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Rick Ross (consultant)
Encyclopedia
Rick Alan Ross works as a consultant, lecturer, and intervention
specialist, with an interest in exit counseling
and deprogramming
of former cult
members. He runs a blog at CultNews.com, and in 2003 founded the Rick A. Ross Institute, which maintains a database of press articles on controversial groups, court documents, and essays.
Ross has worked as an expert court witness
and as an analyst for the media in cases relating to such groups.
In 1995, he reached an agreement with Pentecostalist Jason Scott over his forcible deprogamming in 1993. The defendants had been found liable for conspiracy to deprive Scott of his civil rights and religious liberties and were awarded $875,000 in compensatory damages, and punitive damages in the amount of $1,000,000 against the Cult Awareness Network, and $2,500,000 against Ross.
A number of credentialed cult experts have rejected Ross's claims to be an expert on cults.
In 1974, Ross was convicted of the attempted burglary of a vacant model home and sentenced to probation. The following year, he robbed a jewelry store in Phoenix. Ross confessed to the crime and received five years probation. In response to questions about his criminal background, Ross later said, "I had been in trouble as a young man, and I turned my life around ... I never again in my life made another mistake like that."
After high school, he worked for a finance company and then a local bank. In 1975, he began work for a cousin's car-salvage business, later becoming company vice-president. He continued working in the car-salvage field until 1982.
. The group infiltrated the Jewish nursing home where Ross's grandmother lived. After bringing the matter to the attention of the director and of the local Jewish community, Ross successfully campaigned to have the group's activities stopped. He then began working as a volunteer, lecturer and researcher for a variety of Jewish organizations. He worked for the Jewish Federation of Greater Phoenix, and the Union of American Hebrew Congregations appointed him to two national committees focusing on cults and inter-religious affairs.
During the 1980s Ross represented the Jewish community on the Religious Advisory Committee of the Arizona Department of Corrections
. Later the Committee elected him as its chairman, and he served as chairman of the International Coalition of Jewish Prisoners Programs sponsored by B'nai Brith in Washington D.C. Ross's work within the prison system covered inmate religious rights and educational efforts regarding hate group
s. Ross also worked as a member of the professional staff of the Jewish Family and Children's Service (JFCS) and the Bureau of Jewish Education (BJE) in Phoenix, Arizona.
.
He undertook a number of involuntary deprogramming interventions at the requests of parents whose children had joined controversial groups and movements. By 2004, Ross had handled more than 350 deprogramming cases in various countries including the United States, the United Kingdom, Israel and Italy, typically charging around $5,000 per case. Ross claimed a success-rate of 75%, and journalist Nick Johnstone credited him with having "rescued many people from harmful situations".
In 1989 the CBS
television program 48 Hours
covered Ross's deprogramming of a 14-year-old boy, Aaron Paron, a member of the Potter's House Christian Fellowship
. Aaron refused to leave the organization, and saw his mother as "possessed by the devil". Most of the hour-long program focused upon Ross's efforts to persuade Paron to see the Potter's House as "a destructive Bible-based group" bent on taking control of its members' lives. The case resulted in the parties entering into an agreement that Potter's House would not harbor Aaron, entice him away from his mother, attempt to influence his behavior or take any action that would interfere with his mother's parental rights.
In 1992 and 1993, Ross opposed actions of the Branch Davidian
group led by David Koresh
in Waco, Texas. Ross had previously deprogrammed a member of the group. Ross was the only deprogrammer to work with Branch Davidian members prior to a siege involving the death of many of the group's members
at Waco. Television broadcaster CBS
hired Ross as an on-scene analyst for their coverage of the Waco siege
. Ross also offered unsolicited advice to the FBI during the standoff. A later Department of Justice
report on the matter stated that "the FBI did not 'rely' on Ross for advice whatsoever during the standoff." According to the report, the FBI "politely declined his unsolicited offers of assistance throughout the standoff" and treated the information Ross supplied as it would any other unsolicited information received from the public. Criticism of government agencies' involvement with Ross has come from Nancy Ammerman
, a professor of sociology of religion, who cited FBI interview notes which stated that Ross "has a personal hatred for all religious cults." She claimed that the BATF
and the FBI did rely on Ross when Ross recommended that agents "attempt to publicly humiliate Koresh, hoping to drive a wedge between him and his followers." She criticized them for doing so and ignoring the "wider social sciences community". Other scholars also criticized Ross' involvement. Ross characterized his critics as cult apologist
s who held the belief that cult groups "should not be held accountable for their action like others within our society".
