

According to the warrant and people familiar with the investigation, Paul Sweetman was killed at the behest of Joanne Sweetman in what was a struggle for control of the cult after Schacknow’s death in 1996. Joanne Sweetman, who was previously married to Schacknow, died in April 2011.

Minery, of Burlington, told New Britain police that in the months leading up to Sweetman’s murder, he and Hannon were members of Brother Julius’ cult. Minery said Hannon worked for months to convince him that Sweetman “needed to be killed because he was hurting his wife, Joanne Sweetman and that God would have wanted them to kill Sweetman,” the warrant reads.

During those conversations, Minery told police, he and Hannon decided the “murder should not involve a gun or knife because it was too messy,” according to the warrant.

Minery said he respected Joanne Sweetman and “looked up to her as a high religious figure” and that “because of this, he began believing Rudy Hannon and believed Paul Sweetman needed to die.”

Minery told police he arrived at his business, Blue Ridge Construction in Plainville and discovered Hannon standing over Sweetman’s body. Minery said Hannon, who had a key to the shop, asked for his help in disposing of the body.

They stripped Sweetman down to his underwear then loaded him into a freezer. Three to four days later, Minery told police, he returned to his shop to dismember the body.

“Minery stated that he used an electric saw and dismembered the body while it was still in the freezer,” the warrant reads. “Minery stated he remembers cutting off the head easily and cutting off both legs.”

He then put the body parts in garbage bags and placed them back in the freezer, he told police. He said he buried the head and legs in a shallow grave on land near the New Britain reservoir, and buried the torso and arms beneath the shed of his New Britain home, then poured concrete over them.

The case may not have been solved had an animal not dug up one of Sweetman’s legs and left it on Shuttle Meadow Country Club property. That got New Britain police involved in the case. In 2016 detectives matched the leg to Paul Sweetman after obtaining a DNA sample from his son, Kenneth Sweetman.

Hannon told a different tale. Initially, he told police he delivered Sweetman to Minery’s shop and that Minery killed him. He claimed he thought Minery was only going to beat Sweetman, but admitted he helped put the body in the freezer.

Hannon, in an interview with New Britain police at the Nevada prison where he was serving a violation of probation sentence, eventually admitted that he watched Minery severely beat Sweetman until Sweetman vomited a large amount of blood, then fell back flat on the floor and folded his arms across his chest.

http://www.courant.com/news/connecticut/hc-rudy-hannon-brother-julius-cult-killing-20180827-story.html

A severed leg led police to a Connecticut cult's 'chief apostle' who went missing 14 years ago

Allyson Chiu
Washington Post
August 2, 2018


The historic Shuttle Meadow Country Club in Kensington, Conn., sprawls over nearly 400 acres of land. Surrounded by dense forests and rolling hills, the club’s picturesque 18-hole course is a golfer’s dream.

About 14 years ago, New Britain police made a grim discovery there. Responding to a report of human remains on Aug. 27, 2004, police arrived to find part of a leg, severed so that they could come to only one conclusion: Someone had been killed.

The source of the leg would remain a mystery until 2016, according to a recently released arrest warrant. In April that year, New Britain police learned from the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System that the Southington Police Department had an open missing person case for a man named Paul Sweetman. Police also learned that the FBI was investigating a claim that Sweetman had been murdered, dismembered and his body parts buried around New Britain, the arrest warrant said.

Sweetman, who had gained local fame as the self-described “chief apostle” of a religious cult known as “the Work,” was reported missing by his wife, Joanne Sweetman, on July 24, 2004, according to the warrant. He was 70 years old.

Using DNA from Sweetman’s son, authorities confirmed that the leg’s DNA was a parental match.

Connecting Sweetman to the leg was one of the first major developments in an investigation that culminated this week with the arrests of 72-year-old Rudy Hannon and 42-year-old Sorek Minery. The men face charges of murder and felony murder, according to court records.

Hannon and Minery were also members of the Work, which was based in central Connecticut, the warrant said. In its heyday, the cult boasted a following of several hundred people and was led by Julius Schacknow, who believed he was Jesus Christ reincarnated. Plagued by run-ins with the law and claims from former members of sexual and financial exploitation, the group began losing followers in the early 1990s, the Hartford Courant reported at the time. Schacknow died in 1996.

Police say the men allegedly murdered Sweetman based on the wishes of Joanne Sweetman, also an influential member of the cult who was described by its members as “the holy spirit.” Joanne Sweetman died in 2011, the Hartford Courant reported.

The mystery surrounding Sweetman’s disappearance began unraveling about 12 years ago. According to the warrant, Hannon was interviewed in February 2006 by the FBI under a proffer agreement, meaning he was cooperating. During the interview, Hannon accused Minery of killing Sweetman.

