I've heard something
about a lawsuit by 8 women, accusing Ananda and Swami Kriyananda
of sexual misconduct. Are their accusations true?
No, they are not true
There was never a lawsuit against Kriyananda or Ananda by
eight women. There was a single lawsuit filed by a former
Ananda member, Anne-Marie Bertolucci, disgruntled over the failure
of her love affair with a married Ananda member.
Initially, Bertolucci accused Kriyananda only of having sexual
“designs” on her. She cited a brief (consensual) neck
massage incident and the viewing of a movie. Although Kriyananda
was married, Bertolucci also accused him of “fraudulently”
holding himself out to be celibate by his continued use of the
title, “swami.”
Bertolucci’s allegations of sexual misconduct against
Kriyananda enabled her to introduce accusations against Kriyananda
by others from the distant past as supporting evidence for her
case. Standing alone, these allegations were too old to be the
basis of a separate lawsuit.
Kriyananda responded immediately in writing to the accusations,
and later published his response in a national magazine. He categorically
denied the allegations:
"I have never harassed anyone, sexually or in any other
way. It would be contrary to my most basic instincts and principles
to go against another person’s free will, which it is my
practice to support even at great cost to myself.
"[Our] adversaries …have raised the general subject
of my status as a celibate, claiming that I have misrepresented
myself publicly in order to deceive people. I welcome this charge
as an important opportunity to clear the air not for only myself,
but for many other spiritual teachers in America who have faced
similar charges in recent years.”
For Kriyananda’s complete statement, see Gurus,
Celibacy and Spiritual Authority.
Kriyananda later stated under oath that he had been involved
in a few sexual relationships in the early ‘80s, prior to
his marriage in 1985, but these relationships had been fully
consensual. After these relationships ended, the women involved
remained friendly with Kriyananda, never suggesting they had
felt “coerced.” Their stories became very different
years later, after they had become involved with SRF.
Details about the eight women.
Unfortunately, at the trial, as a result of a highly irregular
ruling by the judge, Kriyananda’s attorneys were not allowed
to cross-examine any of his accusers on the sexual allegations.
What was the Bertolucci lawsuit about?
Anne-Marie Bertolucci was a single woman living at Ananda
Village, who in 1993 had a consensual affair with Danny L., a
married man with a young daughter. Both worked in Ananda’s
publishing department.
When Bertolucci and Danny L., who believed they were in love,
sought counseling from Swami Kriyananda about their relationship,
he urged them to end the relationship. Danny L., however, was
undecided as to whether he wanted to remain with his wife. Danny
L. later decided that he definitely wanted to stay with his wife
and child, and he so informed Bertolucci and Kriyananda.
When Bertolucci nonetheless continued to pursue the relationship,
Kriyananda told her she would have to move to another Ananda
community. She decided to move to the Palo Alto community, where
she had previously lived.
Though initially angry with Kriyananda, Bertolucci later apologized.
In Palo Alto, she participated in community life and seemed to
be adjusting.
While Bertolucci was living in the Palo Alto community, Eric Estep circulated a letter, highly
critical of Kriyananda, to residents of Ananda colonies. Eric
and his wife, Naomi, had lived at Ananda Village a decade earlier,
but were now staunch SRF members and vocally anti-Ananda. While
living at Ananda Village, Estep had refused to pay rent, a requirement
for all members, and had decided to leave rather than pay.
Estep’s letter defended SRF’s position in its lawsuit
against Ananda, and criticized Kriyananda for presuming to represent
Yogananda. He urged Ananda members not to support Kriyananda
and to follow instead the leadership of SRF’s president,
Daya Mata. After receiving the letter, Bertolucci contacted Estep.
Shortly afterwards, Bertolucci began attending services at
the Richmond SRF temple, accompanied by the Esteps. There she
was introduced to Don Price, one
of the “founders” of the anti-Ananda website. Bertolucci
moved out of the Palo Alto community in August 1994.
Estep later persuaded Ford Greene, an “anti-cult”
attorney, to be Bertolucci’s attorney in a lawsuit against
Ananda. Shortly before filing her lawsuit, escorted by the Esteps,
Bertolucci flew to SRF headquarters in southern California, and
to the SRF Retreat in Encinitas. There she met with SRF board
members and senior monastics, including SRF president, Daya Mata.
