The Binge Crimes: Lady Mafia - Mystic Mother | 5. The Charges

Episode Date: September 27, 2022

After a search warrant is served on the Temple, more than 30 members face daunting felony charges, and Tracy could face decades in prison. Want the full story? Unlock all episodes of Witnessed: Mystic Mother, ad-free right now by subscribing to The Binge — All Episodes. All at Once. Plus you’ll unlock brand new stories, dropping every month — that’s all episodes, all at once, all ad-free. Just click ‘Subscribe’ on the top of the Witnessed show page on Apple Podcasts or visit GetTheBinge.com to get access wherever you listen. Find out more about The Binge and other podcasts from Sony Music Entertainment at sonymusic.com/podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I hadn't been around the temple long enough to really understand what was happening. But the classes stopped. This is a woman who we'll call Nicole. She wanted to remain anonymous so we're not using her real name. Nicole worked at the temple briefly, around the time that the Phoenix New Times article came out. And remember, after that, things really started to change. There was more tension and fewer classes. I would show up at the time where the classes were supposed to be happening, and then there would be no class. And I'd just be sitting there

at this temple, just wondering what's going to happen. After a few weeks, she wasn't getting the training she'd signed up for, and she decided to leave. Months later, she heard about the raid. Their mugshots were all over the headlines and the news. It was a big story, and it really scared me, but I thought, you know, I was barely involved in all of that. I felt at the time like I had dodged a bullet. Until one night in 2012, more than a year after the raid, she and her sister got into a fight driving home from work. It was late, and they were headed to pick up their kids from the raid. She and her sister got into a fight driving home from work. It was late,

and they were headed to pick up their kids from the sitter. Instead of picking our kids up at one o'clock in the morning from the babysitter, she wanted to go to somebody's house and party and get drunk and whatever. And so it turned into a disagreement. She became very belligerent, yelling, screaming. Then it became physical. She was driving with one hand while she's punching me with the other. She hit a sidewalk. She ran several red lights. It was snowing outside. She was scaring me really bad.

I ended up screaming at her several times. If you can't pull over, I am going to call 911. Nicole did call the police. But when they showed up, it was Nicole who was arrested. She and her young son were living in Utah at the time. But there was a warrant out for her arrest in Arizona. Nicole says she had no idea what she was charged with, but soon she would find out. From Campside Media and Sony Music Entertainment, you're listening to Witnessed, Mystic Mother. Episode 5, The Charges. I'm Indra Varma, and in the latest season of The Spy Who,

we open the file on Daphne Park, the spy who killed the Prime Minister. As the Belgian Congo gains its independence, Officer Park sets out to build a spy network. Together, they're about to go to new extremes to keep Congo free of communists. Follow The Spy Who now wherever you listen to podcasts. Nicole was raised in a strict religious patriarchal community, and she says she never quite fit the mold. The men run everything, and God is a man, and Jesus is a man, and the only people that can receive guidance directly from God is a man. And a woman couldn't even get into heaven without being married to a man. He was her ticket to heaven.

And I always felt ashamed of who I was, ashamed of being a woman, like I was just born bad. The Phoenix Goddess Temple was completely different. Instead of being shamed, it seemed like women were being celebrated and uplifted. And then for the first time in my life, I'm being told women are not bad. By being a woman, you have your own power and you have your own beauty and you're more powerful than you ever knew. And it felt like I'd hit the jackpot. you have your own power and you have your own beauty and you're more powerful than you ever knew. And it felt like I'd hit the jackpot. There were other women who felt and believed the way that I did.

When Nicole found the temple, she was looking for work to support herself and her son, who was a toddler at the time. She had chronic health problems, which made having a conventional 9-to-5 job really difficult. She often had no choice but to take what she could get. And she had some really bad experiences. Nicole was initially hesitant to talk about her past work.

I'm, like, going through my head trying to think how much I really want to say between you ladies and me. But then she opened up. Initially, I started off as an exotic dancer at a club. I was assaulted in the club, and then the club did nothing, and the police did nothing. The security people that I paid to protect me refused, so I quit. After she quit the club, she started doing adult body rubs, out of necessity, so that she'd have a source of income. But she didn't want to do that forever. My son was growing up, and I didn't want to be that for him.

