Gentle Wind Project former members
Posted by:
Cosmophilospher
()
Date: January 15, 2005 03:23AM
[pressherald.mainetoday.com]
Sunday, January 9, 2005
Gentle Wind Project sues couple over Internet postings
By GREGORY D. KESICH, Portland Press Herald Writer
The Gentle Wind Project collected millions of dollars in donations by distributing plastic healing instruments that believers say alleviate suffering through the regeneration of human energy fields damaged by trauma.
But when two of the group's former associates went on the Internet and compared the Kittery-based nonprofit to a "mind-control cult," Gentle Wind called a lawyer.
The organization and six of its officers have filed a complex defamation lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Portland. It charges that former adherents James Bergin and Judy Garvey, a married couple from Blue Hill, made false accusations of financial and sexual exploitation that damaged the organization's reputation and slowed the flow of donations, its only income.
According to court documents, Bergin wrote that he and Garvey had been "obedient followers" of Gentle Wind for 17 years, allowing the organization to influence his family in "very destructive ways." He said his wife had participated in sexual rituals with members of the Gentle Wind inner circle. Bergin said after leaving the group he studied "cults and high-control groups" and was struck with "their universal similarity of these groups to Gentle Wind."
But Gentle Wind is not a cult, said Mary Miller, a director and spokeswoman for the 21-year-old organization, and the group is ready to fight to prove it.
"We want our reputation back," Miller said in a recent interview. "When someone says lies about the organization, it might be possible to believe that these things are true. We want to let people know that they are not true."
Gentle Wind is suing for unspecified damages, including punitive damages. To win its case, the organization must prove that the statements are false and Bergin and Garvey were negligent by publishing them. To get punitive damages, they will have to prove that Bergin and Garvey knew the statements were false and made them to intentionally hurt the organization.
The couple say they have a legal right to tell their life stories and call the lawsuit an attempt to intimidate them. They have already spent $12,000 defending themselves and could pay more before the case runs it course.
"They are simply expressing their views," said Jerrol Crouter of Drummond Woodsum and MacMahon, the couple's lawyer. "They have suffered a significant personal toll of being accused of substantial wrongdoing, and it's a completely unfounded claim."
Bergin and Garvey's allegations were made public in online articles published on their own Web site, www.windsofchange. org, and later repeated on other sites.
According to the lawsuit, the couple alleged in their articles that Gentle Wind is a cult-like organization run by John "Tubby" Miller. They described Miller as a charismatic former psychotherapist who manipulates naive people around the world, allowing him and his inner circle to live a life of luxury.
John Miller would not be interviewed for this story, said Mary Miller, Gentle Wind's spokeswoman. She said Gentle Wind does not have a leader.
THREE INTERNET SITES SETTLE
In their articles, which are quoted in the lawsuit, Bergin and Garvey charge that over a 17-year period, Gentle Wind's control of their lives led them to sell a profitable publishing business in Massachusetts and donate tens of thousands of dollars to the organization.
According to court records, Garvey also claims that for a period of time she took part in group sexual rituals that she believed were necessary to provide the energy needed to make the healing instruments the organization distributes.
In addition to Bergin and Garvey, the lawsuit names as defendants several operators of Internet sites that published the couple's work. Three of the operators have settled the claims against them by removing the material from their Web sites, and one has published an apology.
But one Web site operator, Rick Ross, a New Jersey consultant who studies cults and similar groups and sometimes testifies about them in court, has refused to remove the material he has collected on Gentle Wind and remains a defendant in the case.
At stake is an "alternative and complimentary healing" program operated out of houses in Kittery and Durham, N.H., which, before the controversy, collected more than $1 million a year in donations, Miller said.
Donations fell by $587,000 over an 18-month period ending in August, according to court records. The organization has cut its paid staff from 12 to seven.
Gentle Wind's legal fight had cost $113,103 when a September report was issued, and the case is far from resolution. Bergin and Garvey have asked that the case be dismissed from federal court, but even if they are successful, Gentle Wind will continue to pursue them, said Daniel Rosenthal of Verrill Dana, Gentle Wind's lawyer.
"There's no prospect of it going away," Rosenthal said. "The only question is whether it's in state or federal court."
TYPICAL CONTRIBUTORS
Bergin said he was a successful academic textbook publisher in 1983, when he and his wife began looking for parenting advice from Mary Miller, who they say was then known as Claudia Panuthos.
Bergin and Garvey were educated professionals in their mid-40s - typical of people involved in Gentle Wind, he said.
"They don't want starry-eyed bliss-ninnies," Bergin said in an interview. "They want people who have a life. We had money and skills. They wanted us. We were prime."
Bergin said their involvement began with a "soul reading" in which they sent hair samples to Mary Miller and received an audiotape. The insights were "mysterious and intriguing," Bergin said, and the speaker seemed to know them better than they knew themselves.
Over time, Garvey began visiting the Gentle Wind members in Maine, and eventually the family moved to Blue Hill, where John Miller had temporarily set up headquarters.
Bergin said nearly every decision in his life was based on advice from John Miller and Mary Miller. They dictated how he made his living, how he raised his sons and the most intimate details of his marriage. Bergin said he discovered that his wife gave Gentle Wind $77,000 in cash contributions and advanced them $205,000 in no-interest loans, which were repaid.
In 2000, the couple started to have second thoughts. They started researching cults and found similarities. In a section of his article quoted in court records, Bergin said he realized he had given up control of his life to benefit Gentle Wind.
He wrote that, "The process was deceptively subtle, pervasive and persistent."
But in interviews and court documents, Gentle Wind's directors adamantly deny the couple's charges.
"Gentle Wind is not a 'group,' it does not have a 'leader' and does not recruit additional staff," the lawsuit charges. "Gentle Wind does not . . . espouse an all-encompassing belief system and does not have an agenda other than developing and promoting the use of its healing instruments."
THE HEALING INSTRUMENTS
The instruments include colorful plastic cards and hockey pucks that are displayed on the company's Web site, www.gentlewindproject.org. The items are said to restore the "human energy field and contribute to healing."
Although the instruments are free, each is posted with a recommended donation, starting at $250 for the Advanced Family Unity/Integrated Space Set and including $5,850 for the Rainbow Puck, which "may solve many of the problems found in humanity."
Two products designed to work together are the City Block Sweep and Decompressor, for $1,175, to "relieve stress from confinement and transactional and territorial disputes" in homes and offices and the New World System V - suggested donation $7,800 - which is a handheld device to "improve emotional physical well being."
The instruments are circulated at open houses held around the country and abroad by about 7,000 people, Miller said. They have been given to soldiers returning from Iraq and will be delivered to aid tsunami victims in Asia, she said.
Miller, a former social worker, said she began using the instruments in the late 1970s when she saw their effectiveness in the emotional healing of parents who had lost children. "They showed noticeable improvement that far outpaced the normal grieving process," she said.
Although the products don't work for everyone, the organization enjoyed a good reputation among people who used them, including some health-care professionals, she said.