On November 28, 1994, Bertolucci filed a lawsuit against Danny
L., Ananda, and Swami Kriyananda. Her main claims were: 1) wrongful
termination; 2) fraud; 3) intentional infliction of emotional
distress; 4) breach of fiduciary duty; 5) negligence; 6) negligent
supervision; and 7) alter ego liability.
Her consensual love affair had now become “sexual harassment,”
made possible, she claimed, by the cult-like “brainwashing”
she had been subjected to by Ananda. She named both devotional
chanting and Yogananda's meditation techniques as key elements
in the brainwashing process.
She also claimed that Ananda fostered an inhospitable environment
for women, and encouraged ministers to seek out young women for
sex. She specifically accused Kriyananda, who had been publicly
married to Rosanna Golia between1985 and 1994, of fraudulently
holding himself out to be a celibate swami, and of sexually abusing
various women in the past.
Bertolucci’s initial complaint included no claim of any
specific sexual misconduct toward her by Kriyananda. The complaint
stated only that Bertolucci now believed that Danny L. and Kriyananda
planned to pass her back and forth sexually.
Beyond that, she said only that Kriyananda had adjusted and
massaged her neck with her permission, and invited her to watch
what she described as a ‘”pornographic” movie,
but in fact was the award winning comedy, “Ruthless People,”
starring Bette Midler and Danny DeVito.
In 1995, after Bertolucci’s attorney, Ford Green, lost
a key motion in court, two new lawyers, Michael Flynn and Philip
Stillman, took charge of her case. Ananda later learned that
Flynn and Stillman were SRF members with close ties to the SRF
leadership. These same lawyers later entered the SRF lawsuit
against Ananda as SRF’s attorneys.
Later, at Ananda’s deposition of Bertolucci, Flynn and
Greene called a recess and took Bertolucci out of the room just
before she was to be questioned about the neck-massage incident
with Kriyananda. When Bertolucci’s deposition resumed,
she claimed for the first time that there had been sexual
contact by Kriyananda. She said that when Kriyananda massaged
her neck, her face was in his lap and he rubbed her face against
his penis. This new allegation appeared for the first time in
the Second Amended Complaint, dated January 19, 1996.
These new allegations, which Kriyananda categorically denied,
virtually ensured that the accusations against Kriyananda dating
back to the late ‘70s and early ‘80s would remain in
the case. They had become “relevant” because of Bertolucci’s
new allegations against Kriyananda.
Under Flynn’s direction, the case, which formerly had
focused on Danny L., shifted to Swami Kriyananda and Ananda as
a whole. Flynn repeatedly accused Kriyananda of masquerading
as a “celibate swami.”
More about Anne-Marie Bertolucci.
How did the Bertolucci case end?
The trial in the Bertolucci case began September 1997. Ananda’s
evidence showed that between 1985 and 1994 Kriyananda was married,
and that this fact was publicly known and written about in the
press. He was not “masquerading as a celibate swami”
as Bertolucci claimed. Kriyananda admitted to a handful of consensual
sexual relationships in the early 1980s, before his marriage
to Rosanna Golia, but denied sexually harassing anyone, including
Bertolucci.
In a highly irregular ruling, the trial court refused to allow
Kriyananda’s lawyers to cross-examine his accusers, or to
impeach their credibility through the testimony of other witnesses.
The judge also refused to allow Kriyananda’s lawyers to
tell the jury why they weren’t cross-examining these
women, or introducing other impeachment evidence.
The testimony of Kriyananda’s accusers thus stood unchallenged
and unexplained. The jurors could draw only one conclusion: that
their testimony was true.
The court order prohibiting cross-examination was imposed
as a discovery sanction. Ananda had hired a private investigator
to obtain information relating to SRF’s sponsorship of the
Bertolucci suit. Despite Ananda’s clear instructions to
the investigator that all information was to be obtained legally,
the sub-agent of the investigator’s agent apparently reached
into a fenced outdoor trash area to obtain the trash from the
Flynn Sheridan and Tabb law firm, (now Flynn and Stillman),
instead of waiting until the trash had been placed on the nearby
street.
The documents obtained from the trash were worthless and outdated,
and were not used by Ananda. Set aside and forgotten, they were
not included in later document productions. This oversight in
not producing copies of the documents in discovery provided the
basis for the sanctions. Details.
The jury verdict:
1) Count one: Both the Ananda Church and Walters were found
liable on the charge of "constructive fraud."
2) Count two: Ananda Church, Walters, and Danny L. were found
liable for "intentional infliction of emotional distress."
3) Count three: Ananda Church was found liable for "negligent
supervision"; the Church had a duty to control Walters’
behavior, and failed to do so.
