Uncover - S1 "Escaping NXIVM" E5: Blow It Up

Episode Date: September 14, 2018

Sarah and her husband try to escape NXIVM and take it down while warning others who are still inside. For transcripts of this series, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/uncover/uncover-season-1-escaping-nxivm-transcripts-listen-1.4675949

It's 2011 and the Arab Spring is raging. A lesbian activist in Syria starts a blog. She names it Gay Girl in Damascus. Am I crazy? Maybe. As her profile grows, so does the danger. The object of the email was, please read this while sitting down. It's like a genie came out of the bottle

and you can't put it back. Gay Girl Gone. Available now. This is a CBC Podcast. The vows, do you want me to read them? Let me get my computer. Okay. All the things I get in trouble for is reading Keith Vow's on national radio. Okay.

Keith Vow's. Do you remember what they were called? I don't remember. Keith Vow's Doc. Oh, there. It looks like them. This is the vow. To me, you are my love in human form. You are all poetry, beauty,

awe, and joy. You are my love in human form. You are all poetry, most of the time. Awe and joy. In my every experience, there you are. You hold my senses and self in you. you hold my senses and self in practical life I will always in practical life will always hold out my best for you against any and all adversity I'll feel I will fill each moment with this promise remembering someday one of these moments will be our last one of these moments will be our last this made me cry in our wedding. You're only my very best and true partner. I love you with all that I know. To be me, this love will serve as my guide for the rest of time.

When Sarah and Nippy were married in 2013 at the Shangri-La Hotel in Vancouver, Keith Raniere wrote their vows. I vow to the end of human possibility to never forget or forsake this love. He wasn't there in person, but 60 of his followers were, including Nancy Salzman and her daughter Lauren. Lauren officiated the wedding. I choose you, Sarah, to be my wife. To love together and laugh together. In working on the story, I've come to appreciate just how much Sarah's entire life was shaped by this group.

Most of her friends were in NXIVM. It occupied almost all her waking hours. It was the lens through which she filtered everything. Even her wedding. It was definitely a very NXIVM-centered wedding. My poor family having to sit through the shenanigans. Allison Mack sang at my wedding, sang U2. From this day onward, I choose you, Nippy. I choose you, Nippy.

Lauren Rosera is the officiant, and she wrote a really beautiful speech that had, you know, Nippy cried. I cry all the time, but to see him cry, definitely a single tear, of course, one single tear. It was a beautiful ceremony. It was meaningful for them to have Lauren officiate. She was one of Sarah's closest friends, and later named godmother to Nippy and Sarah's son. This was years before Lauren would become master, and Sarah, her slave.

Oh my god, the best was when the dancing started, like after the ceremony and after dinner, the dancing started with this great DJ on the dance floor, and we had, it was September, so three weeks earlier we had all been at V-Week. And we had done this dance in dance class that was sort of like a flash mob style.

Like, it's just really upbeat and positive. Sarah shows me this video from her wedding of the flash mob. She was surrounded by her NXIVM sisters. You know, like, fists in the air. Their arms outstretched, eyes to the heavens, huge smiles and self-possessed. We were just so happy, you know, and it was so fun to bust out into this song and everyone was watching. And, you know, we did a flash mob at my wedding. That was a moment.

The wedding, these dancers, the vows, the way NXIVM was so deeply integrated into Sarah's life. It reminds me of a term my friend Jamie told me about. Ontological security. Wait, say it again. Ontological security. What does that mean? Oh, geez. You want me to define it now? It's a cognitive need that humans have to feel secure in their identity and stable in their identity.

They need to know who they are and what they are. Ontological security. It's a profound feeling of stability and meaning that comes from believing the world is predictable and ordered and you know your place in it. That's what NXIVM offered Sarah. It was the very fabric of her identity. What's the opposite of ontological security? Ontological insecurity, which is a feeling of great chaos and uncertainty. It's where you don't know what your identity is.

It's when you don't know what meaning is. Meaning is lost. And that gives you a feeling of great insecurity. Ontological insecurity. It's the nauseating and disorienting feeling of having your foundation torn out from under you. I'm trying to imagine how that would feel. Maybe like discovering that gravity is a hoax.

