The Pulling Report
The Pulling Report
Compiled by and © 1990 Michael A. Stackpole
Contents Background The Devil’s Web
Cult Crime Investigator Exploits and Allies
Profile and Conclusion
Questionnaire
Editor and Director of Acknowledgements
BADD Appendix 1 – Sean
Editorial Fiat Sellers
“Lies, damn lies and Appendix 2 – About the
statistics” Author
Magical World View Bibliography
“Expert Witness” References
Has Pat Pulling Ever
Played a Role-Playing
Game?
Summary
Introduction
Patricia Pulling is a woman known for having mounted a brave
campaign against the diabolical forces that have been unleashed
in America today. A licensed private Investigator, she is the
founder of Bothered About Dungeons and Dragons and the author of
The Devil’s Web. She has been hired as an expert in gaming for
murder trials in Missouri, Oklahoma and North Carolina. She has
appeared on 60 Minutes, Geraldo and on numerous radio programs,
like the nationally syndicated “Jim Bohannon Show.”
Her courage in the face of the Satanic conspiracy is nothing
short of amazing. The dogged tirelessness that allows her to go
on lecture tours, write books and edit newsletters is incredible.
Her willingness to help the police investigate cult crimes and
her uncompromising drive to publicize the dangers of Satanism are
unquestionably seen as noble and civic minded.
Within the community of “Cult Crime” investigators, she has
become a figure of mythic proportion.
Unfortunately for Mrs. Pulling – as with most myths – the kernel
of truth around which the legend has been built is no where near
as attractive as the myth. As will be shown in this report, which
cuts through the blue smoke and mirrors surrounding her crusade,
Mrs. Pulling is hardly the appropriate person to be given
responsibility in crime investigations. In her pursuit of a grand
Satanic conspiracy – the same one she ultimately holds
responsible for the suicide death of her son – she has engaged in
unethical and illegal practices. Her methods and tactics, at
their very best, taint any evidence she might offer and, at their
worst, construct a monster where none exists.
This report, while hardly exhaustive, provides a catalog of
things Mrs. Pulling has done to produce evidence of everything
from murderous toys to a worldwide Satanic conspiracy that
contains in it one out of every twelve citizens of Richmond,
Virginia. The majority of this information deals with her early
assault on the games upon which she blames her son’s death. The
rest of it has been developed through study of her occult
investigations and the other individuals with whom she works and
associates in the anti-Satanism movement.
Background
Mrs. Pulling’s career as an occult investigator began with the
unfortunate death of her son, Irving Lee “Bink” Pulling. On 9
June 1982, Bink shot himself in the chest with a handgun, “hours
after a D&D® curse was placed on him during a game conducted at
his local high school.”1 Though Bink’s obituary makes no mention
of how he died, and his death did not make the local Richmond
papers, within a year Mrs. Pulling had filed a lawsuit against
Robert A. Bracey, III, the principal of the high school her son
attended and where he played Dungeons & Dragons®.2
The lawsuit, which was thrown out of court on 26 October 19833,
was the first public instance of Mrs. Pulling engaging in an
investigation concerning a “cult crime.” (It is curious that this
landmark in her career is not mentioned in her book, The Devil’s
Web.) At this time she formed Bothered About Dungeons & Dragons
(BADD) and became involved in the murder trial of Darren Lee
Molitor in 1984. The Molitor case was her first trial4 and the
first instance in which she was brought in as an “expert” in D&D.
Cult Crime Investigator
On a radio broadcast over KFYI in Phoenix in the fall of 1987,
Pat Pulling was billed as “a private investigator for the past
six years.” Robert D. Hicks, a law enforcement analyst for the
State of Virginia said in a letter, “Pulling is a licensed
private investigator, a certification she earned on October 6,
1987.” He went on to note:
You might be interested to know, however, the
certification process. Anyone with any educational
background can obtain a license. One must, though, do
two things. First, one must either attend a 42-hour or
a 48-hour course, which can be conducted virtually
anywhere. The course includes such topics as rules of
evidence, civil and criminal procedure, collecting and
reporting information, interviewing techniques, and
investigative techniques. The difference between the
two courses – six hours – involves firearms
instruction. Obviously, in six hours one cannot learn
much about firearms beyond a simple orientation.
Anyway, Pulling appears certified in the armed variety.
The second prerequisite to obtaining a license is to
pass a background investigation consisting of a
fingerprint-based criminal records check through the
state and FBI files. If one passes the background
check, and if one passes a one-hour exam at the end of
the private investigator training, one pays for a
license.5
Her career, if it was six years old in 1987, would have predated
her son’s 9 June 82 suicide by at least six months. Regardless,
she became a PI in October of 1987. To allow herself to be
represented as having been such before that time grants her
“facts” an inappropriate legitimacy.
Profile and Questionnaire
Pat Pulling, in her role as a cult crime investigator, has
prepared more than one document that deals with painting a
profile of a child in jeopardy of cult involvement because of
gaming and other factors. She uses the following profile to
pinpoint kids who are headed for an involvement with Satanism and
she also allows it to classify youngsters who are potentially
suicidal. Quoting from one of her BADD documents – one meant
solely for distribution to police organizations – the profile
goes as follows:6
THE WHO WHAT WHEN WHERE AND HOW OF TEEN SATANISM
WHO
1. Adolescents from all walks of life.
2. Many from middle to upper middle class families
3. Intelligent
Over or Under Achievers
Creative/Curious
Some are Rebellious
Some have low self esteem and are loners
Some children have been abused (physically or sexually)
WHEN does this occur?
It appears the ages most vulnerable are 11-17
WHERE?
1. Public places such as rock concerts, game clubs in communities
or at school.
2. Private parties at a friend’s home.
HOW?
1. Through Black Heavy Metal Music
2. Through fantasy role playing games like Dungeons & Dragons (R)
3. Obsession with movies, videos, which have occult themes
4. Collecting and reading/researching occult books
5. Involvement with “Satanic Cults”, [sic] through recruitment
6. Some are born into families who pratice [sic] “satanic cult
rituals”
TWO BASIC PRINCIPLES APPLY HERE “Law of Attraction” and the “Law
of Invitation”
WHAT can be expected?
1. Obsession with occult entertainment
2. Minor to major behavior disorders
3. Committing crimes and status offenses such as:
A. Running away
B. Graverobbing (such as bones)
C. Breaking and entering to steal religious artifacts or
sometimes stealing small items to prove loyalty to the group
D. Defacing public or private property using “Satanic Graffetti
[sic]” or related Graffetti [sic]
E. Threatening to kill (self or others, self mutilation is very
common)
F. Aggression directed towards family, teachers and authority
figures
G. Contempt for organized religion
H. Supremist attitudes
I. Kidnapping or assistance in kidnapping
J. Murder
K. Suicide pacts among members of the group
WHAT can we do?
1. Document all information relating to occult involvement (even
if it does not appear relevant at the time)
2. Keep an open mind
3. Stay objective
4. Never assume that an individual is acting along [sic] until
all other information surrounding the case and individual has
been fully investigated.
5. If individual is involved in “satanic activity,” he/she will
deny a great deal to protect other members of the group as well
as the “satanic philosophy”.[sic]
6. Have a team approach, work with a therapist, a clergymen and
other helping professionals.
7. Educate the community so that potential tragedies might be
avoided.
This profile, which is distributed by BADD to police departments
for their use in interrogating suspects in crimes clearly has
some flaws. Even a casual glance at the first three sections will
show that virtually any child from the ages of 11-17 is a
potential candidate for seduction into Satanism. Furthermore,
this seduction will take place at times when a parent is least
likely to be present. In short, if you have a reasonably
intelligent child from a good background and he is out of your
sight, he is open to recruitment by Satanists. This is patent
nonsense and no where does Pulling offer evidence to indicate
occult recruitment of any sort is a common occurrence.
Obviously, in Mrs. Pulling’s view, no child is safe at any time.
Once this profile has been used to help parents and others
identify potential problem children, Pat reveals the
prosecutorial mentality BADD encourages in investigators.
WHAT can we do?
2. Keep an open mind
3. Stay objective
5. If individual is involved in “satanic activity,”
he/she will deny a great deal to protect other members
of the group as well as the “satanic philosophy”.[sic]7
When grouped together like this, these three points sum up Mrs.
Pulling’s approach toward “objective” investigating. While Pat
encourages and open mind and objectivity in points 2 and 3, she
provides a caution in point 5. In essence, she says, if they do
not tell you what you want to hear, they are lying because
Satanists will lie to protect their friends. The mixed message
here helps cloud what is already a very confused issue within law
enforcement.
More importantly, this advice automatically puts the suspect and
the police into an adversarial relationship – even if the suspect
is fully willing to cooperate. When used in conjunction with the
questionnaire provided by Pulling, the problem is intensified.
Because Pulling’s questionnaire provides questions and sample
answers – most of which are wrong or inapplicable – she had
created a situation where a suspect telling the truth must be
seen to be lying to the police.
In the questionnaire titled Interviewing Fantasy Role Playing
Gamers, which is included in the Interviewing Techniques
publication, Pulling advises:
It is very important to understand that not all players
of fantasy role playing games over identify with the
game and or their player/characters. However, it
appears that a significant amount of youngsters are
having difficulty with separating fantasy from reality.
Or in other instances, their role playing has modified
their behavior to the extent that they react in real
life situations in the same fashion that they would
react in a gaming situation. This is not always obvious
or apparent to the suspect. The personality change is
so subtle that in some cases the role player is unaware
of any behavior or personality changes.8
What does Mrs. Pulling mean when she says, “a significant amount
of youngsters are having difficulty with separating fantasy from
reality?” Role playing games have been around since 1975 and Mrs.
Pulling herself concedes there are 4,000,000 players of D&D in
the United States alone. How many children constitutes a
“significant amount?” Without clarification or evidence, that is
a meaningless comment useful only for its inflammatory content.
Just below that we have a warning to the cops that a player may
not be able to distinguish between fantasy and reality. She notes
that game players “react in real life situations in the same
fashion that they would react in a gaming situation.” In a game,
problems are solved by rolling dice and consulting a chart to see
what the result are. Have police reported kids dealing with
muggings by asking the attackers to hold off while they roll
dice? Have teachers reported difficult test questions being
puzzled out by kids rolling dice and consulting some chart? What
exactly do these game reactions to real life situations consist
of, and where is the evidence that they exist?
To expand on or explain away the lack of evidence supporting her
claim, Mrs. Pulling suggests that any behavior change is so
subtle the person might not notice it. If truly that subtle, is
it significant? Does it have any meaning? And does the term
“subtle” adequately describe an inability to distinguish between
fantasy and reality? Could rolling dice in the face of stress be
considered subtle?
Pulling continues:
This is why it is important for the investigator to not
only be familiar with the game but to be able to ask
questions which are relevant to the suspect’s gaming
background.9
The questions from the questionnaire listed below are frightening
because of their incomplete nature, their quest for insignificant
information and their general imbecility. Recall that Pulling has
told the investigators that the suspect will lie to protect his
friends. She has also said they may not be able to tell fantasy
from reality. Bearing those things in mind, as well as
endeavoring to be open minded, the investigator is given the
following list of questions with hints for answers. Italics are
the author’s comments on the questions for perspective.
1. Since it is necessary to have a Dungeon Master or
game master/leader and two or more player characters,
it is important to ask the suspect, who is the Dungeon
Master. [sic] (At this point you may get double talk
about several people being the Dungeon Master or the
suspect may say “no one in particular. [sic] This is
not typically standard. Generally there is one person
who assumes the continuous lead of Dungeon Master.)
Actually, sharing the Gamemaster duties in a group is
quite common. For example, one gaming group in Phoenix
had a half-dozen Gamemasters working within the same
world-setting in a superhero game. Switching off
Gamemastering duties, especially between game systems,
is very common and gives everyone a chance to
experience both sides of the game. This tendency to
share Gamemastering duties is by no means just a recent
development, but it has become far more prevalent as
games matured in the latter half of the 1980s.
2. What is the character of your suspect in the game?
They will be as follows: Thief, Magic User, Fighter,
Cleric. In the aforementioned character classes they
may be sub-classes that the individual will refer to
such as Thief-Assassin, etc.
These are most often known as character classes in
gaming. They were very common in early RPGs, but often
went by other names, like Rogue, Wizard, Shaman, etc.
Since 1983 or so, virtually no game has come out with
character classes because they are restrictive to play.
It would be very easy for a player to deny having a
Thief or Magic User or Fighter or Cleric – without
lying about it in any way.
3. Also, ask the individual if he “ran” multiple
characters such as a Fighter/Magic-user.
The same comment as above applies – denying knowledge
of how to answer this question would not be uncommon
among gamers, nor would it be an attempt to hide cult
involvement.
