New book recounts New Mexico lawmaker’s cult exploits
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It's not news. State Senator Mark Boitano is a member of the Unification Church - a Moonie. But a new book on the Reverend Sun Myung Moon includes a account of a 1979 incident involving the Albuquerque lawmaker that may be news to lot of people in New Mexico.
The book's title says it all: Bad Moon Rising - How Reverend Moon Created The Washington Times, Seduced the Religious Right, and Built an American Kingdom. The author, John Gorenfeld, has been reporting on Moon for years and exposed the story behind the 2004 Capitol Hill party at which Moon had himself and his wife coronated as "King and Queen of America." Boitano was there. Lobbyist Charlie Black, John McCain's chief political advisor, was on the coronation host committee.
Jim Scarantino covered the Boitano story back in a 2005 in a well-researched Weekly Alibi piece, The Messiah's Senator. He wrote:
But now here's something rather startling, this passage on pages 159-160 of Gorenfeld's new book:
Six shots in all were fired. Boitano, the Unification Church's Norfolk director at the time, was arrested. Obviously it's a good thing the shots failed to hit any of the occupants or we're looking at a Jonestown, Guyana airstrip moment. You can read more of the WaPo account on Gorenfeld's website.
It seems that Boitano's past exploits as a cult leader and his current devotions became an issue in the 2008 race for Congressional district 1. He told blogger Dennis Domrzalski that Republican bigwigs threatened to attack him over his church membership if he carried through on his plans to run against Bernalillo County Sheriff Darren White. Boitano dropped out.
Really now. Such ingratitude! After all Moon has done for them... showering millions on the favored ones ($250,000 to George W., $2 million to his dad, and $1 million to brother Neil)... after creating the Washington Times, Ronald Reagan's favorite newspaper. Then to treat minion Mark in such a horrid fashion -- just shameful.
* * * * * * * * *
Here's Gorenfeld's book.
And here's Gorenfeld's and Patrick Runkle's short film , The King of America, which opens with Moon channeling Theodore Roosevelt endorsement from the spirit world.
Online Videos by Veoh.com
The book's title says it all: Bad Moon Rising - How Reverend Moon Created The Washington Times, Seduced the Religious Right, and Built an American Kingdom. The author, John Gorenfeld, has been reporting on Moon for years and exposed the story behind the 2004 Capitol Hill party at which Moon had himself and his wife coronated as "King and Queen of America." Boitano was there. Lobbyist Charlie Black, John McCain's chief political advisor, was on the coronation host committee.
Jim Scarantino covered the Boitano story back in a 2005 in a well-researched Weekly Alibi piece, The Messiah's Senator. He wrote:
"The Honorable Mark Boitano, state senator, New Mexico" was listed as a member of the invitation committee. In an e-mail exchange last week, Boitano wrote, "Reverend Moon is the most remarkable person I've ever met--he deserves every bit of recognition he receives."
But now here's something rather startling, this passage on pages 159-160 of Gorenfeld's new book:
She (Unification Church spokesperson, Betty Lancaster) made news in 1979 after trigger-happy young churchman fired rifle shots at fleeing exit counselors. The visitors had brought two ex-members by the dorm in Norfolk, Virginia, to collect their belongings. Lancaster told the Washington Post that the visitors were "criminals" who made off with church property - including an anticommunism film featuring Ronald Reagan.
As the van lurched into gear, young Unification Church member Mark Boitano, twenty-six, was ordered by another sect member to shoot a rifle at the fleeing ex-members. One bullet punctured the front tire. Another pierced a door on the passenger side, but no one was hurt. In an unlikely twist of fate, Boitano stayed with the church and is now a GOP state senator in New Mexico.
Six shots in all were fired. Boitano, the Unification Church's Norfolk director at the time, was arrested. Obviously it's a good thing the shots failed to hit any of the occupants or we're looking at a Jonestown, Guyana airstrip moment. You can read more of the WaPo account on Gorenfeld's website.
It seems that Boitano's past exploits as a cult leader and his current devotions became an issue in the 2008 race for Congressional district 1. He told blogger Dennis Domrzalski that Republican bigwigs threatened to attack him over his church membership if he carried through on his plans to run against Bernalillo County Sheriff Darren White. Boitano dropped out.
Really now. Such ingratitude! After all Moon has done for them... showering millions on the favored ones ($250,000 to George W., $2 million to his dad, and $1 million to brother Neil)... after creating the Washington Times, Ronald Reagan's favorite newspaper. Then to treat minion Mark in such a horrid fashion -- just shameful.
* * * * * * * * *
Here's Gorenfeld's book.
And here's Gorenfeld's and Patrick Runkle's short film , The King of America, which opens with Moon channeling Theodore Roosevelt endorsement from the spirit world.
Online Videos by Veoh.com
Norfolk (AP) -- Police say two former followers of the Rev. Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church and four self-styled cult deprogrammers were shot at while trying to reclaim beongings of the former Moonies at the home of the church's Virginia director.
The director, Scott Powell, and the church's Norfolk director, Mark Boitano, were charged with shooting into an occupied auto and unauthorized use of an auto after a series of events that began Monday in Richmond and ended in a quiet Norfolk residential neighborhood.
