Stealing Hope: James Ray’s Deadly Method (Colleen Conaway’s Story)

It’s exactly three years since The Secret star and motivational torturer, James Arthur Ray lied to police about the death of one of his customers.

Colleen Conaway was attending Ray’s Creating Absolute Wealth seminar in July 2009 when her life came to a horrible and untimely end.

Screen-shot from The Secret: “James Arthur Ray, Philosopher”

James Ray and his staff abandoned Colleen’s body in a shopping mall and managed to conceal her death from her fellow participants. Their crude and cynical cover up was also enough to convince the San Diego Police to simply declare Colleen’s death a suicide and close the case. Ray, a charismatic millionaire with his head office at nearby Carlsbad, was obviously impressive enough for the police not to have smelled a rat. (They may, however, have noticed a faint whiff of the high powered attorneys, who Ray would later pay $5 million to defend him from manslaughter charges.)

Colleen’s death only became “news” after three more people died at Ray’s next event in Arizona. But at first, no one apart from her family and friends knew of Colleen’s fate. And the role that the internationally recognized “philosopher” from The Secret had played in ending her life could only be guessed at by her family.

James Ray: Locked Up for 2 Years

Motivational torturer, James Arthur Ray, has been sentenced to two years in prison for three of the four lives he snuffed out. (Also, a wrongful death civil lawsuit is taking the place of charges which the San Diego Police Department didn’t bother laying in relation to the death of Colleen Conaway.)

Ray’s million dollar law team based their defense on attempting to cast doubt on the cause of death, and openly and cynically attempting to get Ray off on a technicality. After the judge ruled the state had technically committed “Brady violation” (failure to disclose evidence), which could have led to a mistrial, Ray tweeted:

Judge ruled it was Brady… That’s in our favor. Now he needs to decide what to do. Woohooo!! (13 April 2011)

At the sentencing, however he was suddenly blubbering apologies to the bereaved and claiming he

didn’t know anyone was dying or in serious distress

— A statement he chose not to make during the trial. He also didn’t say anything like that when the event occurred, preferring to tell police that the firekeeper was in charge of his fake sweat lodge. And although his defense attorneys also claimed before the trial that he didn’t know anyone was in distress, they also decided not to expose that claim to cross examination. Luis Li certainly made no mention of such an idea during his seven hour closing statement.

Ray’s tears, however sounded genuine, as did his statement that “If there was anything I could do to turn back the clock I would do it.” But that comes more than two and a half years too late, and only with a jail term staring him in the face. Check out Ray’s twitter account, if you think he feels any more remorse for these lives than he did for Colleen Conaway. All four of his victims were admitted to hospital or the morgue labeled Jane or John Doe because Ray valued PR damage control more highly than human life.

The legal justice system has been kind to James Ray.

James Ray Trial: Pre-Trial Hearings + Updates…

I will post further updates on the James Ray Trial (set to begin on 16 Feb 2011) here for now. (For more background see here.) Scroll down for the first post covering general information and links to witness statements and prosecution documents is under 16 November.

(Please note, I’m posting from Europe, so I only have access to internet resources. Feel free to add any links in the comments.)

…

March 3 2011 Evidence regarding earlier sweat lodges will be allowed under certain conditions. Admissibility will be decided case by case, so to speak. That means that Ray’s serial recklessness during previous groups and sweat lodges will be included to a considerable degree, as evidence.

I’ll post more about the trial as it unfolds – bit hard to stay current from here in Germany. Excellent up to date blog coverage on Salty Droid’s James Ray Trial Updates page, with extensive background info.

Here’s my take on Ray’s overall defense strategy: James Ray’s Defense: Nothing But Objections.

See also the original witness statements from the prosecution’s investigation:

Witness statements: ONE — TWO — THREE

More transcripts here.

Legal documents partly outlining the case for the prosecution: ONE — TWO

See also the James Ray Trial – Background page on this site.

Reporter Elizabeth Erwin is covering the proceedings on twitter. Live coverage here.

The Lonesome Death of Colleen Conaway – One year on

This blog was basically started in order to campaign for justice for Colleen Conaway. Today is the first anniversary of her death.

Colleen Conaway died while participating in a personal growth event led by Secret star, James Arthur Ray.

James Ray and his staff (one of whom witnessed Colleen’s death) abandoned Colleen’s body, concealed her death from the other participants, left fake messages on her cell phone to make it look they were searching for her (recordings posted here), and lied to police.

