From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A production of I Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt, my name is Noel. They call me Ben. We are joined, as always with our super producer Paul mission controlled decand in spirit. Today we are joined in reality with our super producer Maya Cole. So do say hello to her on the web. Most importantly, you are you. You are here, and that makes this stuff they don't want you to know. This is uh an episode that I don't know about. You guys, It's been on my mind for a long time. For a number of years. Yeah, five five years to be exact. Matt, right, has it been that long? It has? Indeed. The first season of True Detective premiered in fourteen. This series, written by an author named Nick Pizolatto, seemed set to change the face of television as we knew. It's one of those prestige programs that's kind of like a very long serialized film, like The Wire Right or Breaking Bad. Maybe the Sopranos would be another one sure, and then of course lost right, all these things that change the way we look at formats and the way we look at storytelling. True Detective made this enormous impact on the zeitgeist, the spirit of our age, and a lot of people said, where do these ideas come from? What possessed you, Nick Nicholas to create something this dark and deranged and gritty and horrifying? Can I do a shameless plug really quick? Nick Pisolato actually wrote an episode for a series that's coming out that I worked on called baron a Banjo. He wrote the the ultimate episode, the finale. Really yeah, they wrote the story. Yeah, well it's not horrifying at all. It's a little bit of a ghost story, honestly, but it's definitely lighter fair than when he wrote and True Detective. But check it out in the first episode of the show drops tomorrow, in fact, which is the the second of October, so this will be in the past by then, but check it out. That's fantastic. True Detective was really one of those shows that had the tone somewhere between a film noir and a weird fiction, right, And I think that's why a lot of people latched onto it, and it felt kind of like you're saying, Ben, it felt so out there the main storyline where there was corruption and terrible things happening to children. Um, at least it didn't feel real, right, But as we found out, maybe there's something else to it. That's that's correct that we do want to issue this disclaimer at the top of today's episode. Uh. This episode contains not only spoilers for True Detective season one and probably a little bit of trash talking about True Detective season two. For being honest, this also contains discussion of graphic crimes of a sexual nature. UH. The discussion of animal cruelty abuse very very heavy, disturbing, potentially triggering things, so listener discretion is advised. Here are the facts True Detective, the peak behind the Curtain. The three of us really love this show when it came out in it In a way, True Detective could be described as an anthology. Each season their three seasons so far takes place in this It's its own self contained narrative that maybe exists in the same universe. Each season will follow a different set of characters as the attempt to unravel UH. The twisted story of a crime right or as you noted in some cases, high that story. True Detective Season one takes this just wonderful nonlinear approach. It follows two homicide detectives in Louisiana from their initial investigation of the murder of a sex worker in the mid nineties to their very problematic reunion and their relaunch of the investigation almost twenty years later. Here are the spoilers. Spoiler alert if you do not want to be spoiled. If you haven't seen True Detective and you're gonna get angry about spoilers, fast forward past this part. It gets It gets very strange, very quickly. Interestingly enough, True Detective is actually a one of the very first true crime magazines. Is kind of a pulpy, trashy true crime rag that published, i think from the forties up until the seventies, and it was all of these gritty, grizzly details about actual murders. So in this series the first season, our detectives are heroes, are sort of anti heroes in certain ways. It's interesting that the dynamic there between them will get more into They come across a very deep, uh running intergenerational conspiracy um, a secret cult with members across Louisiana society UM that ritualizes sexual assault and murder, and members of the cults are prominent figures in the community, politicians, religious figures, pastors, drug dealers, high level drug dealers, and more. Um there's a absolutely insidious use of smoke screens, using thing places like youth centers and churches and other spots that are sort of unimpeachable in their sanctity right, trustworthy institutions used to cover up these horrific crimes. And while the detectives Marty and Rust do manage to eventually solve the immediate cry which set them off on this this deranged journey, they are not able to get complete justice. They are not able to arrest the entire cult. And it's strongly implied that this cult continues on in some form and even worse, some of the members of the cult, the prominent ones you mentioned earlier, all retain their positions in society. They get away, nothing bad happens to them. Yeah, that's the worst part of the thought that they that it's over. It's over for those detectives because the case is over, but they will never be able to bring the actual or even no the like true extent of that operating conspiracy, right, nor the history of it or how far back it goes. This work draws inspiration from a lot of places. First would be