4. Each character will have certain abilities or
attributes such as Strength, Wisdom, Intelligence,
Charisma, Constitution and Dexterity.
These abilities are obtained by rolling 3 6-sided dice.
Therefore, the ability score of each category will
range from 3 to 18. You should find out what the
[attributes are for their current game characters].
Two problems here. Many games have attributes with
different names, like Agility, Speed, Comeliness,
Presence, Essence and Body. Some game groups, as they
find it necessary, make up their own attributes and add
them to their games. Any list given to a police officer
in the course of an investigation would likely include
attributes not listed above.
Furthermore only in D&D are scores restricted to 3-18.
In Tunnels & Trolls, for example, scores have no upper
limit. In Traveller they went from 1 to F and in
ShadowRun they go from 1-7. In a game the author
finished designing in July 1989, (the Renegade Legion
Role Playing Game, slated for summer 1990 release from
FASA Corp.) attributes run from 2-20 initially and are
determined by point allocation or the roll of 2 ten
sided dice.
As above, perfectly correct and truthful answers to
these questions can be given that do not coincide with
Pulling’s suggested answers without cult involvement.
5. How long has the individual been playing this role
playing game?
There is no clue given on a proper answer and the
relevance of this question is doubtful. With over 300
role playing games in existence, and players constantly
shifting from one to another as they get bored or the
Gamemastering duties shift, length of time involved
with one game is irrelevant. A long-time player could
have been playing a particular game for only the month
since it appeared on the market, for example.
Another important point is that the popularity of
certain games has shifted. Fantasy is no longer as
popular as it once was and Science Fiction games have
really picked up in numbers of players. Many of the SF
games feature no magic and no religion, hence clearly
lack the diabolical lures Mrs. Pulling and others find
in Dungeons & Dragons.
6. How long has he/she been playing the particular
character that he is currently playing?
Again, no clue as to a right answer is provided. While
it is true that players will become attached to
characters, that attachment is no more sinister than a
golfer’s attachment to his set of clubs. And, as with a
golfer and a broken club, a dead character is exchanged
for another character.
7. What is his level of his character/characters? Be
specific.
No clue for an answer here, but Mrs. Pulling must see
this as an important question because it appears again
as question 12. There she explains that level reflects
how much power a character has. This is only true in
games where they have levels. Like character classes,
levels have become somewhat passé in more recent games.
Curiously, the “power level” concept of gaming runs
counter to the “role playing” aspects that Mrs. Pulling
sees as dangerous in games. In a gaming group where
role-playing predominates, power level and combat are
downplayed because that interferes with the role
playing. (Imagine an improvisational play in which the
cast has to spend two minutes out of every five rolling
dice. It would be decidedly boring, as it is in gaming.
“Role-playing versus roll-playing” has long been a
dichotomy in gaming and the two do not mix well
together.)
8. What is his/her alignment?
The following are a list of categories for alignment:
Chaotic Evil, Chaotic Good, Chaotic Neutral, Lawful
Evil, Lawful Good, Lawful Neutral, Neutral Evil,
Neutral Good and Neutral.
...Observations indicate that in the past a significant
number of adolescents will [sic] choose an evil
alignment. The reasons that young players give for
choosing an evil alignment is they feel that there are
less restrictions on the player/characters therefore,
they can do more, get by with more and stay alive
longer in the game.
In reality, most players do whatever they have to do
and don’t worry about alignment. Alignments are
generally viewed with distaste among players and are
not featured in many games outside the D&D family. (The
author once postulated an alignment system for a game
that consisted of one axis running from Naughty to Nice
and the other from Sloppy to Neat, but it never caught
on.) Alignments are basically silly and impede play, so
are most often ignored.
[Pulling continues in this section by noting “There was
a young boy who was fourteen years old in Orlando,
Florida who stated that he has a Thief with a Lawful
Good Alignment. In reality thieves are not thought of
in society as Good, therefore the confusion over proper
attitudes about more qualities become confused. Right
and Wrong are situational. The author would like to
point out that Robin Hood or the patriots who held the
Boston Tea Party could have been tagged with the label
of Good Thieves. ]
9. Has the individual has [sic] any curses placed on
his/her character? If yes, what kind and get him to
discuss the procedure, type of curse.
Mrs. Pulling’s concern over curses stems from her
belief that having a curse placed on his character is
what drove her son to kill himself. That belief is pure
nonsense and is based, as will be shown, in a willful
ignorance of the circumstances surrounding Bink
Pulling’s suicide. To suggest that an event in a game
could cause an otherwise normal child to kill himself
means that one would have to accept the idea that a
player who goes bankrupt in Monopoly could be driven to
kill himself because of it. Because Monopoly is an old
standard, no one would ever believe that sort of
allegation, but because role-playing games are so new
and poorly understood, that sort of illogical charge
goes unquestioned.
10. What was the individual’s character name/names?
Mrs. Pulling places a great deal of weight on the name
of characters, especially if they can be found in
occult works, such as the dreaded Necronomicon! She
also notes Darren Molitor used the names Demun and
Sammy Sager for his characters. After he confessed to
the FBI, he signed his confession in those names as
well as his own.
The choice of a name for a character, at the very
worst, is a form of wish fulfillment. It is directly
analogous to a person making a selection of a costume
for a masquerade party. Choosing to go as Zorro, for
example, is not because the person in the costume sees
himself as Zorro, but because it’s fun, for a short
time, to adopt that role.
More commonly the choice of a name for a character is
the result of a joke in the gaming group or a matter of
pure expediency. In a fantasy game the author once
named a character ‘Waring-blender’because he was in the
kitchen when filling out the character sheet. The
similarity between Darren Molitor’s Sammy Sager and the
popular musician Sammy Hagar suggests a similar origin
there. Another player of the author’s acquaintance,
because his friends claim he always plays himself, no
matter what game is going on, names many of his
characters with some variation of his own name.
The significance of a character’s name, as can be seen
from the examples, is highly subjective and can easily
vary from character to character depending upon the
game and the circumstances under which the character
was named. To attempt to generalize about the import of
character names is as foolish as attempting to
generalize about the nature of the names of cats and
dogs.
11. What was his/her racial class in the game?
This only becomes important with the fact that many
youngsters will try try to “get over” on you when you
ask what is their character and they will tell you that
they are an elf. An elf in the game is a racial class,
not a character class, therefore most people feel that
elves are innocuous, innocent creature and pass over
any involvement with negative thoughts. The Racial
classes are as follows: Dwarven, Elven, Gnome,
Half-Elven, Halfling (Hobbit), Half-Orc and Human.
In other games there are other racial/alien types. The
advantage of playing a different race comes in added
strength for Dwarves, or night vision for Elves, etc.
People play other races to escape, which is what
relaxation and hobbies are all about. The choice of
racial type has little significance in the gaming
world, but Mrs. Pulling clearly sees it in another way.
Because Elves and Dwarves and Hobbits and the rest are
not mentioned in the Bible, they must be creations of
the devil. As such, playing a non-human character
carries with it all sorts of evil baggage.
12. What is his/her level in the game?
See question seven.
13. What god or gods did the individual serve in the
game?10
Because most games do not deal with religion, the
answer to this question could be “Huh?” very easily –
once again without an intention to deceive on the
suspect’s part.
Moreover, there is an equating here with game actions
and real actions. To suggest that “worshiping” an
imaginary god in a game is the same as worshiping that
god in real life is to suggest that any actor who’s
donned a Nazi uniform and saluted a portrait of Hitler
is a Nazi. Because the Bible forbids having “false
gods” before God, even offering a sacrifice in a game
to a god the Gamemaster has made up becomes an act of
idolatry, and idolatry is of the devil. Therefore,
clearly, a game in which this happens is Satanic and is
quite capable of luring a child to the devil.
This sort of crippled logic can be used to show almost
anything is Satanic.
As can easily be seen from the material above, not only are the
questions useless, but Pulling’s explanations for possible
answers are nearly incoherent. Very obviously Pulling’s questions
are designed to determine if the suspect can distinguish between
fantasy and reality. Plainly, Pat’s confusion of one with the
other gives birth to a whole host of problems. A normally well
adjusted youth who enjoys games, by virtue of answering those
questions in an open and truthful manner, could be painted as a
staunch Satanist doing his best to hide his coven!
Worse yet, Mrs. Pulling is distributing this questionnaire to
police officers who attend Cult Crime seminars. Clearly the
determination of a suspect’s sanity, as pertains to his ability
to sort out reality and fantasy, is a judgement best made by
someone with psychological training, not someone who has spent a
weekend listening to Mrs. Pulling. To believe that the
questionnaire could help in determining the depth and breadth of
a satanic conspiracy is folly because, through its
misinformation, the document creates that conspiracy just by its
use.
Mrs. Pulling adds another set of questions to the thirteen she
asked the police to use above. The first is : “Has he read the
Necronomicon or is he familiar with it?” In her explanation of
this general section she notes, “This will help determine if the
individual has a working knowledge of the occult, and if his
gaming abilities lean more to the dark side which could give
cause or reason for bizarre behavior.”11
The phrase, “if his gaming abilities lean more to the dark side,”
requires close examination. The very phrase and its wording
suggests that games somehow are possessed of power that can be
used for good or evil. This is nonsense – games are not batteries
filled with good energy or evil energy. If games were anything
more than a form of entertainment, everyone who ever won a game
of Monopoly would magically become a Donald Trump and good Risk
players would have taken over the world.
In that dire question, Mrs. Pulling mentions the Necronomicon. By
context alone it would have to be assumed that the Necronomicon
is an occult tome the rough equal of the Satanic Bible. In fact,
the Necronomicon predates the Satanic Bible and has a rather well
known history.
The Necronomicon is a joke. It was created as a volume of
“forbidden knowledge” by Howard Phillips Lovecraft. Lovecraft
wrote back during the pulp era12 and created the Elder Gods, the
best known of which is Cthulhu (Kaa-thu-lu or Kaa-tu-lu). The
Necronomicon was supposedly written by the mad Arab, Abdul
Alhazred. Penned in blood on parchment made of human flesh, it
contained a history of the Elder Gods and spoke of their nature
and the things they had done. To read it was to go insane.
Lovecraft shared his “Cthulhu Mythos” with the other writers of
the day, opening it up to public domain. Cthulhu, the other gods
and the Necronomicon began to show up in stories in the horror
genre from a whole host of writers – professional and amateur
alike. Phantom copies of this book would mysteriously appear
listed in library databases, though it always seemed to be
checked out to a Mr. A. Alhazred.
In short, the Necronomicon became an inside joke shared by
fantasy and horror fans. For the first half century of its life
it did not see print because no text of it existed. It was a
fantasy and probably would have remained so if several different
people had not decided a fast buck could be made actually
bringing out this forbidden tome.
In the late seventies the first of at least five different
versions of the book appeared on the market. Most are gibberish
and at least one version repeats its Romanized Arabic text every
ten pages (the author having assumed that no one would ever try
to wade through more than ten pages of the nonsense). Another
book appeared with a black leather binding and gold stamped
cover. It retailed for $50 in 1978 and now goes for well over
$100.
Though now extant, The Necronomicon has the same veracity as
Gulliver’s Travels or Dante’s Inferno. Citing it as an occult
book would be akin to citing Rona Jaffe’s novel “Mazes and
Monsters” as an investigative book. (The fact that NCTV’s Dr.
Thomas Radecki did just that in one of his press releases does
not make the novel a factual book.) A moment’s research into the
Necronomicon would have revealed its less than blue-ribbon
pedigree, but Mrs. Pulling has not apparently put that much study
into this tome.
Editor and Director of BADD
As the head of Bothered About Dungeons and Dragons, Mrs. Pulling
has exercised an interesting editorial approach in producing
documents. Most of her material is cut and pasted from newspaper
articles. While this would seem a simple and economic way to
circulate information her members pass on to her, what Mrs.
Pulling does with the data is, in fact, unethical and illegal.
Editorial Fiat
Pulling’s Techniques includes a newspaper article, complete with
pictures, originally printed in the Daily News-Sun of Sun City,
AZ13. The story details the apparent suicide of Sean Hughes in
Springerville, Arizona on 19 April 1988. The piece, written by
Doug Dollemore, is a balanced story that gets facts and opinions
from family, friends and law enforcement officials. Pulling
reprints it as a centerpiece of the Techniques, and the story
ends with Springerville Police Chief Darrel Jenkins saying, “If
Sean hadn’t been involved in role-playing games, he may have
thought long and hard before he pulled that trigger.”14
Because the story was published in a community close to Phoenix,
the author called Doug Dollemore and agreed to meet with him.
When the author showed him Pulling’s edition of his story, he
glanced at it, then stopped when he got to the last page. He told
the author that the original last page of the story had run in
one long column, and the last page, to be reproduced by Pulling
on an 8.5" x 11" sheet of paper, had been snipped into five parts
so it could all fit. In doing the cutting, the pieces had been
rearranged to provide the sheriff’s quote last.