Miller said the trouble started when Garvey was asked to leave a volunteer position in Kittery in 2000 and began publishing her criticism of Gentle Wind. Miller would not discuss why Garvey was fired or any of the details of the suit, but she denied the couple's allegations, which she called "hurtful."
"You won't find any evidence for claims of a cult," she said. "We wouldn't be spending these kind of resources if these charges were true."
Miller would not shed any light on the relationship between the Gentle Wind staff and directors, some whom live together and receive room and board as well as salaries from the organization. She said that she and others have changed their last names to Miller but would not explain why.
"I don't want to go into that," she said. "But it has nothing to do with cult behavior, I can tell you that."
'PUBLIC HAS RIGHT TO KNOW'
Defendant Ross said he is getting used to being sued by groups he writes about. As executive director of the New Jersey-based Rick A. Ross Institute for the Study of Cults, Controversial Groups and Movements, he has pending cases with groups called Pure Bride Ministries and Church of Immortal Consciousness for material he posted on his Web site, www.culteducation.com.
He said he has been successfully defended in other lawsuits, thanks to pro bono legal work from different law firms.
"I regard these as nothing more than harassment suits designed to get critical information off the Internet," Ross said.
On his Web site, Ross called Gentle Wind "a rather odd group." He says he could settle his part of the case by removing the critical articles, but he has refused.
"I feel the public has a right to know what information is out there, and I have a First Amendment right to tell what I know," Ross said.
U.S. District Court Judge Gene Carter has described the lawsuit as "convoluted." The original complaint, filed in May, claimed relief under federal racketeering laws. Bergin and Garvey successfully got those charges dropped. But Gentle Wind filed a new complaint that relied on different laws.
A motion to dismiss those claims is pending. In the meantime, one defendant, a Web site operator in New Zealand, has been found in default for not responding to the complaint, and three Web site operators have settled.
Ross has asked to be dismissed from the case because he argues that he never came to Maine and could not have violated Maine law.
The role of the Web site operators is what is driving the case, said Rosenthal, Gentle Wind's lawyer.
If Bergin and Garvey had made their charges to a neighbor, Gentle Wind could still sue them, he said. But since the charges were published on the Internet, the damage to the organization has been far greater.
"These things really started to spread like wildfire," he said. "This case really shows what can happen when rumors spread in the electronic age."
Sunday, January 9, 2005
Gentle Wind Project sues couple over Internet postings
By GREGORY D. KESICH, Portland Press Herald Writer
The Gentle Wind Project collected millions of dollars in donations by distributing plastic healing instruments that believers say alleviate suffering through the regeneration of human energy fields damaged by trauma.
But when two of the group's former associates went on the Internet and compared the Kittery-based nonprofit to a "mind-control cult," Gentle Wind called a lawyer.
The organization and six of its officers have filed a complex defamation lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Portland. It charges that former adherents James Bergin and Judy Garvey, a married couple from Blue Hill, made false accusations of financial and sexual exploitation that damaged the organization's reputation and slowed the flow of donations, its only income.
According to court documents, Bergin wrote that he and Garvey had been "obedient followers" of Gentle Wind for 17 years, allowing the organization to influence his family in "very destructive ways." He said his wife had participated in sexual rituals with members of the Gentle Wind inner circle. Bergin said after leaving the group he studied "cults and high-control groups" and was struck with "their universal similarity of these groups to Gentle Wind."
But Gentle Wind is not a cult, said Mary Miller, a director and spokeswoman for the 21-year-old organization, and the group is ready to fight to prove it.
"We want our reputation back," Miller said in a recent interview. "When someone says lies about the organization, it might be possible to believe that these things are true. We want to let people know that they are not true."
Gentle Wind is suing for unspecified damages, including punitive damages. To win its case, the organization must prove that the statements are false and Bergin and Garvey were negligent by publishing them. To get punitive damages, they will have to prove that Bergin and Garvey knew the statements were false and made them to intentionally hurt the organization.
The couple say they have a legal right to tell their life stories and call the lawsuit an attempt to intimidate them. They have already spent $12,000 defending themselves and could pay more before the case runs it course.
"They are simply expressing their views," said Jerrol Crouter of Drummond Woodsum and MacMahon, the couple's lawyer. "They have suffered a significant personal toll of being accused of substantial wrongdoing, and it's a completely unfounded claim."
Bergin and Garvey's allegations were made public in online articles published on their own Web site, www.windsofchange. org, and later repeated on other sites.
According to the lawsuit, the couple alleged in their articles that Gentle Wind is a cult-like organization run by John "Tubby" Miller. They described Miller as a charismatic former psychotherapist who manipulates naive people around the world, allowing him and his inner circle to live a life of luxury.
John Miller would not be interviewed for this story, said Mary Miller, Gentle Wind's spokeswoman. She said Gentle Wind does not have a leader.
THREE INTERNET SITES SETTLE
In their articles, which are quoted in the lawsuit, Bergin and Garvey charge that over a 17-year period, Gentle Wind's control of their lives led them to sell a profitable publishing business in Massachusetts and donate tens of thousands of dollars to the organization.
According to court records, Garvey also claims that for a period of time she took part in group sexual rituals that she believed were necessary to provide the energy needed to make the healing instruments the organization distributes.
In addition to Bergin and Garvey, the lawsuit names as defendants several operators of Internet sites that published the couple's work. Three of the operators have settled the claims against them by removing the material from their Web sites, and one has published an apology.
But one Web site operator, Rick Ross, a New Jersey consultant who studies cults and similar groups and sometimes testifies about them in court, has refused to remove the material he has collected on Gentle Wind and remains a defendant in the case.
At stake is an "alternative and complimentary healing" program operated out of houses in Kittery and Durham, N.H., which, before the controversy, collected more than $1 million a year in donations, Miller said.
Donations fell by $587,000 over an 18-month period ending in August, according to court records. The organization has cut its paid staff from 12 to seven.
Gentle Wind's legal fight had cost $113,103 when a September report was issued, and the case is far from resolution. Bergin and Garvey have asked that the case be dismissed from federal court, but even if they are successful, Gentle Wind will continue to pursue them, said Daniel Rosenthal of Verrill Dana, Gentle Wind's lawyer.
"There's no prospect of it going away," Rosenthal said. "The only question is whether it's in state or federal court."
TYPICAL CONTRIBUTORS
Bergin said he was a successful academic textbook publisher in 1983, when he and his wife began looking for parenting advice from Mary Miller, who they say was then known as Claudia Panuthos.
Bergin and Garvey were educated professionals in their mid-40s - typical of people involved in Gentle Wind, he said.
"They don't want starry-eyed bliss-ninnies," Bergin said in an interview. "They want people who have a life. We had money and skills. They wanted us. We were prime."
Bergin said their involvement began with a "soul reading" in which they sent hair samples to Mary Miller and received an audiotape. The insights were "mysterious and intriguing," Bergin said, and the speaker seemed to know them better than they knew themselves.