without the use of force or restraint. He states that despite refinement of processes over the years, exit counseling and deprogramming continue to depend on the same principles.
Stuart A. Wright
has referred to Ross as one of the most important "hardline anticultists".
In 1996 Ross started a website titled "The Ross Institute Internet Archives for the Study of Destructive Cults, Controversial Groups and Movements". Ross has lectured at the University of Pennsylvania
, University of Chicago
and University of Arizona
, and has testified as an expert witness in court cases. According to the biography page on his website he has worked as a paid consultant for television networks CBS
, CBC
and Nippon
, and Miramax/Disney
retained him as a technical consultant to one of the actors involved in making Jane Campion
's film Holy Smoke!
.
In 2001 Ross moved to New Jersey
and two years later founded the Rick A. Ross Institute for the Study of Destructive Cults and Controversial Groups and Movements, a non-profit, 501(c)(3) public charity located in New Jersey, USA. The Advisory Board of the RRI includes Ford Greene
, a California attorney specializing in cult-related litigation, as well as Flo Conway
and Jim Siegelman
, co-authors of the books Snapping: America's Epidemic of Sudden Personality Change
and Holy Terror: The Fundamentalist War on America's Freedoms in Religion, Politics and Our Private Lives. Psychologist Margaret Singer
also served as a board member of the Institute until her death in 2003.
In June 2004 Landmark Education
filed a US$1 million lawsuit against the Institute, claiming that the Institute's online archives damaged Landmark Education's product.
In December 2005, Landmark Education filed to dismiss its own lawsuit with prejudice, purportedly on the grounds of a material change in case law after the publication of an opinion in another case, Donato v. Moldow, regarding the Communications Decency Act of 1996.
church, in 1991. Ross was acquitted in a January 1994 jury trial.
Scott sued Ross, two of his associates, and the Cult Awareness Network
(CAN), for his abduction and failed deprogramming. Scott was eighteen years old at the time of the abduction. CAN was a co-defendant because a CAN contact person had referred Scott's mother to Ross.
The two men hired by Scott's mother seized him outside her house. Scott was handcuffed but never struck. After he bit one of the men, they taped his mouth, and both the handcuffs and tape were removed after he was put in the van to go to the hotel where they held the deprogramming. The deprogramming personnel restrained him and told him his release depended on the completion of the deprogramming.
The defendants were found liable for conspiracy to deprive Scott of his civil rights
and religious liberties
and awarded $875,000 in compensatory damages, and punitive damages
in the amount of $1,000,000 against CAN, $2,500,000 against Ross, and $250,000 against each of the other two individual defendants. The case bankrupted the Cult Awareness Network.
In 1995 Ross filed for personal bankruptcy because of the damages award against him in the Scott civil trial. Scott then settled with Ross, accepting $5,000 plus 200 hours of Ross's professional services "as an expert consultant and intervention specialist". Berry, Scott's new attorney, said that Scott's decision to use Ross's services was not a vindication of Ross's deprogramming methods and refused to say what services Ross would provide.