As can be seen above, that quote is a nasty indictment of gaming.
Doug’s original version of the story ended with Sean’s mother
saying, “If there’s a trial I want to be there. I want some
answers.”15 This was an ending more in keeping with the whole
non-judgmental tone of the piece. Doug also noted that the
News-Sun had not been contacted for nor given consent for the
piece to be reprinted with Pat’s material.
Pat Pulling, in her Primer, reprinted the article from the
Washington Post about her son’s death. The story ran a full 20
column inches16, but Mrs. Pulling only runs the first 14 inches
of the story. The article notes:
[Bink Pulling] had trouble ‘fitting in’ and became
dejected when he was unable to find a campaign manager
when he ran for school office. Shortly before his
death, he wrote ‘Life is a Joke’ on the blackboard in
one of his classes, one classmate said.
In the section of the article Pulling did not print the following
appeared:
’He had a lot of problems anyway that weren’t
associated with the game,’ said Victoria Rockecharlie,
another classmate of Pulling’s in the Talented and
Gifted program.
Editing newspaper accounts to alter their content is, by no means
legitimate and, in the case of copyrighted material, is actually
illegal. The aforementioned two instances are examples of direct
editing. More generally Mrs. Pulling continues to report cases as
being game related, even after follow-up articles or letters by
parents disavow any connection between a crime or suicide and a
game. In even the most cursory hunt for details concerning cases
she cites, an abundance of contradictory evidence is relatively
easy to find.
Such a case is the death of her own son. The two pictures she
gives of her son’s death vary more sharply than the cut and uncut
versions of the Washington Post article suggest. On Geraldo, Mrs.
Pulling said of her son’s death:
We did not understand [his death]. And we found – of
course the police found a lot of the writings and
letters. And the first thing they asked us that night,
before they removed his body was – they took my husband
and I aside and they said, “Mrs. Pulling, are you a
devil worshiper?” And I said, “No.” I said, “You can
look through my house. I don’t” – you know, we were
Jewish. And I said, “We don’t have anything like that
in my house.” And they took my husband aside. They
obviously thought it was coming from the family.17
This above account is substantially the same as the one offered
in The Devil’s Web. In the book, however, Mrs. Pulling notes her
son used her gun to kill himself. Of her feelings at that point,
she says:
I did not feel the shame as I have heard that so many
families do when there has been a suicide, but I did
feel extreme pain and, to some degree, anger. Yes,
anger. Anger that I had not known what was going on in
my son’s mind, anger and guilt that I must have lacked
something that would have allowed me to know that I had
a child in trouble. I did not feel that Lee [her
husband] and I were to blame in any way for what had
happened, but I wondered why we hadn’t seen that
something was very wrong. What could have caused our
son to become so disturbed, and how did it happen so
subtly? Had I not been paying attention?18
Her obvious shock, as presented above, is at odds with a comment
made by her attorney, Peter W. D. Wright, during the attempt to
sue the principal of the high school Bink attended:
...I don’t believe that the Court can go forward today
and rule on a Plea of Sovereign Immunity until such
time as we have had an opportunity to put before the
Court evidence of insurance coverage, evidence as to
what role Dr. Bracey played in this game being played
in the school, and what acts did he not do perhaps that
should have been done to prevent the game being played
because of the knowledge that they have had of this
youngster undergoing severe emotional distress prior to
his actually taking his life.19
The apparent confusion over what Mrs. Pulling did or did not know
about her son’s emotional state gets stranger. Though she
continues to present herself as taken completely by surprise at
her son’s death in BADD publications, in The Devil’s Web and on
national television programs, Mrs. Pulling herself offers a
different picture to law enforcement officials. During a seminar
given at the North Colorado/South Wyoming Detective Association
9-12 Sept 86 (and as reported in a seminar “synopsis” by Larry
Jones, the editor of File 18) she said her son had been
displaying “lycanthropic” tendencies like running around the
backyard barking.20 Furthermore, according to Jones’
transcription:
[Bink Pulling] growled, screamed, walked on all fours,
and clawed the ground. Nineteen rabbits raised by the
Pullings were found torn to pieces in the last three
weeks of his life, although stray dogs were never seen.
A cat was found disemboweled with a knife. The internal
torment which lead to his death was plain, yet he had
been a normally-well-adjusted, gifted young man only a
few months before.21
Certainly the picture of a young man so tormented is not a pretty
sight, nor is it a situation to be taken lightly. Still, is Pat
Pulling’s obvious deception concerning her son’s death to be
taken as a responsible action? In her statements meant for
civilian consumption she acts as if her son’s death caught her
utterly unawares – as if she had no clues about his troubles. Yet
in court she tries to sue a principal for having ignored signs of
emotional problems that were present in her son. These very signs
she herself describes in hideous detail to law enforcement
professionals – a full two years before appearing on Geraldo and
three years before writing her book.
This creates a contradiction which leaves us two possible roles
for Mrs. Pulling, neither of which is very attractive. If what
she told Geraldo is taken at face value, we have a woman who was
truly taken unawares by her son’s emotional problems and death.
That route, however, also gives us a woman who sued the principal
of the school for having missed signs of disturbance in her son
that she herself missed. On the other hand we have a woman who
saw the signs of her son’s emotional disturbance, yet was unable
to do anything about it. If this is the truth, then Pat Pulling
has been lying in BADD publications and in her media appearances.
That the loss of her son was a tragedy, preventable or otherwise,
is not a point of debate. Being truthful and honest about his
death is. Her willingness to portray two different stories
concerning his suicide – including the reprinting of edited news
accounts of same – indicates a lack of perspective concerning the
incident. This tunnel vision bleeds over into BADD, as if only
through the destruction of games and now Satanism, she can
somehow make sense of her son’s final act.
This contradiction surrounding Bink’s death is not the only
evidence of her lack of perspective. In the back of her book, she
lists resources for interested and troubled individuals. Starting
on page 198, these resources include her own BADD organization
and continue including explanations of who and what a few of the
organizations listed actually are. One resource that comes
without an explanation is “Radical Teens for Christ”.22
Radical Teens for Christ is the “ministry” of Sean R. Sellers and
the address is that at which he receives his mail on death row in
the Oklahoma State Penitentiary at McAlester. Sean is a convicted
triple murderer who murdered a convenience store clerk and, six
months later, shot his parents to death while they slept. After
his conviction, Sean became “born again” and is quite anxious to
help other troubled children. His good intentions aside, it seems
incredible that Mrs. Pulling would list a diagnosed sociopath as
a “resource” without even a single line of explanation in her
book.
“Lies, damn lies and statistics”
Mark Twain attributes the above to Benjamin Disraeli, but neither
man probably could have dreamed of the odd statistical “evidence”
Pat Pulling is capable of pulling out to prove the existence of a
Satanic conspiracy.
In January of 1988 Pat Pulling stated, in a Style Weekly article,
she “conservatively estimates that about 8 percent of the
Richmond [VA]-area population is involved with Satanic worship at
some level.” A Richmond News Leader article notes this would be
roughly 56,000 people, “more than the number of United Methodists
in the Richmond area and nearly the entire population of Hanover
County.”23
In an interview for that story Mrs. Pulled redefined “Satanic
worship” as “occult” and said it included “dabbling in witchcraft
and such New Age activities as channeling.” She went on to say
that she had gotten the 8% figure by “estimating 4 percent of the
area’s teenagers, and 4 percent of the adults, were involved. She
added the figures.”24
The reporter informed her that mathematically that amounted to 4%
of the total population, but she said it didn’t matter because 8
percent – roughly one out of every dozen citizens – was probably
“conservative” anyway. She went on to add that some of the bodies
from unexplained homicides across the country actually may be
Satanic sacrifice victims. “They certainly have found a number of
unsolved murders with no motive, haven’t they?”25
An earlier Richmond Times-Dispatch article noted, “Authorities
have estimated that more than 30,000 people nationwide –
including doctors, lawyers and other professionals – practice...
alternative religion [like Satanism and other cults].”26 In that
same article, one that predates both the 8 percent solution and
its defense, Pulling is quoted as saying, “To me, this is just
like any other fanatic type of group. They’re not large in
numbers, but they create a lot of problems.”27
Barely seven months earlier another Richmond Times-Dispatch
article about Pulling estimated the number of Satanists at
“300,000 nationally.”28 It was noted they come from “as many as
four generations of Satanists and from feeding stream of
teenagers recruited with promise of easy drugs and sex and the
ultimate in revolt against parental control. ‘We’ve found that
the people in Satanism can be found on all levels of society,’
says Pat Pulling...’Across the country, doctors, lawyers,
clergymen, even police are involved in this.’” In this particular
story she also makes her famous 8 percent remark, but it goes
unquestioned and uncorrected.
Mrs. Pulling gives us a number of conflicting images in these
stories. First we have 300,000 Satanists involved in all levels
of society, including the police, lawyers and even members of the
clergy. Seven months pass and they’ve been reduced to a tenth of
their former number, but they still comprise 8% of the Richmond
area population. At this point Mrs. Pulling calls them “not large
in number.” Later yet she defends her error in estimating 56,000
people of Richmond as being Satanists by noting her estimate was
“conservative.”
The important thing to note here is that Pulling’s statistics and
comments tend to vary wildly. If there was a distinct threat, one
that could be dealt with in a clear manner, the statistics would
support her theories. The fluctuation in her numbers, and the way
the level of the Satanic threat seems to vary from interview to
interview suggests either an impotent conspiracy that is
collapsing, or a phantom conspiracy that could never supply
reliable statistics because it doesn’t exist.
One other thing must be examined concerning the conspiracy theory
Mrs. Pulling flogs. She notes that the police have plenty of
murders nationwide with no motive and suggests that many of them
could be victims of Satanic crime. In doing this she is applying
negative evidence to show that a vast conspiracy exists and
murders people.
This, obviously, is a fallacious argument. That same negative
evidence can used to “prove” that molemen from beneath the
surface of the earth have perpetrated these murders. The fact
that the molemen have left no evidence behind proves how good
they are at remaining hidden. That no sewer or road building
projects have ever cut across their tunnels proves that
politicians and engineers and other professionals are in league
with the molemen. Just as obviously, anyone who denies the
molemen exist is either in league with them, or is a fool who
cannot see the end coming.
No one would deny that Richard Ramierez, the Nightstalker, went
on a murder spree in Los Angeles. Similarly no one would deny
that Ramierez claimed he was sacrificing people to Satan. No one
would deny that graffiti with pentagrams shows up on walls and
bridges all over the United States. Sean Sellers clearly claims
his murders were performed in the name of Satan. However, the
isolated acts of individuals, deranged or being rebelliously
committing acts of vandalism, does not an invisible conspiracy
make.
Once that line is crossed, once an individual starts linking up
disparate actions and events into a conspiratorial web, any
subsequent action can be made to fit in the web with incredible
ease. Individuals who believe that that a cartel of International
Bankers are working to form a One World Government can take
something as wonderful as the collapse of the Warsaw Pact and
turn it into a sinister portent of things to come. There is no
end to it, just like there is no logic to it, or evidence to
support it.
Magical World View
In her “The Who What When Where and How of Teen Satanism” she
appends to the HOW section this curious note: “TWO BASIC
PRINCIPLES APPY HERE ‘Law of Attraction’ and the ‘Law of
Invitation.’” These are not laws in any judicial sense, they are
“Laws of Magick” and they govern the supernatural in the same way
that the Laws of Thermodynamics govern our physical reality.
There is no doubt about it, Patricia Pulling fervently believes
that devils and demons not only exist, but they can be summoned
and used to cause physical effects in our world.
This belief system could easily be dismissed as a harmless
idiosyncrasy, but it is not. Law does not recognize the existence
of magick because there is no evidence to prove magick exists or
is a mechanism for accomplishing anything in the world. If the
law were to recognize magick as a force in our world, everyone
who ever threw a dart into a picture of Quadafi could be indicted
for attempted murder – and if magic were a force in the real
world, the man would have expired long ago from multiple-magical
dart wounds.
Certainly, a majority of citizens in the United States believe in
Heaven and Hell, in God and angels and the devil, but individuals
ascribing to a magical world view carry things much further than
that. In the last century, to remove things from a Christian
Fundamentalist setting for a moment, American Indians fervently
believed that when they performed a Ghost Dance the gods would
come and help sweep the white man from the face of the continent.
In China, during the Boxer Rebellion, certain Chinese believe
that a specific set of exercises would make them immune to
Western bullets.
In neither of those cases, though the practitioners held their
world view to be the complete and utter truth, did magic
accomplish its ends. The Indians still ended up in reservations.
The Boxers died when shot. Tossing a dart into a Quadafi picture
has not killed him, nor did burning Reagan in effigy in Tripoli
kill the former President.