Over time, Garvey began visiting the Gentle Wind members in Maine, and eventually the family moved to Blue Hill, where John Miller had temporarily set up headquarters.
Bergin said nearly every decision in his life was based on advice from John Miller and Mary Miller. They dictated how he made his living, how he raised his sons and the most intimate details of his marriage. Bergin said he discovered that his wife gave Gentle Wind $77,000 in cash contributions and advanced them $205,000 in no-interest loans, which were repaid.
In 2000, the couple started to have second thoughts. They started researching cults and found similarities. In a section of his article quoted in court records, Bergin said he realized he had given up control of his life to benefit Gentle Wind.
He wrote that, "The process was deceptively subtle, pervasive and persistent."
But in interviews and court documents, Gentle Wind's directors adamantly deny the couple's charges.
"Gentle Wind is not a 'group,' it does not have a 'leader' and does not recruit additional staff," the lawsuit charges. "Gentle Wind does not . . . espouse an all-encompassing belief system and does not have an agenda other than developing and promoting the use of its healing instruments."
THE HEALING INSTRUMENTS
The instruments include colorful plastic cards and hockey pucks that are displayed on the company's Web site, www.gentlewindproject.org. The items are said to restore the "human energy field and contribute to healing."
Although the instruments are free, each is posted with a recommended donation, starting at $250 for the Advanced Family Unity/Integrated Space Set and including $5,850 for the Rainbow Puck, which "may solve many of the problems found in humanity."
Two products designed to work together are the City Block Sweep and Decompressor, for $1,175, to "relieve stress from confinement and transactional and territorial disputes" in homes and offices and the New World System V - suggested donation $7,800 - which is a handheld device to "improve emotional physical well being."
The instruments are circulated at open houses held around the country and abroad by about 7,000 people, Miller said. They have been given to soldiers returning from Iraq and will be delivered to aid tsunami victims in Asia, she said.
Miller, a former social worker, said she began using the instruments in the late 1970s when she saw their effectiveness in the emotional healing of parents who had lost children. "They showed noticeable improvement that far outpaced the normal grieving process," she said.
Although the products don't work for everyone, the organization enjoyed a good reputation among people who used them, including some health-care professionals, she said.
Miller said the trouble started when Garvey was asked to leave a volunteer position in Kittery in 2000 and began publishing her criticism of Gentle Wind. Miller would not discuss why Garvey was fired or any of the details of the suit, but she denied the couple's allegations, which she called "hurtful."
"You won't find any evidence for claims of a cult," she said. "We wouldn't be spending these kind of resources if these charges were true."
Miller would not shed any light on the relationship between the Gentle Wind staff and directors, some whom live together and receive room and board as well as salaries from the organization. She said that she and others have changed their last names to Miller but would not explain why.
"I don't want to go into that," she said. "But it has nothing to do with cult behavior, I can tell you that."
'PUBLIC HAS RIGHT TO KNOW'
Defendant Ross said he is getting used to being sued by groups he writes about. As executive director of the New Jersey-based Rick A. Ross Institute for the Study of Cults, Controversial Groups and Movements, he has pending cases with groups called Pure Bride Ministries and Church of Immortal Consciousness for material he posted on his Web site, www.culteducation.com.
He said he has been successfully defended in other lawsuits, thanks to pro bono legal work from different law firms.
"I regard these as nothing more than harassment suits designed to get critical information off the Internet," Ross said.
On his Web site, Ross called Gentle Wind "a rather odd group." He says he could settle his part of the case by removing the critical articles, but he has refused.
"I feel the public has a right to know what information is out there, and I have a First Amendment right to tell what I know," Ross said.
U.S. District Court Judge Gene Carter has described the lawsuit as "convoluted." The original complaint, filed in May, claimed relief under federal racketeering laws. Bergin and Garvey successfully got those charges dropped. But Gentle Wind filed a new complaint that relied on different laws.
A motion to dismiss those claims is pending. In the meantime, one defendant, a Web site operator in New Zealand, has been found in default for not responding to the complaint, and three Web site operators have settled.
Ross has asked to be dismissed from the case because he argues that he never came to Maine and could not have violated Maine law.
The role of the Web site operators is what is driving the case, said Rosenthal, Gentle Wind's lawyer.
If Bergin and Garvey had made their charges to a neighbor, Gentle Wind could still sue them, he said. But since the charges were published on the Internet, the damage to the organization has been far greater.
"These things really started to spread like wildfire," he said. "This case really shows what can happen when rumors spread in the electronic age."
Gentle Wind Project former members
Posted by:
Cosmophilospher
()
Date: January 15, 2005 03:36AM
[www.ellsworthamerican.com]
Gentle Wind Project” Wafts into Ellsworth
Alternative “Healer” Sues Former Fans
By Tom Walsh
ELLSWORTH — Veterans coping with battlefield injuries and post-traumatic stress are actively being courted by the Gentle Wind Project, a controversial, Maine-based “healing organization
Founded in 1983, and headquartered for many years in Blue Hill, the organization is now based in Kittery. For nearly 20 years, the project has been developing an array of “healing instruments,” claiming those who use them become calmer, stronger and more in control of their lives.
One such instrument — the “healing puck” — resembles a hockey puck. The “Rod of Light” instrument is a clear, acrylic rod decorated with bands of color. Both instruments are described as being embedded with various combinations of herbs, salts, minerals and precious stones.
---------------
Financial Growth
The GWP lawsuit begs for analysis of the project’s finances. As a private, nonprofit corporation known as “Gentle Wind Retreat” the project is exempt from federal income taxes, much like a church, a hospital or a private college. On its annual Form 990 filing with the Internal Revenue Service, GWP lists its primary exempt purpose as “educational research.”
“Gentle Wind Retreat has conducted extensive research on mental and emotional well-being and the healing of trauma,” it told the IRS. “The organization has developed healing instruments as a result of this research. Seminars conducted by the organization provide educational opportunities for attendees.”
The latest Form 990 filing shows GWP net assets of $2,077,324 as of August 31, 2003, up from $1,918,205 the year before. Revenue for the 2002-03 fiscal year totaled $1,969,923, with expenses totaling $1,810,804.
Direct public support, which GWP terms “donations,” accounted for $1,889,227 of revenues.
In its lawsuit, GWP makes the point that it does not sell its healing instruments. “Instead, the instruments are given free of charge to individuals who request them, while a suggested donation is requested. Gentle Wind’s income comes entirely from donations.”
Miller said Saturday most donations come from health care professionals who find GWP’s “healing instruments” benefit their patients.
Expenses during the 2002-03 fiscal year included $1,015,899 for “program services.” The project spent $358,995 in compensation to officers and directors. As president of the corporation, Mary Miller earned $71,799 during the 2002-03 fiscal year, the same salary as the corporation’s treasurer and clerk. The project also spent $379,845 for other salaries and wages. Expenses also included $43,474 for employee benefits and $176,072 for “supplies.”