The King in Yellow, Delightful disturbing book by Robert W. Chambers. It's an anthology of semi links stories, and four of these stories reference a mysterious work, a play called The King and Yellow that is about this same figure, the supernatural character called the King and Yellow or the Yellow King. And you never read the play in full. You only see it alluded to because when people read this play or when they see it performed, drives them insane. You can see some excerpts in it. Uh, there was in the story Casilda's Song. There's a line from act one, scene two of the play, and I'll just read this part song of my soul. My voice is dead, die out, unsung as tears on shed, shall dry and die in lost Carcosa, Carcosa ringing any bells? Right? And this so this was like atmospheric tone, right, cosmic horror, which is explored, you know, in in True Detective. But it's not it's not a supernatural monster film, right, It's not a supernatural monster story, there's this it feels like it's teetering on the edge of it. It is always yeah, never really gets there. I think that's one thing that maybe was a little bit of a letdown for some folks near the mirroring the end of the season is I think there was an expectation there was gonna be some supernatural qualities and that spoiler alert didn't really pan out that way. There's some interesting fan theories which cannot be cannot be proven or disproven without you know, talking to Nick. But but if you want to lose an afternoon, it's a great way to spend it. The one the other literary influence that Pizolatto sites is called The Conspiracy against the Human Race. It's nonfiction essays by a horror writer named Thomas Logatti who was an amazing, very unhappy writer. Bad things happened in his stories, so as we know. In the in the story True Detective season one, there's the detective Us Cole, played uh pitch perfectly by Matthew McConaughey, and Rust Cole is just over the idea of people. He has a pessimistic of philosophy that he expounds upon apparently every time they're in a car kind of and he is also what we would call an anti natalist, someone who thinks that, uh, people are born and that's a negative thing. And it gets worse from there. Absolutely, I mean, it's definitely a philosophy that is much more prominent in his grizzled older version of the character. The younger one he sees definitely still got that vibe and he's constantly pissing off his partner played by Woody Harrelson for being a bit of a pill and and well that's that happens later. But yeah, absolutely, But the uh, the story is framed in like a past and future kind of cross cutting, and the future Russ Cole is in a not a deposition, but he's being interrogated by police officers from I guess would be modern day and he's clearly been through some oh yeah, and this is where a lot of his his statements come out, you know, not not a deposition, but that interview, right, and in earlier interviews outside of the universe of the show, as we said, Nick Pizolato said, well this did influence me. This is an amazing piece of literature. But he was initially accused of plagiarism because of the similarity between Cole's dialogue and Legati's writing, And he does say there's an influence, but he does deny that he was in any way of plagiaris. But these are just two atmospheric philosophical things. They are the side, They are the sauce. They are not the main dish. The main dish, as you mentioned earlier, Matt is the terrible, terrible unfolding of events in the course of the plot. And that leads us to today's question, what if there is more to the story. What if True Detective doesn't just take inspiration from works of fiction. What if there is a real story behind this television show. What if there is, for lack of a better phrase, a true true Detective. We'll learn more afterward from our sponsor. Here's where it gets crazy. So all the you know, the things that we see on screen, the overall characters, and you know roughly the place and all of these things. The details in True Detective are fictional, right, I mean that we can all agree on that it's a fictional show about a fictional thing. However, there appears to be at least one particular occurrence that you know, really was a decade that it really hits troublingly close to what is explored, at least within the television show. Right right, we'll travel to poncha Tula, Louisiana. Now off air. The three of us were flexing our or Southern accent muscles. We we love a good we love a good down South voice. I'm gonna try not to fall into it because this is serious stuff, but it might happen. There is a place where there was a place in Ponchatoula, Louisiana called Hosanna Church was founded by a pastor named Louis Lamonica. And originally when they started, they had less than twenty four people, less than twenty four congregates. It's a very small church, but it's not unusual for churches to start small, right, yes, true, And in the seventies this church was attended regularly by around a thousand people. I wonder what changed. The facilities of Hosanna Church had a sanctuary and behind that there was eight children's school and um Louis Lamonica, the founder and had pastor like you mentioned men passed away in ninety four and the church went through about a decade of various temporary leaders until Louis Lemonica's son, Louis Lemonica Jr. Took the reins. It should be noted here that the original Louis Lemonica Sr. Was seen as kind of a paragon of the community. He was beloved by both people that went to the church and known by people who just lived in the parish. At least that's the story. And he was kind of a ned Flanders. You get the vibe