Quite plainly, mixing the supernatural with law enforcement
should be avoided at all costs. It is vital to be wary of a
magical world view, especially as it applies to criminal
investigations. The reason for this caution is simple: when one
starts looking for magick and symbolism, one sees it everyw
Below, in the section concerning Mrs. Pulling’s alleged expertise
in role playing games, she objects because a role playing game,
Tunnels and Trolls, requires the use of three six-sided dice in
character generation, creating the possibility of the pattern 6,
6, 6.29 This is the famed “Number of the Beast” from Revelations,
but in the game, triple sixes are treated as an 18 and is
considered a great score. In other words, to the gamers, the
pattern is not 6, 6, 6, but is 18 and is treated with no greater
significance than that.
Symbolic manipulation can get nasty, however. The number 18 is
obviously composed of 6+6+6. For this reason 18 can be seen as
“shorthand” for “the number of the Beast.” In a similar vein, the
number 29 can be seen as a pair of nines or two nines, which
added together produces 18, which is, after all, 6,6,6. And so it
goes.
To be sure this is convoluted logic at its worst, but convoluted
and tortured logic is all we have to work with in this case. This
is the same sort of logic that sees skateboarding equipment with
the word “Natas” on it and determines that word is really “Satan”
spelled backward. While that is true, Natas (the male form of
Natasha) happens to be the equipment designer’s first name. (It
is a common enough name in Eastern Europe, which is where the
designer’s family came from.)
It is that same sort of logic that could make all sorts of
sinister things out of the fact that Pat Pulling’s questionnaire
has 13 questions. Thirteen is the number of people who appear in
a coven, therefore it is an evil number. While it is probably
just coincidence that Pulling’s questionnaire had 13 questions,
the fact that one question was repeated twice might seem rather
suspicious...
And so it goes.
One of the most dangerous aspects of a magical world view is that
it repopulates our world with demons that can force us to do
things we do not want to do. As a result, adults no longer have
to accept responsibility for themselves or their unruly children.
Whereas the line, “The devil made me do it,” brought laughs
twenty years ago, now it is seen as a defense for murder, an
excuse for suicide and a shelter from blame for a host of other
crimes.
Worst of all, this magical world view brings with it a fanatical
self-righteousness that slops over into accusations of diabolical
duplicity when it is questioned. Doubting the existence of
Satanism and a conspiracy is not just doubting the evidence for
the same. It is not just doubting the word of a witness
concerning sacrifices of which one can find no trace. Within the
magical world view, the mere act of doubting becomes an act of
treason against God. To question the existence of a worldwide
Satanic conspiracy means the skeptic is either a high ranking
member of that conspiracy out to spread disinformation, or a
poor, pitiful, ignorant dupe of that conspiracy.
A magical world view enables a person to see relationships
between things that do not exist. It invests power in things that
cannot be controlled and, therefore, responsibility for actions
does not have to be accepted. It creates around a believer a smug
cocoon that insulates him from any fragment of reality that might
disturb him. Finally, it puts everyone who dares challenge their
beliefs in the camp of the Enemy in some cosmic struggle between
good and evil.
In reality, a person questioning the existence of the Satanic
conspiracy is merely pointing out that the emperor is wearing no
clothes. In that case, one can understand why the emperor’s
tailors get upset and suggest the person doing the pointing is a
tool of the devil. Then the question comes down to one of whether
the crowd will believe the evidence they have before them, or if
they will buy into the tailors’ fantasies.
“Expert Witness”
In her book The Devil’s Web she says she has given testimony in a
number of trials and cites three as standing out in her mind. “My
role was that of jury education, explaining to the jury members
the game of ‘Dungeons & Dragons’ and how it is played.”30 That
she could be hired to give testimony in a court of law as an
expert on games is quite chilling. The only solace to be found in
this is that, at least in the three cases she cites, her client
was convicted and sentenced to death or life without parole.
Mrs. Pulling says in her book, “A number of other fantasy
role-playing games exist, and most are imitations of ‘Dungeons &
Dragons.’ Some of the most popular ones are ‘Tunnels & Trolls’,
‘The Arduin Grimoire’, ‘Runequest’, ‘Empire of the Petal Throne’,
‘Nuclear Escalation’, ‘Traveller’, ‘Boot Hill’, ‘Demons’, ‘The
Court of Ardor’, ‘Melee & Wizard’, Metamorphosis Alpha’, and
‘Gamma World’.”31
Tunnels & Trolls is still in print and has even been
computerized. Versions of this game have been
translated into French, German, Italian and Japanese.
T&T does include magic, but has no religious system
included or implied in the game. The game has been
available since 1975, has had five editions, but has
seen its sales dwindle since 1985. Its chief claim to
fame was in its line of solo adventures to be played by
single players. (Through the solo line the author
became involved in T&T and has designed six solo
adventures for that system.) Her main objection to T&T
is that “In this game you obtain your character by
rolling 3 six-sided dice (6,6,6)...”32
The Arduin Grimoire is a set of unsanctioned D&D
supplements written by Dave Hargraves. Hargraves’
company went under in the mid-1980s, but a publisher in
Texas kept his work in print and brought out new books
as he wrote them. Hargraves died in 1988 and recently a
company in San Francisco has considered bringing his
books back into print. Arduin’s highest point of
distribution came in the early 80’s, but because of the
violence depicted in the game, most shops don’t stock
it and won’t sell it. At best 30,000 copies of the
books were probably produced and the author knows of no
translations.
Runequest is one of the most popular RPGs and was the
first to break away from using “levels” to gauge
character development. It has been translated into
several languages, but annual sales have slipped since
1986 when the Avalon Hill Game Company took over
publication from the Chaosium. Runequest likewise
suffers, in Pulling’s opinion, from the use of 3
six-sided dice for rolling characters (6,6,6).33
Empire of the Petal Throne was originally published by
TSR. It went out of print in the early 80s, then
reappeared from Gamescience in 1983. The game is
virtually unknown in 1990 and difficult to find in
gaming stores.
Nuclear Escalation is not a role-playing game at all.
The author knows this because he helped develop this
sequel to the Nuclear War card game. It is another card
game. Pulling put it on the list in Primer on the basis
of ad copy in an unspecified magazine. The text she has
excerpted includes the phrase “Nuclear Escalation card
game” in it.34 (Having written the ad originally, the
author made sure the game was clearly seen as a card
game.)
Traveller is a science fiction role-playing game
published by Game Designers Workshop. The game has been
changed and is now published under the title
Megatraveller, with Traveller 2300 AD being another
title in that line. This game has neither magic nor
religion, though the occasional psionic ability (ESP,
Telepathy, etc.) could be taken by some as demonic. It
is a very popular game.
Boot Hill was a wild west game published by TSR. It has
been out of print since the mid 1980s.35
Demons was a small board game from SPI, Inc. It
appeared in 1980/81 and has been out of print since
1982. SPI was later absorbed by TSR and the game has
not been reissued.
The Court of Ardor is not a role playing game, but an
adventure for the Middle Earth Role Playing Game (a
game based on the world of J. R. R. Tolkien’s Lord of
The Rings). (It cannot be used except in conjunction
with the MERP rules or with another RPG after extensive
revision.) Iron Crown Enterprises first published it in
1983 and it was the toughest/highest level adventure
produced for that game system. It has been out of print
for the last couple of years and there are no immediate
plans to reprint it.
Melee & Wizard is actually two games: Melee and Wizard.
Melee was a man to man combat game and Wizard was a
magic duel game. The two could be combined for larger
battles. Designed by Steve Jackson, they were published
by Metagaming. They have been out of print since
Metagaming’s collapse in 1983.
Metamorphosis Alpha and Gamma World were both TSR
products released in the late 70s and early 80s. MA is
out of print, though Gamma World had a revised edition
in 1986. Gamma World has been revived as Gammarauders,
but the two games have little more than concept in
common.
Of the thirteen games on the Pulling list, we have:
5 out of print
5 in serious decline
2 that are not role playing games at all
1 is still popular, but goes under a different name
One for thirteen as a score for a self-acknowledged game “expert”
is rather low.
Mrs. Pulling’s expertise with games apparently ends with 1983
because all of the products she lists in her 1989 book were
printed before then, and none that have hit the market since are
covered or even mentioned with the exception explained below.
Mrs. Pulling continues her listing of games in Web by noting, “In
England, a fantasy role-playing game is being played by mail. A
news article headline reads, ‘Kids sent murder in the mail.’
...The game is called ‘It’s A Crime,’ and details have been
mailed to homes all over England.”36
What Mrs. Pulling – the game “expert” – fails to understand, is
that “It’s A Crime” is a game that was created and is still being
run here in the United States. It has been available since 1985
and is produced by Adventures By Mail – a company in New York.
The game deals with building up a criminal cartel, which is not a
subject that is particularly attractive, but “It’s a Crime” has
enjoyed a modest following since its inception.
She continues on, calling “Further into Fantasy” a “popular
fantasy-by-mail game in England.” She links it to the case of
Michael Ryan, a young man who went on a shooting spree in
England. What she does not know is that the game was very small,
had no more than two dozen players and was being run by two
Swedes in Scotland. The game collapsed after the Michael Ryan
incident and the Swedes fled the country. No charges of any sort
have been brought against them and no one – except game “expert”
Pat Pulling – has suggested Ryan’s involvement in the game had
anything to do with his madness.
Has Pat Pulling Ever Played a Role-Playing Game?
Pat says she spent “several hours a day every day for a month”37
learning how to play the game Dungeons & Dragons®. Her grasp of
RPGs is weak, however, and can be pointed up through things she
has written. Or, in the case of the How the Game Is Played
section of The Devil’s Web, things she has rewritten.
The quotes below come from two sources: Pat’s book The Devil’s
Web and the slightly infamous (within gaming circles) Darren
Molitor Letter. Darren’s letter was published in BADD material
and even ended up, in electronic form, distributed over computer
bulletin board systems by a group calling themselves “Computers
for Christ.” The excerpts are provided below for contrast. You
will see that the pieces from The Devil’s Web closely resemble
their source material. They were not adjusted in any way that
would indicate an understanding of games on the part of Pat
Pulling or her co-writer Kathy Cawthon.
The Devil’s Web:
The game itself is set in the middle ages. Each player
is solely responsible for the actions of his character,
and all players are under the direction of the Dungeon
Master. Play begins with the six rolls of dice by each
participant who then uses the six numbers he has rolled
to organized the traits of his character (based upon
strength, intelligence, wisdom, constitution, dexterity
and charisma). If he wishes, he may roll again to
determine the physical size of his character after
which he assigns his persona a race (such as elf,
dwarf, etc.), a class (occupation) and an alignment
(attitude or outlook).38
The Darren Molitor Letter:
The game is called “Dungeons & Dragons” and it is a
fantasy role-playing game. As you can probably assume
from the title it is set in the medieval era of our
time or history. Because it is a game of “fantasy”
anything is possible and being a “role-playing” game
means you act as a character of that time as if you
were on stage. But there is no physical action on the
player’s part. Everything is played or imagined in the
mind. And you, as the player, are the sole person
responsible for the action of your character or
characters. You control him totally. His/her actions,
words feelings, thought. Everything about this
character you control.
To obtain a “character”,[sic] a player must first roll
three six-sided dice. Add up the numbers rolled and
write it down. A player does this six times and then he
must organize the numbers he has rolled to the six
characteristics of his character. The six
characteristics are strength, intelligence, wisdom,
constitution, dexterity and charisma. These
characteristics are the “heart” of your character.
After which the player may roll to obtain the height
and weight or he/she may choose it. The player assigns
a race to the character, a class, which is his/her
occupation and the alignment. An alignment is the
character’s attitude or outlook on life.39
The Devil’s Web:
[The Dungeon Master’s] major responsibility is to
create an adventure or dungeon for the characters.
Books are available with prepared dungeons, but most
DMs prefer to create the dungeons themselves. He must
invent the scenery that the characters may encounter in
the course of the adventure, the climate, the smells,
the monsters and the treasure. This process can take
from 36 to 48 hours of work. One woman has left her
career to be a full-time DM; she is supported entirely
by her D&D players.40
The Darren Molitor Letter:
The DM has a lot of responsibility, as you can imagine.
For example, the DM must create an adventure or
dungeon. There are many books called modules with
“dungeons” already prepared, but for the most part the
DM creates them himself/herself. He/she must create the
scenery (indoor, outdoor, underground, the various and
numerable characters a player may encounter, the
temperature, the smell, the monsters and the treasure.
[sic] It is a very long and tedious process and the
average dungeon takes anywhere from 36-48 hours of
work. There is one case of the game being followed,
that the DM, a lady, has quit her job and does nothing
except create and prepare a dungeon for her players.