The project’s books also show that gifts, grants and contributions collectively totaled $4,112,751 during the fiscal years that began in 1998 through 2001. Total revenue for that same period was $5,593,033.
The filing also shows a $231,660 loan to a GWP employee who is the brother of a corporation officer. No purpose for the loan is listed.
Gentle Wind Project” Wafts into Ellsworth
Alternative “Healer” Sues Former Fans
By Tom Walsh
ELLSWORTH — Veterans coping with battlefield injuries and post-traumatic stress are actively being courted by the Gentle Wind Project, a controversial, Maine-based “healing organization
Founded in 1983, and headquartered for many years in Blue Hill, the organization is now based in Kittery. For nearly 20 years, the project has been developing an array of “healing instruments,” claiming those who use them become calmer, stronger and more in control of their lives.
One such instrument — the “healing puck” — resembles a hockey puck. The “Rod of Light” instrument is a clear, acrylic rod decorated with bands of color. Both instruments are described as being embedded with various combinations of herbs, salts, minerals and precious stones.
---------------
Financial Growth
The GWP lawsuit begs for analysis of the project’s finances. As a private, nonprofit corporation known as “Gentle Wind Retreat” the project is exempt from federal income taxes, much like a church, a hospital or a private college. On its annual Form 990 filing with the Internal Revenue Service, GWP lists its primary exempt purpose as “educational research.”
“Gentle Wind Retreat has conducted extensive research on mental and emotional well-being and the healing of trauma,” it told the IRS. “The organization has developed healing instruments as a result of this research. Seminars conducted by the organization provide educational opportunities for attendees.”
The latest Form 990 filing shows GWP net assets of $2,077,324 as of August 31, 2003, up from $1,918,205 the year before. Revenue for the 2002-03 fiscal year totaled $1,969,923, with expenses totaling $1,810,804.
Direct public support, which GWP terms “donations,” accounted for $1,889,227 of revenues.
In its lawsuit, GWP makes the point that it does not sell its healing instruments. “Instead, the instruments are given free of charge to individuals who request them, while a suggested donation is requested. Gentle Wind’s income comes entirely from donations.”
Miller said Saturday most donations come from health care professionals who find GWP’s “healing instruments” benefit their patients.
Expenses during the 2002-03 fiscal year included $1,015,899 for “program services.” The project spent $358,995 in compensation to officers and directors. As president of the corporation, Mary Miller earned $71,799 during the 2002-03 fiscal year, the same salary as the corporation’s treasurer and clerk. The project also spent $379,845 for other salaries and wages. Expenses also included $43,474 for employee benefits and $176,072 for “supplies.”
The project’s books also show that gifts, grants and contributions collectively totaled $4,112,751 during the fiscal years that began in 1998 through 2001. Total revenue for that same period was $5,593,033.
The filing also shows a $231,660 loan to a GWP employee who is the brother of a corporation officer. No purpose for the loan is listed.
Gentle Wind Project former members
Posted by:
Cosmophilospher
()
Date: January 15, 2005 03:59AM
[www-2.cs.cmu.edu]
"Gentle Wind Project" Exposed
This big boy is feeling no pain, thanks to trauma cards and healing hockey pucks. He's John Miller ("Tubby" to his friends), supreme leader of the Gentle Wind Project. Your voluntary donations keep "Tubby", "Moe", and their fellow instrument fondlers fed, clothed, and well-supplied with sand and plastic bits. Please give generously.
[img:09d15b5fe4]http://www-2.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Gentle-Wind/jmmed.jpg[/img:09d15b5fe4]
The Gentle Wind Project sells "healing instruments" that they claim were designed by benevolent space aliens who communicate telepathically with their leader, John Miller. One of these instruments is a hockey puck that sold for $300 to $450. (Newer puck models sell for as much as $5850, and other designs go for even more!) We have obtained an early model puck and photographed the insides. There's not much to it:
The top is a piece of clear plastic. This is used to cover a piece of paper with an art design printed on it. The art is generated by a computer art program that the group's leader uses.
The clear plastic cover is screwed to a 3/4" plain white acrylic disk.
The bottom of the white acrylic disk has a hole (1/2" x 1/2") to hold a small amount of sand (see photos below.) The sand is then covered with a blob of glue or epoxy placed on the plastic bottom piece, to fit over the hole.
The green plastic bottom piece is 3/16" thick and is screwed to the white acrylic. It breaks easily when unscrewed; notice that a chip is missing in the photo.
The sand is just that -- a sandy substance with a slight smell of kitchen spice. No "precious stones" uncovered, although the catalog claims that these instruments include such stones.
[img:09d15b5fe4]http://www-2.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Gentle-Wind/images/14.jpg[/img:09d15b5fe4]
[www-2.cs.cmu.edu]
"Gentle Wind Project" Exposed
This big boy is feeling no pain, thanks to trauma cards and healing hockey pucks. He's John Miller ("Tubby" to his friends), supreme leader of the Gentle Wind Project. Your voluntary donations keep "Tubby", "Moe", and their fellow instrument fondlers fed, clothed, and well-supplied with sand and plastic bits. Please give generously.
[img:09d15b5fe4]http://www-2.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Gentle-Wind/jmmed.jpg[/img:09d15b5fe4]
The Gentle Wind Project sells "healing instruments" that they claim were designed by benevolent space aliens who communicate telepathically with their leader, John Miller. One of these instruments is a hockey puck that sold for $300 to $450. (Newer puck models sell for as much as $5850, and other designs go for even more!) We have obtained an early model puck and photographed the insides. There's not much to it:
The top is a piece of clear plastic. This is used to cover a piece of paper with an art design printed on it. The art is generated by a computer art program that the group's leader uses.
The clear plastic cover is screwed to a 3/4" plain white acrylic disk.
The bottom of the white acrylic disk has a hole (1/2" x 1/2") to hold a small amount of sand (see photos below.) The sand is then covered with a blob of glue or epoxy placed on the plastic bottom piece, to fit over the hole.
The green plastic bottom piece is 3/16" thick and is screwed to the white acrylic. It breaks easily when unscrewed; notice that a chip is missing in the photo.
The sand is just that -- a sandy substance with a slight smell of kitchen spice. No "precious stones" uncovered, although the catalog claims that these instruments include such stones.
[img:09d15b5fe4]http://www-2.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Gentle-Wind/images/14.jpg[/img:09d15b5fe4]
[www-2.cs.cmu.edu]
Gentle Wind Project former members
Posted by:
Cosmophilospher
()
Date: January 16, 2005 05:50AM
Canadian Skeptics website about Medical Quackery, Health Fraud, and the Gentle Wind Project....and info about it being a "scam" or a "cult"...
[www.healthwatcher.net]
[www.healthwatcher.net]
Gentle Wind Project former members
Posted by:
Toni
()
Date: January 16, 2005 08:46AM
That's right!
Corboy, your writings about 'group sex in cults' are no longer available... were very well written about the neurological changes caused by such disorientation. Wished i'd saved it for my own reference.