That's the feeling consuming Sarah, as she's about to leave everything she's known for over a decade. And we're like, okay, what do we do? How do we get out of this? This is when I'm scared. And we said, yeah, we decided to do business as usual. And then I went back to the house and packed up the house. And that 10-hour train ride was like one of the most stressful travel days of my life. It was all very, very stressful.

And I'm just like... My heart's... I don't think I've ever been in as much fight or flight. I'm Josh Bloch. This is Escaping NXIVM. From CBC Podcasts, Uncover. Chapter 5. Blow it Up.

It's May 31st, 2017. Sarah is on a train with her son, heading to see her grandfather in Toronto. He has cancer, so she has an excuse not to be at the annual NXIVM summit taking place in Albany. I was in survival mode. I was like, I just have to get out. I just have to figure out how to get out of the confines of DOS. At that moment, you know they have collateral on you. Those nude photos of Sarah and videos making damaging claims about Nippy and her parents. And I didn't know what they were going to do with it. Like, they were going to post my photo online any minute. You know, like, I didn't know what they were going to do. Sarah is operating on very limited information.

NXIVM is secretive. DOS, even more so. I mean, I thought they would have sent someone up to Toronto to follow me. No, it was really tense. By the time Sarah is on this train to Toronto, this is what she suspects is going on. One, the secret women's empowerment group she joined is actually run by Keith Raniere. Two, Keith is Lauren Salzman's master. Three, Keith's initials are seared onto her body.

Four, Lauren lied to her about all these things. But the most pressing worry for Sarah during this train ride is that she knows another branding session is scheduled within a week. I spent the whole time on the phone, traveling alone with a three-year-old. Luckily, I had headphones for our son to listen to the iPad, and he slept, and he couldn't hear me because I was on the phone. What he can't hear is Sarah warning women about DOS. You know, making sure that there were people not getting on the plane to come to the summit because I knew they were going to be branded.

So I spent that whole time on the phone, making sure people knew, trying to figure out who was in and who was out. Sarah and Nippy have told me that they want to leave NXIVM quietly. What they mean is that they don't want to give the group a reason to come after them, like they did with other high-profile defectors. So Sarah is extremely cautious about who she contacts and what she says. The thing that I was most afraid of is that I wanted to let people know, but I didn't want it to come from me.

So I was afraid that I was going to get sued for slander or whatever. They need a cover story. Here's how it goes down. Once Sarah and their son are in Toronto, Nippy heads to the NXIVM conference in Albany. The event is held at a dingy former Italian restaurant in Clifton Park. The place is buzzing with about 100 NXIVM members from Canada, Mexico, and the United States. I go up to the summit, and I'm in there, and I'm in the atmosphere, and I just want to flip shit.

I just want to flip the breakfast table. I want to grab the mic and just fucking let everyone know. Nippy finds Lauren Salzman and Jim Del Negro in the parking lot near the port-a-potties. Jim is one of Keith's closest advisors and runs the men's group, Society of Protectors, with Nippy. Nippy tapes the exchange using a cell phone tucked into his pocket. Sarah tells me she got fucking branded. She got fucking branded. And what did she say about it? The beginning is a bit hard to make out.

Nippy's saying, Sarah tells me she got fucking branded. She got branded. And Jim responds by asking, but what did she say about it? You listening to me? Uh-huh. Dude, this is criminal shit. This is stuff that I don't want to have anything to fucking do with. I. Dude, this is criminal shit. This is stuff that I don't want to have anything to fucking do with.

I mean, Sarah's involved with it. Yeah, Sarah's involved with it. No, don't try and wrap your head around how this is okay. Okay? I'm not here to do that. I'm telling you right now, I want nothing more to do with these organizations. I'm out. I'm out.

If you think you're doing something good and helping people, the definition of personal growth isn't given by the fucking brand. And then the fucking sex ring. Oh, okay, sure, right. He has fucking initials in his crotch. Nippy makes certain he's in plain sight. He wants everyone to hear him say, DOS is a sex ring,

and engaged in illegal activity. What do you mean, Nick? How are you sitting here and saying that's okay? You tell me what you need from me. I don't care about doing anything to slander anyone. I want out. I'll give it to you. Honestly, I don't want to have a conversation.