She has created an entire country. The players of the
group support her living necessities. They pay for her
home, her groceries, her bills, etc.41
The first block of text from Darren is an accurate, if confused,
explanation of how a character is created for D&D®, though the
description would apply to many role playing games in general.
Mrs. Pulling’s version of the text is nothing more than a
condensation of the Molitor text. Not only it it utterly devoid
of editorial comments and elaborations, but it retains the
rambling, stream-of-consciousness organization of the original.
In a recent letter I asked Darren Molitor if he knew his essay
about gaming was still being circulated. He replied, “It is hard
to believe that my ‘letter’ is still being distributed through
the country.”42
He goes on to note:
At the time of the writing I was under a lot of tension
and completely in confusion because I was still
awaiting my trial. I say this because I may have gone a
little overboard.
...Though I no longer feel the game is dangerous for
everyone as it was for me I do feel it can be harmful
if circumstances occur.43
Pat Pulling is unaware of Darren’s change of heart about the game
and the harm it can do, or so it seems. In the Devil’s Web she
asserts, “Darren works hard today, writing from his prison cell
to warn others about the dangers of fantasy role playing
games.”44 This when Darren, still in that cell, was surprised to
know his letter was still being distributed.
While it is indeed possible to lavish an incredible amount of
time in building up a world for gaming, the situation is not as
clear cut as Pulling’s second text excerpt would like to make it.
The total number of hours spent probably dwarfs the numbers given
above, but it is time spent both gaming and in one or two hour
bites here and there. The first adventure a player creates might
take 10 or 12 hours to get perfect, but very few folks have the
gumption to make their game a full time job. As the learning
curve progresses, design time becomes shorter and some
individuals, the author included, run games totally off the cuff
– with no preparation time at all.
Yes, games can be time consuming, but what relaxing hobby is
immune from that criticism?
It would be fallacious to suggest the only way a doctor could
cure a disease is to have survived a bout with the disease
himself. On the other hand, an expert in gaming would be expected
to have an understanding of a game, and few are the people who
can fully comprehend all the nuances and features of a game
without playing it. Pat herself confirms her experience is
limited, “Admittedly, I did play the game for only a short
time.”45
Just reading the rules of chess and learning how to move the
pieces does not impart the understanding of the game that playing
it several times does. Certainly a month spent playing chess
would not be enough to make one an “expert” at it, much less an
“expert” in all chess-like games. How then can Mrs. Pulling claim
to be an expert in games after so little experience with and
understanding of games?
Summary
With Mrs. Pulling’s fear and loathing of RPGs, her reluctance to
play and fully comprehend the games is understandable. Why,
however, has this fear prevented her from keeping abreast of the
games that are currently being manufactures and sold in the US
and around the world? Why has she been prevented from doing
market research? Why does she cite, in a recent book, games that
are no longer available? Why isn’t she up to date with the trends
in gaming, which now include a multi-media approach that produces
novels and computer versions of games right along with the paper
and pencil originals? Why has she never mentioned the DragonLance
series of novels? Based on a Dungeons & Dragons campaign, they
went on to become best selling books ranked on the New York Times
Bestseller List, but Mrs. Pulling remains blissfully ignorant of
their existence.
It is clear that Mrs. Pulling is not an expert in games. She
takes as gospel the word of a confused youth who was convicted of
murder and gives it her imprimatur. Moreover she casts him in the
role of a diligent foe of games, clearly at odds with his own
feelings on the matter. As Darren notes, “I must be honest in
that I have 3 AD&D books here [in prison] (lost my dice) because
I can’t part with them.”46
Her status as a game “expert” might seem to have little to do
with her standing as an expert in cult crimes. Even ignoring the
fact that her son’s gaming related death got her started in her
career, her course of action concerning games provides a scary
look into her tactics and methods. The techniques she uses to
condemn games hardly inspire confidence in her ability to pursue
occult crime investigations with an open mind.
Above she has been shown to manufacture evidence by editing
newspaper accounts. She has reprinted material without having any
understanding of its content. She has created documents that, if
used as she intends them, generate incompetent or misleading
intelligence reports for law enforcement. She claims expertise
where she has none, then makes no attempt to stay current with a
field in which she claims that expertise. Her “investigations”
consist of little more than reprinting newspaper articles or
having chats with confused and scared young men in prison for
serious crimes. She also attaches cosmic significance to trivial
or incorrect information, then extrapolates from it. When caught
in an error, she rationalizes it by saying she’s being
“conservative.”
The Devil’s Web
Patricia Pulling’s book is a monument to illogical thinking and
innuendo. It is not sourced, though a bibliography is provided.
Countless cases are reported with vague detail and pseudonyms so
that no verification is possible for the “facts” they present.
Most of the material printed is loosely rewritten from a host of
BADD documents, or involves reprints of newspaper clippings. If
not for its value in presenting ample evidence of Pat Pulling’s
incompetence, the book would less than worthless.
Right from the start Pat Pulling shows the reader the sort of
logical deductive ability that helped convince the State of
Virginia to license her as a private investigator:
I asked [a store clerk] where I could find a
[gamemaster to teach her D&D], and she showed me a
bulletin board filled with personal ads posted by
people who wanted to act as Dungeon Masters and others
who wanted to join gaming groups.
It all sounded pretty complicated to me and, as an
adult, I had better sense than to call up someone I
didn’t know and ask him to get together with me to play
a game I didn’t know anything about. Instead, I went to
a local college and hung around until I spotted some
young men carrying “Dungeons and Dragons” books under
their arms.47
The logic of refusing to call a stranger to teach you a game
versus seeking a stranger out for a face to face meeting escapes
the author. Strangers are strangers, and in meeting one to
investigate a strange game or strange anything else, being safely
at the other end of a phone is preferable to a face to face meet.
Time and again Mrs. Pulling cites as gospel allegation by sources
that are dubious at best. In The Devil’s Web we get to see a
picture of Pat Pulling shaking hands with Henry Lee Lucas, a
serial murderer who has claimed, at various times, to have
murdered upward of 360 people. Mrs. Pulling notes:
“I was amazed at the accuracy with which Henry Lee
Lucas (who is almost illiterate and who has little more
than a fifth-grade education) related his alleged
involvement with [the Hand of Death] cult. He described
rituals and methodology that only could be known by
someone who has participated in cult activities.”48
The faulty reasoning here takes two directions. First Mrs.
Pulling clearly believes, given her statement, that books or
participation in cult activity are the only ways to learn of it.
Clearly watching any of a number of B-movies that featured
Satanic rituals in them could have provided Lucas with more than
enough source material for his tales of ritual murder.
Second, and of more importance, Henry Lee Lucas has repudiated
the vast majority of his confessions. He has pointed out, again
and again, that police brought him to murder sites and prompted
his recollections of particular murders. With this coaching, akin
to that of children in the McMartin case, of course he was able
to supply details known only to the killer. In addition to that,
the vast majority of articles concerning Lucas and his case do
not mention the Hand of Death Cult.
Mrs. Pulling’s infatuation with unreliable evidence does not end
with Lucas.
The question concerning “organized satanic networks”
comes up at seminars and conferences where I speak. to
date, there may not be sufficient information or
evidence gathered to say without a doubt that such
networks exist. However, there is quite a bit of
information that the non-criminal occultist do network
with one another through newsletters and computer
bulletin board systems. If these hard-line occultists
are actively networking, it would be quite naive of us
to assume that the destructive criminal cults do not do
the same.
Another example of possible networking unfolded several
years ago. I received a document in a plain brown
envelope that I have not shared with anyone prior to
the writing of this book. The lengthy report was on
official government investigative report forms; it is
frightening in the information it contains.
That report, dated and signed on April 10, 1975, is
summarized here... [and concerns cattle mutilation]
The investigator had determined that a certain pattern
existed in the cattle mutilation cases (which numbers
over a hundred in an eight-state area). In most of
these cases, the animal had been found int he middle of
an open field. Body parts (which included eyes, ears,
lips, tongue, teats and sex organs) had been removed
surgically. In many of the cases, the animals had been
drained of all blood; in several of the cases,
veterinarians had been unable to determine the cause of
death. In nearly every case, no tracks were visible on
the ground near the animals’ bodies, and no blood
spills or stains were found.49
The obvious problem with this little piece is that the report,
and all the parts of it printed on pages 57-63 are utterly and
completely without facts that can be verified. In book printed in
1984, Mute Evidence, authors Daniel Kagan and Ian Summers lay to
rest any sinister causes of cattle mutilations. In an exhaustive
work – which deals primarily with UFO-sourced mutilations, but
does touch on cult allegations – the authors show that cattle
mutilations are nothing more sinister than natural scavengers
chewing up animals that have been dead for days out on the range
before discovery.
This layering of urban myth (cattle mutilations) upon urban myth
(Satanic conspiracy) to create “proof” of a sinister reality is a
fascinating technique that expands the target market for the
Satanist Crusade. Anyone who ever heard of cattle mutilations and
was intrigued by them now has a new explanation in the form of
Satanic Cults. Instead of flying saucers plucking cattle from
range land and mutilating them without a trace, now cultists do
this by means of helicopters or cherry-pickers. Whereas any
number of sensible folks derided the UFO explanation for cattle
mutilations, now that cattle are centerpieces in the war between
God and Satan, their dead bodies become proof of the
insidiousness of the Satanic plot.
It is curious, then, that Satanists would not dispose of the
cattle corpses as well as they do those of their unreported human
victims. If the Satanist Cabal is really that cautious, are they
mocking people with these cattle killings?
Exploits and Allies
Pat Pulling’s odyssey through the wasteland of cult crimes has
gathered to her a truly interesting band of characters.
Descriptions of several of the more prominent ones have been
included below because Pat relies heavily upon them and
information they provide her to bolster her convictions
concerning occult crime.
Cassandra “Sam” Hoyer
Cassandra “Sam” Hoyer is a woman who claims that she was raised
in New England to become a High Priestess for a Satanic Cult.
Both she and Pulling appeared on the same KFYI radio show in
Phoenix on Satanism during the fall of 1987.
In a news magazine article Sam says she was given over to the
cult at the age of 3 by her mother. She was “born physically
perfect and so was found acceptable to Satan. Her twin sister was
born with a deformed foot. The sister was ritually murdered, she
says.”50 On KFYI Sam elaborated, saying she was trained until the
age of 17 to be the High Priestess. At that time she was sent out
into the world even though she had witnessed multiple murders.
She confessed to having consumed some of her sister’s body at the
time of her murder.
In a Richmond News Leader story she said she was, at the age of
9, “ritually burned and I was one who didn’t [die]. By the grace
of God I didn’t burn, which means I was chosen to be Satan’s high
priestess at the age of 42.”.51 [Note: God makes Satan’s draft
picks for him!] She also said she was tortured and abused for 16
years, then hypnotized into forgetting everything later. “When I
turned 39 they would attempt to tap back into my
consciousness.”52
In another article Sam’s psychotherapist said she suffered from
multiple personality disorder53. The article goes on to relate
that Ms. Hoyer began to realize she was a Satanic cult victim
while undergoing psychotherapy in recent years.
In the KFYI radio program callers were allowed to as questions of
the guests. The most telling question for Hoyer came when a male
caller asked, “Do Satanists believe in an afterlife?” Sam
answered, “Oh, no, I don’t think so.” This from a woman who was
being trained to be a High Priestess?
It doesn’t take someone in the College of Cardinals, or a
seminary graduate to answer that question from the Catholic point
of view. How is it, then, that a woman being trained to hold
sacrifices couldn’t answer that question? Even Bob Larson, noted
radio preacher, said Satanists spend eternity with Satan, so at
least one cult “expert” believes Satanists believe in an
afterlife.54 In a situation where a guessed answer had a 50%
chance of being right, Ms. Hoyer balked.
And why, if Cassandra Hoyer is so terrified of Satanists finding
her, is she willing to go public with her story, letting people
know she lives and has lived in Richmond for the past nine years?
If these Satanists are so good at making all their other victims
disappear, why has Hoyer survived? Could not a conspiracy of
doctors and lawyers and cops and clergymen cover up her death or
make it seem like an accident?
By her own analyst’s admission, Hoyer is a very sick woman. To be
exploiting her illness is not a good thing.
Darren Lee Molitor
Darren Lee Molitor murdered Mary Towey by wrapping a bandage
around her throat tightly enough to kill her in a “Friday the
13th joke.” Mrs. Pulling notes that Darren’s case was the first
court case in which she became involved. “My involvement began
with a phone call from Darren’s Attorney, Lee Patton of St.
Louis, Missouri.”55 She goes on to note, “My role was that of
jury education, explaining to the jury members the game of
‘Dungeons & Dragons’ and how it is played.”56 She give the
impression that after “several frustrating days as the
prosecution continued to object to any testimony related to
‘Dungeons & Dragons,’”57 she was allowed to speak before the
jury. “On several occasions, the jury was removed from the
courtroom.... Finally, I was allowed to testify with my
statements strictly confined to an overview of D&D.”58
Darren Molitor remembers the situation described a bit
differently than Mrs. Pulling reports it.
