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n total, three women and five children were rescued from Mr Manrique, the police said. All were suffering from malnutrition.

“I’ve been sent a photo of her and I didn’t recognise her,” said Maite Rojas of the charity SOS Desaparecidos, which looks for missing people. “She lived . . . in terrible conditions. They were only given food once a week.”

Adriana Vega, the sister of one of the other people rescued, said that Mr Manrique had sexual relations with the women he kept and that he “combined different religions for his own convenience”.

The Spanish media has said that Mr Manrique was the leader of Gnosis Perú, which was described as a “satanic” and “apocalyptic” sect, and it was reported that he called himself “Prince Gurdjeff”. However, Gnosis Perú has issued a statement distancing itself from him, saying that he was only involved with the group for a short time in 2012.

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Ms Aguilar, from Alicante, went to Peru in January 2017 shortly after turning 18, apparently to join Mr Manrique. Her father said that the two had made contact via the internet when his daughter was 16.

The Peruvian police had been on the trail of Mr Manrique for several months ahead of his arrest.

“This case began in January,” the Peruvian police’s head of people trafficking investigations, José Antonio Capa, told El País newspaper.

“In June we managed to impose restrictive measures on Manrique and 10 days ago a team of eight people were ordered to find and rescue the victims.”

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“According to the family’s version, the girl was caught on the Internet by the leader of the Latin American sect Gnosis in Peru. This is Felix Steven Manrique, who calls himself Prince Gurdjeff, and who has also been arrested”, wrote El País.

Aguilar was held captive along with two other women and their children, and they were found living in very bad conditions. They were only given food once a week, according to El País, and were forced to work.

“The first step is the attention to the victims, in health, food and psychological assistance, we have asked for support from the Victims Protection Unit of the Public Prosecutor’s Office, and also the Ministry of Women, to assist the children by the high degree of malnutrition they present”, explained the head of the Directorate against Trafficking in Persons to El País.

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July 06, 2018

.."They found her after more than one and a half years with a daughter of a month in arms, in the dangerous peruvian jungle. The young Spaniard Patricia Aguilar, now 19 years old, had fled her home in Elche, Spain, January 7, 2017, just when she was 18 years old....


Released with other women and children, all malnourished and with signs of violence .

Aguilar was located during the operation in which Manrique was captured. The girl was in the heart of the Apurimac Valley, Ene and Mantaro Rios (Vraem), one of the most dangerous areas in Peru, controlled by drug traffickers and the remaining members of the Sendero Luminoso terrorist group. Aguilar and his daughter were rescued with four other minors and two other women who were part of the sect. They were all malnourished and had signs of violence.

.... The girl, however, appeared in several local media and claimed to be with Manrique of his own will

...

According to the Spanish newspaper El Pais, Aguilar was convinced by Manrique via the Internet to fly to Peru and go with him. The guru's guru, called Gnosis, is alleged to have been chosen to repopulate the earth after the apocalypse and put together a woman's harem.

"This case began in January. Freedom limitation against Manrique, and 10 days ago a group of eight people was sent to locate and rescue the victims," ??said Jose Capa, head of the Peruvian Department of Trafficking in Human Beings, who speaks to the Spanish Journal. Now, the Aguilar family is studying a way to get her daughter back to Spain, for the Peruvian authorities, her daughter is an irregular immigrant with a daughter of Peruvian nationality.

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Patricia Aguilar disappeared from Alicante last year just after her 18th birthday.

Now Peruvian police have arrested a man accused of heading a cult that kept three women – including the teen – as sexual slaves.

Patricia's relatives claim she was lured to Peru through social media after being contacted by the leader of the “Gnosis” sect.

Cult leader Félix Steven Manrique, who goes by Prince Gurdjeff, claims he has been chosen to repopulate the Earth following the apocalypse, which is why he keeps a harem of women, according to Spanish media.

Patricia’s family said Manrique took advantage of emotionally unstable teens who he contacted online.

According to her family, Patricia was feeling vulnerable following the death of a beloved uncle.

That is when she first was in touch with Manrique.

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Patricia was found five hours after Manrique’s arrest, inside a house with two other women where she had been placed in charge of five children ages four to 10 – all allegedly fathered by the sect leader.

The children appeared to be suffering from malnutrition, Peruvian authorities said following the rescue operation.

Manrique set up the cult deep in the Amazonian jungle and reportedly never left the house where he held his rituals.

“He would send the women off to work, one of which is currently eight months pregnant,” rescue bosses said.

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SPAIN PERU
Gnosis Peru rejects relationship with alleged captor of young Spanish

05/07/2018 23:22
Lima, July 5 (EFE) .- The group Gnosis Peru today rejected "any kind of connection" with Felix Manrique, alleged captor of the Spanish found this Wednesday in the Peruvian jungle, Patricia Aguilar, and assured Efe today that she has started " a defamation legal process "against you.

The representative of the Gnosis group in Peru, Elvis Huacho, explained that Félix Manrique was a participant of the institution in 2012, but that "he was never a leader or representative, only an initial participant who was four months in the institution," the one that decided to separate him by his "strange attitudes".

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"We realized that he had mythomania features, of feeling like a special envoy, that's why he was removed and expelled, even with a letter," said Huacho.

He added that since then they had no further knowledge of him until they learned of the case of Patricia Aguilar, the young Spanish woman whose father Alberto Aguilar was looking for, after denouncing in 2017 that the 19-year-old girl had been caught online by Manrique.

"For us, he was a crazy man, and we thought that we would hope he would correct himself, but from then on we saw what had happened, and how our name began to mix," explained the representative of Gnosis Peru.

According to Huacho, "the confusion" is due to the fact that Felix Manrique had been using counterfeit material from Gnosis Peru, "texts that have mostly been changed or exaggerated at will, as a result of his mental problem", so they will also begin another process for identity plagiarism.

"He thought he was a space envoy, he wanted to repopulate the world, and in order to do so he had to have nine wives," he said.

In that sense, the representative of the religious organization reiterated that Gnosis Peru is "a serious institution", which has been present in Peru since 1990 and which "promotes values ??and spirituality".