“Does Ted have a history of attempting to obtain private information inappropriately?”

Ted’s entire history with the FBI seems to be one of attempting to obtain private information inappropriately. I think his own behavior, in part, fueled his paranoia about the FBI after he left its active duty. It is also quite clear that Gunderson also went to great lengths to try an secure testimony to corroborate his lunacy, whether by coercion, promised rewards, or bullying. This was attested to in regards to the McDonald case, it was clear in the McMartin case (where he admitted, with no apparent realization of wrong-doing, to haranguing an archaeologist into saying there were tunnels underneath the site, when in fact there were none). I believe when all the files are in I’ll find evidence of Gunderson’s coercion in the Franklin trial perjuries as well. (If some of these references are obscure to you, I apologize — I will elaborate directly on all of this in my next piece).

“Also since Ted’s death, is there someone who has replaced him as the criminal ‘expert’ among the conspiracy theorists?”

Nobody with Ted’s credentials has come along to take his place, and most every professional openly recognizes the Satanic Panic for what it was. However, the same old fools that followed Gunderson are still at it, and there are plenty of under-educated therapists and social workers who still purvey the conspiracy delusions that he worked so hard to spread. In the UK there is Valerie Sinason, a discredited therapist who still manages to get media attention by making claims of Satanic Cult crimes. In the US, there is a delusional little man named Randy Noblitt who is actually a professor at Alliant University in California, where he actually teaches Satanic delusion as a matter of academic inquiry. We also have Neil Brick, a guy who claims that he himself was a victim of Satanic/Illuminati/CIA mind-control (they turned him into some kind of super assassin during the Cold War. Very action-hero stuff) — he runs annual conferences and even works as a licensed counselor in Massachusetts. Not long ago, a con woman by the name of Judy Byington self-published a book, 22 Faces, about an alleged case of Satanic Ritual Abuse — however, the book was not even logically consistent within, it made bizarre supernatural claims, and some colleagues and I ultimately debunked her claims (as flat lies) to being a consultant for the Utah Attorney General’s Office (they have nothing to do with her). In fact, there are no shortage of panic-purveyors who continue to spread delusion to the mentally vulnerable.

An ex-FBI agent came to Australia about nine years ago apparently and I suspect it may be Ted Gunderson based on your description of him. He was here as a guest speaker for a conference on ritual abuse. Only professionals were invited to the conference/workshop which ran for a few days I believe. Do you know if Ted visited Australia in around 2004?

The reason I ask is because my counsellor at the time attended the conference and was one of only twelve participants. She told me later about how he approached her individually stating that she was the only person he was interested in working with and plans were made to exchange notes. I didn’t hear how things turned out after that.

However since my own personal history involved ritual abuse (I personally refer to it as sadistic abuse) I felt uncomfortable about his special interest in my counsellor. It was not long after this time that I discovered two other instances of people attempting to gain access to my medical files and other information.

He hadn’t even talked to my (very unattractive) counsellor about her work before singling her out which sounded as if he had prior knowledge of the type of work she was doing. This counsellor has since retired.

Does Ted have a history of attempting to obtain private information inappropriately?

Also since Ted’s death, is there someone who has replaced him as the criminal ‘expert’ among the conspiracy theorists?

This information would be very helpful to me.

Regards

Leonie

And you make this bizarre statement: “The Franklin Conspiracy case he worked with resulted in a federal lawsuit winning against the perpetrator, somewhat vindicating the allegations by the child victims […]” In fact, Gunderson’s claims in the Franklin Conspiracy resulted in a Grand Jury statement that the allegations of Satanic Abuse were a “carefully crafted hoax”. The charges of embezzlement that “the perpetrator” was convicted of had nothing to do with any investigation of the short-sighted, monotone, and absurdly credulous Gunderson.

You give yourself away as being somebody well removed from reason when you write about Aquino, “who was associated with both has a huge amount published about him and things like the Presidio day care molestation case in which he was hardly vindicated despite an apparent cover up.” There we have the no-evidence-is-evidence-of-a-cover-up mentally that is the trademark of the paranoiac. Again, when a Satanic Cult conspiracy is spoken of, do you truly believe that either the Church of Satan or the Temple of Set, both of which hardly even exist any longer, can be implicated?