But I didn't know what else to do. I kind of felt like I was backed in a corner, and I had to do this to survive. But I wanted a way out, and that's what I felt Phoenix Goddess Temple was going to be for me. It was my way out. Nicole met with Tracy and told her she was interested in a 12-week Reiki certification course the temple offered. The course cost way more than Nicole could afford, and she managed to work out a deal with Tracy. And she said, it's okay if you can't. We're a temple. We're going to help you out. And if you want to do some work around the temple to earn your way through school,

you can do that that way. Kind of like a work-study program. But pretty quickly, Nicole started to notice that the program was a lot different than she thought it would be. When I heard work around the temple, I thought, like, I'm going to help clean. I'm going to help cook. I didn't think that I'd be expected to start taking on the responsibility of taking seekers. Taking seekers meant doing sessions. Tracy asked Nicole to help with this on multiple occasions, even though she hadn't received any training.

She would say, can you please take this seeker that just showed up? We don't have anybody else who can do it. I mean, I would say, yeah, of course, I'll help out. And then I would end up in this room, then going, okay, now what? What am I supposed to do? Am I supposed to do Reiki? I'm not even certified yet in Reiki. Am I supposed to do? Am I supposed to do Reiki? I'm not even certified yet in Reiki. Am I supposed to just do my best? I was left to wing it a lot. And there were some very, very awkward moments. So more than once, Nicole ends up alone in a room with the seeker, who's clearly expecting more than a chakra balancing. It made her uncomfortable,

but she felt like she had no choice. For a time, I did tell myself, okay, I got to just get myself through this. I got to do what I got to do and buckle down so that I can get these certifications. And if I have to wing it with a few strangers or endure things, then the greater good is that I'm going to have a career when I'm done here. And I hung on to that for several weeks, even though there were a lot of very blatant red flags. Nicole ignored the red flags until they became impossible to ignore when the New Times article came out.

Tension started to build around the temple, quite a lot. I could see there was a big shift in the energy. All of a sudden, the freedom and what felt like initially was a breath of fresh air, now everything was changing and there was a lot of fear. It became clear she wasn't going to get the certification she'd signed up for. So that's when Nicole decided to leave the temple. She went back to doing adult body rubs out of her apartment. The temple hadn't been the refuge she was hoping for.

And she thought her time there was finally behind her. But she had no idea that she was already on the Phoenix PD's radar. All right, you got me? I got you. All right. If you guys are behind me, the building straight in front of me is building 12. Okay. This is an undercover detective who met with Nicole for a session.

This recording takes place at Nicole's apartment after she stopped doing sessions at the temple. This is takes place at Nicole's apartment after she stopped doing sessions at the temple. This is a place. This is a place where you can bring your clothes here, or you can fold them and stack them under there. And you can start face down, and then we can go over halfway through. Do you want to do an hour or 90 minutes? An hour. An hour? Okay. Sounds good. So then I'll let you go ahead and jump down to your comfort level, and then when you're ready, go ahead and put the donation under the door, and then call me. And how much is it?

It's $200. Okay. Yeah. All right? All right. All right, I'll be back. They talked about Reiki, healthy sexual practices, and her past work as an exotic dancer. Nicole even recommends the Phoenix Goddess Temple.

And then the detective gets a call and leaves, before she even starts the session. More than a year later, Nicole was sitting in a Utah jail, facing felony charges. All she could think about was her son, waiting for her to pick him up from the sitter. It was hell. I had no idea what happened to him. Nicole's son wound up with her sister, the same sister she called the police on. Finally, 72 hours after her arrest,

Nicole was able to call him. It was Christmas morning. He asked me where I was. And I lied to him and I told him that Santa Claus needed my help because he didn't have enough elves at the North Pole and that I'd be home as fast as I could. But Nicole wouldn't be home for a long time. After two weeks in a local jail, she was extradited from Utah to Arizona. That's after the break. I'm Afua Hirsch. I'm Peter Frankopan. And in our podcast, Legacy, we explore the lives of some of the biggest characters in history.

