Issue 182 – May 2025

S.M.A.R.T.
(Stop Mind control And Ritual abuse Today)
P. O Box 1295, Easthampton, MA 01027-1295 USA E-mail: SMARTNEWS@aol.com
Home page: https://ritualabuse.us/

Issue 182 – May 2025

The purpose of this newsletter is to help stop secretive organizations and groups from abusing others and to help those who allege they have been abused by such organizations and groups. This newsletter is not a substitute for other ways of recovering from ritual abuse. Readers should use caution while reading this newsletter. If necessary, make sure other support systems are available during and after reading this newsletter.

Important:
The resources mentioned in this newsletter are for educational value only. Reading the books cited may or may not help your recovery process, so use caution when reading any book or contacting any resource mentioned in this newsletter. Some may have a religious or other agenda that may be separate from your own recovery process. Others may have valuable information on secretive organizations, but have triggers or be somewhat sympathetic to those organizations. Unless explicitly stated otherwise, the views expressed in this newsletter constitute expressions of opinion, and readers are cautioned to form their own opinions and draw their own conclusions by consulting a variety of sources, including this newsletter. Resources listed, quoted and individual articles, etc. and their writers do not necessarily support all or any of the views mentioned in this newsletter. Also, the views, facts and opinions mentioned in this newsletter are solely the opinions of the authors and are not necessarily the opinions of this newsletter or its editor.

Copyright 2025 – All rights reserved. No reproduction of any material without written permission from the editor and individual authors.

Information in this issue includes:
– SMART is celebrating our 30th anniversary.
– The 2025 Online Annual Ritual Abuse and Mind Control Conference August 16 – 17, 2025

– Self’s Stony Soil, a new book by Wendy Hoffman
– Survivorship Announces Its 14th Annual Weekend Conference Fighting Child Abuse Survivorship Trafficking and Extreme Abuse Online Conference 2025 May 16 – 18, 2025 Survivorship is celebrating its 36th year helping survivors and co-survivors of child abuse.
– ‘Bottom of darkness’: Children raped in ritual ceremonies expose the horrors
– ‘Ritual’ sex abuse case: Utah County Sheriff’s Office says a judge’s dismissal of charges against a central suspect was ‘abhorrent’
– Brainwashing: The history and methods behind coercive mind control

SMART is celebrating our 30th anniversary this year. This is our 182st newsletter. Our first issue (online at https://ritualabuse.us/2008/10/issue-1-march-1995/ discussed the book Ritual Abuse What it is, Why it Happens and How to Help by Margaret Smith. This discussed Masonic Ritual Abuse. It covered a thesis on Masonic Ritual Abuse called “Ritual Abuse, its Effects and the Process of Recovery Using Self Help Methods and Resources, and Focusing on the Spiritual Aspect of Damage and Recover.” Over the years, SMART expanded its scope to cover institutionalized abuse, clergy abuse, government mind control and sex trafficking issues. SMART has had yearly conferences since 1997. SMART has become one of the largest ritual abuse resource information providers on the Internet.

The 2025 Online Annual Ritual Abuse and Mind Control Conference August 16 – 17, 2025 – If you are interested in participating in our conference or getting on a mailing list, please write: smartnews@aol.com Internet conference information: http://ritualabuse.us/smart-conference/

Speakers
Please use caution while reading this information. It may be triggering for survivors.

Self’s Stony Soil, by Wendy Hoffman
A novella, written in free style poetry and flash fiction, Self’s Stony Soil is about the sexual trafficking of children. They are packed tight into cages, taken by airplanes to other countries, abused by politicians, the wealthy, royalty, and known people in the world. It tells the story of a child’s only friend, a doll, and how much she needed it. A trafficked person had amnesia until late in life. Remembering began the healing of deep scars. She began to find her true self. This is her story and unfortunately the story of many more. It is also about memory and healing from these horrendous acts. Wendy will talk about how the book came about and read from some of its passages.
Wendy Hoffman has published four memoirs: The Enslaved Queen, White Witch in a Black Robe, A Brain of My Own and After Amnesia. The Enslaved Queen has been translated and published in Germany. Her book of poetry, Forceps, was also published along with a book of essays, From the Trenches, co-authored with Dr. Alison Miller. Her second poetry book Belonging was nominated for the Eric Hoffer Book Award. The Theft, a novel, is forthcoming. She does consultations for therapists working in the field of dissociative disorders and presentations internationally.