when you read people read people's accounts of meeting him and living with him. Not so for junior uh Louis Lamonica Jr. When he took the When he took leadership of the church began circling the wagons, things started to look strange for people on the outside of the church walls. He started excommunicating church members for various perceived slights or sins or missteps. It could be a disagreement over doctrine, sure, but if they attended another church even once, they would be excommunicated. One popular competitor was Harvest World Reach Ministries, started by the former youth minister of Hasana Church. This is troubling. A few years back we did um We did a video in which we broke down the ways that cults operate on the human mind. And one of the first, one of the very first things a lot of cults will do when they're moving from being, you know, a religion to an actual cult of some sort is they will isolate the members, They'll isolate the followers. This you can see the video if you want, but this, this isolation itself. It's important to note this is not a crime. This is just people deciding to live together in a like minded way, and there is not a law against it. You can't really write a law against it, because you know, if people want to do things that other people think are weird, more power to them, so long as they're not hurting anyone. Yeah, yeah, you're right. I just want to point out here really quickly that I've been a part of several church movements where um, my family and I followed a pastor to a different church, and it wasn't so much about the church itself. It was a lot about the people that were there, the congregation, but it was more about the experience you get when you're you know, sitting in a pew listening to a pastor speak, right, because it really is in a lot of ways of performance and do I like this performance doesn't resonate with me. That's how it goes. And that's not inherently insidious, right, And it's just a personal preference where it's like, I like this guy versus others, And why would I, you know, why would I get something different at the dinner? You know, I like my corn beef sandwich. Well, yeah, And it hits in the nature of this and and just to get into that background a little bit, having this this person that you trust and have grown up with. Ostensibly you probably had maybe had kids while this pastor was the head of your church, and whatever occurred in your life, you went through high school, whatever it is. Um then he passes away. They you go through all these temporary things and this new guy comes through. And I'm just imagining being in the mindset of one of his congregation, what you're what you're feeling as all of this stuff starts to happen that you're describing then where he seems to be either going off the rails or at least uh handling the reins in a very different way. So you think he was calling the members of the congregation that would not be susceptible to this new regime that he was trying to bring about, right, I think someone was that's yeah, well there's a twist to that. Uh so, Lamonica. Also, just like you said, I love that you put out culling. That's a good way to describe it. He also fought with the church's staff, other people who would be in the power structure, and he ordered multiple staff members to skedattle to leave the church and never returned, including the church's secretary, who is his mother. He kicked his mom out of the church. Yeah, and it really doesn't make sense to me unless it is something a little off handed, if they we're dealing with here, Because a church like that, especially as smaller church, even if you've got a thousand members, you you exist because every Sunday and whatever other fundraiser, you're having people put money into a plate and that goes into the church fund, right, and no matter how many, no matter how small of a contribution. Let's say it's just ten dollars every Sunday, maybe five dollars, maybe up to twenty or more. Getting rid of that on a monthly basis. If you think about it like a Netflix subscription or something that, uh, that's going to ruin a church really fast. Absolutely, And speaking of scandal, it was during this time, by their own confession, it was during this time that members of the Hosanna Church were routinely ritualistically assaulting children and animals. The following information may not be suitable for all listeners. This come from the New York Times. We have an excerpt here and we're using it to summarize some of the events, but also to underline to emphasize that this was not something that was reported in fringe sources. This was in papers of note. This was huge news New York Times, says. Sheriff Daniel H. Edwards of Tangitpota said that as many as twenty five children, about evenly split between boys and girls, might have been involved in sex acts at the youth center there in Hosanna, in cars and in the homes of at least two of those charged. The abuse, according to Edwards, seems to have begun in and stopped occurring on church grounds after two thousand and three. However, Edwards went on to say, nobody really believes they just stopped abusing children. Yeah, it's true. Edwards said that the group apparently had a pretty effective formula for going under the radar. And that was, as we mentioned the same in Tree Detective, using the church um and that close knit relationship between the members and victims who would very likely look the other way when it came to reporting these abuses to authorities, for sure. And he didn't actually say, hey, look guys, everybody, we've got devil worshiping going on here and it's a cult they never do well. You