Ms. Pulling contacted either my parents or my lawyer
after her husband saw a St. Louis newspaper with my
case in it. She and Dr. Radecki did testify at my
trial, but is was “off the record.” In other words it
went into the transcript but the jurors were not
allowed to hear it because it was ruled irrelevant.59
As noted above, Darren is not, as Mrs. Pulling said in her book,
“[working] hard today, writing from his prison cell to warn
others about the dangers of fantasy role-playing games.”60 In
fact, according to Darren, the distribution of his “letter”
concerning D&D was out of his hands. “Pat Pulling did all of the
work in distribution. As far as that goes; how many, when ,
where, etc., I have no idea.”61
Sean Sellers
Sean is a disturbed young man who murdered his parents while they
slept. Six months previously he and a friend slew a
convenience-store clerk. Sean claimed not to have remembered
killing his parents until after his conviction. At that time Sean
underwent a conversion to Christianity and confessed his sins to
a number of different people. His and their explanation for his
murders is that his body was taken over by the demon “Ezurate”
during the murder of his parents. “Sean Sellers says that’s
exactly what happened to him.”62
Since that time Sean has appeared on Geraldo Rivera’s show,
including the special on Satanism, and has done a number of radio
appearances with Bob Larson – including a Cult Crime Seminar
Larson held in November of 1989. In late 1989 the author entered
into a correspondence with Sean and has also spoken with him on
the phone.
Of Sean, Pat Pulling writes, “Sean had become involved with D&D
when he was around 13-years-old and, while he had used some of
the typical game characters, he stated that he preferred the
Egyptian Gods. This interest had created a desire in Sean to dig
deeper into a variety of occult topics.”63 Mrs. Pulling goes on
to give the impression that Sean’s involvement with D&D® led
directly to his involvement with Satanism and the subsequent
murders for which he was charged and convicted.
This view of Sean is contradicted by Sean himself.
When I was playing D&D I was not a satanist, and in
fact would probably have punched any Satanist I met
right in the mouth. I was interested in witchcraft and
Zen however. In doing some research at the library for
a D&D adventure I was leading I happened upon the other
books that led to my study of occultism.
...to be fair to TSR [the manufacturer of D&D] and in
the spirit of honesty I must concede that D&D
contributed to my involvement in Satanism like an
interest in electronics can contribute to building a
bomb. Like the decision to build a bomb, I had already
made decisions of a destructive nature before I
incorporated D&D materials into my coven projects, and
it was Satanism not D&D that had a decisive role in my
crimes.64
While Sean does feel a Satanic menace does exist in America, he
does not stand four-square behind Pat Pulling. “Patricia has an
aptitude for going beyond moderation...”65 Of those who would
seek to make him an example of what happens to game players, as
Mrs. Pulling has repeatedly done, Sean writes, “...using my past
as a common example of the effects of the game is either
irrational or fanatical.”66
Dr. Thomas Radecki
Dr. Radecki is the founder of the National Coalition of
Television Violence (NCTV). He has been a prime ally for Pat
Pulling since her early war on games. On one of the NCTV’s press
releases concerning “game related deaths” Pat Pulling is listed
as a person to contact.67 Radecki describes himself as “A
board-certified psychiatrist with a busy private practice and...
a research director [with] the NCTV.”68
In a Comics Journal interview, Radecki was asked if the NCTV had
any ideological bias. He replied:
I hope not. I imagine that – you know, we’re only
human. But I hope not. ...I don’t know where the
ideological bias would be. I’m not aware of one.69
Despite that denial, a look at NCTV material gives a different
view. In one issue of the NCTV newsletter Dr. Radecki himself
authored an article entitled, “Christ, Forgiveness, Pardon, and
Trust”70 in which he proceeds to explain, with copious Biblical
citations, the true meaning of Christ’s teachings on the subject
of forgiveness. On the Bob Larson Radio Show, as a spokesman for
NCTV, Radecki repeatedly criticized Saturday morning cartoon
violence as being contrary to the teachings of Jesus Christ, once
again using numerous Biblical quotes to back himself up.71
The difficulty posed by a Fundamentalist Christian bias is
two-fold. First, as a tenet of faith, a Fundamentalist accepts
the existence of the devil and his ability to exercise power in
the real world. This means he is predisposed to seeing Satanism
and declaring it evil. From there it is a simple step to link
anything he perceives as evil backward with Satanism.
This link forms a very strong bond that precludes value neutral
examination of a subject because, in the war between God and
Satan, neutrality cannot exist. Either you are with God, or you
are of the Devil. This is the magical world view again with its
full Christian trappings. Putting a Fundamentalist in charge of
an investigation of Satanism would be as foolish as having an all
New York Umpire crew for a Mets-Dodgers World Series.
The religious bias of the NCTV is less of a problem than their
research methods. Their study of best selling books from
1905-1988, was undertaken “to determine whether there has been an
increase in violent themes in bestseller books during the 20th
century.”72 One would assume, given the scope of the study,
reviewers would be asked to read all of the books on the list and
to rate the books for acts of violence, both pro- and
anti-social. This, however, was not how the study was done.
Dr. Radecki explains:
NCTV invested hundreds of hours of work in the
bestseller study so as to be as objective and fair as
possible. The total cost of the study with all its
aspects is close to $8,000 and took over three years
for its initial beginning with many reworkings. [The
study has one primary researcher and two other major
contributors.] NCTV considered reading the entirety of
the 800 books involved in the bestseller study, but
found that some of the books would have been difficult
to obtain and the cost of the study would have tripled,
beyond the financial abilities of NCTV to undertake.73
While sympathetic to Dr. Radecki’s plight, the author cannot help
but wonder if Dr. Radecki has never heard of borrowing a book
from a library. If the library does not have the book, obtaining
it through Inter-Library Loan is a very common and simple
practice. As well, with research projects of merit, grants are
often available, and a grant could easily have provided the money
necessary to get a copies of the books unavailable from the
library or through ILL.
Having gone through the list Dr. Radecki supplies with the study,
the author of this report has determined there are, in fact, only
725 books on the list because some books appear on the list in
two or more years. In fact, one book, The Robe by Lloyd C.
Douglas, made the list four times (#7 in 1942, #1 in 1943, #2 in
1945 and # 1 in 1953 again). Despite this remarkable track
record, this book was not read for the study.
If the books were not going to be read, how was their violence
rating obtained? The study itself outlines the methodology used:
Book reviews were used for the study from the Book
Review Digest, published annually by R. R. Bowker: New
York....While some of the book reviewers may not have
been as sensitive to violence as they should have been,
a sampling of books actually read by NCTV and their
reviews found that ratings from the book reviews agreed
or were close to agreeing the vast majority of the
time.
...We have found that sometimes book reviewers are not
sensitive to violence, themselves being sensitized.
NCTV has documented this in the case of Time Magazine74
reviewers. The pattern is very similar to that of film
reviewers. Some are sensitive while others positively
enjoy and mistakenly promote the sadistic and sick.75
Instead of reading the books themselves, given 3 people and 3
years in which to read 725 books (1.5 books per week for the
course of the study), book reviews were used to determine the
violence ratings for the bestsellers from 1905-1984. It would be
assumed that the correct books would be dealt with, but the
description of The Yearling suggests that errors did creep in.
The book, which is about a boy and a deer, is described as
“[Jody] and his horse run free, which upsets his parents, and as
the horse grows larger and stronger, they force Jody to give up
his yearling.”76
Moreover, a second phase of the study was conducted with even
less stringent controls:
The second part of the study reviewed book covers of
popular paperback books randomly selected from the
shelves of Waldenbooks and B. Dalton Books in
Champaign, Illinois. The various categories of popular
books were compared and the brief sketches on the book
cover were presumed to be related to the contents of
the books.77
It does not take a rocket scientist to remember that judging a
book by its cover is a dangerous thing. Moreover, as a published
novelist who knows many other published novelists, the author of
this report can state, categorically, that covers and cover
blurbs often bear no connection to the work inside. More often
than not, back cover copy is written by a marketing individual
who has not even read the book! The idea that a paragraph on the
back of a book or the eye-catching excerpt printed on the inside
front page could sum up a novel of over 100,000 words is absurd
and insulting.
This survey technique, not surprisingly, reported the following
results: “An incredible 79% of all paperback books featured
violent themes.”78 Also not much of a surprise, 100% of
Spy/Intrigue and Crime/Detective books were considered violent,
while Sword & Sorcery, Horror and Science Fiction weighed in with
violence percentages of 98, 96 and 81 respectively. Aside from an
unexplained “Other” category, the least violent books appear to
be Modern Romances in which only 33% were considered violent.
The definition of violent, according to the NCTV is, “Any book
whose plot involves physical violence in a significant or crucial
manner. Actual or attempted homicides or rapes are to be few in
number. Also, any book in which the hero (or anti-hero) wins by
using violence in a significant or crucial manner....Romantic
books that teach the rape myth belong in this category.”79
For perspective, Red Storm Rising by Tom Clancy was rated XUnfit.
That classification is defined as “extreme and sadistic violence
with graphic and gruesome characteristics. Intensely callous and
degrading sexual material, especially when associated with
violence tends to fall in this category as well.”80 The Hunt for
the Red October earned the same rating.
Clearly the methodology of the study is flawed. Judging a book on
the basis of a review is nonsensical because one cannot begin to
control for all the different biases of reviewer, any
interpersonal animosity between reviewer and author, or simply a
review that was edited down for space as the magazine went to
press. More importantly, there is no way to determine if the
reviewer actually even read the book, or if the review was
written on the basis of promotional material sent out by the
publisher. The only way to determine the content of a book is to
read it and, if the book is one of a set, to read all of them.
It is with this perspective, then, that we can take a brief look
at the problems with the list of “cases” concerning games and
their diabolical content that both Dr. Radecki and Mrs. Pulling
tout so heavily. Perhaps the author’s favorite of the Pulling
cases is the very first one that appears on the NCTV list: “Name
withheld, details confidential at request of family, age 14,
1979, suicide.”81 This sort of reporting with vague details is
characteristic of 5 other cases on the list of 37 NCTV first
presented.
In yet other case listings, the fact that a person was reported
to have played D&D, as seen above in the Sean Hughes case, is
enough to make his death related to the game, even though the
case has not be solved or closed by the police. If there is any
way for BADD and NCTV to link anything to D&D, the link is forced
and the chain of manufactured evidence grows longer.
One of the “non-fatal” cases listed points this out in exquisite
detail:
A 15-year old girl was reportedly raped in Angleton,
Texas by Armando Simon, 33, a prison psychologist
counseling inmates for sexual crimes. According to
court testimony, the girl was enticed into sex through
an extended D&D game in which she was given the role of
“someone who would lose her powers after doing
something wrong.” Simon played a character constantly
interested in women and his wife would often play a
lesbian. The wife encouraged the sex by showing the
girl photos of Simon naked with other women. She told
the girl, “He always wanted a virgin as a gift.” The
psychologist and the girl first had sex after returning
from a D&D convention in Houston (Houston Chronicle, 8
May 85)82
Not only is it absurd to suggest that the above crime took place
because of D&D, but it is ridiculous to even imply that it would
not have taken place were D&D not around. In her book, Pat
Pulling quotes Dr. Arnold Goldstein, Ph.D, director of the Center
for Research on Aggression at the University of Syracuse, as
saying, “We psychologists use role-playing in therapy... to bring
about good effects.”83 Simon’s seduction of the girl was abuse of
trust between patient and therapist and had nothing to do with a
game.
In 1985, the BADD/NCTV list contained 37 dead individuals and 5
“non-fatal” cases of D&D violence. They note “...there are 8 more
deaths (6 suicides and 2 murders) in which the information is
confidential. Pat Pulling & Tom Radecki are investigating an
additional 7 murders that have been recently reported to us in 3
separate cases. Deaths are being reported at the rate of about 5
per month.” [Emphasis added.] In a January 1987 release, however,
the list has only grown by two murders and the above rate
projection has been amended to read, “Deaths are being reported
at the rate of three to four per month.”
In that two years a couple of changes were made to the list. NCTV
deleted one case (1985, #16, an anonymous suicide). They updated
one case (adding the name Mike Cote to 1985, #37/1987, #36). They
added two cases with a total of 3 victims (Patrick Beach and
Cayce Moore). They also add the Roland Cartier case to this list,
but have it under its own section: “Reported D&D related deaths
with less information available.”
Despite the shuffling, the fact is that 120 new cases did not
materialize between 1985 and 1987. Likewise, 108 new cases did
not arise between 1987 and 1990, despite NCTV’s dire predictions.