Thirty Years of Publishing and Advocacy – Neil Brick
Neil Brick will discuss how and why he created the SMART Newsletter. He will talk about how the newsletter and the field of ritual abuse have changed over the years. He will discuss the importance of advocacy and public education. Ideas for the future growth of the field will be discussed.
Neil Brick is a survivor of ritualistic abuse. His work continues to educate the public about child abuse, trauma and ritualistic abuse crimes. His child abuse and ritualistic abuse newsletter S.M.A.R.T. https://ritualabuse.us has been published for over 30 years. http://neilbrick.com

Videos, PowerPoints and transcripts from our 2024 conference https://ritualabuse.us/smart-conference/2024-conference/2024-conference-video-presentations-and-powerpoints/

Self’s Stony Soil: Trafficked Children: An Autobiographical Novella in Verse (Robert D Reed Publishers) by Wendy Hoffman is now available.
Written in free-style poetry, a novella, Self’s Stony Soil reveals the horrors of sex trafficking. A child is trafficked. Taken by airplanes to other countries, she was packed tight into cages, abused by politicians, the wealthy, royalty, and known people in the world. She has amnesia until late in life. That begins the healing of these deep scars. She begins to find her true self. This is her story.
“Self’s Stony Soil speaks to the lifelong consequences to victims of sex trafficking and their efforts to reclaim their humanity and autonomy. Sex trafficking robs the individual of free will. It is demoralizing and soul-crushing. But Self’s Stony Soil reveals even the fragility of a damaged life can reveal hidden strength and the perseverance to overcome the nightmare of sex trafficking and lead to growth, healing, and peace.” James Randall Noblitt and Pamela Perskin Noblitt, Editors/Authors of RITUAL ABUSE in the TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY: Psychological, Forensic, Social, and Political Considerations. https://rdrpublishers.com/collections/frontpage/products/selfs-stony-soil-trafficked-children-an-autobiographical-novella-in-verse

Wendy Hoffman has published additional books, The Enslaved Queen (Karnac Books, 2014, new edition by Aeon Books, 2019), White Witch in a Black Robe (Karnac Books, 2016, new edition by Aeon Books, 2019) and A Brain of My Own (Aeon Books, 2020, Karnac Books 2023). The Enslaved Queen has been translated and published in Germany (Asanger-Verlag, 2021). Her book of poetry, Forceps, was published (Karnac books, 2016) along with a book of essays, From the Trenches, written with Dr. Alison Miller (Karnac Books, 2018). Her fourth memoir, After Amnesia, is published on the SmartNews and Survivorship websites (2022). https://www.karnacbooks.com/Author.asp?AID=20191 Additional information about her work is at: https://ritualabuse.us/smart/wendy-hoffman/

Survivorship Announces Its 14th Annual Weekend Conference Fighting Child Abuse
Survivorship is celebrating its 36th year helping survivors and co-survivors of child abuse. It was founded in 1989 by Caryn Stardancer and Catherine Raggazzi. For many years, Survivorship has provided resource information, education and conferences for survivors of extreme abuse. https://survivorship.org
Survivorship is proud to announce that this May 16 – 18, 2025, we will be having an online conference. Our Survivorship Trafficking and Extreme Abuse Online Conference 2025 will have presentations for survivors and clinicians. We will be celebrating the gains fighting ritual abuse. https://survivorship.org/the-survivorship-trafficking-and-extreme-abuse-online-conference-2025

Presentations will include “Progress made against Ritual Abuse in Scotland since 1980” by Laurie Matthew. Dr. Laurie Matthew OBE is the founder and Manager of Eighteen And Under an award winning charity providing confidential support services to young people who have been abused. She is a founding member of MAIRSINN (formerly the Ritual Abuse Network Forum – RANS). https://www.mairsinn.org.uk/ https://www.18u.org.uk

“Researching, Writing and Publishing about Masonic Ritual Abuse – What are the issues?” by Lynn Brunet. Lynn Brunet (PhD) is an Australian art historian whose research examines the coupling of trauma and ritual in modern and contemporary western art and literature. It traces the connection between Masonic and other fraternal initiation rites and complex trauma in the work of so-called ‘tortured’ artists and writers.

“People Who Identify as Plural” by Randy Noblitt PhD. This presentation discusses the variety of circumstances where people may have the experience of multiple identities or selves. Randy Noblitt is a professor of Clinical Psychology at Alliant International University, Los Angeles and a licensed psychologist in Texas. He has evaluated and treated extreme abuse survivors clinically since 1979.

“Successful Investigations of Extreme Abuse Cases – The Role of Mental Health Professionals in Family Courts” by Dr. Rainer Hermann Kurz. Rainer Kurz is a Chartered Psychologist based in London. Since 1990 Rainer has worked in Research & Development roles for leading test publishers. His PhD dissertation was on enhancing the validity and utility of ability testing.