Corboy, your writings about 'group sex in cults' are no longer available... were very well written about the neurological changes caused by such disorientation. Wished i'd saved it for my own reference.
Gentle Wind Project former members
Posted by:
windofchanges
()
Date: January 16, 2005 10:24PM
Some of Corboy's information might still be available under the Forum topic, "Group Sex in Cults." Gentle Wind Project's "energy work" was mentioned in this also.
[board.culteducation.com]
If more has been written, we would like to see it again.
Wind of Changes
[board.culteducation.com]
If more has been written, we would like to see it again.
Wind of Changes
Gentle Wind Project former members
Posted by:
Cosmophilospher
()
Date: January 19, 2005 05:30AM
[www.philadelphiaweekly.com]
Oh How the Gentle Wind Blows
If you're anxious or depressed, you might want to trek to the airport Sheraton this weekend to size up the handheld "healing instruments" proffered by the Gentle Wind Project, a self-described nonprofit alternative health organization headquartered in Maine. Then again, if you heed the advice of those who regard Gentle Wind's brain trust as charlatans, you'll find something-- anything--better to do. Gentle Wind co-founder Mary "Mo" Miller, a former social worker, says her group has "21 years of documented evidence that shows our healing instruments relieve mental and emotional distress in some people." Miller adds that Gentle Wind's "healing pucks," "trauma cards" and other devices contain herbs and minerals, and can be borrowed for free from the approximately 7,000 Gentle Wind practitioners worldwide. But on Gentle Wind's website (www.gentlewindproject.org) the group touts seven instruments' therapeutic powers under "requested donations" ranging from $250 to $7,700. "In our opinion, they're exploiting people who are vulnerable by selling these things for huge donations," says Kevin LaChappelle, director of the Special Investigations Agency, a San Diego-based nonprofit that probes suspected scam artists. "They tell people this 'super puck' will fix everything that's wrong with you. The whole thing is ludicrous. They're bilking people." Miller responds that SIA is trumpeting the claims of several Gentle Wind critics whom her outfit has sued for defamation of character, and insinuates that SIA may be receiving payments from those defendants. "That's absolutely untrue," LaChappelle says, adding that "unlike theirs, our books are wide open." The Gentle Wind show kicks off Saturday at 1 p.m.
Oh How the Gentle Wind Blows
If you're anxious or depressed, you might want to trek to the airport Sheraton this weekend to size up the handheld "healing instruments" proffered by the Gentle Wind Project, a self-described nonprofit alternative health organization headquartered in Maine. Then again, if you heed the advice of those who regard Gentle Wind's brain trust as charlatans, you'll find something-- anything--better to do. Gentle Wind co-founder Mary "Mo" Miller, a former social worker, says her group has "21 years of documented evidence that shows our healing instruments relieve mental and emotional distress in some people." Miller adds that Gentle Wind's "healing pucks," "trauma cards" and other devices contain herbs and minerals, and can be borrowed for free from the approximately 7,000 Gentle Wind practitioners worldwide. But on Gentle Wind's website (www.gentlewindproject.org) the group touts seven instruments' therapeutic powers under "requested donations" ranging from $250 to $7,700. "In our opinion, they're exploiting people who are vulnerable by selling these things for huge donations," says Kevin LaChappelle, director of the Special Investigations Agency, a San Diego-based nonprofit that probes suspected scam artists. "They tell people this 'super puck' will fix everything that's wrong with you. The whole thing is ludicrous. They're bilking people." Miller responds that SIA is trumpeting the claims of several Gentle Wind critics whom her outfit has sued for defamation of character, and insinuates that SIA may be receiving payments from those defendants. "That's absolutely untrue," LaChappelle says, adding that "unlike theirs, our books are wide open." The Gentle Wind show kicks off Saturday at 1 p.m.
Gentle Wind Project former members
Posted by:
Cosmophilospher
()
Date: January 19, 2005 05:32AM
[www.nowtoronto.com]
Can this card save you?
Gentle Wind's big-buck healing instruments panned by ex-members
By STEVE JONES
There are probably stranger ways to spend the Saturday of the Thanksgiving long weekend, but here I am holding a "trauma card" to heal my "damaged spirit" with a dozen other people in a conference room of the Sheraton Hotel.
I shake it (no sound) and give it a sniff (odourless). An "instrument keeper" with the Gentle Wind Project, the controversial New-England-based group sponsoring this seminar, whispers, "Put it between your hands like you're praying."
In quiet card contemplation, I feel my heartbeat more clearly, which is what usually happens when I meditate.
Others claim that holding a Gentle Wind "healing instrument" (besides the trauma card, there are "healing pucks" and a half-dozen other instruments) makes everything from anxieties to serious ailments go away.
I approached the seminar seeking insight into the theory behind these bizarre objects. Health care workers are among Gentle Wind's promoters and detractors on the Internet.
This bitter Web site warfare has moved to the courts. Gentle Wind is suing two prominent former members and other detractors in the U.S. for making what it alleges are false accusations about the group's health claims and fundraising activities.
Gentle Wind says in a document filed in U.S. court that allegations against the group are "wild, scurrilous and utterly unfounded."
Back inside the seminar, the group's president, Mary Miller, who's sporting no-fuss hair and sensible shoes, is eager to tackle from the get-go the legal ill wind blowing around Gentle Wind.
"For those who don't know," Miller begins, "there's some negative information about us on the Internet, calling us ridiculous things. But believe me, we're the most boring group of middle-aged people around, and you'd be crazy to want to follow us." Laughs all around.
She then takes a direct shot at the group's critics. "When the quack-watchers bad-mouth you, you know you've made it in alternative medicine!" Miller says.
Maybe so. But the "quack-watchers" aren't the only ones keeping a watchful eye on Gentle Wind.
The Maine attorney general's office is interested enough in what former members have to say about Gentle Wind to be keeping an active file.
Canadian authorities have also taken note of the group's forays here, which include regular gatherings in Vancouver and Montreal. The group's most recent Toronto visit raised concerns at Health Canada.
It seems the Gentle Wind Project is selling what Health Canada considers "risk class 1" devices, something the group is not allowed to do without a licence. ***
The Gentle Wind Project, whose motto is "Science and engineering for the human spirit," takes its name from a passage in the I Ching that refers to "the way the sage's thought penetrates us…." John and Mary Miller were young adults when they met at social work school at the University of Connecticut. They became friends and were both "interested in going beyond the limits of counselling and psychotherapy," she says. They began to look at Dr. Edward Bach's Bach Flower Remedies, which were a good start, according to Miller, but limited because of the difficulty of knowing which remedy goes with which ailment.
Nine years after graduation, John Miller approached her with his new technology based on "radiational paraphysics," which he thought vastly superior because it healed the specific damaged areas of the spirit. "It was a gradual development process that is still ongoing," she says.
Indeed, the Millers say they are constantly upgrading the "technology." Miller says Gentle Wind produces countless prototypes, of which few "go out into the world." The five regularly produced models undergo improvements every year. There have probably been over 100 models since 1984.