I just want to leave. Nippy calls it a strategic temper tantrum. The anger is very real, but the timing of this outburst is calculated. What if you're wrong? What if you're wrong? What if you're wrong? But I'm open to talking about it. No, no, it doesn't seem like it. I've spoken to you about this.

This is it. I'm done. I'm out. Sorry. I've seen enough. I'm sorry that you're branding my fucking wife. So I've known about the tantrum. In fact, that was our plan, that Nippy should have a reaction. Sarah and Nippy's plan is a kind of NXIVM flip of their own. They're going to turn the NXIVM philosophy against itself and use it to help them leave.

And that was going to be my out. That I'm going to choose him over ESP, which would be consistent with my, quote, issues of dependency. And why is that the strategy you guys have chosen? We've heard from other people who left that sort of the best way to leave a cult is to leave for the things that they've decided as your issue, so it's consistent

with your personality. Now it's Sarah's turn to sell the story. Now it's Sarah's turn to sell the story. She records herself calling Lauren Salzman from Toronto. It's just after Nippy's tantrum. I get her to play it back for me. When I first heard this recording, I just thought it was a panicked call Sarah made as she was leaving. And it is.

But now I realize there's more to it. I'm just trying to wrap my head around this, Lauren. Like, my husband wants a divorce. My husband wants a divorce. Lauren, I have been in fight or flight since January. I haven't been able to sleep. Nippy doesn't really want a divorce. Sarah is selling their story. She's also trying to get as much information out of Lauren as she can. It's a kind of chess game. This is Sarah's best friend and her master. But she doesn't trust her. I just got here and Nippy screamed at me about your branch.

This is Lauren. She's talking about when Nippy screamed at her in the parking lot. I haven't seen it, but he just demanded I tell him, and if I didn't tell him that if I had one, he'd divorce me. Yeah. What is going on? Your voice sounds, at the beginning of this, you sound tense.

I was always very tense. I was incredibly tense. You know, I couldn't say to her. So I discovered that Keith is having sex with everybody and using DOS as a way to bring in fresh meat, and I'm no longer wanting to participate, so all the best. Sarah's pressing hard for the answers she couldn't get when she first joined DOS. I mean, is Keith behind DOS? Is Keith the one who organized this? It's not something that we discuss, Sarah.

It's not something we discuss, was her answer to me. She knows very well that Keith was her master. Keith is her master. She doesn't say no. Nope. But Keith gave his go-ahead on it. Like, he said, yeah, I use my tools for this women's group. He gave them permission to use collateral and penance.

Okay, but he didn't know about the branding. He knew about it, but he didn't cause it. And he didn't create the brand. The girls did. This is the version of events that NXIVM continues to stand by. The DOS was created by women in NXIVM, not Keith. I don't believe it's bad for women in NXIVM, not Keith. cow or something. Oh, Mom. I love you. I love you, too. I love you, too.

I love you, too, baby. I think my son was starting to pick up on my level of anxiety that was pretty extreme at this point. Who's got my photos, for real? I promise you, I am the only one who has them. Can you please delete those?

Yeah. And my confessions and my family? I'll get rid of everything. I just thought that Keith's seen pictures of me, you know, or that Keith, you know, I'm not what I signed up for long. I'm sorry, I don't want to do this anymore. There's a lot going on for Sarah during this phone call. At times, this sounds like a warm conversation between old friends.

Despite everything, it's a friendship Sarah doesn't want to lose. We wanted to do something good in the world. We wanted to bond together for goodness, to uphold something. It wasn't supposed to be a horrible experience. It was supposed to be boot camp to be to build character and and then take that and do awesome shit i want to have a normal friendship with you i i i need to step back from this and just go back to like everything we said on the call is okay okay okay okay okay all right okay i love you very much love you too talk to you soon love you too much. Love you, too. Talk to you soon. Love you, too.