Hannon told the FBI that he took Sweetman to Minery’s construction workshop, where he then waited in his car. The warrant said he said he thought Minery only planned to “work [Sweetman] over,” not kill him. Hannon claimed Minery beat Sweetman to death, adding that he saw Sweetman lying on the ground with “a large amount of blood” on his face and shirt, the warrant said.

According to the warrant, Hannon said he did help Minery put Sweetman’s body into a freezer and told the FBI where to find the body parts. Sweetman’s torso, he said, could be found at a residence owned by Minery underneath a shed and a slab of concrete, the warrant said.

The warrant does not explain why this information was not given to New Britain police.

In October 2016, local authorities went to the address Hannon gave the FBI. Behind the white clapboard house on a tree-lined street, they unearthed the remains of a headless human torso wrapped in three layers of garbage bags and buried under a large slab of concrete. A DNA test confirmed that it was Sweetman. Also found with the body was a gold watch and two gold rings. One of the rings had “Joanne” inscribed on it, police said.

Two days later, Minery was brought in.

Although he allegedly told police he did dismember Sweetman and dispose of the body parts, he pointed the finger at Hannon for the killing.

According to Minery, in the months leading up to the murder, Hannon tried to convince him that Sweetman “needed to be killed because he was hurting his wife Joanne Sweetman” and that “God would have wanted them to kill Sweetman,” the warrant said.

Minery said because he “respected Joanne Sweetman and looked up to her as a high religious figure . . . he began believing Hannon and believed Paul Sweetman needed to die,” according to police.

In Minery’s version of what happened, he walked in on Hannon standing over Sweetman’s body, the warrant said. Then, it was Hannon who asked for help to put Sweetman into the freezer, Minery said.

According to the warrant, after a few days had gone by, Minery told police that he returned and dismembered the body using an electric saw. He allegedly took Sweetman’s legs and head to a wooded area near the New Britain Reservoir and buried them in a shallow grave, the warrant said. He hid the arms and torso at his house, the warrant said.

In addition to blaming the murder on Hannon, Minery also alleged that Hannon threatened to tell police about the crime unless he wired him money, the warrant said.

In June 2017, police traveled to the Southern Desert Correctional Center in Nevada where Hannon was jailed at the time for violating parole. According to the New Britain Herald, court officials said Tuesday that Hannon has a lengthy criminal record and served time in federal prison.

After allegedly failing a polygraph exam, Hannon admitted that he was not waiting outside the workshop when Sweetman was killed but said Minery was the one who did the beating, the warrant said.

According to the warrant, Hannon said that “he watched Minery severely beat the victim, striking him in the head and ribs before placing him in a rear chokehold.”

Then, Hannon disclosed new information: Sweetman may not have been dead after being beaten up.

He told police that while Sweetman was lying on the ground, he “suddenly sat up at the waist, vomiting a large bloody mass,” before falling back down. Hannon said he saw Sweetman “hold his arms across his own body, slightly elevated above his torso.”

According to the warrant, after both men put Sweetman into the freezer, Hannon allegedly put his finger under Sweetman’s nose and told police it felt warm. He then said Minery “placed a large bag or box of heavy tools across the freezer lid,” the warrant said.

“A reasonable person would believe that this action was done to prevent the escape of Paul Sweetman from inside the freezer,” the warrant said. “Furthermore, a reasonable person would believe that a person who had been violently assaulted and purposely placed into a freezer would succumb to death if they did not receive medical treatment.”

According to court records, Hannon was extradited and arrested by New Britain police Tuesday. He is being held on $2 million bond. His attorney J. Patten Brown III told reporters Wednesday that his client, who is recovering from medical treatments including bypass surgery, “seems to be in as good spirits as one can be.” Brown could not be reached for comment.

Minery was also arraigned Wednesday, and his bond was also set at $2 million, according to court records. No attorney was listed.

Minery is scheduled to appear in New Britain Superior Court on Tuesday. Hannon’s next court date is Aug. 27. Neither men has filed pleas.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2018/08/02/a-severed-leg-led-police-to-a-connecticut-cults-chief-apostle-who-went-missing-14-years-ago/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.cc127830d079

Cult Problems Grow As Following Shrinks

Gerald Renner

Hartford Courant

June 1, 1993

The business of the "sinful messiah" has fallen on hard times.

Followers of Julius Schacknow, a cult leader known as Brother Julius, have been deserting him as fast as the central Connecticut business empire they built up in the 1980s has collapsed in the 1990s.

A dedicated corps of 200 devoted followers has dwindled to perhaps 50 or fewer. Many who have quit tell stories of sexual and financial exploitation, and say Brother Julius is acting in an increasingly bizarre and abusive way.