The non-profit has grown from pushing aromatherapy to raising more than $1.2 million in "donations" last year.
It boasts a significant enough presence in North America to keep Mary Miller, the group's official face, jetting to conferences and seminars, including stops twice a year in Toronto, where there are at least eight "instrument keepers."
According to the group's literature, the engineering of the instruments is inspired by "telepathic communications from non-physical entities living outside the Earth's physical and astral systems."
John Miller is the main receiver of these messages from the ether, say former members.
It's no secret there are many Millers in the core group of the Gentle Wind Project, but Mary Miller is a little reluctant to get into the finer details on how that all came to pass.
"We were an odd group living and researching in a house in Maine," she says, "and we wanted to do renovations but couldn't get a permit because we didn't constitute a family."
When pressed, she adds, "We were just getting the runaround from an individual person at the town hall, and it's been made into this story about following a guru." Mary and another member, Shelly, changed their names to Miller. The fourth Miller is John's wife, Carol.
A key tenet of the group is that an invisible sphere 5 feet wide and 9 feet high surrounds each of us. It is made of "32 different levels of sub-atomic spiritual tennis netting," says Miller.
According the group, pain, fear and loss cause damage to areas of this netting. Holding a "healing instrument," which contains a particular combination of cell salts, undisclosed herbs and minerals and sometimes gold, returns one's sense of well-being by repairing the damaged bits.
Gentle Wind is registered as a non-profit, but some have wondered about the group's determined sales pitches. At the Toronto seminar, I'm buttonholed by one "instrument keeper."
And Miller is quick to correct anyone who wants to "buy" a healing device. That said, each device comes with a specific "donation request": $2,075 U.S. for a Healing Puck V, and $10,000 for a thorough overhaul from a New World System V 2.2.
At the Toronto seminar, Gentle Winders hand out promotional material stating that "trauma technology has recently been accepted for a phase one clinical trial through a medical university in New England."
Asian medicine practitioner Mary Ryan will conduct this study. She teaches medical anthropology part-time at the University of Massachusetts. The planned 12-week trial will gauge the potency of the trauma and pain cards by giving them to one group of participants and a placebo to another group. Participants will answer questionnaires and mark levels of pain on a scale from one to 10. The study will not be conducted at the university, but at Ryan's Tibetan and Chinese medicine clinic.
"I am willing to put my whole career on the line and report I have never come across an alternative therapy that worked so well and that so escaped my understanding," she says.
But since my contact info appeared on a Gentle Wind "victims" Web forum, I have received more than 20 e-mails from six ex-instrument keepers in Australia, Canada and the U.S. The picture they paint of Gentle Wind is not as glowing.
From Toronto: "I was very ill and the docs couldn't help me. I was desperate to try anything. I was introduced to the original puck by a health care provider in California whom I trusted. I was disappointed with the one I got, so I complained to the GWP, who kept encouraging me to upgrade. I ended up with 14 instruments. Now I'm just broke, humiliated and in need. It will take me years to save $5,000 again. I have to seek government assistance for my needs."
From Brisbane, Australia: "I have shared my instruments with over 3,000 people, and monitored the results…. No one had any long-term benefits. One month I forgot to 'send' distance healings to several people, which involves holding a puck in one hand and thinking about the person's name and location. The persons who gave me their names reported back that they'd all had breakthroughs. That made me aware that placebo and suggestion play a big part in the sales success of the instruments."
The most serious charges against the group, however, come from Judy Garvey and her husband, Jim Bergin, two former Gentle Wind adherents who published on their Web site detailed and dramatic accounts of their 17-year involvement with the group.
The mud-slinging between the Millers and Garvey and Bergin continues with gusto. Mary Miller says Garvey and Bergin stand to profit financially from their public criticism of Gentle Wind. The two have a hypnotherapy practice. Garvey says she was so taken in by Gentle Wind that she participated in "energy work" that involved sex. Both deny the others' charges. ***
Gentle Wind's Web site admits that the way the instruments work "cannot be understood by anyone in humanity at this time." It offers that the devices are based on "high-frequency temporal shifting, matrixed with pre-defined etheric modifications operating in a vertically and horizontally oriented polarization." "Gobbledygook!" says Robert Baratz, president of the National Council Against Health Fraud in the U.S., who has monitored the group. He says Gentle Wind's scientific explanations are "high-sounding phrases that mean nothing."
When I tell him that Mary Miller sent me a stack of instrument-praising testimonials from social workers, nurses and even a couple of MDs, he scoffs.
"A bunch of degrees after someone's name doesn't give them any claim on the truth," Baratz says. "If someone makes a claim about something medical, it is their duty and obligation to provide not anecdotes but hard data that show the claim is true."
In tax forms filed by Gentle Wind with the Internal Revenue Service in 2002, the group claimed a $861,368 exemption for "education and research."
California lawyer Carl Starrett, who has been looking into the group on behalf of a non-profit and consumer watchdog, has been left wondering, "Why is the research so costly if the product specifications come from the spirit world?" Starrett is among a group of detractors who are asking the IRS, among others, to investigate the group for alleged "financial improprieties."
He points to expense reports filed with the IRS by the group, including $66,979 for a sailboat. Miller says the expense is easily explained. She says she and her colleagues teach people how to do things they have never done before, like build a sailboat, to give them confidence and to learn how individuals react to being challenged in a positive way. ***
A spokesperson for the IRS tells NOW that it "cannot confirm or deny anything ongoing" related to Gentle Wind. The attorney general's office in Maine will only confirm that it is "interested in getting information about the Gentle Wind Project." Gentle Wind lawyer Daniel Rosenthal is unfazed.
"The attorney general has had many months to say if there's a problem, and so far there is no resolution."
He adds that Gentle Wind's lawsuit against former members isn't a referendum on customer satisfaction. Instead, Rosenthal says, it's to keep self-professed "experts" from publishing content about a law-abiding group.
The courts, however, have so far not smiled on Gentle Wind. A court has already recommended dismissing federal claims against Garvey and Bergin, as well as several others with links to their Web site.
The courts have also denied Gentle Wind's motion for reconsideration due to lack of personal injury. All that remain are the state claims.
Douglas Brooks, a lawyer for one of the co-defendants, an exit counsellor from Arizona, says Gentle Wind is using litigation "to cow people. "
Back at the Toronto seminar, Miller tells the gathering that "the effects of just one healing can continue throughout a person's life, but it's true that they can't help everyone. We can help people who have problems, not people who are problems."
Can this card save you?
Gentle Wind's big-buck healing instruments panned by ex-members
By STEVE JONES
There are probably stranger ways to spend the Saturday of the Thanksgiving long weekend, but here I am holding a "trauma card" to heal my "damaged spirit" with a dozen other people in a conference room of the Sheraton Hotel.