Media/news
Crisis intervention
Crisis Intervention can be defined as emergency psychological care aimed at assisting individuals in a crisis situation to restore equilibrium to their biopsychosocial functioning and to minimise the potential for psychological trauma...
specialist, with an interest in exit counseling
Exit counseling
Exit counseling, also termed strategic intervention therapy, cult intervention or thought reform consultation, is an intervention designed to persuade an individual to leave a group perceived to be a cult...
and deprogramming
Deprogramming
Deprogramming refers to actions that attempt to force a person to abandon allegiance to a religious, political, economic, or social group. Methods and practices may involve kidnapping and coercion...
of former cult
Cult
The word cult in current popular usage usually refers to a group whose beliefs or practices are considered abnormal or bizarre. The word originally denoted a system of ritual practices...
members. He runs a blog at CultNews.com, and in 2003 founded the Rick A. Ross Institute, which maintains a database of press articles on controversial groups, court documents, and essays.
Ross has worked as an expert court witness
Expert witness
An expert witness, professional witness or judicial expert is a witness, who by virtue of education, training, skill, or experience, is believed to have expertise and specialised knowledge in a particular subject beyond that of the average person, sufficient that others may officially and legally...
and as an analyst for the media in cases relating to such groups.
In 1995, he reached an agreement with Pentecostalist Jason Scott over his forcible deprogamming in 1993. The defendants had been found liable for conspiracy to deprive Scott of his civil rights and religious liberties and were awarded $875,000 in compensatory damages, and punitive damages in the amount of $1,000,000 against the Cult Awareness Network, and $2,500,000 against Ross.
A number of credentialed cult experts have rejected Ross's claims to be an expert on cults.
Early life
Paul and Ethel Ross adopted Rick Ross in 1953 in Cleveland, Ohio. The Ross family moved to Phoenix, Arizona, in 1956, where Ross grew up. Except for attending one year at Camden Military Academy, a boarding school in South Carolina, Ross completed all of his education in Arizona. He graduated from Phoenix High School in 1971 and did not attend college.In 1974, Ross was convicted of the attempted burglary of a vacant model home and sentenced to probation. The following year, he robbed a jewelry store in Phoenix. Ross confessed to the crime and received five years probation. In response to questions about his criminal background, Ross later said, "I had been in trouble as a young man, and I turned my life around ... I never again in my life made another mistake like that."
After high school, he worked for a finance company and then a local bank. In 1975, he began work for a cousin's car-salvage business, later becoming company vice-president. He continued working in the car-salvage field until 1982.
Early career
Ross first became concerned about controversial religious groups in 1982. Jewish Voice Broadcast, a missionary group founded by Assembly of God minister Louis Kaplan, specifically targeted Jews for conversion to PentecostalismPentecostalism
Pentecostalism is a diverse and complex movement within Christianity that places special emphasis on a direct personal experience of God through the baptism in the Holy Spirit, has an eschatological focus, and is an experiential religion. The term Pentecostal is derived from Pentecost, the Greek...
. The group infiltrated the Jewish nursing home where Ross's grandmother lived. After bringing the matter to the attention of the director and of the local Jewish community, Ross successfully campaigned to have the group's activities stopped. He then began working as a volunteer, lecturer and researcher for a variety of Jewish organizations. He worked for the Jewish Federation of Greater Phoenix, and the Union of American Hebrew Congregations appointed him to two national committees focusing on cults and inter-religious affairs.
During the 1980s Ross represented the Jewish community on the Religious Advisory Committee of the Arizona Department of Corrections
Arizona Department of Corrections
The Arizona Department of Corrections is in charge of the incarceration of inmates in 10 prisons in the U.S. state of Arizona. As of April 2009, the ADC manages over 40,191 imprisoned inmates and over 7,216 inmates who have been paroled or that are statutorily released. ADC is also in involved in...
. Later the Committee elected him as its chairman, and he served as chairman of the International Coalition of Jewish Prisoners Programs sponsored by B'nai Brith in Washington D.C. Ross's work within the prison system covered inmate religious rights and educational efforts regarding hate group
Hate group
A hate group is an organized group or movement that advocates and practices hatred, hostility, or violence towards members of a race, ethnicity, religion, gender, sexual orientation or other designated sector of society...
s. Ross also worked as a member of the professional staff of the Jewish Family and Children's Service (JFCS) and the Bureau of Jewish Education (BJE) in Phoenix, Arizona.