Big hugs. Okay. Okay. Bye. All right. You, too. Bye. Okay. Bye. I ended up learning from that phone call that Keith absolutely knew about DOS and that my cover was safe for the time being. Sarah describes this period of time in Toronto as a total blur. She's barely eating or sleeping.

She doesn't know who to trust. She's trying to figure out who else is in DOS without blowing her cover. Lauren thinks Sarah is going to lay low and just take care of her grandfather. But Sarah says the more she finds out, the harder it is to be discreet. I didn't get branded. I didn't even know that DOS existed. I didn't get branded. I didn't even know that DOS existed. I found out because things were getting really weird really fast. Jen Cobell is one of Sarah's NXIVM friends in Vancouver.

She was also Sarah's personal assistant. Remember, she was the one who joined NXIVM after going to a pitch session that Sarah led. I meet Jen in Vancouver. She's the kind of person that looks you directly in the eyes when she speaks. She can be naive and insightful in the same breath. It was May 31st. We saw Sarah's husband, his name popping up on a whole bunch of group chat threads that we were on. And it just kept saying, you know, he left the group, he left the group, he left the group. This is a huge deal. Sarah and Nippy are like the Beyonce and Jay-Z of NXIVM in Vancouver. Word is spreading fast. And we were like, what's going on? Jen reaches out to Sarah.

Sarah's in Toronto at Whole Foods. Then she just started grilling me. And I remember her asking me, Jen, have you ever been invited to join a group? And I was like, what do you mean? In this case, I was just completely unaware of it, and she just, she just burst into tears, and she was crying so hard. And then she started, kind of sounded like she

was just, like, yelling to the world. That mother fucker! That mother fucker! Jen and Sarah start running through the names of NXIVM members in Vancouver, trying to guess who might be in DOS, and warning them. Sarah tells the three women who were her slaves to leave the group, but otherwise she tries to stay behind the scenes, so this disruption can't be linked back to her.

A blog called The Frank Report, run by a former employee of NXIVM, publishes an article about DOS women being branded with KISS initials. More women leave DOS. Like from that moment on, it was just like everything shattered. And that was when the phone calls started from my friends. Jen says they told her they were in DOS, that they've handed over collateral, and described just how explicit it is. They told me I had to put my face and my inner labia

in a shot, a nude photo, that I had to like spread my legs in a very particular way and make sure that my face was in the shot too. I just couldn't believe it. It was just insanity. I couldn't sit still, just walk around the neighborhood. We had pizza like every night for a while. It was just like the only thing that was comforting. Sarah sent us a list of things to read and things to watch to help us like understand what we were coming out of. It is all becoming clear. DOS is bigger than Sarah had imagined.

It has infiltrated the community she built in Vancouver. And the recruiting was still going on. How did it feel to know that people, especially young women that you had recruited into the organization, may very well end up being branded in the same way that you were? I was fucking livid. I can swear, right? Yes. Okay. We've crossed that bridge.

Sorry. The horse is out of the barn there. Okay. But to what extent did you also feel guilty because you're the one that brought them in I felt responsible but I didn't feel guilty I mean I felt badly

I felt I knew that I hadn't done the bad thing to them do you know what I mean I knew that I'd set them up to have the bad thing happen and that's the part that I felt responsible for. To say, hey, trust me. Join this community.

Trust that this is a place where we're all going to grow and love each other and support each other and it's all good. That part I constantly feel guilty about. In 2017, it felt like drugs were everywhere in the news. So I started a podcast called On Drugs. We covered a lot of ground over two seasons, but there are still so many more stories to tell. I'm Jeff Turner, and I'm back with season three of On Drugs. And this time, it's going to get personal.

I don't know who Sober Jeff is. I don't even know if I like that guy. On Drugs is available now wherever you get your podcasts. Within a week, word gets back to the higher-ups in Albany that Sarah is warning others about DOS. I know that when I left Toronto, from the time that I went to Toronto to the time I landed back in Vancouver, I'm pretty sure that they had figured out that... Now everyone knows. Sarah isn't leaving NXIVM because Nippy is threatening divorce.