In addition, the federal government is seeking the return of $2 million that is missing from two government-protected pension funds set up for workers in a construction business.

Recent interviews with people who have broken with Schacknow, sources close to the secretive cult and public documents draw a picture of a disintegrating enterprise that had been built up around the Bible-quoting preacher and his "chief apostle," who had a genius for business ventures.

Schacknow, 68, has declined to be interviewed by The Courant for this story.

He has operated in central Connecticut for 23 years, ever since he moved from New Jersey and proclaimed at an outdoor revival in Trumbull in 1970 that he was Jesus Christ reincarnated.

Several hundred idealistic young people, hungry for spiritual direction, flocked to the guidance of the long-haired preacher who wore a white robe and had mesmerizing green eyes.

He set up a base in Meriden and commanded national attention as a cult leader until, in 1976, he stopped making public appearances.

Driven by what they saw as a holy mission to advance "the Work," Schacknow's followers throughout the 1980s oversaw the building of an expanding, multimillion-dollar real estate and construction business.

They achieved an outstanding financial success under the direction of two of Schacknow's closest associates, Paul Sweetman, his "chief apostle," and Joseph Joyce, another top "apostle."

Among the businesses was J-Anne North/Century 21, a real estate company based in Southington that operated five Century 21 franchises in central Connecticut and did $100 million in sales a year, national franchise records show.

Their contracting business, County Wide Construction Co. and its affiliate, County Wide Home Improvement and Maintenance Co., did major work for towns, private developers and homeowners.

Schacknow himself stayed aloof from direct involvement in the businesses but exhorted his followers to give their utmost. People who quit complained that they put in long work days, were paid below-minimum wages and sometimes were denied sales commissions.

But, if the 1980s marked the ascendancy of the self-proclaimed messiah, his decline and fall is being tracked in the 1990s.

Many people have left him, former followers say, including several of Schacknow's "12 apostles," the key men who had been in charge.

Schacknow, whose self-description progressed from prophet to reincarnation of Jesus Christ and finally to God almighty, is reported to be ailing. He frequently calls off his six-hour-long Sunday services he holds in a rented Veterans of Foreign Wars hall on Route 10 in Plainville.

Although David Koresh of the Branch Davidians in Waco, Texas, called himself a "sinful messiah," Schacknow virtually coined the term in the 1970s, claiming that he had to sin himself to know what sin was like.

Born into a Jewish family in Brooklyn in 1924, Schacknow converted to Christianity after he served in the Navy in World War II. He recounts his conversion in an autobiography he wrote in 1947 for admission to the Bible Institute of Los Angeles, a fundamentalist school.

He was an outstanding student of the Bible. But from his earliest days as a preacher he was being accused of using his charisma and position as a religious leader to manipulate young women, suggesting that it was God's will that they sleep with him.

At least two women, including a stepdaughter, accused Schacknow in separate lawsuits in 1986 and 1988 of having sexually abused them when they were children. Their civil suits were settled out of court for undisclosed sums, and no criminal charges were ever brought against him.

All but one of the six Century 21 real estate franchises the Juliusites ran have closed or been sold. Joseph Joyce continues to run J-Anne North in Southington with a reduced staff.

County Wide has gone out of business. The 130 people who worked for County Wide and had money coming to them from two federally protected pension plans have found that nothing is left to pay them, court records show.

Paul Sweetman and Alfred Dube Jr., another "apostle," were trustees of the plans. The U.S. Labor Department has accused them of having taken more than $2 million from the plans for personal loans and loans to companies in which they had an interest.

Sweetman and Dube agreed to reimburse the pension plans $1.8 million by January 1994, and to waive their rights to their share of more than $300,000, in an order signed by federal Judge Alan H. Nevas in the U.S. District Court in Bridgeport on Jan. 28.

They made an initial payment of $10,000 but missed making a $100,000 installment due April 28, said John Chavez, a Labor Department spokesman in Boston.

No further action is being taken against them at this time because, Chavez said, "They are continuing to show the department good faith efforts to try to raise the money."

But those who are owed the money raise questions about how much good faith Sweetman and Dube are showing.

"As far as I am concerned, I think they took the money and squirreled it away and we won't ever see it," said Bob Langston.

Langston, who had been a follower of Brother Julius for nearly 20 years, had been in charge of County Wide's aluminum division. When he quit both the job and the cult, he sought his pension money but, he said, "I was getting the runaround from everyone."

He complained to the Labor Department, which investigated and took civil action against Sweetman and Dube.

In a consent decree with the Labor Department, Sweetman and Dube cite assets that will be used to reimburse the pension plans. But one asset they cite is highly questionable.