They did all that while still finding time to enjoy the closing party for the event (see photos below the fold). Ray contacted his lawyers immediately, but never contacted Colleen’s family, did not refund the $5000 she paid, and even charged her a further $10,000 for a future group she had booked.

That future group was the infamous event where three more innocent people died — for which Ray has been charged with three counts of manslaughter.

Currently, Ray’s legal team are attempting to prevent Colleen’s death and the circumstances under which it occurred from being discussed in that trial.

Trashing New Age Triple Manslaughterer James Ray

The Salty Droid has posted an excellent “edited for truth” version of an old video which James Ray made to advertise his “Creating Absolute Wealth” weekend 2009. Anyone who has read much on this blog will know that this event finished with Ray and his staff abandoning the body of one of its participants, concealing the death from other participants, and then having a party.

James Ray’s Deadly Helpers: Hiding Behind a Lie

Detective Diskin: There’s been a lot of people calling us, upset about Colleen Conway and the way that was handled [by James Ray and his staff]…

Police interview with Megan Fredrickson

The San Diego Police Dept have so far failed to properly investigate the events surrounding death of the first (known) victim of James Ray, the con man, scammer and alleged manslaughterer who caused the death of four people within three months.

Staff members of James Ray International colluded to cover up this earlier death and  led police to believe a lie.

Megan Fredrickson: Lying With Immunity

Just like her boss – the alleged new age manslaughterer and star of The Secret, James Ray – Megan Fredrickson seems to think she can run rings around those conducting the criminal investigation.

Investigators granted her immunity, probably expecting her to admit to destroying evidence, as well as clear up some of the conflicting witness accounts.

Incredibly, when interviewed she continued to play dumb, even when they sprung it on her that they had a copy of a voice mail she left, ordering employees to destroy files “before the investigators find them”.

Either she’s blown her immunity by lying, or she is suffering from a severe psychological disorder which erases huge swathes of memory. She doesn’t recall what her boss said or did despite being next to him most of the time. The horrific scenes after the death lodge, which others will be haunted by for the rest of their days, were for Megan dim foggy memories. Even her own actions are outside the scope of her awareness.

In the one hour interview she uses the phrases:

“I don’t know”                63 times
“I don’t remember”     36 times
“I don’t recall”              13 times

That’s not including the countless times she replied to a “Do you recall…” question with “No”.

Who was Colleen’s “Buddy”?

Colleen Conaway was probably the only participant from Minnesota who travelled down to San Diego to attend James Ray’s Creating Absolute Wealth seminar in July 2009, so her absence on the final afternoon would not have been easily noticed by the 300 or so participants.

Her’s was the first of four pointless deaths inside of three months caused by James Arthur Ray. Her death was covered up by Death Ray and his staff, who concealed it from other participants, certain other staff members, and the San Diego Police – who listed it as suicide, instead of investigating it as a possible negligent homicide.

The participants were simply told nothing. The police, when they were contacted eight hours after staff had witnessed Colleen’s death, were no doubt mislead as to the nature of the innocent sounding “self help seminar”.

But what was Colleen’s “buddy” – the partner allocated to her in the seminar – told?

This person was either lied to about what happened to their partner, OR they assisted James Ray’s staff in covering it up. Who was this person, and why haven’t they been contacted by police?

The Death Lodge – exactly as planned

Contrary to many reports, James Ray’s deadly Arizona sweat lodge went pretty much according to plan.

Lawyers statements confirm it. Witness statements confirm it, and as we shall see, contrary to reports that Ray stood around and did nothing amid the chaos, he in fact gave decisive instructions as the first ambulances started coming down the hill…

Justice For Colleen

I am reproducing below the letter I sent to the San Diego Police Department asking them to re-open their investigation of Colleen Conaway‘s death. (Update: also sent to Sen. Amy Klobuchar, see comments.)

If you are reading this you most likely already know the details surrounding this incident, and, like me have no doubt been touched by how cruel and unnecessary her death was. Seeing the way her family responded to this, and comparing it to the way James Ray and his pack of demented hyenas reacted, makes it clear that something has to be done about this. The police closed the investigation prematurely and won’t re-open it unless “new evidence” comes to light.

There is new evidence. How about dropping them a polite reminder that there are a lot of people watching this case unfold, and a lot of people who want to see justice done.

James Ray and his staff should be charged with negligent homicide for the death of Colleen Conaway.