(Ahem!) As I was saying...

Around 15 May 1992, police took custody of 120 Family of Love children after a raid on six houses located on the outskirts of Sydney, New South Wales and Melbourne, Victoria.*

The Australian government had planned the raids since the spring of the previous year after consultation with child psychologists, and assistance from law enforcement officials in the United States and Spain. The cult had raised police suspicion in November when one colony completely vanished twenty-four hours after a visit from Community Services Victoria (CSV). Later investigation gave them reason to believe that children were living in slave-like conditions, frequently separated from their parents, and left to fend for themselves in the case of such (sometimes serious and chronic) ailments as cerebral palsy.

The Australian raid heralded, and in many ways typified a new era of legal prosecutions against the Family of Love, mostly due to its policies concerning children. Around the world, police and social service agencies saw something not quite right about a group of children who were always forced to smile, almost always transient, with little education and often separated from one or more parent. In these raids, police found incriminating cult literature, from Mo Letters on sexual policy to instructions to children not to tell strangers about the cult’s sexual beliefs lest they receive punishment.

Other raids followed in such places as Mexico, Spain and France, and elsewhere. But I would like to focus on two specific legal actions.

Figure 1. Children sleeping in a Buenos Aires compound

The first happened when, at 2:00am, police simultaneously raided ten family colonies in Buenos Aires (Argentina) on 1 September 1993.

The raid had been a long time in coming. In 1987, member Ruth Frouman fell ill to breast cancer. The Family of Love considered her affliction a “Biblical punishment,“ and consequently excommunicated her. Frouman wanted to leave with her children, then in Buenos Aires, but the cult refused to let them go. After her death in 1991, Frouman’s relatives pressed the case. Finally Judge Julio Campora ordered the children to appear before his court. But the Family of Love had been dissing court dates since the 1970s, as New York State Attorney General Louis Lefkowitz noted in his investigation of them. So, when they didn’t appear this time, Argentina authorities took 137 kids into protective custody, and arrested ninety-eight adults in the process.

It didn’t take more than superficial glance, even at that ungodly hour, to affirm the authorities’ suspicions that the children were mistreated. They found the children sleeping in cramped conditions (Fig. 1). But what shocked the cops more than anything else was the children’s demeanor. As chief investigator, Commissioner Juan Carlos Rebello, told the Sunday Times:

They seemed like Martians, autistic. They were living in compartmentalized cells and answered questions like automatons. Whenever one of them tried to say something, another would look at him and he would fall silent, terrified.

Moreover, he found specimens of the Family’s DO and DFO literature, including those related to childhood sexuality. There was also a mountain of eyewitness testimony from former members, who could honestly say that they were separated from their kids. Even more interesting: the presiding jurist, Judge Roberto Marquevich, disclosed to the press that police had seized a videotape of a man having sex with his prepubescent daughter, along with a cache of weapons.

This particular case intrigued conspiracy researcher Alex Constantine, for it came almost two months before the death of River Phoenix. He felt that these two events were connected. Perhaps, Argentinian prosecutors would request his testimony. After all, he was famous, and had admitted, in the aforementioned Details article, his own indoctrination into sex at the age of four. It’s not as though he could go back and contradict public statements he had given earlier. For this reason, Constantine considered the notion that someone might have taken a hit out on Phoenix.

I’ll table my own feelings about Constantine's speculation for a second. But to give you a preview, assassination wouldn’t be my first guess (or my second, for that matter).

In short, it’s not Constantine’s most compelling argument as it relates to the Family. Nevertheless, the second part of Constantine’s hypothesis does merit serious attention. Namely the state of the investigation itself. You see, despite copious evidence of child abuse, and despite the painstaking six-year investigation that led to the raids, Commissioner Rebello had legitimate cause to worry that justice would not prevail.

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*The exact number of children taken differ from source to source. I’m going with the low end. Other figures claim 121, 128, or other figures.