This season, we are looking at the life of the British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill. It's fair to say he's a complex and controversial character. Almost 150 years since his birth, how does his legacy hold up today? Follow Legacy now wherever you get your podcasts. Or binge entire seasons early and ad-free on Wondery Plus. From the award-winning creators of the hit podcast Father Wants Us Dead comes the stunning new true crime series In the Shadow of Princeton.

In 1989, a prominent woman was found stabbed to death in her Princeton home. With no clear motive, it's a chilling mystery that vexed investigators for years. Was the culprit a young outsider the police said was a serial attacker? Or someone in her family? Or even well-heeled students at the renowned Princeton University? He had a ski mask in his possession and a knife. She was familiar enough with them and trusted them enough that she turned her back on, and that was her mistake. One investigator sees a conspiracy.

Is he way off base, or does privilege help you get away with murder? In the Shadow of Princeton is available wherever you get your podcasts, or you can binge it ad-free by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. Nicole needed to pay $500 to be released on bond,

but she didn't have the money or anyone in her life who would help her. So she had no other option than to remain in custody. I didn't even know what an indictment was. Nobody explained it to me. It was just a big, scary word. Ultimately, I ended up with seven counts of money laundering, all felonies, conspiracy. I think there were two fraud charges. There was a prostitution charge. There was this illegal enterprise charge. Basically, it was made clear to me that I

was facing a minimum of 11 years in prison. A legal enterprise. We had to look that one up, too. It's short for a legal control of an enterprise, which in Arizona is a racketeering crime that you commit if you're employed by or associated with any enterprise that makes money through illegal means, like prostitution. These charges may sound excessive, but it's not that uncommon. It's to the prosecutor's benefit to stack charges and to overcharge. This is Valina Beattie. She's a professor of law at Arizona State University.

They're not supposed to bring charges that they don't believe can fully be substantiated, and yet it is to the benefit of the prosecutor to, on the front end, stack charges, They're not supposed to bring charges that they don't believe can fully be substantiated. And yet it is to the benefit of the prosecutor to, on the front end, stack charges so that when they offer a plea agreement, the plea agreement ultimately is only to the charges that they can prove. In other words, if a prosecutor thinks they can prove you guilty on three charges, they might charge you with more and then offer you a plea agreement. That agreement might be for lesser charges, or it might even include dropping some. It's like a negotiation. The prosecutor comes in high,

your attorney comes in low, and you meet somewhere in the middle. Nicole couldn't afford to hire an attorney, so she was appointed one by the court. And when she met with him, he explained the plea agreement that was on the table. Earlier on in the case, the district attorney had already put forward their best offer.

A few people were able to plead guilty to disorderly conduct, which is just a misdemeanor. But when Nicole was arrested more than a year after the raid, that deal was no longer on the table. The terms she was being offered were much harsher. Instead of a misdemeanor, she would have to plead guilty to the illegal enterprise charge, which is a felony.

She would have a criminal record, but she wouldn't go to prison. She could go home to her son. I said, well, there's no way they can convict me because, one, I'm innocent. And he said, well, there's this evidence that they've presented, and it's extensive, and I recommend what's best for you right now is that you accept a plea deal. It's Nicole's decision to accept a plea or not. But there's a lot to consider and a lot at stake. If she doesn't accept the plea, her defense attorney will need to weigh whether he can put on a defense at trial that a jury will buy.

He might ask questions like, What evidence do we have that we can put on for you? What kind of a case can we build for you? How likely is it that we could win at trial? Because if there's a likelihood that we could win at trial, I can go back to the prosecutor and say, we need a better plea. But Nicole hasn't seen all the evidence the state has against her, like that undercover recording.

And it's common for defendants like Nicole to feel like they have to decide on a plea before reviewing all the discovery, especially in a case like this one, where there's a ton of it. So defendants aren't always seeing the full picture, and they're trying to make the best decision they can, a decision that will affect the rest of their life. Here's Valina again. The legal system can be really opaque to people who are on the outside of it. And there's all these pressures that the system puts on you to try to make decisions that are in your own best interest. But how do you figure that out?