“Ritualistic Abuse Survivors Difficulties Obtaining Services” by Neil Brick. Ritualistic abuse survivors have struggled to obtain adequate mental health and social support services for over twenty years. Neil Brick is a survivor of ritualistic abuse. His child abuse and ritualistic abuse newsletter S.M.A.R.T. http://ritualabuse.us has been published for 30 years. http://neilbrick.com
Ritual Abuse Evidence https://survivorship.org/ritual-abuse-evidence/
Child Abuse Wiki – Ritual Abuse http://childabusewiki.org/index.php?title=Ritual_Abuse

‘Bottom of darkness’: Children raped in ritual ceremonies expose the horrors
Multiple women recount organized abuse including ritual ceremonies conducted by people they knew, even close family members – after months of interviews with victims, their families, treatment professionals and experts in Israel and abroad, a disturbing picture emerges with descriptions difficult to read. by Noam Barkan Published on 04-23-2025

Describes extreme abuse situations

….Each woman we interviewed during our investigation has a different life story. They come from different areas of the country, from north to south. Each is at a different place in her life. Some are students, others work and manage careers and family lives, and there are also young women barely surviving, clinging to life by their fingernails.
These women did not know each other previously, grew up in different communities, and come from different sectors and religious streams. Yet the ritual abuse stories they describe are similar in ways that compel us to listen and not turn a blind eye. Some were harmed in early childhood educational settings or in girls’ schools, others in their family homes, yeshivas or synagogues. In this article, we present only a very small sample from many hours of interviews and information, and some descriptions in this article are difficult to read. The great fear expressed by everyone who spoke with us is that organized sexual abuse of children continues even today….
Victim. Sacrifice. Punishment. Correction. Transcendence. Redemption. These are recurring concepts in the testimonies. The prayers, the mutterings, the ecstasy surrounding the victims. The extreme pain, humiliation, and torture. The crushing of personality and soul. Testimony after testimony after testimony from women who experienced organized childhood abuse that included group rape performed within ceremonial and ritual frameworks.
We met these women over the past few months. We spoke with family members of some victims, with treatment professionals, and with experts in Israel and abroad specializing in trauma and dissociation (a range of conditions from emotional detachment to complete disconnection from feelings, sensations, memories, and more). We collected information about organized ritual child abuse – a phenomenon recognized worldwide.
The picture emerging from all gathered information is disturbing and difficult. It requires, at minimum, a deep and meaningful investigation by law enforcement authorities. “It is a religious-national mission to expose this phenomenon and uncover the truth,” a treatment professional in the religious community familiar with details of the phenomenon told Israel Hayom.
Most women we interviewed come from religious Zionist or ultra-Orthodox communities, although Shishabbat received additional testimonies about similar cases in secular society. Therefore, it’s important to emphasize that these findings don’t target any specific sector, but rather direct a beam of light toward suspected crimes of the most severe kind imaginable – crimes committed in a parallel world transparent to sight, though deeply dark and sinister….

Several rabbis’ names appeared repeatedly in some testimonies. Multiple complaints filed at different police stations around the country were all closed relatively quickly. Even when suspicions arose previously about a network harming children in Jerusalem, police investigators, at best, lacked sufficient tools or knowledge to properly investigate.
In that case, extensively exposed in 2019 on the TV program The Source, suspicions arose about a pedophile network that harmed dozens of children in the Nahlaot neighborhood. Investigators tended to dismiss it as an “invention,” “exaggeration,” or “panic” by parents and treatment professionals, and closed the case with almost no relevant indictments.

A man named Benjamin Satz was convicted and sentenced in 2013 to imprisonment for committing indecent acts and sodomy against girls and boys aged 5 to 8. Another suspect was acquitted due to reasonable doubt. In practice, dozens of children remained traumatized and required years of emotional therapy.
“Not outsiders in the community”
“I remember a pentagram on the floor, usually in red. When the ceremony was in the forest, the pentagram was marked with a hoe and surrounded by lit candles in a circle. The rabbi would bless, ‘Blessed who releases the bound,’ men around prayed with prayer shawls, sometimes dressed in black, while the rabbi wore a white robe. There were several men and boys around the ages of 16-17 who participated in ceremonies for spiritual transcendence….
“Organized rape of children is one of the most horrifying phenomena I encounter,” Dr. Anat Gur said, a psychotherapist specializing in treating women and trauma, head of the Psychotherapy Program for Sexual Trauma Treatment at Bar-Ilan University and the Tel Aviv Rape Crisis Center. “It’s a phenomenon probably much more widespread than we imagine. It exists in many places you wouldn’t expect to find it.”