For instance, Sweetman and Dube said in the consent decree that County Wide will assign $1.3 million due to the pension plans from Prentiss House Inc., which owned a condominium development called Prentice House in the Kensington section of Berlin.

What is not mentioned is that Sweetman is president and the major shareholder in Prentiss House Inc., which has a shaky financial base. It has not made mortgage payments on the condominium development since February 1991 and is in arrears on taxes to the town of Berlin, court records show.

Last month the Superior Court in New Britain ordered the condominium development to be sold Nov. 6. Fleet Bank holds the mortgage, which amounted to more than $1.4 million in unpaid principal and interest two years ago. The wholesale value of the property was assessed at about $1.7 million in a 1992 court document.

"If County Wide or Sweetman is anticipating any revenue from Prentiss to pay toward the $2 million, I doubt if there will be anything paid," said Joseph Gall of Milford, secretary of Prentiss House Inc. He said he lost $175,000 when he went into partnership with Sweetman to convert a factory building into condominiums.

The factory building was converted into condominiums by County Wide Construction, Gall said. An initial estimate that the conversion would cost $45 a square foot soared to $90 a square foot by the time the job was done, Gall said.

Sweetman, who had been living in Cheshire, could not be reached for comment. Dube, who also lives in Cheshire, said, "I have nothing to say."

David Wayne Winters, who represents Sweetman in negotiations with the Labor Department, said, "I just cannot discuss my client's business. I just won't comment."

Julius Schacknow is also unavailable for comment. He has shunned public appearances for 17 years and rarely gives interviews. He turned down a request from the Courant for one last month.

In a two-hour interview with The Courant six years ago, he reiterated his claims to divinity and said he had come to call the world to repent.

"I'm your creator and I've come to punish the world for their sins, for their ungodliness, their crookedness, breaking my commandments ... and treating people who love me as Jesus with contempt. ... You are interviewing Jesus, who has returned like a

thief in the night," he said.

Of the allegations against him, he said: "I won't comment. You have no interest in the truth. You're interested in smutty material that will satisfy the lustful eyes and ears of your public."

He maintains the same position. He responded virtually the same way to a reporter from the Boston Globe in an interview in Boston last month.

Former followers say Schacknow circulates among seven "wives," staying with each one no more than one or two days a week, a regimen he has followed for years. His main "wife" lives in Berlin. An aide drives him from place to place because he has never learned to drive, people close to him said.

But he leads a diminishing flock.

"All the big guns are leaving and when an apostle leaves it has a great effect on everybody in his group," said John Goski, 41, formerly of Bristol, who spent 18 years in the cult.

Each apostle has charge of people who were born under each of the 12 astrological signs, Goski said, so when an apostle quits it has a demoralizing effect.

"He is threatening the people who leave him now," Goski said. The threats are not directly physical but a warning that the deserters will reap divine retribution.

"When I came out he threatened me. He said things like, `One of your kids may die.' Getting the courage to leave is the real miracle," said Goski, who joined Schacknow as a 20-year-old looking for spiritual direction.

A web of friendships, family and work kept him tied to the cult, even after he wanted to leave, Goski said. He finally quit two years ago and has since moved with his wife, Pat, and two children to northern New Jersey.

Pat Goski said Schacknow's tolerance of sexual abuse of some children in the cult caused many people to leave.

Schacknow's son, Daniel Sweetman, 30, was sentenced in Superior Court in Meriden in September to a year in prison for sexually abusing four children. He was released on probation in March. Police investigated allegations against another cult member but said no parents would make a formal complaint.

Daniel Sweetman is the son of Schacknow and Schacknow's former wife, Joanne Sweetman, who is known in the cult as the "holy spirit." She left Schacknow and has been living with Paul Sweetman for at least 20 years, people who know them, including their children, said.

Schacknow and Sweetman swapped wives in New Jersey in the late 1960s, the sources said. Sweetman's first wife, Minnie, who went to live with Schacknow, died in 1970.

Schacknow has recently been pressuring women to share their husbands because so many men have quit the cult, one women who had been with him nearly 20 years said.

"That was the big issue. It was very possible your husband would have to take in another woman," said the woman, who quit two years ago.

She declined to be publicly identified because she did not want to be embarrassed at her place of employment.

She said she and some other women "weren't going to sleep with Julius and we weren't going to swap wives. ... He got into a rampage where he wanted to get rid of people and he got rid of us."

She said throwing people out of the group was Schacknow's way

of exercising his authority. People usually begged him to return, she said, but she and her husband decided they had had enough.

"I guess Julius did us a favor," she said

http://www.courant.com/news/connecticut/hc-archives-julius-schacknow-connecticut-cult-problem-20180801-story,amp.html