MESSIAH OR SEXUAL PREDATOR?

A few years ago in New Mexico, Michael Travesser (real name Wayne Bent), a self-declared Messiah and head of the Lord Our Righteousness Church, had 56 followers, many of them young women, in his end of the world cult living in a compound called Strong City.

“We have our heart set on (the end of the world),” one young woman explained to a documentary filmmaker in 2007, adding that she was looking forward to the end with “all my heart.”

A former Seventh Day Adventists minister, Travesser founded the Lord Our Righteousness Church in 1987. Most of the members were former Seventh Day Adventists.

Not surprisingly, Travesser was arrested by New Mexico state police in 2008 on sex charges. Isn’t that always the way? These self-appointed messiahs and cult leaders make all manner of pronouncements and use their charismatic personalities to captivate people, but in the end, it’s all about sex or, more precisely, sexual exploitation of young women.

Unfortunately, authorities screwed up the case. Travesser was tried and convicted of “one count of criminal sexual contact of a minor and two counts of contributing to the delinquency of a minor.” He was sentenced to 18 years in prison with eight years suspended. However, in June of last year, the New Mexico Court of Appeals overturned all convictions because “the grand jury was not legally assembled.”

It would be easy to be up-in-arms about what many see as a “technicality.” However, since I’m a strong constitutionalist and, like the ACLU, defender of the Bill of Rights, I understand why the court overturned his conviction. On the other hand, he is, in my opinion, a sexual predator and crazy person. Fortunately, he’s still in prison pending the outcome of an appeal filed by the New Mexico attorney general.

What the outcome for Travesser, his story is similar to dozens of others, many of them Mormon polygamists. They control their people through either charisma or the threat of violence. While they await Doomsday or End of Days or whatever, these “leaders” find any number of ways to sexually exploit young girls. There is a depravity there that is astounding, yet what is more astounding is the fact that in so many cases, parents or other adults turn a blind eye to such behavior. Then, it is not the end of the world, just the end of innocence.