The Civil Guard, in the so-called “Avicenna” operation, has arrested three people as leaders of a sect installed in a villa in Pobla Tornesa (Castellón), for the alleged crimes of illicit association, labor intrusion, against public health, assault sexuality and disclosure of secrets, among others. Among the detainees is the sect teacher and her husband.
Agents have broken up a destructive cult of the type known as a psychotherapeutic cult, which hid as a conventional psychotherapy group. Their leader had called herself a teacher and claimed to have the absolute truth. She presented herself to her supposed clients and followers as the only person who could help them solve her problems.
The leaders of the supposed cult had been carrying out this activity for years and for a few months they had established themselves in a chalet in the Castellón town of Pobla Tornesa. His followers frequently attended shamanic therapies or rituals from various points throughout the Spanish geography.
The agents began the investigation after receiving a complaint from the parents of two of the victims, reporting the existence of a group of injured parties who had managed to leave the sect and who were also willing to denounce the facts suffered.
The practice of shamanic rituals with the consumption of drugs, mezcal and hallucinogenic substances was common to later practice collective nudes or workshops related to the chakras and sexual therapies. Sometimes these acts were carried out against the will of the victims after annulling their will, rituals that were sometimes filmed by those responsible in the house in Pobla Tornesa, where various sexual abuses allegedly took place.
The sessions and rituals had to be celebrated when and how the teacher established. To achieve her goals, she threatened the victims with punishment, humiliation and even being disowned when there was already an emotional dependence on the other members.
All the victims had been recruited through people trusted by the organization’s leaders, with the priority target being young people in situations of emotional vulnerability and in search of solutions to their problems.
The ages of recruitment and initiation in the therapies oscillated around 20 years of age in the majority of the cases, all with a low state of mind due to personal or emotional problems. Some of them have been immersed in the collective for more than 15 years, who would have even started when they were still minors.
The situation of the victims made it easier for the teacher to manipulate them through the use of different techniques of control, persuasion, emotional dependence and affective separation from their closest environment in order to be separated from them and integrated into the ‘Family of the Soul’.
The leader imparted the therapies to those affected in exchange for paying large amounts of money, and as the fidelity and emotional dependence of the victims increased, the price of said therapies increased. Payments were made using payment methods that allowed the detection of these activities to be concealed from the authorities.
The people affected are mostly located in the provinces of Tarragona, Castellón and Barcelona and there are around a hundred based on those who have filed a complaint and others who have already been fully identified throughout the long period of activity of this group.
Those responsible for the sect went so far as to carry out trust tests on the most devoted followers where they were required to pay more than 10,000 euros under the promise of accessing the teacher’s closest circle and, if they refused, they were threatened with being disowned by the rest of the people from the only place they were now a part of after their separation from the rest of their social environment.
Likewise, there was also a more exclusive group with greater relevance in the hierarchy of the sect known as “the Circle” or “the Veterans”, made up of several people, some of whom have been immersed in that group for more than 15 years, and to whom in turn the intimacies and personal data of the rest of the members were revealed so that they could exert influence over them.
In the search carried out in the chalet where the group sessions and the alleged psychotherapy sessions were held, a significant amount of cash was found, distributed in envelopes with annotations of the names of the alleged victims; lists of payments for sessions carried out; psychotropic substances used to carry out the different rituals and whose purpose was to cause the victims a state of hallucination, mental alienation and a total loss of will; and a large number of agendas and notes corresponding to the life and personal data of people who could be victims of the sectarian network.
The investigation has been directed by the Investigating Court 3 of Castellón, at whose disposal the three detainees have been placed, as well as all the material and evidence found during the search.
The operation was carried out by agents of the Information Group of the Tarragona Civil Guard Command, the Information Headquarters (UCE-3) and the Castellón Civil Guard Command.