Boaz (pseudonym), a senior treatment professional in the religious community, agrees, “The abusers are typically not outsiders in the community. One patient told me, ‘Understand, he’s the one who blows the shofar on Rosh Hashanah.’ The shofar symbolizes a channel – the person considered most spiritually worthy blows the shofar because he’s closest to God. And he’s the one telling her she is evil, that he’s helping with her atonement in this lifetime. Do you understand the distortion?”….
Beyond the women who dared to meet and speak with Israel Hayom, professionals possess information about additional victims who report sadistic ritual abuse during childhood. The content emerging from these accounts shows remarkable similarities. From all gathered information, it appears that in most cases, the sexual abuse began in very early childhood at home, perpetrated by a father, grandfather, or other family member. In other cases, the abuse occurred in educational or therapeutic settings.
“What I’ve observed over the years,” Dr. Gur said, “is that whoever endures these things suffers catastrophic damage. That’s also one of the challenges with exposure – the victims are so shattered that they’re difficult to believe. The more cruel and sadistic the abusers are and the younger the victims, and the more horrifying the abuse, the smaller the chance that perpetrators will face justice, because there’s no one left to testify. The abusers so thoroughly destroy the victims’ souls that it becomes a crime without witnesses, which of course serves a society that continues to abuse or maintain these rituals.”
Dr. Joanna Silberg, an international expert in treating dissociative disorders among children and adolescents and former president of the International Society for Trauma and Dissociation, guided the treatment of 70 children who allegedly fell victim to organized abuse in Israel over five years. In Chapter 14 of her book “The Child Survivor,” she describes the severe symptoms the children suffered “due to multiple forms of abuse – physical, sexual, emotional, and spiritual.”

Dr. Silberg notes several sources for the numerous testimonies about cases of organized abuse in Jerusalem….
Rabbi Furman also presents research by Johanna Schröder and additional researchers from Germany, who examined attitudes among 165 adults who testified that they were victims of organized ritual sexual abuse, as well as attitudes of 174 professionals who supported victims of this type of abuse. In 88% of reports from both groups – therapists and victims – identical ideological expression emerged. The ideological content and objectives were also presented in a similar order: “justification of violence,” “justification of sexual exploitation,” and “maintaining power and control,” followed by “maintaining group commitment and ensuring redemption.”
“The researchers conclude that ideologies are primarily means to justify organized sexual violence,” Rabbi Froman said. However, in his article, Froman argues that some reports in Israel suggest ideology wasn’t merely a means to justify organized sexual violence, but formed the foundation of the abuse.
Rabbi Furman references, for example, the Nahlaot case, which “is just one of many similar cases, most occurring in ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods. For instance, a private ultra-Orthodox court writes that ritual sexual abuse is cruel and frequent, accompanied by traumatic, accusatory, and confusing ceremonies. The abuse is carried out by large criminal organizations and/or cults and/or secret organizations, with financial investment and recruitment of assisting personnel. The abuse carries for its perpetrators substantial profits such as satisfaction of deviant urges, commerce and pornography, threats and extortion, and more.”

According to Furman, the court document describes the practice of organized abuse: “From preparing the scene, through recruiting collaborators from educational institutions and transportation drivers, to the ceremonies themselves… The ceremony takes place under the leadership of an important rabbi. After a Torah lesson, approximately every two weeks, parents gather with children for what is called ‘soul correction.’ All couples recite Psalms together, sing verses repeatedly with melody, all while standing without clothes. They stand in a circle, naked, praying, lighting candles. The children are positioned in the middle of the circle, also naked.”
In the document, intended for parents, educators, and rabbis, the ultra-Orthodox court “Shaarei Mishpat” in Jerusalem details numerous methods and actions taken by abusers, aiming to warn and raise awareness of this spreading phenomenon and to protect children. Among other things, the document states that to shield themselves from exposure, abusers deliberately act in extreme ways contrary to logic, “so that even if children tell, they will sound completely delusional.”….
In a “partial” list, actions are described, including abusers using disguises and masks, alongside sadistic torture such as forcing children’s hands into boiling water, submerging them underwater for several seconds, or threatening them with aggressive animals to frighten them and intensify the trauma effect. Additional mentioned actions include inserting objects and work or kitchen tools into the children.
To humiliate children and instill feelings of guilt and shame, perpetrators show them pictures of themselves naked or give them food while telling them they ate “carrion,” organize mock “wedding” ceremonies between children, force them to eat feces, and stage their burials.