Well, a defense attorney is supposed to guide their client so they can make an informed decision. But a lot of the people we talked with said they felt pressured into taking a plea. And Valina says there are reasons for that. There are definitely defense attorneys who put pressure on their clients to accept pleas. And they may do that because they think it's in the best interest of their client. And they know that this prosecutor is not going to give anything better. But it may also be because the defense attorney wants to move quickly through their own cases. This is the problem with having an overloaded criminal legal system, is that there's too many cases for anyone to process,

which means that you as the individual, you get lost. You're just a number in a case that needs to be resolved as quickly as possible with the least amount of resources. Nicole says she felt this way with her attorney, like a number. We reached out to him, but he declined to be interviewed. We met a total of three times from beginning to end. It was very quick and very rushed. It just was pushed on me very hard that my only option was to sign a plea deal. So Nicole pushed back. She didn't want to take the deal.

She believed she was innocent and she wanted to go to trial. But remember, Nicole is one of 33 co-defendants in the case. And one person's decision to plead guilty could impact everyone else. Because that plea can be used as evidence at trial. My attorney informed me more than once that if they convicted one person, they were convicting everybody. And since many of the defendants in this case were also charged with conspiracy, they weren't allowed to contact each other. So Nicole had no idea what anyone else was thinking or doing.

Could they fight this? We weren't allowed to have any contact with each other, and the ability to find out what was going on was made incredibly difficult, if not impossible. By the time Nicole was extradited, the case had been dragging on for months. Plea negotiations had been ongoing, and a number of people pleaded guilty to illegal enterprise. In other words, they were convicted.

For Nicole, this meant her chances of being found not guilty at trial were increasingly slim. And if she goes to trial trial and she's found guilty? You're sentenced more harshly after trial than you would be if you had taken a plea agreement. It's called the trial penalty. This is all funneling in on the defendant to plead guilty, this pressure to plead guilty. 95% of defendants, if not more, plead guilty.

They do not go to trial. And if all that pressure wasn't enough, the state re-indicts everyone who hasn't already taken a deal, including Nicole. And they add money laundering charges, which have a mandatory jail sentence. This is enough to push some people over the edge. Even the few who wanted to fight the case and go to trial, they had too much to lose.

Like Nicole, many of the other women arrested were also mothers. Holly Alsop, who was a goddess at the temple, had an attorney she trusted. But that attorney gave Holly the same advice Nicole's attorney gave. Take the plea. Here's Holly. I was devastated. You know in life, you think you're going to fight the fight and win the win, and she's like, nope, the best thing for you to do is retreat and take care of your family.

And she was right. And it was good guidance. I wasn't going to change the law or make it safer for sex work or my family. I had no chance. I pled out. So I could go on with my life. While Nicole is incarcerated, Child Protective Services takes her son. And she's told that if he stays with them too long,

her parental rights could be terminated, meaning she would lose custody permanently. They told me that the only way they would consider giving custody back to me is if I'm no longer facing any prison time, no possibility of prison time, which meant that I had to make the charges go away. The thought of losing her son, that changed everything for Nicole. It might as well have been murder, and I would have still said I was guilty. It didn't matter to me at that point. I just wanted my baby back.

A month after the state adds the money laundering charges, Nicole did what she believed would get her home to her son. She took the deal and pleaded guilty to illegal enterprise, which is a felony. Eventually, nearly everyone who was charged took a plea. Except for Tracy. That's after the break. You know what's great about ambition?

You can't see it. Some things look ambitious, but looks can be deceiving. For example, a runner could be training for a marathon, or they could be late for the bus. You never know. Ambition is on the inside. So that road trip bucket list? Get after it. Drive your ambition.

Mitsubishi Motors. Between 1979 and 1989, a dozen people from Dallas, Texas died mysteriously. Why do you think it was so difficult to tie Terry to these deaths? Because there's no smoking gun. From Sony Music Entertainment, this is Scary Terry. Listen wherever you get your podcasts. All right, this is Detective Campbell, 7828.