Consultant, lecturer, and deprogrammer
In 1986 Ross left the staff of the JFCS and BJE to become a full-time private consultant and deprogrammerDeprogramming
Deprogramming refers to actions that attempt to force a person to abandon allegiance to a religious, political, economic, or social group. Methods and practices may involve kidnapping and coercion...
.
He undertook a number of involuntary deprogramming interventions at the requests of parents whose children had joined controversial groups and movements. By 2004, Ross had handled more than 350 deprogramming cases in various countries including the United States, the United Kingdom, Israel and Italy, typically charging around $5,000 per case. Ross claimed a success-rate of 75%, and journalist Nick Johnstone credited him with having "rescued many people from harmful situations".
In 1989 the CBS
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
television program 48 Hours
48 Hours (TV series)
48 Hours is a documentary and news program broadcast on the CBS television network since January 19, 1988. The program originally presented documentaries of various events related to a particular subject occurring within a 48-hour period, and is credited as one of the first to air a "reality show"...
covered Ross's deprogramming of a 14-year-old boy, Aaron Paron, a member of the Potter's House Christian Fellowship
Potter's House Christian Fellowship
The Potter's House Christian Fellowship is a Christian Pentecostal church organization founded by Pastor Wayman Mitchell in Prescott, Arizona in 1970. The official organization title is Christian Fellowship Ministries or CFM....
. Aaron refused to leave the organization, and saw his mother as "possessed by the devil". Most of the hour-long program focused upon Ross's efforts to persuade Paron to see the Potter's House as "a destructive Bible-based group" bent on taking control of its members' lives. The case resulted in the parties entering into an agreement that Potter's House would not harbor Aaron, entice him away from his mother, attempt to influence his behavior or take any action that would interfere with his mother's parental rights.
In 1992 and 1993, Ross opposed actions of the Branch Davidian
Branch Davidian
The Branch Davidians are a Protestant sect that originated in 1955 from a schism in the Davidian Seventh Day Adventists , a reform movement that began within the Seventh-day Adventist Church around 1930...
group led by David Koresh
David Koresh
David Koresh , born Vernon Wayne Howell, was the leader of a Branch Davidian religious sect, believing himself to be its final prophet. Howell legally changed his name to David Koresh on May 15, 1990. A 1993 raid by the U.S...
in Waco, Texas. Ross had previously deprogrammed a member of the group. Ross was the only deprogrammer to work with Branch Davidian members prior to a siege involving the death of many of the group's members
Waco Siege
The Waco siege began on February 28, 1993, and ended violently 50 days later on April 19. The siege began when the United States Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms attempted to execute a search warrant at the Branch Davidian ranch at Mount Carmel, a property located east-northeast of Waco,...
at Waco. Television broadcaster CBS
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
hired Ross as an on-scene analyst for their coverage of the Waco siege
Waco Siege
The Waco siege began on February 28, 1993, and ended violently 50 days later on April 19. The siege began when the United States Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms attempted to execute a search warrant at the Branch Davidian ranch at Mount Carmel, a property located east-northeast of Waco,...
. Ross also offered unsolicited advice to the FBI during the standoff. A later Department of Justice
United States Department of Justice
The United States Department of Justice , is the United States federal executive department responsible for the enforcement of the law and administration of justice, equivalent to the justice or interior ministries of other countries.The Department is led by the Attorney General, who is nominated...
report on the matter stated that "the FBI did not 'rely' on Ross for advice whatsoever during the standoff." According to the report, the FBI "politely declined his unsolicited offers of assistance throughout the standoff" and treated the information Ross supplied as it would any other unsolicited information received from the public. Criticism of government agencies' involvement with Ross has come from Nancy Ammerman
Nancy Ammerman
Nancy Tatom Ammerman is a professor of sociology of religion, now at Boston University. In 1993 she wrote a controversial report about the Branch Davidians and Waco.-Life:...