Yeah, that's a pretty heavy claim, right. It almost feels you wouldn't be able to really print that necessarily because that is such an accusation. But it's, uh, what they were doing there? What what? At least some of the defendants who were involved in some of the cases that came out of this um, they told investigators that quote devil worship was the reason for their participation in doing these atrocities to children and animals. I guess what I was getting at is like, it's a slippery slope kind of situation when you're indoctrinated into a cult. No one says, hey, I want to join my cult. It's kind of like that mission creep, right, you know. It happens a little over time and then before you know it, it's like the boiling frog kind of situation. You know, it takes a little while and then before you know it. This is just the situation you find yourself in and you don't know how to get out. But in this case, they're saying like, yeah, we joined this thing that I guess could be considered a cult because we wanted to be a part of the devil worship, right, And I'm just laughing a little bit because when you said, nobody comes up and says, hey, we joined my cult because we did a little bit of sketch comedy and in that cult video, that's exactly what you said. And that's exactly Yeah, with Matt as our as our dear leader, our spiritual guru, still ready to you know, kick that thing back up in action whenever you guys, are I miss being a deity? So you know, I you had a gift for it. Let's see, Chuck was on board, we had a lot of Jonathan Strickland was on board. Yes. Yeah. So in this case, at the point the events occurring in the Hasannah Church community appeared to be a genuine case of devil worship. La Monica and his inner circles said that they murdered and defiled animals. They sacrificed cats, They sexually assaulted at least one dog, while irreparably damaging the lives and the minds of multiple child victims. The criminals evolved apparently used pentagrams, they wore robes and other props in the course of their crimes, and some of their victims were their very own children, their own biological offspring. There's no other way to say it. If this is true, it's a genuine case of ritualized satanic abuse. And we've talked about it before the outbreak of hysteria that is now called the Satanic Panic, which gripped American waves throughout the late eighties and the nineties. Most of the things, most of the stories we heard about Satanic panic cases later turned out to be groundless. We're not saying none of them were true. We're saying that there was very little actual proof, but the media didn't really care. This was fantastic fodder for sixty minutes type investigations and grizzly segments on the evening news. There just didn't seem to be too much reality to many of these stories. This case, however, at least at the at first appears to be an exception and one that almost went undiscovered. Authorities didn't learn about the crimes until two thousand and five, right, And it started in the nineties. And that's when Nicole Bernard, who was thirty six years old at the time, called the Sheriff's office there in Louisiana from Black Lick, Ohio to say she had fled town to save her child from abuse. And then the authorities learned that members of the town knew something was rotten much much earlier. So the Telegraph actually reported the church had attempted to intimidate some of the other residents of the area. They cited Tim Norman, who was a property developer, retired property developer UM, who was a resident who lived very close by to the church. UM. He was quoted as saying that Lamonica and his congregation UM had essentially waged war against him, a war of intimidation, a campaign to try to force him out of the community. Yeah. When he he made a lot of accusations about what was going on. Some of them were again a little more colorful than others. UM. One thing he references is some kind of Native American chanting or you know, vocalizations that he characterizes them a little differently. Um, but like whooping noises perhaps, Yeah, that that that would occur by the congregation in his garden or you know, out near his property, or perhaps even on his property, and that their behavior would just increasingly get stranger and stranger. My favorite lines still from it is just it's stuck out to me reading this guy's accounts. I'm not going to do a voice out of respect. But they wanted to baptize their children in my creek, which isn't that crazy on the surface, Like we got a body of water, we want to baptize somebody. Hey, that's not too bad. But I said, you can't do that here. There's gators in there. Yeah, which is also probably true. Checks out, Probably it's true. But at the same time, what does that imply like that wouldn't have been part of the ritual? I mean, what the fact that there are gators in there, like they don't want to die? Oh no, he's just he's giving us a contrast as the non member who lives in the area. But did this guy not sound like a bit of a kuku? Yeah, a little bit, certainly a little bit, but he also is referencing and maybe he's just mischaracterizing some of the noises that he's hearing because his his property really was in in close proximity to the buildings where things were allegedly occurring. Well, it reminds me of the Georgia Guidestone story where we we did a little film for Amazon about that, and we've talked about it on the show. And when I did a senior thesis film on that years ago, UM I interviewed a pastor at a church that was nearby and just really quick the Georgia guide stones just like stone Granite monument in a rural part of Georgia that have been associated