Today's date is September 7th. It is now approximately 2215 hours. I am just about ready to begin my interview with Tracy Elise, the founder of the Phoenix Goddess Temple. Tracy, you have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can be used against you in a court of law. This is Tracy's first police interview after she was arrested at the Sedona Temple

on September 7, 2011. The woman questioning her is Detective Amber Campbell. Tracy doesn't know it yet, but Detective Campbell is one of the two case agents in charge of the investigation. She'd been overseeing all of the undercover operations for months. She even went undercover herself.

It was all leading up to this moment. Oh, goodness. Thank you for being so patient. Actually, there's no goodness in this. The mother has been attacked. My religion is real and this is going to be a big scene.

Detective Campbell is trying to get any information she can from Tracy. But clearly, Tracy has other plans. Okay, Tracy, are you the founder of the Phoenix Goddess Temple? I demur on grounds of false muster.

In case you didn't catch that, Tracy says, I demur on grounds of false muster. Are you requesting an attorney or are you just refusing to answer any questions? I'm demurring on grounds of false muster. I apologize. I don't understand what that means. It means that there's no jurisdiction over this because it's a case of freedom of religion. I mean, you can capture me, but I don't have to, based on my constitutional rights, I don't have to acknowledge your jurisdiction that you get to say who God is and what God's like

and how the ministers of that God act. So I demur on grounds of, I can't answer any of these questions, I demur on grounds of false muster. Okay. So from the beginning, Tracy refuses to cooperate. I can't answer any of these questions. I have to mirror my grounds of false muster. Okay, so from the beginning, Tracy refuses to cooperate. She's suggesting that this isn't a criminal matter, it's a civil matter, because she believes she's being persecuted by the state for her religious beliefs.

And she's convinced that those in power, like Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery, who's Catholic, are misogynistic and threatened by her faith in the goddess. Legitimate church activities, legitimate religious practices don't look like this. They aren't, in fact, criminal acts. In one document, Tracy writes, "...continue to attack this female empowerment ministry, and Mr. Montgomery risks being seen as a scrooge for women's equality in religion.

Tracy says she was even offered a plea deal that would have given her just three months of jail time. And she declined. She wants to take this to trial. And in order to do that, she would need a great lawyer. Someone diligent, but open-minded, who could navigate religious freedom issues. Someone like David Couture, Tracy's court-appointed attorney. Couture had been working as a criminal defense attorney in Arizona for over a decade. When he joined the case, Tracy was impressed and grateful.

She even dubbed him Temple Champion. But pretty soon, they started bumping heads. Tracy felt that Couture was prioritizing other clients over her case. She also said he wasn't communicating enough and that he wasn't taking her seriously. For example, Tracy had to wear an ankle monitor while she was out on bond. And she told Couture that the electromagnetic waves from the monitor were triggering symptoms akin to multiple sclerosis, which runs in her family. She even pulled together research to back it up. But Couture told her there was no way the court would replace her ankle monitor

and that she needed to drop it. And Couture was frustrated too. He declined to be interviewed without Tracy's permission. But we know that one of the main points of contention between them is that Tracy wanted Couture to be more of a team player. She expected him to share his legal strategy with the attorneys representing her co-defendants. In a court record, Tracy says she was, quote,

extremely upset about this unwillingness to lead the co-defendants in a unified defense. Right. Tracy had been trying to reach Temple members through Facebook, email, and mutual friends, even though she wasn't supposed to. She was trying to send a message, one that was different from what most of the goddesses were hearing from their attorneys. Do not take the plea. We can fight this together. It's important to remember that if others take a plea,

it could hurt Tracy's case. But she also feels a responsibility towards her co-defendants. She knows many of them can't afford to hire a private attorney, and they don't have family support. In several emails, Tracy tells Couture that she must uphold her vow to protect them and put their needs above her own, even if it could hurt her case. Couture repeatedly tries to explain to Tracy that's not how things work. He's her lawyer. It's not his job to defend anyone else. Then in July 2012, the state filed a motion to preclude a religious defense at trial, which means Tracy and her co-defendants can't argue that what was

happening at the temple was part of their religion. So Couture files a pretty strong response on Tracy's behalf. But again, she's frustrated, because she says he won't share it with any of the other lawyers. This is also when the state starts to turn up the heat. A new deputy county attorney joined the case, Annie Laurie Van Wee. Van Wee prosecuted the Desert Divas case. Desert Divas was an internet-based escort service, shut down in 2008 by Phoenix PD, in one of the largest prostitution busts in Arizona history at the time. She was experienced and aggressive, and she's the prosecutor who would re-indict everyone who hadn't already taken a plea and add money laundering charges.