Sarah is leaving because she wants to. And she's taking others with her. How much did your life change that day? I don't even want to say it, but I feel like I lost a big part of myself because I myself was so wrapped up in my community. And that was just like severed in such a violent way. And like if I was upset about something, I would go to Lauren. Lauren is who I'd go to.

That's who I'd reach out to first. Sorry. I feel so sad about Lauren. I think she's a good person. You know, 12 years of friendship with someone. And I'm just still so hurt, I guess, that, you know, she can't even just pick up a phone and go, oh my God, I'm so sorry I lied to you about that.

I was so angry that she was flipping this around and making me bad. She was, you know, the main thing that really bothered me is that she told everybody that it was completely consensual and I knew exactly what I was getting into. It's been just over a week since Nippy had his tantrum at the NXIVM summit. Sarah's back in Vancouver. The branding ceremony at the summit was cancelled,

and it's starting to sink in what leaving NXIVM will actually mean. She spends most of the day on the phone with her former students, trying to explain DOS and why she left. She doesn't have to hide her efforts anymore. She tells me it was not uncommon for one call to last six hours. She hears Lauren is also calling people in Vancouver, telling a different story about DOS and Sarah. Jen Kobelt describes it like two Jedi Knights trying to use their powers of persuasion over people. It's like a line has been drawn on the dance floor at Sarah's wedding. There are now those who side with Sarah and leave NXIVM,

and those that turn against her and shut her out. Sarah also hears that NXIVM is building a legal case against her. She doesn't want to end up in Claire Bronfman's bad books. And she's desperate to speak with anyone in charge, to plead her case. Oh man, it's been so crazy. Honestly, like, no one will talk to me. I'm so glad you're willing. This is the last phone call Sarah has with a higher-up in NXIVM. It's with Jim Del Negro, the man who used to run SOP with Nippy.

She recorded it. We listened to it together. I come from the perspective of SOP that when you make a promise to do something, you do it. So one of the things that I had heard is that you had broken a promise to, you know, to work things out within a group. Just keep and things like that. You know, Jim was in charge of a lot of the legal stuff. And I thought if I could get him on my side or at least know that there was more to whatever he was being fed, that at least they wouldn't come after me because a wrong had been done.

In NXIVM, if you've been wronged, you have the right to speak out about it. Sarah's hoping Jim will hear her out, maybe even understand, and defend her to the higher-ups. So, you know, anybody that's in it, people don't come to me when they talk about rumors. Okay. Because they know I don't like to hear them. Well, I don't have rumors. I have firsthand information about the group because I was in it. And I was in it under, I believe, false pretenses. And I believe that I gave collateral that once I gave it, bound me to something that I didn't want to be a part of anymore.

And it used fear, coercion, and obligation and blackmail to keep me in it. No one is talking to each other. People are taping each other. There is a war going on. And really, Jim, it is not coming from me. I don't want to be a part of it. I don't like that I have peace initials next to my vagina. I don't want to be a part of it. I don't like that I have peace initials next to my vagina. I don't want to be a part of this anymore.

I stepped down, I asked for my collateral back, and I was told no because I made a promise. That's actually blackmail. That is where the illegal activity starts. Not with me. I've tried to step away quietly, but now I'm being blamed for everyone else following my lead. I'm just trying to live my life.

I'm fucking devastated. This is not what I signed up for. Did you ever think of talking to Keith about it? I don't want to talk to Keith. I don't trust that Keith has my best intentions anymore. That's basically saying I don't believe in God. That's basically saying I don't believe in God. There's no turning back now.

I'm going to take you guys on the walk. And I would normally do on the way to the center. And the way back will come a different way. You walk at a really fast pace. Yeah. Have you always been that way? I've always been that way. Yes, yeah. We perhaps never walked before, Josh. I think we've walked. I just forgot. There it is. 505. Sarah and I are standing at 505 Georgia Street. It's a two-story building where NXIVM's coaching sessions were held. We've walked for 20 minutes from her condo to where she used to work.