Police said the two former Moonies, Robert Straw and Brett Blaze, both of Pasadena, Calif., walked into a Unification Church home in Richmond Monday morning.
They were surrounded by four members of the West Virginia chapter of the International Foundation for Individual Freedom (IFIF).
Their task was to gather clothes and other belongings of Straw, 19, who was grabbed by the IFIF deprogrammers June 27 on a Richmond street corner and subsequently was convinced to leave the church.
The deprogrammers had volunteered their services to the parents of the two Californians.
Police said Richmond Moonies watched silently as the six men hauled out the belongings and packed them in a car. The six drove to Norfolk, where they planned to seek out Blaze's van and other belongings.
Blaze, 20, was rescued, as the deprogrammers call it, two weeks ago on a Norfolk street.
Police said Powell, who was working Monday in Richmond, was notified of the events, and he and a carload of followers raced toward Norfolk.
Before a meeting outside Powell's home near Old Dominion University was over, police said a rifle shot puncured a tire of the deprogrammers' car and another bullet pierced a passenger-side door as they were trying to drive away on three tires.
"...I've never seen anything like it, " said a Norfolk detective, frustrated by police attempts to unravel the story.
"This was the first time I'd ever seen Moonies packing guns," said Ed Lilly, a West Virginia social worker and one of the deprogrammers.
Police said late Monday this was what they had determined:
Powell and the other Moonies from Richmond aopparently arrived in Norfolk ahead of the deprogrammers. Lorenzo Gibson, 24, a new Moonie recruit from Richmond, was left at Powell's home with instructions to call police if the deprogrammers appeared.
Gibson decided to hide on the roof with a telephone, the cord stretched out a window.
Not long afterwords, while Powell and others were elsewhere on some unknown mission, the deprogrammers, Straw and Blaze pulled up at Powell's home at 1422 Melrose.
Lilly said he and his companions walked unobstructed into the house and hauled out belongings for about 30 minutes, but no call was made to police. Gibson apparently was so well hidden on the roof he did not know he had visitors.
All packed, but still wondering where they could find Blaze's van, Lilly and company started to drive away. Just then, Powell and company pulled in front, blocking them on the one-way street.
"Powell said, 'You're not going anywhere,"' Lilly claimed.
"We said, 'Where's the van?' and Powell told us before we would leave we would have to run over them. I started walking toward the van with the man with the rifle (Boitano), because I wasn't scared.
"Moonies are usually passive, and (I didn't think) that he meant to kill us. I was going to try to grab the gun, but I thought he might accidentally shoot me, so I didn't go for it."
Lilly said he told the Moonies he and his friends were going to the police, but as they were trying to leave, he heard someone yell, 'Stop them!"
"The guy shot out our front tire. We were backing down the road, with the doors banging open, just weaving over the road, " Lilly said.
The man with the gun "began chasing us and then shot at our back tire."
That shot missed.
"We were still flying down the street (and) he shot at the door.
"The bullet hit the (door) lining, and I could feel the bullet lodge right at my side."
That's when he first was scared, Lilly said.
The deprogrammers managed to get away, however. They stopped several blocks away to change the tire, then drove to police headquarters to file a complaint.
Powell was arrested at his house several hours later, and Boitano turned himself in at headquarters soon afterwards. Both were released on $5,000 bond Monay night.
Levi Daughtery, 35, of Richmond, assistant state director of the Unification Church and one of the Moonies who came to Norfolk with Powell , said Boitano shot at the car.
"But the shot (was) to detain them until police arrived," he said. He said Lilly and his companions had taken "things that didn't belong to them. They took some tapes and pictures that belonged to us."
He said Moonies normally do not carry guns, "but Scott bought the rifle this morning because of the break-in." He said the Moonies considered the deprogrammers' intrusion in Richmond a break-in.
But Norfolk police said authorities here and in Richmond do not plan to charge the deprogrammers with breaking and entering.
August 22, 1979
By Jane Freundel
Washinston Post Staff Writer
The Virginia and Norfolk area directors of the Rev. Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church were arrested in Norfolk Monday on charges of shooting at the car of two former church members.
Scott Powell, 28, Virginia director, and Mark Boitano, 26. Norfolk director, were charged with shooting into an occupied auto and unauthorized use of an auto..
The incident began when two former members of the sect, Robert Straw, 19, and Brett Blaze, 20, both of Pasadena, Calif., returned to their for mer Unification Church homes to retrieve belongings left behind when they left the church recently. They were accompanied by four members of the West Virginia chapter of the International Foundation for Individual Freedom, an educational and counsel ing group that aids persons who want to leave religious cults.
The six men first went to a Richmond church group home where, police said, they recovered Straw's belongings as resident Moonies watched. Then the group went to the home of Virginia director Powell in Norfolk, where Blaze had lived, intending to retrieve clothes and a van belonging to Blaze, according to police,
Powell, who was working in Richmond Monday, and a carload of followers pursued the group, arriving at Powell’s Norfolk home as the ex-Moonies were leaving.
The two groups exchanged words over the custody of Blaze's van. Powell ordered Boitano to shoot at the car occupied by the ex-Moonies, according
to police, who said six rifle shots were fired and three hit the vehicle. One bullet pierced a front tire on the car belonging to Foundation for Individual Freedom member Rodney Connor.
Another bullet pierced a passenger side door [...]