In fact, the only new cases to come to light are those of Sean
Sellers, Jeffrey Meyers, Cliff Meling and Daniel Kasten. Adding
the 8 deaths between those four cases to the 39 NCTV has already
still puts us rather shy Pat Pulling’s reported 125 cases.84
As an aside, the 1985 release is the one in which Dr. Radecki
quotes from “the investigative book, ‘Mazes and Monsters’ by Rona
Jaffe.”85 Jaffe’s book is a novel, set at an imaginary college in
an imaginary town in Pennsylvania. The fact that it is fiction
does not stop Radecki from quoting a letter written to the
school’s newspaper about the dangers of D&D as if it were a
testimonial. For one who spends a great deal of time trying to
determine if kids know the difference between fantasy and
reality, Dr. Radecki, like Mrs. Pulling, seems to have developed
his own problem in that area.
Dr. Radecki, while pursuing the admirable goal of eliminating
violence from society, has engaged in “research” that has been
less than scientific in its methodology. His conclusions,
therefore, are suspect. Likewise is his continued willingness to
publicize data that can only contribute to hysteria.
Larry Jones and File 18
As scary as it seems for Pat Pulling to be retained as a “jury
trainer” and expert witness in capital cases, yet more terrifying
is her alliance with Larry Jones. Jones serves with the Boise,
Idaho police department and is the head of the Cult Crime Impact
Network, Inc. He is the publisher of File 18, a newsletter that
he claims reaches between 1,500 and 2,500 law enforcement
individuals. File 18 reports on occult crimes from all over the
country, but appears to use as its sources newspaper clippings
sent by readers and other interested parties.
A few excerpts from File 18 are in order to reflect BADD’s ties
with it, and the general slant of its editorial bias. While each
issue bears the following, or some variation of the following
disclaimer, the newsletter carries no copyright. Disclaimer:
“CONFIDENTIAL: RESTRICTED ACCESS INFORMATION FOR OFFICIAL LAW
ENFORCEMENT USE ONLY.” The April 1989 issue expands this to read:
“CONFIDENTIAL: RESTRICTED ACCESS INFORMATION. NOT FOR RELEASE TO
PUBLIC, MEDIA, OR UNAUTHORIZED PERSONS OR GROUPS. INFORMATION IN
THIS PUBLICATION IS INTENDED TO PRIMARILY AID LAW ENFORCEMENT,
AND LEGITIMATE COMMUNITY PROFESSIONALS WHO ARE COMBATTING
CULT-MOTIVATION CRIMES AND ASSISTING SURVIVORS.
The December 1988 issue notes the link with BADD.
XI. WHO HAS YOUR ADDRESS?
Over the past six months or so, a number of
non-authorized publications and letters have been
mailed to persons on the FILE 18 NEWSLETTER. With the
exception of two mailings from B. A. D. D., Inc. about
their upcoming seminars, the C. C. I. N. Board did not
give prior authorization to use the mailing list. We
have verifiable information that some law enforcement
officers on the FILE 18 list are also members of occult
groups. These people have apparently take the mailing
list and copies of FILE 18 and passed them on to
persons whose goals are to influence the reader’s
sentiments against the mission of C. C. I. N.86
The February 1989 issue provides an interesting look into the
thought processes of individuals charged with seeking evidence in
criminal cases:
All across the United States, men sit in prisons and on
death rows convicted of satanic sacrifice killings.
Others have been imprisoned for gruesome abuse and
victimization of infants, children, and adults. Adult
survivors tell strikingly similar accounts of bondage,
fear, mind control, and rituals accomplished for years
under the noses (or with the complicity) of so-called
“normal society” and its officials.
Those who deny, explain away, or cover-up the obvious
undeniably growing mountain of evidence, often demand
statistical evidence or positive linkages between
operational suspect groups. At best, this demand for
positive proof of a “horizontal conspiracy” is naive.
At its worst, it is a red herring designed to misdirect
the attention of the growing number of professionals
who are convinced that we must effectively pursue and
confront what could be the crime of the 90’s.
Consider the possibility that the reason supposedly
unrelated groups in different localities over various
time periods are acting-out in a similar manner, is
that consistent directives are recieved [sic]
independently from higher levels of authority. Instead
of being directly linked to each other, these groups
may be linked vertically to a common source of
direction and control. This “vertical conspiracy model”
is consistent with the “authoritarian” (pyramid-type)
structure seen in many cult and occult groups. Those
who accept this theory as a reasonable possibility need
to re-think the meaning, scope, and effects of the term
conspiracy!
A growing body of evidence, intelligence information,
survivor statements, and court convictions exert
increasing pressure upon us to “reach the verdict” that
hertofore [sic] ‘unrelated problems,’ are being
orchestrated from a central source. Let’s wake up and
see the reality of what we’ve ineffectually fought for
so long. Only by chopping at the tap root of the crime
tree instead of just raking the leaves can we hope to
stem or turn the tide.87
In that same issue the following appears:
The solution [to Satanism]: The Editorial Staff concurs
that the only true and lasting solution to “devil
worship” or satanic involvement is a personal encounter
with true Christianity and with the central figure of
that faith, Jesus Christ. Only through this light can
the deep and dangerous tentacles of satanic or occult
enslavement be exposed and removed from a person’s
life.88
Jones, at a symposium sponsored by Bob Larson, defined Satanism
as “people worshipping a deity other than the God of the
Bible.”89 He went on to note that, “you cannot be a dedicated
Satanist without violating the law of the land.”90 Therefore,
anyone who is not a Christian or a Jew is, de facto, both a
Satanist and a criminal. And, given his statement above, the only
cure for the Satanist menace is a national revival. This is a
dangerous view for a law enforcement officer to hold as it
presumes guilt in absence of any proof of a crime.
Lastly, the two following quotes come from the April 1989 issue
of File 18:
We believe that certain groups and interests either
finally became aware of C. C. I. N.’s existence or
decided we weren’t going to go away. They devised
active campaigns of infiltration and
counter-information intended to intimidate, nullify,
and/or eliminate the work we started, the work we
encourage among the many legitimate professionals in
police departments, schools, treatment facilities,
churches, and special interest groups across this
nation. Wedges of distrust have been driven between
credible resource groups and authorities. Today, the
forces of opposition are hammering out volumes of
information designed to confuse, mislead, and dilute
the truth. Tactics including: character assassination,
rumor, innuendo, ridicule, and threats of civil
litigation are designed to halt the vital exposure of
formerly secret practices, associations, and criminal
methodologies.91
A bit later in that same issue we get:
VIII. Acquino, Again:
In March, 1988... on The Oprah Winfrey Show, [Temple of
Set founder Michael Acquino] said that if satanists
were really committing crimes the police would know
about them and investigate, putting the satanists under
arrest.
In the File 18 Newsletter, Vol. III... we asked for
confirmation that the United States Military had
reopened an investigation on Lt. Co. Acquino.
Confirmation came from no less than an article
published in the San Jose Mercury News, December 23,
1988. Linda Godlston, Staff Writer, reported: ”Six
months after the U. S. Attorney’s Office closed the
Presidio child sex abuse case, the Army has launched a
new investigation of one of the original suspects in
the matter – a high ranking officer who founded a
satanic church, according to those close to the probe.
We certainly afford Mr. Acquino the benefit of the
legal presumption of his innocence, but...92
This File 18 material needs discussion to cover only a couple of
points. The general tone of paranoia is disturbing within a
document being published by and for police officials and other
interested professionals. The idea that the solution to satanic
crimes is a personal encounter with Jesus Christ went out with
witch trials and has no place in U. S. law enforcement.
Most of what appears in File 18 “is quoted from books and
articles available on the newsstands... Most so-called ‘police
only’ materials we now use have been developed by civilians!”93
If this is true, why does Jones publish it and thereby provide it
with a veneer of legitimacy that it does not deserve? Newspaper
accounts stress the unusual and always seek to have a unique
angle, but that angle often fades to insignificance as a case is
studied. Why then is so much emphasis placed on newsstand
accounts of the crimes?
Larry Jones appears continually vexed with the lack of solid and
credible evidence concerning Satanic crimes. The most recent
issue of File 1894 in the author possession contains news clips
from sources as diverse as Farm Times of Idaho (concerning cattle
mutilations) to personal correspondence from a psychotherapist
who was less than pleased when the Washington State Senate only
wanted to devote 10 minutes of the Law and Justice Committee’s
time to listening to his talk about ritual crime. Very
interesting by it’s inclusion is a review of the book When The
World Will Be As One by Tal Brooke. This book purports to tell of
the past events and future plans of a “One World Government”
conspiracy. It was written by an individual who, after a
conversion to Christianity, was “qualified to write such a book
due to his former involvement in the New Age movement, [and]
experience in the occult... which enhances his ability to express
the philosophies behind-the-scenes of the ‘Global Age.’”95 File
18 makes the Brooke book available through it to interested
folks.
The File 18 “vertical conspiracy” theory falls quickly when
Occam’s Razor is applied to it with even the barest of pressure.
What need is there of an invisible cabal when Dan Rather or
Geraldo Rivera inform everyone of any bizarre occurrence from
coast to coast – making copycat antics not only easy, but a
surefire way of getting publicity? Why does anyone need cultists
propagating their rituals in secret when anyone can pick up a
hundred different horror novels that describe things in
spine-chilling detail?
Despite the total lack of evidence concerning a Satanic
conspiracy – and ignorant of the tactics Mrs. Pulling has
employed in her crusade – Larry Jones continues to cling to a
belief in an evil cabal out to destroy America. In a most
stunning perversion of logic, Jones asks:
Does denial [of alcoholism] alter truth? No.
Things are as they are – regardless of the drinker’s
willingness to admit the truth to himself or others. In
fact, to avoid confronting his reality he will conceive
rationalizations, repeat empty explanations, divert
attention to non-issues, surround himself with
like-minded drinkers, and fabricate falsehoods. All the
while, the destruction wrought by his compulsion
continues to take its toll. It saps his vitality,
destroys his creativity, drains his resources, steals
his energy, diverts his potential and lures him to his
own death amidst the false security of his muddled
mind.96
Each of the things Jones points out as tactics of an alcoholic to
avoid realizing he has a problem is a tactic Mrs. Pulling and
other Satan-hunters have employed. They fight so hard to point
out that the ghosts and goblins that they see are real, they lose
touch with the real world. Gathered together they reinforce their
skewed impressions of reality, and defend each other against
rational attempts to show them the errors of their ways.
Conclusion
Patricia Pulling, like any responsible adult, is concerned for
the welfare and well-being of children in our society. A personal
tragedy in her life galvanized her and started her off on a
crusade to save children from the horror she saw as having taken
her son. Her motivation, both at the beginning and now, is
something we can only guess at, but clearly she believes she is
fighting a war against diabolical forces poised to consume young
Americans.
Just as clearly, somewhere in her career as an investigator, she
lost her perspective. She has, willfully or negligently,
manufactured reports concerning suicides and murders related to
games and Satanism. She has promoted individuals who are, at the
very least, in need of serious psychiatric help to deal with
their emotional and psychological problems. She has repeatedly
represented herself as an “expert witness” concerning games of
which she knows little or nothing. She has perpetrated a
deception concerning the circumstances surrounding the senseless
death of her son.
Without a doubt, Mrs. Pulling started searching for a way to
prevent other children from following in her son’s footsteps. Her
efforts on behalf of his memory were obviously well intentioned,
but as the anti-game hysteria bled over into a war against Satan,
the ends began to justify the means. What became important was to
sound a clarion-call concerning the dangers of Satanism, and any
method that worked to get that message out was perfectly
acceptable.
Pat Pulling and her allies regularly conduct “cult crime
seminars” at locations across the country. They are offered for
police and teachers at between $100 and $300 a head, not
including lodging, transportation or meals. These seminars go
beyond “the blind leading the blind” because the anti-Satanists
profit greatly from giving the seminars. Moreover, taxpayers
shell out for these dubious educational experiences, then have
the disinformation and misinformation used against them when
earnest cops try to utilize what they have learned and accepted
in good faith.
As was shown above, these are the seminars in which Pat Pulling
distributes a questionnaire that, if used in accordance with the
instructions, will prove virtually anyone to be a Satanist. These
are seminars in which mentally disturbed individuals like
Cassandra Hoyer or Lauren Stratford/Laurel Wilson97 tell tales of
the horrors “cult survivors” endure. These are the seminars at
which “occult symbol” hand-outs are distributed, including things
like “the Star of David” and at which any non-Christian religion
is branded “Satanism.”