I shake it (no sound) and give it a sniff (odourless). An "instrument keeper" with the Gentle Wind Project, the controversial New-England-based group sponsoring this seminar, whispers, "Put it between your hands like you're praying."
In quiet card contemplation, I feel my heartbeat more clearly, which is what usually happens when I meditate.
Others claim that holding a Gentle Wind "healing instrument" (besides the trauma card, there are "healing pucks" and a half-dozen other instruments) makes everything from anxieties to serious ailments go away.
I approached the seminar seeking insight into the theory behind these bizarre objects. Health care workers are among Gentle Wind's promoters and detractors on the Internet.
This bitter Web site warfare has moved to the courts. Gentle Wind is suing two prominent former members and other detractors in the U.S. for making what it alleges are false accusations about the group's health claims and fundraising activities.
Gentle Wind says in a document filed in U.S. court that allegations against the group are "wild, scurrilous and utterly unfounded."
Back inside the seminar, the group's president, Mary Miller, who's sporting no-fuss hair and sensible shoes, is eager to tackle from the get-go the legal ill wind blowing around Gentle Wind.
"For those who don't know," Miller begins, "there's some negative information about us on the Internet, calling us ridiculous things. But believe me, we're the most boring group of middle-aged people around, and you'd be crazy to want to follow us." Laughs all around.
She then takes a direct shot at the group's critics. "When the quack-watchers bad-mouth you, you know you've made it in alternative medicine!" Miller says.
Maybe so. But the "quack-watchers" aren't the only ones keeping a watchful eye on Gentle Wind.
The Maine attorney general's office is interested enough in what former members have to say about Gentle Wind to be keeping an active file.
Canadian authorities have also taken note of the group's forays here, which include regular gatherings in Vancouver and Montreal. The group's most recent Toronto visit raised concerns at Health Canada.
It seems the Gentle Wind Project is selling what Health Canada considers "risk class 1" devices, something the group is not allowed to do without a licence. ***
The Gentle Wind Project, whose motto is "Science and engineering for the human spirit," takes its name from a passage in the I Ching that refers to "the way the sage's thought penetrates us…." John and Mary Miller were young adults when they met at social work school at the University of Connecticut. They became friends and were both "interested in going beyond the limits of counselling and psychotherapy," she says. They began to look at Dr. Edward Bach's Bach Flower Remedies, which were a good start, according to Miller, but limited because of the difficulty of knowing which remedy goes with which ailment.
Nine years after graduation, John Miller approached her with his new technology based on "radiational paraphysics," which he thought vastly superior because it healed the specific damaged areas of the spirit. "It was a gradual development process that is still ongoing," she says.
Indeed, the Millers say they are constantly upgrading the "technology." Miller says Gentle Wind produces countless prototypes, of which few "go out into the world." The five regularly produced models undergo improvements every year. There have probably been over 100 models since 1984.
The non-profit has grown from pushing aromatherapy to raising more than $1.2 million in "donations" last year.
It boasts a significant enough presence in North America to keep Mary Miller, the group's official face, jetting to conferences and seminars, including stops twice a year in Toronto, where there are at least eight "instrument keepers."
According to the group's literature, the engineering of the instruments is inspired by "telepathic communications from non-physical entities living outside the Earth's physical and astral systems."
John Miller is the main receiver of these messages from the ether, say former members.
It's no secret there are many Millers in the core group of the Gentle Wind Project, but Mary Miller is a little reluctant to get into the finer details on how that all came to pass.
"We were an odd group living and researching in a house in Maine," she says, "and we wanted to do renovations but couldn't get a permit because we didn't constitute a family."
When pressed, she adds, "We were just getting the runaround from an individual person at the town hall, and it's been made into this story about following a guru." Mary and another member, Shelly, changed their names to Miller. The fourth Miller is John's wife, Carol.
A key tenet of the group is that an invisible sphere 5 feet wide and 9 feet high surrounds each of us. It is made of "32 different levels of sub-atomic spiritual tennis netting," says Miller.
According the group, pain, fear and loss cause damage to areas of this netting. Holding a "healing instrument," which contains a particular combination of cell salts, undisclosed herbs and minerals and sometimes gold, returns one's sense of well-being by repairing the damaged bits.
Gentle Wind is registered as a non-profit, but some have wondered about the group's determined sales pitches. At the Toronto seminar, I'm buttonholed by one "instrument keeper."
And Miller is quick to correct anyone who wants to "buy" a healing device. That said, each device comes with a specific "donation request": $2,075 U.S. for a Healing Puck V, and $10,000 for a thorough overhaul from a New World System V 2.2.
At the Toronto seminar, Gentle Winders hand out promotional material stating that "trauma technology has recently been accepted for a phase one clinical trial through a medical university in New England."
Asian medicine practitioner Mary Ryan will conduct this study. She teaches medical anthropology part-time at the University of Massachusetts. The planned 12-week trial will gauge the potency of the trauma and pain cards by giving them to one group of participants and a placebo to another group. Participants will answer questionnaires and mark levels of pain on a scale from one to 10. The study will not be conducted at the university, but at Ryan's Tibetan and Chinese medicine clinic.
"I am willing to put my whole career on the line and report I have never come across an alternative therapy that worked so well and that so escaped my understanding," she says.
But since my contact info appeared on a Gentle Wind "victims" Web forum, I have received more than 20 e-mails from six ex-instrument keepers in Australia, Canada and the U.S. The picture they paint of Gentle Wind is not as glowing.
From Toronto: "I was very ill and the docs couldn't help me. I was desperate to try anything. I was introduced to the original puck by a health care provider in California whom I trusted. I was disappointed with the one I got, so I complained to the GWP, who kept encouraging me to upgrade. I ended up with 14 instruments. Now I'm just broke, humiliated and in need. It will take me years to save $5,000 again. I have to seek government assistance for my needs."
From Brisbane, Australia: "I have shared my instruments with over 3,000 people, and monitored the results…. No one had any long-term benefits. One month I forgot to 'send' distance healings to several people, which involves holding a puck in one hand and thinking about the person's name and location. The persons who gave me their names reported back that they'd all had breakthroughs. That made me aware that placebo and suggestion play a big part in the sales success of the instruments."
The most serious charges against the group, however, come from Judy Garvey and her husband, Jim Bergin, two former Gentle Wind adherents who published on their Web site detailed and dramatic accounts of their 17-year involvement with the group.
The mud-slinging between the Millers and Garvey and Bergin continues with gusto. Mary Miller says Garvey and Bergin stand to profit financially from their public criticism of Gentle Wind. The two have a hypnotherapy practice. Garvey says she was so taken in by Gentle Wind that she participated in "energy work" that involved sex. Both deny the others' charges. ***
Gentle Wind's Web site admits that the way the instruments work "cannot be understood by anyone in humanity at this time." It offers that the devices are based on "high-frequency temporal shifting, matrixed with pre-defined etheric modifications operating in a vertically and horizontally oriented polarization." "Gobbledygook!" says Robert Baratz, president of the National Council Against Health Fraud in the U.S., who has monitored the group. He says Gentle Wind's scientific explanations are "high-sounding phrases that mean nothing."