Awards for compensatory damages:
$595,000 in compensatory damages against Swami Kriyananda
and the Ananda church
$30,000 in compensatory damages against Danny L.
Awards for punitive damages:
$1,000,000 (one million dollars) against Kriyananda, which
was later lowered to $400,000.
Alter ego claim
The court rejected Bertolucci’s claim that Ananda existed
primarily for Kriyananda’s financial enrichment. This claim
was tried by the judge without the jury, and there were no restrictions
on Ananda’s ability to cross-examine witnesses.
The judge found that Kriyananda did not have a dominant role
in the handling of Ananda’s financial affairs:
"[Bertolucci’s]claim rests upon two dominant themes:
that there was a commingling of corporate assets funds to Defendant
Walters’ control and benefit and his actual control over
corporate affairs was sufficiently dominant that the two must
be viewed as one and the same for purposes of alter ego liability….[The
evidence shows that][C]hurch officers and directors (not Walters)
played the dominant role in the exercise of control over such
matters."
Immediately following the verdict, Bertolucci and Flynn filed
a new lawsuit against Kriyananda and Ananda, based on the trash
incident and “malicious prosecution.” Bertolucci claimed
that in light of the jury verdict in her favor, Ananda’s
cross-complaint for defamation was “malicious prosecution.”
They sought millions of dollars in damages.
Thereafter, Bertolucci and her attorneys threatened to seize
the property at Ananda Village and the Ananda Meditation Retreat,
and also the copyrights to Kriyananda’s books.
Although there were many grounds for an
appeal, including First Amendment religious freedom violations,
the large Bertolucci judgment, the new lawsuit, and Ananda’s
precarious financial position forced Ananda to seek Chapter 11
bankruptcy protection.
Under court supervision, Ananda settled the Bertolucci judgment
and new lawsuit by agreeing to pay $1.8 million dollars to Bertolucci
and her attorneys. The bankruptcy court approved the plan, and
with considerable belt-tightening, Ananda
managed to pay the full amount by 2001.
More complete information about the Bertolucci
case.
Was SRF involved in the Bertolucci lawsuit?
We believe so. As of 1994, SRF had suffered loss after loss
in its lawsuit against Ananda. Among SRF’s remaining claims,
its claim of “tarnishment” provided a possible avenue
for regaining its cancelled trademarks in “Self-realization”
and “Paramahansa Yogananda,”
Citing the tarnishment claim, SRF asked the judge to consider
whether SRF was being "tarnished" by association with
Ananda. The Bertolucci lawsuit had been filed, SRF said, and
was being reported in the newspapers.
Ananda responded by accusing SRF of having "unclean hands" in the matter. SRF could not both create the tarnishment and then benefit from it. Ananda demanded to take the deposition of Daya Mata to explore SRF's involvement in the Bertolucci lawsuit. Ananda based its case on the following facts:
1. Just weeks before she filed her lawsuit, Bertolucci was
escorted by long-time SRF members to SRF headquarters, where
she met with Daya Mata and other SRF board members.
2. SRF members helped instigate the lawsuit by supporting
and encouraging Bertolucci, and helping her find an attorney
to take her case.
3. Nearly all of the women making accusations against Swami
Kriyananda were associated with SRF, either as members or followers.
4. Michael Flynn brought Paul Friedman, a successful businessman
and major SRF donor with close ties to Daya Mata, to Kriyananda's
sealed deposition, under the pretense that Friedman was a paralegal
at Flynn's firm.
5. Shortly after Kriyananda’s deposition, SRF transferred
to Paul Friedman an apparently valuable piece of land for $1
and "other consideration."
6. Friedman boasted to a new Ananda member that he had attended
Kriyananda's deposition, and that even though most SRF members
did not know anything about the Bertolucci lawsuit, Friedman
did because he was so well-connected with people at the higher
levels of SRF, and knew Daya Mata well.
Despite the court order, Daya Mata refused to appear for her
deposition, forcing Ananda to file a second motion to enforce
the deposition order. At this point, Daya Mata accepted Kriyananda's
suggestion that both sides sit down together and try to settle
the SRF case.
One of the first concessions SRF requested was that Ananda
not take Daya Mata’s deposition. As a gesture of goodwill,
Ananda agreed. A few months later, settlement discussions broke
down. In the meantime, SRF decided not to pursue its tarnishment
claim. Had it done so, the issue of unclean hands could have
been revisited.
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