Basically, the goddesses had no access to Tracy, and now a religious defense was off the table and jail time was a real possibility. So as we heard earlier, by this point, many of the goddesses decided it was too risky to try to fight, and several of them plea out. Tracy blames Couture for being unwilling to share his defense. In an email to Couture, she says she can't explain the, quote, tearing of her soul in all of this, and calls her co-defendants, quote, lambs led to slaughter. I attempted through the court-appointed counsel to get defense materials into the hands of my co-defendants and was absolutely blocked by my own defense counsel from sharing defendant information that would have helped my people in the temple defend themselves. I was told that I was crazy for wanting to share defense information. It's eventually going to come out that a number of people in this case took police because they didn't have a choice.

This was a pivotal moment. And then on top of all of that, Tamara Brusso, co-founder of the Phoenix Goddess Temple and Tracy's closest friend, dies while under house arrest. Tamara suffered from severe back pain and struggled with mobility. Here's what Nicole remembers about what happened to her. She was left to fend for herself completely alone in her own home. And when she had a seizure, she fell down her stairs, broke her neck, and passed away before she even got to trial, before she even got a chance to work everything out. That was the one that stood out to me most, was that a woman lost her life. And I never heard anything about that on the news. I never heard anything about that again. It's like she was

completely forgotten. That's really disturbing to me. Tracy was devastated. She's grieving her friend, and she's also really angry at the state and at her own attorney, Couture, who's supposed to be defending her. Tracy and Couture just can't agree. According to court filings, Couture's worried that she's making decisions that will hurt her case, And he believes that despite his best efforts, Tracy seems unable or unwilling to aid him in her defense. So he files a motion for something called a Rule 11 prescreen. It's essentially a request for a psychiatric evaluation to determine whether or not Tracy's fit to stand trial. This isn't a decision an attorney would take lightly, and it's another critical moment in part because it means the court has to press pause on the entire case, which delayed the trial for everyone. But Tracy remains confident in her mental

stability, and she's unwavering in her religious beliefs. So she cooperates, and she treats it as an opportunity to show that she's not crazy or delusional and that her beliefs are sincere, even if they're outside the status quo. Tracy is so committed to her beliefs that she was advertising sessions on Backpage.com under the name Uma while she's out on bond, awaiting trial for prostitution charges. But I'm just telling you, because you need to be careful. I am obviously not a police person, but they do sting the men sometimes with fake girls. They do. The cops do.

And what they'll do is they'll do exactly what you're doing right now. Let's say I'm the cop and you're the guy. They try to get what to bust somebody's prostitution. You've got to get them to talk about sex acts, particular acts of sex. And because we already talked about money, we both committed prostitution. And it's a pretty severe thing in this state. It's pretty severe. Ironically, the person she's explaining a sting to is an undercover cop. So Tracy ends up back in custody. And while she's incarcerated, she's evaluated by two

psychiatrists. They interview her and review her psychiatric history, which shows she's been previously diagnosed with certain mood disorders. And according to medical records, Tracy is trying really hard to remain calm, focused, and positive while she's in jail. She, quote, reads, ministers to her peers, does yoga and breathing exercises to manage stress, and apparently, she writes original songs. As above, so below. she writes original songs. She also works on her legal defense. Ultimately, Tracy is found incompetent. According to records, examiners found problems with her judgment

and say that she's labile or emotionally unstable. Basically, she can't process that her religious beliefs can't be used as a defense at trial. And therefore, her attorney, Kuture, can't reason with her. And all of this reinforces Tracy's belief that the state is discriminating against her. I was found incompetent for believing in the Constitution, that it mattered. I was found incompetent for saying that the ankle monitor

was affecting me in all these different ways, even though I presented medical research, they said I was crazy. And I was put into rule 11 by my own attorney who tricked me and said that that was the way they would stop calling me a crazy charismatic cult leader. This is another technique that they use to discredit you and to silence you and to make people disregard you as crazy. After just two months of testing, treatment, and competency education, Tracy's competency was restored, which meant she could go to trial.

