Deadly Cults

There's 15, 20 people down.

- It was a sweat lodge gone absolutely wrong.

- Several people at the hospital.

Three people died.

- This was a woman who would not have chosen death.

- How somebody would stay inside an environment

where their body cooks to death--

this has got to be some kind of cult.

- Part of my purpose is to redefine spirituality.

- The core of James Ray's teaching is

"I can show you how to control your destiny."

- He knows better about what I can do than I do.

Then his judgment's better than my judgment.

- I thought, I'm on the right path.

- Once these leaders grab onto somebody,

they're able to keep them.

- He's the modern version of a cult leader.

- It's hot. Hellacious hot.

You will feel as if you are going to die.

- This is a life and death situation.

It looked like a war zone.

- You're not allowed to call 911.

This was not an accident.

- Sedona, Arizona is known as a place

that they have what's called vortexes

and can draw people that are spiritual.

You take a dirt road off of Highway 89A

between Cottonwood and Sedona, Arizona.

And basically, when you come over

the top of a crest of a hill,

you look down and you see Angel Valley,

and it's just-- it's beautiful.

People go to Angel Valley to get away.

They do retreats there.

Myself and another deputy

were actually 25, 30 minutes away

from where the incident occurred,

and we heard another deputy calling for backup,

calling for more medical personnel,

saying there's multiple people that needed assistance there.

And we just didn't know what was going on.

- In my mind, I was just thinking

it was a mass suicide because I've never had a call

where there was that many people

that needed assistance like that.

When I got on scene,

there was 50, maybe 60 people there.

They were all, you know, milling around.

The fire department was working on some people.

There was other people lying down on the ground

that they were waiting to be worked on,

a helicopter that had landed,

there was another helicopter that was attempting to land.

It was such utter chaos.

There were so many people.

My walls came down. I didn't know what to do.

I was the first detective there,

and I remember as I was driving down there,

I could see this large dome covered in tarps.

And I began noticing women with their head shaved

walking around almost in a daze.

And so initially, I thought,

this has got to be some kind of cult.

I was told that several people were at the hospital,

three people had died,

and that it involved a sweat lodge.

All I knew about sweat lodges

is that they were a tradition by Native Americans.

The victims said that there was rocks in the middle

that were heat rocks,

and they'd pour water over 'em to release the heat.

And it was to enlighten them, basically.

This was a retreat called Spiritual Warrior.

It consisted of various different activities.

The sweat lodge was the final event of the retreat.

And there's three dead people.

And there's so many different factors

that could be the difference between whether this was

a tragic accident or a crime.

This is the picture of Kirby

that we chose to represent her

when we had to find some pictures to send out to media

because I wanted people to know immediately who she was

and who had been lost.

This was a woman who was brimming with life

and would not have chosen death.

- This investigation was to determine

if a crime was committed,

and we didn't know if there was

some kind of toxin involved,

if this was some kind of ritual

where something was ingested

that could've caused the death of these people.

So we began interviewing everybody involved.

I started with the gentleman

that was facilitating heating the rocks

for the sweat lodge.

He worked at Angel Valley,

and he explained to me that he had conducted

several sweat lodges for several different groups.

And the leader of this group

who facilitated this sweat lodge

was a man named James Ray.

And I had never heard the name James Ray.

I didn't know who he was.

- Part of my purpose is to redefine spirituality

because everything is spiritual.

- I learned that James Ray was somewhat of a celebrity--

a self-help guru--

and had a huge following.

He was involved with a film called "The Secret."

- So many times people say to me,

"Well, I'd like to double my income in the next year."

- "The Secret" is based on the Law of Attraction--

your thoughts dictate reality.

And James Ray is probably the strongest personality

of the people who were in "The Secret."

- That's kinda what propelled him

into becoming a star.

- I had peers in our industry tell me,

"You will never be on Oprah.

You're not mainstream enough."

I said baby, I'm the new mainstream.

I saw him on "The Secret."

And then later,

I saw him on Larry King and on Oprah.

And I thought wow, if he's on these shows,

he must be something.

And at the time, I had gone through a divorce

and my parents had passed away.

And I felt that I wanted more from life.

And James Ray promised

that if we went through his course

that he would help us change our lives.

I believed it.

I really did believe it.

- Teach me, teach me, to use the Law of Attraction

to attract my soul mate.

The first time I saw James Ray

was on the movie "The Secret."

My husband and I wanted to expand

our spiritual experience,

and that's what attracted us.

He was extremely personable,

very charismatic.

He could read people really well.

James on stage, cameras rolling,

people there, thousands of people would say

that he was kahuna,

that he was trained in Hawaiian spiritual practices,

that he was a shaman,

that he was trained by Native Americans

to run a sweat lodge.

And you get really excited and think,

wow, he's worth the money.

I mean, how many people in the world

could offer this kind of knowledge?

- The core of James Ray's teaching, I believe,

is that you can control your destiny

and I can show you how to do it.

He had what he called The Journey of Power.

And it was structured like a pyramid.

It was five events, ending in Spiritual Warrior.

Each even got progressively more expensive

from a free event to Spiritual Warrior,

which was a $10,000 event.

If I told you exactly what you must do

to guarantee you accomplish

every single thing you desire and deserve,

would you do it?

No or yes? all: Yes.

- In these programs, he was trying to simulate

having a spiritual breakthrough

by bringing people to the edge

of what they could handle physically,

simulating a breakthrough by causing a breakdown.

So breaking boards or bricks,

walking over hot coals,

putting your hand into a aquarium full of snakes.

- Everybody's sitting there going,

"Uh, I'm not feeling really good about this.

I don't--I can't do that."

And he tells you, "Yes, you can.

You can do it, you can do it now."

And you do it, and you realize,

well, again, I was wrong.

As you go along, you start going, okay,

I don't like the way he pushes finance,

okay, I don't like all these other things.

But man, I am moving along.

I'm making some really big strides and things.

And he knows better about what I can do than I do,

then his judgment's better than my judgment.

He sounded very wise

and authoritative.

And I didn't question too much.

I thought, I'm on the right path.

- You'll start to attract new results,

new people, new opportunities,

and your life will change.