“They collapse all self-trust and ability to resist,” Rabbi Froman said. “The regular and frequent abuse is so destructive that the children despair of ‘normality’ and the abuse becomes their life routine. Psychiatrists have diagnosed a complete ‘personality fracture’ in the normal part, allowing the child to continue functioning normally in school.”
According to Dr. Silberg, in each group, individual participants may have their own motives, such as sexual deviations, bizarre ideological affiliations that include conducting ceremonies, or economic enrichment, for example, through human trafficking for sexual exploitation, or producing images of child sexual abuse. These motives are not necessarily shared by all members.
Dr. Silberg further notes that networks engaged in producing and distributing child pornography, including organized abuse, have been exposed worldwide, and “despite the recurring, almost ideological skepticism, there have been several successful convictions of members of organized abuse networks worldwide.”
Over the years, there have been multiple examples of cases where authorities successfully exposed and convicted members of such networks. According to Dr. Silberg, as well as other researchers, since the development of the internet, and especially the emergence of peer-to-peer networks and the dark web, the phenomenon of sexual assaults on children has intensified significantly….. https://www.israelhayom.com/2025/04/23/bottom-of-darkness-children-raped-in-ritual-ceremonies-expose-the-horrors/

‘Ritual’ sex abuse case: Utah County Sheriff’s Office says a judge’s dismissal of charges against a central suspect was ‘abhorrent’
The sheriff’s office said it didn’t get the chance to defend its investigators in court, and said it handed over critical evidence to prosecutors in 2022. Defense attorneys didn’t get that evidence until this year. By Jessica Schreifels March 28, 2025
The Utah County Sheriff’s Office said Thursday that the department was “shocked” by a judge’s rare decision a week ago to permanently dismiss criminal charges against a central suspect in the agency’s investigation into decades-old allegations of satanic ritual abuse.
Fourth District Judge Roger Griffin last week dismissed six felony sex abuse counts against former therapist David Hamblin, charges that stemmed from allegations that Hamblin had abused a girl who lived in his neighborhood in the 1980s. The judge tossed the case after finding that police and prosecutors withheld key evidence that could have helped Hamblin’s defense. And he dismissed it with prejudice, meaning that prosecutors can’t refile the charges in the future.
In a lengthy statement released on Thursday, the sheriff’s office defended its investigators and said they gave all the evidence in the case to prosecutors back when Hamblin was first charged in 2022.
Since he was charged, Hamblin’s defense team has questioned whether they had been given all that they were supposed to receive, and expressed concern about some of the correspondence between the alleged victim and the investigators.
The sheriff’s office said it anticipated that investigators would have had the chance to explain themselves in a court hearing and challenge the allegation that they were improperly withholding evidence, but that never happened. The office said that the judge relied on one side’s account and agreed with what the defense alleged without holding an evidentiary hearing to find out the facts.
“This complete lack of due process resulting in the dismissal of heinous charges of sex abuse of a child based on an incomplete evidentiary picture is extremely concerning,” the department’s statement reads. “…The fact that the court dismissed with prejudice these charges against David Hamblin without one word of testimony from the victim or the investigators is abhorrent.”…. https://www.sltrib.com/news/2025/03/28/ritual-sex-abuse-utah-sheriffs

Brainwashing: The history and methods behind coercive mind control
Produced and written by Andrea Brody Apr. 20, 2025
….What makes someone susceptible to brainwashing? Rebecca Lemov, professor of the history of science at Harvard University and author of The Instability of Truth: Brainwashing, Mind Control, and Hyper-persuasion, has studied its evolution from military applications to cult recruitment. She says what’s often so remarkable, especially within cults, is that the ability to disable one’s ego, can also lead to a feeling of happiness and belonging. “Beating down the typical functions of the ego actually leaves room for connecting more with a group sometimes, or even states of ecstasy or exhilaration.”
It’s difficult to comprehend the psychological manipulation these individuals endured. Their communist captors exploited their vulnerabilities and grievances, painting life in China as far more appealing. While their methods were both brutal and deceptive, the outcomes may feel more familiar to us than we’d like to admit.
Lemov offers her perspective on the ‘softer’ brainwashing of social media and doom scrolling today, saying, “what you’re seeing in your interactions is not the same as what anyone else is seeing in the old days of mass media, when everyone saw the same broadcast. What you made of it was individual, but it was a shared phenomenon, and now you may see a political ad, or just for you.”
https://www.kcrw.com/culture/shows/life-examined/rebecca-lemov-mind-control-brainwashing-coercive-persuasion

April 28, 2025 · Filed Under Newsletter 2025 - Issue 180 - 185