Clearly Pat Pulling is a “cult crime expert” only in her own eyes
and those of her cronies, allies and disciples. Barry Goldwater
once said, “Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice.” The
extremism connected with the battle against the Satanic
Conspiracy is defending no liberty. Fanaticism such as that which
perpetuates of a hysterical fantasy is nothing short of pure
evil. The only greater evil is to do nothing to share the truth
with those who might be mislead by Mrs. Pulling.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Acknowledgements
The author would like to thank the following people for their
assistance in preparing this report: Loren K. Wiseman, Greg
Stafford, Shawn Carlson, Robert D. Hicks, David Alexander, Jim
Lippard, Sean Sellers, Darren Molitor and Liz Danforth.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Appendix 1
Sean Sellers produced the following letter and sent it to the
author of this report. Sean gave permission for reprinting the
letter with the proviso that it appear complete when it is
published.
With the controversy over role playing games so
prevalent today many well meaning people have sought to
use my past as a reference for rebuking role playing.
While it is true that D&D contributed to my interest
and knowledge of occultism I must be fair and explain
to what extent D&D contributed.
When I was playing D&D I was not a Satanist, and in
fact would have probably punched any Satanist I met
right in the mouth. I was interested in witchcraft and
Zen however. In doing some research at the library for
a D&D adventure I was leading I happened upon other
books that led to my study of occultism.
After I became a Satanist I used D&D manuals for their
magical symbols and character references for my initial
studies. I also used my experience as a Dungeonmaster
to introduce people to Satanic behavior concepts and
recruit them into the occult.
I do have objections to some of the material TSR
releases for their role playing games. I think their
excessive use of paganism and occultism is unnecessary
and can lead to idealistic problems among some players;
however, to be fair to TSR and in the spirit of honesty
I must concede that D&D contributed to my involvement
in Satanism like an interest in electronics can
contributed to building a bomb. Like the decision to
build a bomb, I had already made decisions of a
destructive nature before I incorporated D&D material
into my coven projects, and it was Satanism not D&D
that had a decisive role in my crimes.
Personally, for reasons I publish myself, I don’t think
kids need to be playing D&D, but using my past as a
common example of the effects of the game is either
irrational or fanatical.
February 5th 1990
Sean R. Sellers
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Appendix 2
The author of this report, Michael A. Stackpole, is a science
fiction novelist, game designer and computer game designer. In
1979 he earned a Bachelor of Arts Degree in History from the
University of Vermont. Upon graduation he began a career as a
game designer with Flying Buffalo, Inc. of Scottsdale, Arizona.
In 1983 and 1984 projects to which he contributed won the H. G.
Wells Award for Best Adventure of the Year. In 1988 Wasteland, a
computer game he designed, was chosen as Best Adventure Game of
the year by Computer Gaming World, and in 1989 Neuromancer,
another game he worked on, won the same award. Also in 1988
another computer game, Bards Tale III, was selected Best Computer
Game by the Strategist Club.
His interest in the controversy surrounding games began in 1979
when James Dallas Egbert’s disappearance from the Michigan State
University campus in East Lansing catapulted D&D and role playing
games to national attention. As an investigation of that case
showed the game had nothing to do with Egbert’s disappearance. It
also pointed out that reality and the public perception of what
went on did not match. Since that time, in conjunction with
others in the game industry, he has worked at researching cases
and setting the record straight. As was bound to happen, his
course cut across that of Patricia Pulling and BADD, and the
information he has gathered in his research is presented in the
above report. As her area of “expertise” moved into Satanism, his
researches followed.
Who’s Who In The West 1990 edition.
Contact Information:
Michael A. Stackpole
Phoenix Skeptics
Box 62792
Phoenix, AZ 85082-2792
(602) 231-8624/(602) 392-0328 Fax
On the GEnie Computer System, he can be reached at the E-Mail
address of M.Stackpole.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Bibliography
Periodicals
Cornerstone, Vol. 18 Issue 90, Jan. 1990, Satan’s Sideshow by
Gretchen & Bob Passantino and Jon Trott
Daily News-Sun of Sun City, AZ Tuesday, 7 June 1988 “Death of a
Kid” by Doug Dollemore
File 18, Vol. III, No. 88-4, Cult Crime Impact Network, Inc.,
Larry Jones, editor
File 18, Vol. IV, No. 89-1, Cult Crime Impact Network, Inc.,
Larry Jones, editor
File 18, Vol. IV, No. 89-2, Cult Crime Impact Network, Inc.,
Larry Jones, editor
File 18, Vol. IV, No. 89-6, Cult Crime Impact Network, Inc.,
Larry Jones, editor
File 18, Vol. V, No. 90-1, Cult Crime Impact Network, Inc., Larry
Jones, editor
INSIGHT, 11 January 88, “Battling Satanism a Haunting Task” by
Derk Kinnane Roelofsma
National Coalition on Television Violence, press release 17
January 1985
NCTV News, Vol. 6, Jan-Feb 1985
NCTV press release, June 1985, as reprinted in BADD’s Law
Enforcement Primer.
NCTV Bestseller Study 1905-1988
Richmond News Leader, 21 September 1988
Richmond News Leader, 7 April 89, “Local Believers short on
Evidence” by Rex Springston
Richmond Times-Dispatch, 5 March 88, “Satanic Cults said to
entice teens with sex, drugs” by Ed Briggs
Richmond Times-Dispatch, 23 September 88
The Comics Journal, No. 133, December 1989, “Thomas Radecki
Interview” by Gary Groth & Robert Boyd & Greg Baisden
Washington Post, 13 August 1983, “Game Cited in Youth’s Suicide”
by Michael Isikoff
Transcripts and Media Presentations
Transcript of Case No. L-128-83 Virginia Circuit Court of the
County of Hanover, the Honorable Richard H. C. Taylor, Judge.
Geraldo, 6 October 1988, Transcript #276 “Teenage Satanism”
The Emergence of Ritualistic Crime in Today’s Society Transcribed
Notes from Speakers at the Seminar Hosted by the No. Colo.-So.
Wyo Detectives Association 9-12 September 86 Ft. Collins, Colo.
Compiled and Published by Larry M. Jones Cult Crime Impact
Network 222 N. Latah St., Boise. Idaho 83706
Bob Larson Radio Show, 29 March 1990
Bob Larson Radio Show, 3 April 1990
Bob Larson Satanism Symposium 4 November 1989, notes by Vicki
Copeland of Cult Watch Response.
Books and Publications
Pulling, Patricia, with Kathy Cawthon, 1989, The Devil’s Web,
Huntington House, Inc. Lafayette, LA
––––––– , 1988, Interviewing Techniques for Adolescents, BADD,
Inc., Richmond, VA
––––––– , 1986, A Law Enforcement Primer on Fantasy Role Playing
Games, BADD, Inc., Richmond, VA
Molitor, Darren Lee, 1985, The Darren Molitor Letter, BADD, Inc.,
Richmond, VA
Wedge, Thomas W. with Robert L. Powers, 1988, The Satan Hunter,
Daring Books, Canton, Ohio
Correspondence
Hicks, Robert D., 28 November 1988
Sellers, Sean R., 5 February 1990
––––––– , 27 December 1989
Molitor, Darren Lee, 14 March 1990
––––––– , 10 April 1990
-----------------------------------------------------------------
References
1 NCTV press release 17 January 1985
2 Washington Post, 13 August 1983
3 Transcript of Case No. L-128-83 Virginia Circuit Court of the
County of Hanover, the Honorable Richard H. C. Taylor, Judge.
4 The Devil’s Web, p. 90
5 Personal correspondence with the author, 28 November 1988
6 Interviewing Techniques for Adolescents (BADD, Inc., Sept
1988), pp. 13-14
7 Interviewing Techniques for Adolescents (BADD, Inc., Sept
1988), p. 14
8 Ibid., p. 3
9 Ibid., p. 3
10 Ibid, pp. 3-6
11 Ibid, pp. 6-7
12 The pulp era was roughly 1920 to 1950 and is named after the
pulp-paper magazines common in those days. After the war and
paper rationing severely damaged the pulp trade, the advent of
paperback books in the 1950s finished it off. The Shadow Magazine
and Weird Tales are two well known examples of pulp magazines.
Lovecraft was a frequent contributor to the latter magazine.
13 Daily News-Sun of Sun City, AZ Tuesday, 7 June 1988
14 Ibid.
15 Ibid.
16 Washington Post, 13 Aug 1983
17 Geraldo, 6 October 1988, Transcript #276, pp. 9-10
18 The Devil’s Web, p. 7-8.
19 Transcript of Case No. L-128-83 Virginia Circuit Court of the
County of Hanover, the Honorable Richard H. C. Taylor, Judge, pp.
13-14.
20 THE EMERGENCE OF RITUALISTIC CRIME IN TODAY’S SOCIETY
Transcribed Notes from Speakers at the Seminar Hosted by the No.
Colo.-So. Wyo Detectives Association 9-12 September 86 Ft.
Collins, Colo. Compiled and Published by Larry M. Jones Cult
Crime Impact Network 222 N. Latah St., Boise. Idaho 83706
21 Ibid.
22 The Devil’s Web, p. 199
23 Richmond News Leader, 7 April 89
24 Ibid.
25 Ibid.
26 Richmond Times-Dispatch, 23 September 88
27 Ibid.
28 Richmond Times-Dispatch, 5 March 88
29 A Law Enforcement Primer on Fantasy Role Playing Games, p. 10
30 The Devil’s Web, p. 91
31 The Devil’s Web, p. 97, see also A Law Enforcement Primer on
Fantasy Role Playing Games, pp. 10-11
32 Primer, p. 10
33 Primer, p. 10
34 Primer, p. 11
35 TSR, Inc. regularly returns out of print games to print to
retain the trademark on the names. Boot Hill is rumored to be
scheduled for a 1990 rerelease just to maintain the title
trademark. This, presumably, was the reason Gamma World was
rereleased in 1986. It would not be inconceivable to see a
reissue of Metamorphosis Alpha as well, but it is not expected.
36 The Devil’s Web, p. 97
37 The Devil’s Web, p. 9
38 The Devil’s Web, p. 79
39 The Darren Molitor Letter
40 The Devil’s Web, p. 79
41 The Darren Molitor Letter.
42 Personal correspondence with the author, 14 March 1990
43 Ibid
44 The Devil’s Web, p. 88
45 The Devil’s Web, p. 11
46 Personal correspondence with the author, 14 March 1990
47 The Devil’s Web, p. 9
48 Ibid., p. 54
49 The Devil’s Web, p. 57
50 INSIGHT, 11 January 88, p. 48
51 Richmond News Leader, 21 September 1988
52 Ibid.
53 Richmond News Leader, 7 April 1989
54 Bob Larson Radio Show, 3 April 1990
55 The Devil’s Web, p. 90
56 Ibid., p. 91
57 Ibid., p. 91
58 Ibid., p. 91
59 Personal correspondence with the author, 10 April 1990
60 The Devil’s Web, p. 88
61 Personal correspondence with the author, 10 April 1990
62 The Satan Hunter, p. 11.
63 The Devil’s Web, p. 92
64 Personal correspondence with the author, 5 February 1990
65 Personal correspondence with the author, 27 December 1989
66 Personal correspondence with the author, 5 February 1990
67 NCTV press release, 17 January 1985
68 The Comics Journal, No. 133, December 1989, p. 66
69 Ibid., p. 74
70 NCTV News, Vol. 6, Jan-Feb 1985
71 Bob Larson Radio Show, 29 March 1990
72 NCTV Bestseller Study 1905-1988
73 Ibid., p. 1
74 The caution about Time Magazine reviews is curious because,
two paragraphs above where it appears, the report notes, “The
book reviews themselves come primarily from Time and Newsweek,
the New York Times...”
75 Ibid., p. 1
76 Ibid., p. 11
77 Ibid., p. 1
78 Ibid., p. 25
79 Ibid., p. 25
80 Ibid., p. 26
81 NCTV press release, 17 Jan 1985, p. 5
82 NCTV press release, June 1985, as reprinted in BADD’s Law
Enforcement Primer.
83 The Devil’s Web, p. 82
84 Ibid., p. 85
85 NCTV press release, 17 January, 1985, p. 8
86 File 18, Vol. III, No. 88-4, p. 12
87 File 18, Vol. IV, No. 89-1, p. 1
88 Ibid., p. 3
89 Bob Larson Satanism Symposium 4 November 1989. Approximately
500 people attended, paying $100 each for the one day program.
90 Ibid.
91 File 18, Vol. IV, No. 89-2, p. 1
92 Ibid., p. 5
93 Ibid., p. 2
94 File 18, Vol. V, No. 90-1
95 Ibid., p. 5
96 File 18, Vol. IV, No. 89-6, p. 1
97 Stratford/Wilson was the author of a survivor memoir titled
Satan’s Underground. The publisher, Harvest House, withdrew it
from publication after Cornerstone, a Christian magazine,
published an article (Satan’s Sideshow by Gretchen & Bob
Passantino and Jon Trott, Vol. 18 Issue 90, Jan. 1990) that
exposed her book as a fraud.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
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