And then you throw out a bunch of disparate facts that have nothing to do with this dialogue at all. Various religions and religious cults exist. Child Abuse exists. Human trafficking exists.

Of course they do. One need not accept the absurd to preserve these facts. Nor does promoting idiotic false notions of supernatural crimes or international megalomaniacal super-cults do anything to aid the battle against child abuse or sex trafficking. And then you conclude by saying that churches and sex abuse sometimes overlap. Yes, but if that’s all you think Gunderson was saying, I have an article you might like to read (see full text above comments).

[This comment courtesy of yellowgavin@yahoo.com]

There is a Church of Satan and Temple of Set both recognized by the DOD as official churches, and Michael Aquino who was associated with both has a huge amount published about him and things like the Presidio day care molestation case in which he was hardly vindicated despite an apparent cover up.

I’ve seen European interviews with minors used in SRA type abuse and they are heartbreaking and you obviously don’t do your research if you can ignore the volumes of credible accounts. I suppose the simple answer is well those established “churches” are above board and don’t subscribe to any of this SRA rubbish–which is ludicrous at face value. http://youtu.be/MUzQ7aqFyiU

There are all kinds of kinky cults in this world of every persuasion, from Druids to Wicca to hedonists and everything in between. To pretend adults that don’t believe in moral values and abuse children don’t exist turns a blind eye to sex trafficking, prostitution, human slavery as if these crimes don’t exist. Ever heard of sex tourism in Asia? Whether or not some avowed Satanists are involved there are volumes of adults perpetrating these real crimes. If by chance some of the participants, who already are involved in various perversions, just happen to have sympathy for Satanism or similar cults it isn’t a stretch to believe these two worlds cross over at times.

There are Satanic churches, try Wikipedia for a start. There is child abuse and sexploitation of children, try Google. Sometimes these two sets of characters overlap, try some in-depth research.

As for Maury Terry, he did in fact resurface recently when the Great Plains Examiner revisited the Arlis Perry case: http://www.greatplainsexaminer.com/2012/06/25/the-killing-of-arlis-perry/

” “When Berkowitz identified the man in the photograph, it confirmed (Terry’s) suspicions that that may have been the visitor at the law firm the day before Perry was killed,” Martinson said. “And it’s entirely possible that Berkowitz met that person while he was in North Dakota.””

thank you so much for the kind words.

i have been particularly frustrated by the publicity mrs. byington has gotten for her absurd book, 22 faces. the book is so obscene, delusional, self-contradicting, and outright incorrect, that one would hope debunking it would be entirely unnecessary. however, as you have seen, NPR affiliates, and now — i am made to understand — even dr. phil have proved willing to humor byington’s book as a mere biographical account of a rare and “misunderstood” psychiatric condition. i have written a review of 22 faces that has been posted online both here:

http://www.dysgenics.com/2012/09/27/when-therapists-are-lunatics-a-review-of-22-faces-by-judy-byington/

and here:

http://www.examiner.com/review/the-lunatics-are-all-therapists-a-review-of-22-faces-by-judy-byington?cid=db_articles

i believe i will have a piece about 22 faces in the next issue of skeptical inquirer magazine to hit the stands in the next 2 or 3 weeks as well. i say “i believe” because, though i turned the piece in and included supporting fact-checking documentation, i haven’t yet received a proof, and i’m not certain the editor got to it on time to make it to the printing. in any case, as you’ll see, i object very specifically, primarily, to the supernatural nature of the book. the question of the legitimacy or lack-thereof of theories of traumatic repression and multiple personalities isn’t even worth considering — and gives the book too much credit — when the book is rife with so many other implausible claims. i bullet-pointed some of the supernatural claims thus:

Prophecy: The protagonist’s birth is foretold by her uncle in exacting detail.
Extra Sensory Perception (ESP): apparently believing that child abuse can prove beneficial to the victim, author Judy Byington describes that the protagonist, Jenny Hill, was able to break through certain subliminal barriers, not in spite of, but because of, early humiliations
Divine guidance: desperate and in prayer, Jenny Hill hears “a soft, yet thundering voice”, which urges her to “continue to write down your life experiences, for one day a book will be written.”
Divine intervention: In the midst of a Satanic ceremony in which she is bound to an altar, Jenny Hill is spared from sacrifice by a bare-footed “white-robed male personage, surrounded in a glorious White Light”. (Had this “personage” taken a little effort to arrive just a moment earlier, he could have spared the unlucky girl next to Hill, who is said to have been decapitated… but I’m sure His schedule is as busy as His Ways mysterious.)
Spirit Possession: Making clear that possession isn’t merely a more primitive cultural interpretation of DID, Byington describes that Hill suffered BOTH DID and spirit possession, the latter being cured by the prayers of LDS church officials

infuriatingly, byington has failed to confront any of my criticisms while still accusing me of “spreading falsehoods”. i have asked her repeatedly to specify what exactly these “falsehoods” are, as i am happy to correct anything i’ve written that is demonstrably wrong. failing this, she simple-mindedly repeats that i am somehow “defending rapists and murders” with my demonic rationalism, and indeed she has decided that i am a satanist myself.

anyway — i have so much more to say on the topic, and the sister of the protagonist of byington’s book has had some very interesting things to say as well, but i would be grateful if we could move the dialogue to the comments sections of one of the above links about byington’s book for the benefit of any readers specifically searching out that topic.

regarding maury terry and his laughable piece-of-shit book about the process (yes, the very “the process” from which the domain process.org is derived). he’s another case where merely reading his book with a sensible mind is enough to see it for what it is — the flimsy speculations of a low-quality hack. if you can suffer his page-after-page bloated attempt at building a suspenseful crime drama, you find an interesting subtext that describes a talentless journalist struggling to find a unique perspective on an over-exposed and sensational story, the berkowitz .44 calibre slayings.

i provided some research for a recent book about the process called ‘love sex fear death’ written by former process inner-circle luminary, timothy wyllie. to be sure, the process was a cult, and timothy is very candid about the cultic lives the processeans led. following publication of the book, wyllie and feral house publisher, adam parfrey, toured with some publicity events. i remember parfrey said that he had reached out to terry a few times during the course of this, but to no avail. wyllie was quite ready to debate terry, as i would be any time, but terry seems to make himself unavailable to such things, and i hardly think he’s up to the task. one doesn’t hear much of terry anymore, but i did see that he posted some type of brief eulogy for ted gunderson in the comments of a website not long after gunderson’s death. i believe his relationship to gunderson alone is enough to certainly cast doubt upon his powers of critical reasoning…

So you know, my interest in satanic panic and conspiracies is nothing more than a horror geek’s fascination with local lore and urban legend. I’m firmly on the side of humanism, science and reason. I was a teenager in 1980s suburban/rural Ct where the satanic panic was all around and it made everything kind of hyper real and falsely thrilling. Silly.

I first came across your name in reading your responses to an NPR station with local Utah satanic panic cheerleader Judy Byington. I’ve since commented on her youtube videos (she removed my comments). I couldn’t agree more with you that she’s probably causing that poor ill woman great harm. When you say this:

“I think a better question to be asked of you would be, why is it that you seem to be obsessed with fictional pornographic tales of child murder and rape? It’s a disgusting hobby, it’s a terrible insult to victims of real abuse when you try to co-opt them into your religious conspiracy theory, and it’s a horrible thing to impose on a mentally vulnerable mental health consumer.”

You couldn’t be more right. I humbly ask your permission to post that on her Barnes and Noble book site for her stupid cheap book.

Did you know that now Byington is claiming that her patient saw a girl who went missing in Pennsylvania in 1965 murdered in a satanic ritual?

http://www.examiner.com/article/utah-woman-claims-witnessing-a-human-sacrifice

“Hill states that on June 21, 1965, she was taken to a “Black Temple” rite in
Garden Grove, California, where the six year-old was strapped to an altar,
tortured, and forced to watch the murder of another six year-old identified
as Kathleen Shea. Shea’s cold case has remained open in Tyrone,
Pennsylvania, since she disappeared on March 18, 1965 while walking
four blocks to school.”

I think it’s pretty disgusting for her to use an actual missing persons case like that, no matter how old. I’d love to see you debunking this.

I’d also love to know what you know about that granddaddy magnum opus of satanic panic “non-fiction” written by a “journalist” with a last name that rhymes with Berry!

Thanks again, keep up the good work.