with things like the New World Order in the Illuminati, and occasionally Satanic rituals. And the pastor that I spoke to swore up and down that he saw blood rituals being done. They're absolutely no evidence of that ever having taken place. Um Or maybe what he saw was perhaps some pagans in robes doing some sort of solstice ritual, but I feel as though in his mind, being a particularly god fearing type of man, inserted some detail and that maybe wasn't there. And it occurs to me, maybe some of that's going on here. I don't know. We all see through the lenses that we put up in front of Um. That's right, that's right. And everybody's the protagonists of their own story. So they very well may have just been doing something in their community or in their movement and he decided it was about him, you know what I mean, it's possible or he felt left out, maybe it actually was, or maybe it's just the truth exactly. Well, and that's the way these kinds of stories, in particular, this one feels like could all of this really have been happening? Right? And there's so much more? Yeah? Yeah, So in two thousand and three, that's when we see the first confession. Law enforcement is not involved. Some members of the church confess to other congregates, disclosing their crime and asking according to authorities, and later investigation for forgiveness. This led to a schism, a final mass departure from the church. Hosanna's membership dwindled. And you can imagine why that would occur, Right, some people go up in front of church, or you hear about people going up and confessing to doing those things. Yeah, it would be Yeah, the you know, God may forgive, but it's it's a tall order for a lot of people, especially given them just the perverse nature of these crimes. Back to Nicole Bernard, she was the former spouse of Hassanna's youth minister, a guy named Austin Tree Bernard the third. He had sometimes been described as the mastermind or the ringleader of this group. Bernard claimed that she had tapes and videos that belonged to the church that substantiated what she was saying, because she was saying, you know there's an abuse cult out there children or in danger. I have proof, and you just remind everybody she's the one who called in from Ohio, yes to like begin reporting on this or to begin telling people the story. And she was later arrested along with some of the people that she named, and along with her ex husband, the youth pastor, Austin Bernard. That is just the first of the confessions. So a law enforcement officer in the name of Stan Carpenter and his colleagues were absolutely astonished when Louis Lamonica Jr. Came by the station nearby Sheriff's office in two thousand five and he said that he wanted to talk about the dedication of a baby to Satan that was held of the church upstairs, and what he referred to as the youth room. Um, and he this sounds like he's like turning himself in. This is bizarre. He went on to describe a room where all the windows were blacked out. He was quoted as same quote, like black paper, keep it dark. Uh. There was a pentagram in the middle of the floor, he said, and a book of quote spells and temptations, which sounds like the most Southern. It sounds like it's it's a thing purposefully made to scare people who are participating in like Christianity in the South. I saw a book of spells and temptations exactly. Or did you guys ever, Matt at your church, do they ever do those hell plays? I have been to those at other tribulation trail, like the Halloween stuff. I love it. Yeah. To me, it's like an excuse for them to like while out and do the most offensive, creepy, you know, satanic stuff. But it was all with the purpose of like it was like scared straight, like scaring you two into the arms of the Lord. I'm probably going to one this month. This is my favorite time. It's a good time of the year. I remember the one they had in my church, your church near bund my house. They had a a crashed car that they would park outside and it was like they had like a fake dead body in it who would be presumably done drugs or something, you know, unholy. See that sounds like my high school. The tribulation trail. Things were squarely aimed at abortion where and then there's like the final act where someone saying, well you could have repented, And then there's the crew of people at the end of the thing. That's my least favorite part. I tried to skip the talk after I'm there for the show. Oh yeah, give me the action. Um so a little little bit of lighthearted in their heartedness there for everybody. Lightheartedness. Now, we do want to say before we continue that Lamonica here is speaking in a very casual, disaffected and calm way. He doesn't he's not you know, like on the edge of death or well, and he's not necessarily worried that he's about to get arrested. Well like, at least that's what what the reporting says reminds me of the character from seven No spoilers for seven when he turns himself in a very matter of factly speaks to the authorities in a way where it's like this guy doesn't care what happens to him, he says, detective detector. I guess he does get a little upset. He's just emphatic, right, he had a plan he was working on, you know what I mean. But Lamonica apparently had some kind of in because he confesses this and more without any prompting, right, and he goes into detail. Yeah, he says he's been having sex with at least two young boys from the time they were four years old until they were twelve or thirteen. Um. He named names, including Christopher Lobat, who was twenty four, a deputy sheriff of give it to me, Matt, I call it Tangerboho Tanjeboe. But but we've