This was the heart of Sarah's NXIVM community, and her life. Oh my god, I just hate it here. One of the last times Sarah was here was not long after that conversation with Jim. Most people in Vancouver quit once they learned about DOS, and that Sarah and Nippy left NXIVM. Sarah came here with a small group of former members to shut the place down. We all came in and packed up the center,

like took out all the ESP stuff, put it in a box. There was this huge executive success poster board that we got for one of our first personal like, personal development fairs we went to, where we had, like, a booth to this huge executive success board with our pictures on it. And we took turns holding it and, like, shit-kicking it. Like, holding this thing and just fucking ripping into it and tearing it apart, and, like, primal screaming and just crying and kicking and swearing. We all took turns with that. It was amazingly cathartic.

Fuck you! Fuck you! Sarah made arrangements with Claire Bronfman to hand over materials that belonged to NXIVM. There were bags of sashes and binders full of ESP curriculum. There were reams of paperwork. But there was one thing she didn't want to turn over. The student files had everyone's personal information, their credit card information, their addresses, their phone numbers, and then their intake form. And their intake form had very personal information, starting with, you know, benign things like, what are your goals?

Why are you coming here? And then it would say, what's your worst moment in your life? And what's your worst decision? It could be, think of the worst thing you've ever done and not wanting someone to read that. Claire went to the Vancouver police. One of her complaints was that by holding back those files, Sarah had committed theft. Do you remember that day? Did you get a call from the police? Yes. I got a call from an investigator. He told me what the charges were for fraud, mischief, and theft, and that Claire had come and given them evidence to this.

And, you know, my first thought was like, I'm happy to come in and tell you everything because I know that I'm in the right and that she's in the wrong and this is what she does. This is what they do to discredit and silence witnesses and whistleblowers because this is their playbook. So I remember, on one hand, not taking it very seriously and the same token being like, oh, my God, here we go. Here we go. This is serious. Because you know that this has happened to others before you. Yeah. here we go. This is serious.

Because you know that this has happened to others before you. Yeah. And that's kind of been my take this whole time. Like, okay, they're going to sue me or drag me through the legal system or drain me financially and then at the same time going, fucking bring it on. So I decided to just blow it up.

This was around the time I ran into Sarah on Hornby Island, and she told me she had just left a cult. She said Claire Bronfman had filed a criminal complaint against her. She was being blamed for the mass exodus of NXIVM students in Vancouver. She was struggling to find words to tell her story, or even know where to begin. After months of research, I have a far better appreciation for what was going on. Sarah was about to throw her final punch. Nippy said it had to be a death blow.

Claire had already pressed charges against Sarah. It kind of felt like if you were taking the temperature of the war at that point, we were losing. And we had all our cards and all our eggs in the basket of how the strength of Barry Meyer's article to vindicate us. They go to the press. They speak with a journalist, a guy named Barry Meyer of the New York Times. Hello. Hi, Barry, it's Josh in Toronto. Can you hear me? Yeah, I can hear you. Okay, great. I hope you're enjoying retirement. You know, I've been working fucking harder than I did when I was working, so. Barry retired after nearly 30 years with the New York Times,

just after his story about Sarah came out. His article about Sarah was published in October of 2017. What was your first impression of her and her story? Well, I mean, I think it was very important for someone who had been branded to speak publicly about that. Because at this point, I wasn't sure if I was going to talk to him and tell him my story, and we agreed that we were just going to talk. At that point, I almost had a shift. I remember talking to Barry, walking along the seawall in Jericho or the beach there. And so I think Sarah was very brave. He said something like,

the fact that this happened to you means it could happen to anybody. I recall when I think about going public, I never considered, you know, my neighbors reading the news or casting directors or, you know, Prime Minister Trudeau. I was like, I was only thinking about the people in Exxon, really. And like the family members of like saving these people and helping women get out of their contracts and getting their collateral back. And also, I mean, it was definitely in my mind

about like future recruitment. Like I didn't want anyone else to get money. But I didn't really think about like the magnitude of that paper being everywhere. You know what I mean? Like no one else cares about this stupid little cult. Next, he is under the states of microscope now after a recent article by the New York Times stating allegations against were framed. This woman says she was held down and branded during a bizarre initiation. NXIVM released a statement saying they firmly oppose violence and abuse. They also say the allegations...