When I tell him that Mary Miller sent me a stack of instrument-praising testimonials from social workers, nurses and even a couple of MDs, he scoffs.
"A bunch of degrees after someone's name doesn't give them any claim on the truth," Baratz says. "If someone makes a claim about something medical, it is their duty and obligation to provide not anecdotes but hard data that show the claim is true."
In tax forms filed by Gentle Wind with the Internal Revenue Service in 2002, the group claimed a $861,368 exemption for "education and research."
California lawyer Carl Starrett, who has been looking into the group on behalf of a non-profit and consumer watchdog, has been left wondering, "Why is the research so costly if the product specifications come from the spirit world?" Starrett is among a group of detractors who are asking the IRS, among others, to investigate the group for alleged "financial improprieties."
He points to expense reports filed with the IRS by the group, including $66,979 for a sailboat. Miller says the expense is easily explained. She says she and her colleagues teach people how to do things they have never done before, like build a sailboat, to give them confidence and to learn how individuals react to being challenged in a positive way. ***
A spokesperson for the IRS tells NOW that it "cannot confirm or deny anything ongoing" related to Gentle Wind. The attorney general's office in Maine will only confirm that it is "interested in getting information about the Gentle Wind Project." Gentle Wind lawyer Daniel Rosenthal is unfazed.
"The attorney general has had many months to say if there's a problem, and so far there is no resolution."
He adds that Gentle Wind's lawsuit against former members isn't a referendum on customer satisfaction. Instead, Rosenthal says, it's to keep self-professed "experts" from publishing content about a law-abiding group.
The courts, however, have so far not smiled on Gentle Wind. A court has already recommended dismissing federal claims against Garvey and Bergin, as well as several others with links to their Web site.
The courts have also denied Gentle Wind's motion for reconsideration due to lack of personal injury. All that remain are the state claims.
Douglas Brooks, a lawyer for one of the co-defendants, an exit counsellor from Arizona, says Gentle Wind is using litigation "to cow people. "
Back at the Toronto seminar, Miller tells the gathering that "the effects of just one healing can continue throughout a person's life, but it's true that they can't help everyone. We can help people who have problems, not people who are problems."
Gentle Wind Project former members
Posted by:
windofchanges
()
Date: February 09, 2005 11:31AM
According to a Gentle Wind Project Victims' Board posting:
Maine's Attorney General is accepting testimonies from individuals who paid "donations" to Gentle Wind Project for "healing instruments" or "contributions," and/or were refused refunds, or were told about physical, medical, or psychological benefits of the "healing instruments," or whose reports to GW were used as "research" for GWP's articles or reports. Statements to the Attorney General are confidential and protected from legal action.
Individuals can also send information about being part of what GWP calls "research." For some people, this might have been during the earlier years when GWP told followers that the "spirit world" was researching individuals as they worked on photography, electronics, lathes, ham radios, boat building, radio planes, "energy work," and so on. More recently -- attempting to create a "scientific image" -- GW leaders might have asked for reports from "instrument keepers" on the "positive benefits" of using their "healing instruments."
According to the announcement, individuals that have already contacted the Attorney General may send additional information.
Contact information:
Email: consumer.mediation@maine.gov - RE: Gentle Wind Project
Website: [www.state.me.us]
Direct submission of a complaint: [www.maine.gov]
Mail: Maine Attorney General, RE: Gentle Wind Project, 6 State House Station, Augusta, ME 04333-0006, USA
Phone: 207-626-8800 / Fax: 207-626-8518, RE: Gentle Wind Project
Maine's Attorney General is accepting testimonies from individuals who paid "donations" to Gentle Wind Project for "healing instruments" or "contributions," and/or were refused refunds, or were told about physical, medical, or psychological benefits of the "healing instruments," or whose reports to GW were used as "research" for GWP's articles or reports. Statements to the Attorney General are confidential and protected from legal action.
Individuals can also send information about being part of what GWP calls "research." For some people, this might have been during the earlier years when GWP told followers that the "spirit world" was researching individuals as they worked on photography, electronics, lathes, ham radios, boat building, radio planes, "energy work," and so on. More recently -- attempting to create a "scientific image" -- GW leaders might have asked for reports from "instrument keepers" on the "positive benefits" of using their "healing instruments."
According to the announcement, individuals that have already contacted the Attorney General may send additional information.
Contact information:
Email: consumer.mediation@maine.gov - RE: Gentle Wind Project
Website: [www.state.me.us]
Direct submission of a complaint: [www.maine.gov]
Mail: Maine Attorney General, RE: Gentle Wind Project, 6 State House Station, Augusta, ME 04333-0006, USA
Phone: 207-626-8800 / Fax: 207-626-8518, RE: Gentle Wind Project
Gentle Wind Project former members
Posted by:
Cosmophilospher
()
Date: February 17, 2005 11:54AM
[www.cultnews.com]
Today US District Court Judge Gene Carter dismissed a lawsuit filed in Maine by the Gentle Wind Project (GWP) against Rick Ross and the Rick A. Ross Institute For The Study of Destructive Cults, Controversial Groups and Movements (RI).
The judge also denied the plaintiff’s motion for any further discovery, effectively ending the litigation in Maine entirely regarding both this “cult watcher” and the nonprofit RI database.
...
Other defendants in the lawsuit settled with the group by complying with its demands to purge any information about GWP, which it deemed offensive, from their respective Web sites.
One such defendant was noted anti-cult professional Steven Hassan, who quickly complied with GWP demands and no longer lists or has any information about the group at his Freedom of Mind Web site.
...
The remaining defendants Bergin and Garvey also received good news today from the court, two of the primary counts against them, which formed much of the core of GWP’s case, were also dismissed.
...
It seems that the Gentle Wind Project has blown its situation rather badly through all its recent legal wrangling and would have been better off remaining more like a quiet breeze.
[www.cultnews.com]
Today US District Court Judge Gene Carter dismissed a lawsuit filed in Maine by the Gentle Wind Project (GWP) against Rick Ross and the Rick A. Ross Institute For The Study of Destructive Cults, Controversial Groups and Movements (RI).
The judge also denied the plaintiff’s motion for any further discovery, effectively ending the litigation in Maine entirely regarding both this “cult watcher” and the nonprofit RI database.
...
Other defendants in the lawsuit settled with the group by complying with its demands to purge any information about GWP, which it deemed offensive, from their respective Web sites.
One such defendant was noted anti-cult professional Steven Hassan, who quickly complied with GWP demands and no longer lists or has any information about the group at his Freedom of Mind Web site.
...
The remaining defendants Bergin and Garvey also received good news today from the court, two of the primary counts against them, which formed much of the core of GWP’s case, were also dismissed.
...
It seems that the Gentle Wind Project has blown its situation rather badly through all its recent legal wrangling and would have been better off remaining more like a quiet breeze.
[www.cultnews.com]
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