been calling it Tanga tan. Look, we don't write us right in. Let us know if you're from t T Town, t parish, let us know how to pronounce it. He implicated. This person, Christopher Labat, who was a law enforcement official who apparently for a while lived on the church grounds and was a co conspirator. According to La Monica's very early even handed testimony. Yeah. He said that they had abused boys and girls between the age of one and sixteen, taught them to have sexual relations with each other as well as with the canine. He said to your drunk cat's blood. They poured it over the bodies of victims, some of them were his biological children, and it goes into very very disturbing graphic detail. We found an excerpt from the Daily Mail reporting on this. This is the kind of stuff the Daily Mail likes to report on, and they are rightly not seen as the best of all possible sources. This is mainly to give give everyone a sense of what kind of stuff was being reported here. Lamonica describes one of the rituals that allegedly occurs. He says, they would start off like a church service, but it was Satanic music. There were candles burning, dark red candle holders and the dedication of baby A. That's probably because the kid's name is is you know, kept out of public records. The dedication of baby A into Satan with his pentagram. She was put in the middle in a black dress. He describes chanting around the child, who is barely one years old at the time, before killing a cat, draining its blood, drinking it. Uh. They said they didn't make the child drink the cat blood because she was too young, so instead they sprinkled the blood over her. And Lamonica said these meetings took place once every two or three months, and we we should stayed here that according to the Daily Mail, that child that is being described there is the baby of Nicole Bernard, the person that we heard about again who kind of blew the whistle on this whole thing, and then he goes into detail about how they would pursue the sexual abuse. Let's just call back real quick to our Black Metal episode. This is what you would consider theistic Satanism, right where it's like worshiping Satan Lucifer as a deity in the way you would worship any other god. And I think I had a boo boo in the and the Death Metal episode Black met episode RRI I said something about, how you know, I equated paganism to Satanism, and I know that's not the case. But there is something called dark paganism or the left hand path, or the idea of black magic rituals or occultism that is can be folded into the idea of theistic Satanism. So back to the description of these um what La Monica UH describes as these sexual abuse rituals and how they carried her round. You can find the details online if if you must, if you need to know, but it is disturbing, it is I would I do not use this word lightly. It is unclean, uh, and it is not something that we we off off air. Decided not to present this in graphic detail on air, both out of respect for the victims, respect for everyone's sanity, and the fact that if you want to know, you could find it. But he walked into the sheriff's office and he laid this out. You know, he had a disgusting, evil ted talk of sorts. He claimed that they laid feces and urine around while this stuff was happening. And then he said, during these Satanic rituals, who would become quote distorted by the devil demons would change him into an animal, a snake, a fox, wolf, spiders and like you said, no, he named all of his accomplices and it was men and women involved at yes, absolutely men and women, And later interviews with victims appeared to confirm the veracity of his account, and Lamonica said the abuse started in stopped in two thousand three, but law enforcement officials like Edwards believe it probably continue to members homes for some unknown period of time after the church shuddered its doors. Astute listeners, you'll notice that we've been using the word claim or a allegedly pretty often. Here there are a single person stated this in Um. What we're gonna do after this short break is look at the evidence of what could be proven. So if this was going to go to court and you had to have some kind of material evidence, what would it be, um? And it may be surprising to you. So we'll see you right after this we're back. So how much of it is true? Yeah, I mean, you know, it's it's all hearsay, honestly at this point. I mean, there's some corroboration, there's some similaritias between these stories. But inside the closed youth haul behind the sanctuary that we've been talking about, the cops did find a faint imprint of some pentagrams drawn on the floor that someone had tried to scrub um. They seized computers, as well as dozens of videotapes and hundreds of computer disks and eight back says of documents and photographs. Um I Deputy Shriff of Name with Charles Reid, said that included videos of morality plays performed to confuse the victims and in some cases, uh, there under educated parents. Now, so there's a lot of playing on people's um fears and perhaps ignorance. Yeah. Well, it's it's a problem of authority, right. We trust certain people who wear certain clothes because they're in certain roles. Right. We've talked about that a lot before on this show. And if you've got someone of authority explaining to you why this is right and this is good. Um, unless you have the ammunition to back up, you know, either philosophically or morally or whatever, that this is wrong, then you may be easily manipulated. Yeah, yeah, it's it's true. And we want to emphasize again that these were initial reports. The initial reports seemed to change and the