, a professor of sociology of religion, who cited FBI interview notes which stated that Ross "has a personal hatred for all religious cults." She claimed that the BATF
Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is a federal law enforcement organization within the United States Department of Justice...
and the FBI did rely on Ross when Ross recommended that agents "attempt to publicly humiliate Koresh, hoping to drive a wedge between him and his followers." She criticized them for doing so and ignoring the "wider social sciences community". Other scholars also criticized Ross' involvement. Ross characterized his critics as cult apologist
Cult apologist
The term cult apologist is used by opponents of cults and new religious movements to describe social scientists, religious scholars, and other persons who write about cults and new religious movements whose writings they consider as uncritical or not sufficiently critical. Scholars have referred to...
s who held the belief that cult groups "should not be held accountable for their action like others within our society".
Rick A. Ross Institute
As a result of the legal risks involved, Ross stopped advocating coercive deprogramming or involuntary interventions for adults, preferring instead voluntary exit counselingExit counseling
Exit counseling, also termed strategic intervention therapy, cult intervention or thought reform consultation, is an intervention designed to persuade an individual to leave a group perceived to be a cult...
without the use of force or restraint. He states that despite refinement of processes over the years, exit counseling and deprogramming continue to depend on the same principles.
Stuart A. Wright
Stuart A. Wright
Stuart A. Wright is Professor of Sociology and Director of Research in the Office of Research and Sponsored Programs at Lamar University with primary research interests in religious and political movements, sectarian conflict, violence and terrorism...
has referred to Ross as one of the most important "hardline anticultists".
In 1996 Ross started a website titled "The Ross Institute Internet Archives for the Study of Destructive Cults, Controversial Groups and Movements". Ross has lectured at the University of Pennsylvania
University of Pennsylvania
The University of Pennsylvania is a private, Ivy League university located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Penn is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States,Penn is the fourth-oldest using the founding dates claimed by each institution...
, University of Chicago
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois, USA. It was founded by the American Baptist Education Society with a donation from oil magnate and philanthropist John D. Rockefeller and incorporated in 1890...
and University of Arizona
University of Arizona
The University of Arizona is a land-grant and space-grant public institution of higher education and research located in Tucson, Arizona, United States. The University of Arizona was the first university in the state of Arizona, founded in 1885...
, and has testified as an expert witness in court cases. According to the biography page on his website he has worked as a paid consultant for television networks CBS
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
, CBC
Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, commonly known as CBC and officially as CBC/Radio-Canada, is a Canadian crown corporation that serves as the national public radio and television broadcaster...
and Nippon
Nippon Television
is a television network based in the Shiodome area of Minato, Tokyo, Japan and is controlled by the Yomiuri Shimbun publishing company. Broadcasting terrestrially across Japan, the network is commonly known as , contracted to , and abbreviated as "NTV" or "AX".-Offices:*The Headquarters : 6-1,...
, and Miramax/Disney
The Walt Disney Company
The Walt Disney Company is the largest media conglomerate in the world in terms of revenue. Founded on October 16, 1923, by Walt and Roy Disney as the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio, Walt Disney Productions established itself as a leader in the American animation industry before diversifying into...
retained him as a technical consultant to one of the actors involved in making Jane Campion
Jane Campion
Jane Campion is a filmmaker and screenwriter. She is one of the most internationally successful New Zealand directors, although most of her work has been made in or financed by other countries, principally Australia – where she now lives – and the United States...
's film Holy Smoke!
Holy Smoke!
Holy Smoke! is a 1999 Australian drama film directed by Jane Campion, who co-wrote the screenplay with her sister Anna. It premiered at the Venice Film Festival and was shown at the New York Film Festival and the Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival before being released theatrically.-Plot...
.