The New York Times revealed that the organization NXIVM... The call to action comes after the New York Times published... A recent New York Times investigation has revealed damning allegations. Sarah Edmondson. The brand was literally burned into the flesh of her and four other women. My watch is on silent. I'm going to turn everything off right now. Josh, my phone is blowing up. It is so crazy. Morgan, Josh and I, I'm knowing Josh in his daycare.

Morgan is smiling. Is she your team or do you really have a PR team? No, I really have a PR team, but she's the head of the PR team. I have a PR team, which I actually hired for acting work years ago. Sarah arrives at our studio in Vancouver with an entourage. I just saw an image, someone posted an image of the print newspaper. Yes. It looks like it's above the fold, or certainly on the first page.

It's on the first page. The news about her branding is everywhere. So I wanted to start off by asking you about, you know, here we are the morning after this New York Times article comes out. What have the last 12 hours been like for you? The last 12 hours have been actually pretty insane. Even though I knew it was coming, it was shocking to see Sarah on the front page of the New York Times.

There's a large photo. She's standing against a wall. The top of her jeans are folded down to reveal the brand on her pelvis. It's still red and swollen. It's the first time I've seen it. It's clear why Sarah's story is different than those that have left before her. She has physical evidence on her body that something is not right with this group. You know, I went from being totally silent within the last couple weeks, really just dialing back everything in my life. Now all of a sudden it's like, holy shit, the whole world knows. I like to resolve things. So it's weird and it's empty and lonely and unfulfilled. And I think in that way, I have a therapist who's helping me through this. There's so much unresolved stuff.

There's so much unresolved stuff. The FBI launched an investigation of NXIVM on the heels of this article. In fact, they refer to it in the complaint against Ranieri as one of the reasons it was launched. So far, Sarah is the only woman who is in DOS, and critical of it, who's let the media publish her name and photo. As Sarah comes to terms with her new life, her new identity, and faces who she was while she was in NXIVM, much of the coverage around her escape from the group paints her as a brave whistleblower, that she risked her own reputation to bring down the organization.

But I've discovered that not everyone agrees. There's Keith's perspective and his inner circle's version of events, as well as others who question Sarah's motives and don't see her as a hero. Can you just explain, so we have it on tape here, why don't you explain what just happened,

what just transpired here? Well, we got a notification that we have, a letter has come to our attention from our super secret Dropbox at CBC. We had no idea what it was, but we got an email to us, and do you want me to read it to you? Yeah.

I'm at work with my producer, Kathleen. So it said, hi, Miss Sarah Edmondson, a Vancouver actress, has been in the news recently and featured by the New York Times for her role in the sex and mind control cult NXIVM. In her statements about her involvement with NXIVM, Ms. Edmondson mostly claims to be a victim. But the truth is she and several of her colleagues were ruthless recruiters for Mr. Ranieri and NXIVM for many years. They used bullying tactics, high-pressured sales pitches, defamation, and trickery.

That's interesting. Why, what prompted it? Who knows? They're wanting us to see another side of this. Coming up on Escaping NXIVM. Men do these things, we call them Marines. You know, women do these things, we call them victims. Keith never told Sarah Edmondson what to do.

The government is playing into a sexist agenda. You know, Keith has a unique sex life. He doesn't need DOS to have sexist agenda. You know, Keith has a unique sex life. He doesn't need DOS to have sex with women. Are you suggesting that those women are lying? Yes. I'm saying they're lying. If they're saying

that they were coerced to have sex with Keith, I'm saying they're lying. Thank you. producer, and Arif Noorani is the executive producer. Get the series for free wherever you get your podcasts. We're at cbc.ca slash uncover. If you want to discuss this story with others and get the latest updates, become part of our online community by joining the Uncover Escaping NXIVM Facebook group or following us on Twitter at Uncover CBC. Diamonds and a ring of gold And you say you want Your story to remain untold

But all the promises we've made From the cradle to the grave, here all I want is you. Cause all I want it to end