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News for: October 3, 2002
Florida men, companies sentenced in case of TV psychic 'Miss Cleo'
The Associated Press
ST. LOUIS -- Two Florida cousins and their companies behind the hot lines for television psychic "Miss Cleo" were sentenced Wednesday to probation and fines, resolving illegal-merchandising felonies in Missouri over the supposed clairvoyant.
ARIZONA
2 polygamous towns investigated
The Arizona Republic
Authorities from Arizona and Utah revealed Tuesday that they have spent the past two years investigating underage marriages and other crimes in the polygamous towns of Colorado City and Hildale, although no arrests have been made to date.
Related article:
DPS to investigate fraudulent polygamy document, The Arizona Republic
CALIFORNIA
Hellish studies at San Mateo
The San Francisco Examiner
A group of area high school students is going to hell -- at lunchtime.
The students started a "Satanic Thought" club after studying the teachings of Anton LaVey, founder of San Francisco's Church of Satan.
COLORADO
Yoga Causes Tension for Public Schools
FOX News
ASPEN -- Professional football teams do it. Madonna does it every day. Even a U.S. Supreme Court justice does it. But some don’t want elementary school kids doing yoga on the grounds it teaches public school children about religion.
KANSAS
Naked man said he was doing as God asked
The Wichita Eagle
Police have heard many excuses for public nudity, but rarely does someone plead divine intervention. A 26-year-old man caught walking down Seneca Avenue early Tuesday with his pants around his ankles tried to convince officers he was doing God's work.
MASSACHUSETTS
Experience raises questions of 'cult'
MetroWest Daily News
NATICK -- She knew breaking up with the boy she was dating was her decision, because that's what they told her. What Natick High School student Lisa Guild didn't realize until months later, she says, is that the "disciples" at a Christian group she now calls a cult were slowly taking control of her mind and life.
MISSOURI
Owners of once-popular psychic company indicted by grand jury
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
ST. LOUIS -- Some 6 million people called late-night TV psychic Miss Cleo, and the companies that operated her hot line are swamped with civil fraud complaints. Now, for the first time, the companies are facing criminal charges.
Two plead no contest in Miss Cleo fraud case
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
The two Florida men accused of bilking consumers of $500 million through their Miss Cleo TV psychic operation flew to St. Louis on Wednesday, pleaded no contest to felony fraud, were sentenced and flew home after their corporations paid a $50,000 fine.
Further research:
COURT TV's Full Coverage of Miss Cleo or COURT TV's Miss Cleo Special Report, including legal documents and script which "psychics" read to callers.
WASHINGTON, D.C.
Scientists Discover Fatal Gene Mutation In Amish;
Disorder Traced To Pennsylvania County
local6.com
WASHINGTON -- A newly discovered fatal gene mutation, found only in Amish newborns, could be a major first step toward helping prevent brain defects in babies worldwide, scientists said.
LDS Letter Targets Cove Sale Opponents
The Salt Lake Tribune
WASHINGTON -- Criticizing federal stewardship of a Mormon handcart campsite, LDS Church leaders from Wyoming have delivered a letter to their state's congressional delegation asking them to drop their opposition to the sale of Martin's Cove.
BELARUS
Belarus moves to curb religious freedom
BBC News
The Upper House of Parliament in Belarus has given overwhelming approval to a bill on religion which would severly restrict the activities of smaller denominations, and stress the dominant role of the Russian Orthodox church.
BRAZIL
Brazilian Government may expropriate "moonie" lands
The News
RIO DE JANIERO -- The Brazilian government is attempting to confiscate 16 rural estates owned by the church founded and headed by Rev. Sun Myung Moon, the press reported Tuesday.
Brazil Election Injects Religion
The Associated Press
RIO DE JANEIRO -- At a packed Baptist church, the Rev. Jesse Jackson stood at the altar and told a cheering congregation the country's leading presidential candidate had been "touched by God."