immediate aftermath, nine people are arrested on charges of sexual abuse, cruelty to animals, these related things, including the original person who called from Ohio, Nicole Bernard, so Louis Lamonica Jr. Austin Tree Bernard, the third, Alan R. Pearson, his wife, Patricia Pearson, Robin Lamonica, Paul Fontineaux, uh, and then Louis Mowbray, who will become more important as the story continues. It's interesting that Charles read that that investigator, that deputy sheriff said that based on the interrogations of some of these folks, it wasn't super clear whether they truly believed they were worshiping the devil or whether this was just kind of an excuse to participate in pedophilia. Rampant pedophilia right exactly. And this is where we run into some uh contradicting narratives or different takes. So, writing for an outfit called Theistic Satanism dot Com in two thousand six, Diana Vera notes the initial accusations seemed to quickly narrow and scope over the course of the investigation. So he said that there were allegedly more than twenty children who were victimized by the circle, but by the end of July two thousand five, the number of alleged victims have been whittled down to three per Vera's writing, and the prosecutors decided eventually after a certain hearing, to drop any claims involving satanism or occultism, and this was victims of abuse, child abuse, right, not they don't have bodies there. There's no evidence of DNA of murdering, right right right. That's another that's another thing that Diana Vera brings up, and she says, there's not physical evidence that the children endure or that all these children endured. Uh discusion. Abuse, Yeah, yeah, Torture is a good word, especially when you're considering something like an infant, you know what I mean. So these charges still included the abuse, but other theories alleged this was a different sort of conspiracy, less a case of satanic abuse and more a case of brainwashing. That it was Louis Mowbray, not Trey Bernard, who was the ringleader. And this is where we found an interesting tale from Religion News blog. Yes, and it states that back in two thousand eight, Lamonica Jr. That's the again, the pastor we've been talking about this whole time is Lamonica Jr. Um. He told a jury there in the parish where where the church was, that his confession was in fact false and for everything that he was confessing, um, including the abuse of children, because in his mind it was the only way listen to this to get his wife back and to get his children back. Now that sounds insane. It sounds insane, but it only gets stranger because then his attorney comes through, a guy named Michael Field or tile feel Um. He He maintains that this guy, Lamonica Jr. Actually did falsely confess to this rape because in his mind, or at least in his what his belief is his attorney, is that this guy was being controlled by someone, by a woman who was who believed herself to be a prophet of God, and that Lamonica Jr. Then believed that she was also the prophet or a prophet of God. So it was it was a cult just operating on a different level than maybe we fought, or at least accorney of this religion news blog. Wait, so it was. It was. It was not a Satanic cult at all. It was worshiping some sort of false prophet godlike deity wheels with and wheels. The idea here is essentially that Lois Malbury, the prophet, had created this satanic abuse narrative as a way of controlling the congregants. So she took control of the church around two thousand and three, apparently, but I've been in charge in all of the name for a while. Beforehand. It was like and it started. One of the people that this prophet Malbury or Malbory to control over was was um, the wife of the pastor right right, that's correct, and I mean so like it started in his own home basically, at least according to this story, Yeah, for a while, La Monica said he had to wear a dress and to rubber snakes representing his mother and his aunts because they were quote pharaohs. This is a testimony in court. He said church members weren't shaved his head and called him pharaoh as well. Uh. He said that. Referring to Lois malbrid he said she convinced herself she was like Moses and Tangipahoa was coming out of Egypt. La Monica said, referring to the biblical story about Moses leading people away from slavery in Egypt and that pharaoh was blocking the way. Thus he was Pharaoh with a little bit of performance art, and they had to get him out of there. And in this environment, the wives of La Monica and Bernard, according to this theory, realized that they needed to take custody of their children and free the way from Malbride to lead Tanjapehoa to spiritual fulfillment by making up a story of satanic ritual abuse perpetrated by their husbands. And then Lamonica said he was told that he had to write down all these dirty thoughts. He was forced to do this by the church leadership, and this was a fictional diary of abuse. But then he was told that having a sinful thought is as bad as committing a sinful act. Uh, the only way that he would be able to see his kids again is if he got back on the right path. The only way he could get back on the right path was going to the police station and confessing two things that never happened. That is, that is one of the theories. I mean, it adds up in the most Bonker's way possible. And both of the Monica's sons later recanted their claims of abuse because they said, remember he specifically said that he would he had been abusing them. Well, I mean, I guess we we do have the evidence that it had been scrubbed the crime scene, you know, And yeah, I'm just saying, like, you know, maybe