In 2001 Ross moved to New Jersey
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...
and two years later founded the Rick A. Ross Institute for the Study of Destructive Cults and Controversial Groups and Movements, a non-profit, 501(c)(3) public charity located in New Jersey, USA. The Advisory Board of the RRI includes Ford Greene
Ford Greene
Aylsworth Crawford Greene III is an American attorney from San Anselmo, California, noted for having successfully conducted litigation against Scientology and alleged cults. Greene is currently the mayor of San Anselmo and a twice-elected San Anselmo town councilman...
, a California attorney specializing in cult-related litigation, as well as Flo Conway
Flo Conway
Florence D. Conway is a social activist and former journalist for the Saturday Evening Post.Following the Jonestown deaths of 1978, Dr. Conway testified on February 5, 1979 regarding "The Cult Phenomenon in the United States" along with Jim Siegelman at joint House-U.S. Senate hearings on cult...
and Jim Siegelman
Jim Siegelman
Jim Siegelman is the author of several books about the rise of what he terms cults in America.Along with Flo Conway, he testified at joint House-U.S. Senate hearings on "cult practices" and also received the Leo J...
, co-authors of the books Snapping: America's Epidemic of Sudden Personality Change
Snapping
Snapping: America's Epidemic of Sudden Personality Change is a 1978 anti-cult book which describes the authors' theory of religious conversion, called snapping in terms of mind control, is a mental process through which, the authors argue, a person is recruited by a cult or other religious...
and Holy Terror: The Fundamentalist War on America's Freedoms in Religion, Politics and Our Private Lives. Psychologist Margaret Singer
Margaret Singer
Dr. Margaret Thaler Singer, was a clinical psychologist and a part-time Adjunct Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of California, Berkeley, U.S....
also served as a board member of the Institute until her death in 2003.
In June 2004 Landmark Education
Landmark Education
Landmark Education LLC is a personal training and development company which offers educational programs in approximately 115 locations in more than 20 countries worldwide....
filed a US$1 million lawsuit against the Institute, claiming that the Institute's online archives damaged Landmark Education's product.
In December 2005, Landmark Education filed to dismiss its own lawsuit with prejudice, purportedly on the grounds of a material change in case law after the publication of an opinion in another case, Donato v. Moldow, regarding the Communications Decency Act of 1996.
Abduction of Jason Scott
In 1993, Ross faced charges of unlawful imprisonment in the State of Washington due to the alleged forcible detention of Jason Scott, a member of a PentecostalistPentecostalism
Pentecostalism is a diverse and complex movement within Christianity that places special emphasis on a direct personal experience of God through the baptism in the Holy Spirit, has an eschatological focus, and is an experiential religion. The term Pentecostal is derived from Pentecost, the Greek...
church, in 1991. Ross was acquitted in a January 1994 jury trial.
Scott sued Ross, two of his associates, and the Cult Awareness Network
Cult Awareness Network
The Cult Awareness Network was founded in the wake of the November 18, 1978 deaths of members of the group Peoples Temple and assassination of Congressman Leo J. Ryan in Jonestown, Guyana. CAN is now owned and operated by associates of the Church of Scientology, an organization that the original...
(CAN), for his abduction and failed deprogramming. Scott was eighteen years old at the time of the abduction. CAN was a co-defendant because a CAN contact person had referred Scott's mother to Ross.
The two men hired by Scott's mother seized him outside her house. Scott was handcuffed but never struck. After he bit one of the men, they taped his mouth, and both the handcuffs and tape were removed after he was put in the van to go to the hotel where they held the deprogramming. The deprogramming personnel restrained him and told him his release depended on the completion of the deprogramming.