But her relationship with Couture, that couldn't be fixed. Tracy felt disrespected, ignored, and humiliated. She claims Couture called her a laughingstock. And on certain court records, we noticed handwritten notes, presumably written by Tracy, pointing out individuals who, quote, laughed at the goddess, including a judge and a state attorney. She no longer believed Couture was working in her best interest. And for Tracy, it all came down to trust.

So Tracy does something ill-advised by most. She fires Couture. In an email to him, she writes, I cannot go into the trial of my life not trusting you. There's only one person Tracy can trust. So she files a motion to waive counsel and represent herself in court. That's next time on Witnessed, Mystic Mother.

I told her she was fucking nuts for firing everyone. And she's like, I'm going to win. I'm like, no, you're not. She was just sure that she would win because it was right in her mind. She was trying to operate in her ideal world when she was actually in the mundane world where there are a lot of people who are just opposed to what she was trying to do. The legal precedent in Arizona is to squash illegal religious institutions. Venus Goddess Temple was not a house of worship. It was a house of prostitution.

The defense calls Tracy Elise. What was the last thing that filled you with wonder that took you away from your desk or your car in traffic or your sink full of dishes? As an actor, it's very free being part of these shows. You can step in the booth and kind of be anything. Well, for us, and I'm going to guess for some of you, that thing is... Anubay! Hi, I'm Nick Friedman. I leo murray and i'm leah president and welcome to crunchyroll presents the anime effect it's a weekly news show i literally when i saw it when i found out about this i literally had like a nervous breakdown in a good

way with the best celebrity guests I've never pirated anything, but I'll steal it if I have to. That was how I felt when I started to get really hooked on Black Butler. Oh, it's coming back. It's coming back. So join us every Friday wherever you get your podcasts

and watch full video episodes on Crunchyroll or on the Crunchyroll YouTube channel. Witnessed Mystic Mother on Crunchyroll or on the Crunchyroll YouTube channel. by Sarah Ventry and written by Sarah Ventry and Emily Martinez. Additional reporting by Katie and Leah Hennick. Sarah Ventry is our managing producer. Our story editor and executive producer is Emily Martinez. Additional editing by Mike Meyer. Produced by Katie and Leah Hennick. Associate producer Sidney Fleischman. Additional production assistance from Mo Laborde and Ron Warner. A huge thank you to Rebecca Ross, our legal researcher. Our theme song was composed by Betsy Gans and Chris Norby and performed by Betsy Gans, Chris Norby, and John Rauhaus.

It was recorded and mixed by Michael Krasner and mastered by Chris Norby. The series was sound designed and mixed by Claire Mullen. Our recording engineers are Mike DeLay and Gavin Rain at Real Voice LA. Special thanks to Campside's studio manager and mix engineer, Ewan Lai-Tremuin, and Campside producer, Johnny Kaufman. Our fact-checkers are Sarah Sneath and Callie Hitchcock. Additional research from Alex Yablon. Thanks to Debra Dawn, Hugh Urban, Susan Stieritz,

Rianne Eisler, Sfrana Borkataki-Varma, Phoenix Kalita, Natalia Winkleman, and Miriam Wasser. And thanks to Tracy Elise, who gave Campside permission to use videos she created. The Pat McMahon Show is a production of KAZT-TV. And a special thanks to our operations team, Doug Slaywin, Aaliyah Papes, and Allison Haney. Campside Media's executive producers are Josh Dean, Vanessa Gregoriotis, Adam Hoff, and Matt Scher. If you enjoyed Mystic Mother

please rate and review the show wherever you get your podcasts