CAMBODIA
Three die in Cambodian cult suicide
Reuters
PHNOM PENH -- Three members of an extremist Cambodian Buddhist cult have burned themselves to death in bath-tubs filled with petrol.
Cambodian monk in petrol bath scandal
Radio Australia News
Cambodian police have arrested a Buddhist monk over the deaths of three members of an extreme sect who burnt themselves to death in baths filled with petrol.
Other news agencies:
Monk, two nuns end lives to reach Nirvana, The Star
Cambodian police seek suicide cult leader
BBC News
Police in eastern Cambodia are searching for the leader of a suspected Buddhist cult after a monk and two nuns burned themselves to death.
CANADA
God told me to beat kids, former nun tells trial
The Canadian Press
CHARLOTTETOWN -- Lucille Poulin says the divine hand of God was guiding the rod when the children of her religious commune were beaten.
JAKARTA
Lombok calm after attack on Islamic sect
The Jakarta Post
MATARAM, West Nusa Tenggara -- Calm returned on Monday to Batuyang village in East Lombok, West Nusa Tenggara after a mob burned down a mosque and destroyed eight houses belonging to members of the Indonesian Islam Propagation Council (LDII) sect over the weekend.
NETHERLANDS
Dutch 'should be spoken in mosques'
BBC News
Islamic groups in the Netherlands have reacted angrily to a suggestion that only Dutch should be spoken in mosques.
NIGERIA
'Nigerians won't be stoned for adultery'
Reuters
LAGOS -- Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo gave assurances on Tuesday that the country's higher appeal courts would quash the death-by-stoning sentences for adultery passed by Islamic courts.
My Road to Self-Destruction, Student Cultist Confesses
This Day
Speaks of his initiation as he raises anxiety over his possible poisoning for revealing so much about the campus cult. Like every other Nigerian Child, Cookey Hilkiah's ambition was not only to go to school but to get out of it and acquire the highest university degree possible.
PHILIPPINES
Ecleo brought back to jail
Inquirer News Service
CEBU CITY -- The controversial "supreme master" of the Philippine Benevolent Missionaries Association was brought back to the Bagong Buhay Rehabilitation Center here immediately after government doctors released him from confinement at the Cebu City Medical Center (CCMC).
Previous headlines:
Ecleo taken to hospital, The Philippine Star
Ecleo hospitalized due to hypertension, Inquirer News Service
Ecleo shares new cell with ex-cop
The Philippine Star
CEBU CITY - Cult leader Ruben Ecleo Jr. is back in jail and now shares a cell with another controversial figure, former policeman Engelberto Durano.
3 jail execs relieved over Ecleo privileges
The Philippine Star
CEBU CITY -- Three ranking officials of the Bagong Buhay Rehabilitation Center here have been relieved of their positions as a consequence of the discovery of a woman inside the isolation cell of cult leader and murder suspect Ruben Ecleo Jr. recently.
Councilor blames brod’s death on Ruben use of ICU
Sun Star Cebu
Cult leader Ruben Ecleo Jr.’s confinement at the Cebu City Medical Center intensive care unit (ICU), “deprived” a city councilor’s younger brother of medical attention and died Sunday night.
RUSSIA
Buddhist miracle in Siberia;
Lama's body is intact, 75 years after his death
The New York Times
IVOLGINSK -- A miracle has occurred here in Siberia. Or it may be a hoax. Others believe science can explain it. It is a question, it seems, of faith.
Satanism on the Move in Russia
Pravda
Celibate Priest Anatoly Berestov believes that Satanism has a tendency for development nowadays. Celibate Priest Anatoly is a Doctor of Medical Sciences. He chairs a center for the rehabilitation of people who have suffered from totalitarian sects and occults.
SOUTH AFRICA
Satanist trial: Boy can move objects with eyes
News24.com
PRETORIA -- Her 11-year-old son could move objects with his eyes while in a trance-like state, a mother told the Pretoria High Court on Thursday.