The defendants were found liable for conspiracy to deprive Scott of his civil rights
Civil rights
Civil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' freedom from unwarranted infringement by governments and private organizations, and ensure one's ability to participate in the civil and political life of the state without discrimination or repression.Civil rights include...
and religious liberties
Freedom of religion
Freedom of religion is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or community, in public or private, to manifest religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship, and observance; the concept is generally recognized also to include the freedom to change religion or not to follow any...
and awarded $875,000 in compensatory damages, and punitive damages
Punitive damages
Punitive damages or exemplary damages are damages intended to reform or deter the defendant and others from engaging in conduct similar to that which formed the basis of the lawsuit...
in the amount of $1,000,000 against CAN, $2,500,000 against Ross, and $250,000 against each of the other two individual defendants. The case bankrupted the Cult Awareness Network.
In 1995 Ross filed for personal bankruptcy because of the damages award against him in the Scott civil trial. Scott then settled with Ross, accepting $5,000 plus 200 hours of Ross's professional services "as an expert consultant and intervention specialist". Berry, Scott's new attorney, said that Scott's decision to use Ross's services was not a vindication of Ross's deprogramming methods and refused to say what services Ross would provide.
Other controversies
While Ross states that he is an “expert” on cults, others disagree and point out his lack of credentials, Cult experts who are educated in the field have refused to work with Ross, including Steve Hassan, a Licensed Mental Health Counselor (LMHC) in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and Nationally Certified Counselor (NCC) with a Masters degree in counseling psychology from Cambridge College. When Hassan questioned Ross’ role in the Waco case Ross responded by attacking Hassan's ethics and professionalism.Articles and publications
- Ross, Rick, "Bigotry lurks in born-again Christian doctrine", The Arizona RepublicThe Arizona RepublicThe Arizona Republic is a daily newspaper published in Phoenix. Circulated throughout Arizona, it is the state's largest newspaper. Since 2000, it has been owned by the Gannett newspaper chain. It was ranked tenth in US daily newspapers by circulation in 2007.-Early years:The newspaper was founded...
, November 6, 1982 - Ross, Rick, "Teen Challenge", A report to the Religious Advisory Committee, Arizona Department of CorrectionsArizona Department of CorrectionsThe Arizona Department of Corrections is in charge of the incarceration of inmates in 10 prisons in the U.S. state of Arizona. As of April 2009, the ADC manages over 40,191 imprisoned inmates and over 7,216 inmates who have been paroled or that are statutorily released. ADC is also in involved in...
, 26 July 1984 - Madigan, Tim, See No Evil, Summit Publishing Group - Legacy Books, May 1993, ISBN 1-5653-0063-7 (Foreword by Rick Ross)
- Ross, Rick, Letter to the editors – "What Happened at Waco", Washington Post, 1995-07-25
- Ross, Rick, The Missionary Threat, Institute for First Amendment Studies, 1995
- Ross, Rick. "Is Falun Gong a Cult?", (January 2009) Chinese Academy of Social SciencesChinese Academy of Social SciencesThe Chinese Academy of Social Sciences , established in 1977, is the premier and highest academic research organization in the fields of philosophy and social sciences as well as a national center for comprehensive studies in the People's Republic of China. It was described by Foreign Policy...
.
Further reading
- Madigan, Tim, See No Evil, Summit Publishing Group - Legacy Books, May 1993, ISBN 1-5653-0063-7 (Foreword by Rick Ross)
- Kaplan, Jeffery and Heléne Lööw,The Cultic Milieu: Oppositional Subcultures in an Age of Globalization, Rowman Altamira, 2002, ISBN 075910204X
- Breitbart, Andrew and Mark C. Ebner, Hollywood, Interrupted: Insanity Chic in Babylon-- the Case Against Celebrity, John Wiley and Sons, 2004, ISBN 0471450510
External links
- Rick A. Ross Institute for the Study of Destructive Cults, Controversial Groups and Movements (website)
Media/news
- Beyond Belief, The ObserverThe ObserverThe Observer is a British newspaper, published on Sundays. In the same place on the political spectrum as its daily sister paper The Guardian, which acquired it in 1993, it takes a liberal or social democratic line on most issues. It is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper.-Origins:The first issue,...
, 12 December 2004 - Dogma Free America podcast interview with Rick Ross