that could account for any lack of physical evidence, but it didn't seem like it was the most uh, let's say methodical outfit, the most kind of you know what I mean, like like not a super air tight case. That's what I mean in terms of like, I don't know that they would have been able to like strike every possible scrap of physical evidence from the scene. You know, it seems like it maybe would have acted in a panic or in some out of desperation, but it doesn't seem like it was the most organized or evil genius kind of situation. Right, Like, I don't know if I buy that. Well, you've also got the pastor the guy who is you know, in the beginning of the story allegedly walking in or we have an account of him walking into the police station and confessing to all this stuff. If he knew he was going to do that, then ostensibly you could get rid of all of the evidence prior to walking into that sheriff's office. Right. Um, there's so many weird things going on here. Um, so let's talk about how maybe this actually connects up to the show we mentioned at the top of True Detective, Like where where what are the similarities here? So pits Alto has not come out and said, like, this is my inspiration for writing this. He has said in interviews he said, you know, you can google church crime Louisiana. You'll be surprised what you find. So he is aware and too to some degree. And this of course doesn't follow the plot of the True Detective cult one to one. Uh. This it does seem clear though, as you said, Matt, True Detective Season one was inspired in part by events alleged to have taken place at the Hosannah Church, and we know in real life at the Hosannah Church something definitely happened. And now the question remains how much of the actual real life story is true. From what we can tell, the current evidence indicates three possibilities. One, there genuinely was a theistic satanic abuse ring in play, and maybe not everybody believed it. Maybe there were just some, as you said, predators who were taking the trappings and finding an easy way to get what they actually wanted to The abuse narrative was created by Mowbray as a way to threaten and control members of the Hosannah community. And then three, some fuzzy version of events did occur but then later became exaggerated and then people, uh, several people involved had their self defense mechanisms turned on, where then the story just becomes muddled because people are trying to save themselves and the thing is here too. We say brainwashing, We throw the term around, but we know memory is treacherous and that's why things like hypnotic regression don't bear out in a lot of a lot of scientifically controlled studies. So people's memories of things started to change, and then the opinion of law enforcement started change. According to a detective for the Tangipahoa Parish Sheriff's that was a tough one, Mike the Phillips. There was no physical evidence of the occult such as pentagram's drawn on the floor or spell books that were never found, which is strange because initial reporting said they were. After the hearing where the Phillips relay this information, that's when prosecutors said, Okay, we're gonna drop mentions of the occult from this case. And then going back to Religion News blog, the cases mostly based on statements made by three children, one girl and two boys, who repeatedly were assaulted or forced to engage in sex acts of at least twice a week from two thousand to two thousand one at Hassanna Church and at a home of three of its members. That's according to the Phillips. He says there's at least one other victim who was not mentioned in court. He also noted detectives found no physical evidence of abuse except for some fluids on betting, and that there were no actual videotapes ever found. So in this one statement, in this interchange, he is denying all the other stuff that initially came out. We listed all those items that they found, boxes of docs and tapes with morality plays on them. He's recanting that what do you say, like that said it didn't happen, It doesn't exist. That's according to him. Well, and so here's where we kind of tie it back. Right, So if you think about the True Detective series, you do have that old dilapidated church right that's broken down. You've got that school that's separate in this case rather than being attached to the church facility. Then you've got that larger conspiracy here right where for some people hearing this would think, well, maybe to Phillips, and again, this is not a true statement. This is a statement of opinion. Some people listening may think, well, maybe it's being covered up right when you're hearing there's no, no, those videotapes don't exist, those ones that allegedly had the stuff on there for brainwashing, right, or maybe they just found videos that were mundane that didn't have anything. Maybe they did. But you know, people hear that statement there are no videos, don't worry about it. Well, even the idea of morality plays. I mean, that's more along the lines of the stuff we were talking about earlier, right, the scared straight kind of stuff like the you know, it's not Satanic ritual sacrifice. Well yeah, and the big so far stretch from that. So for for me personally, it's less about is this is this in some way occult are involved with Satanic rituals? Or is this a child sex exploitation ring? Right of people that are involved beyond just the ones who were accused, Right, Well, maybe I'm sorry if I'm if I'm being redundant, but that is a big part of true detective is a lot of the Satanic trappings were just that it was sort of a smoke screen. It was like a subterfuge to draw attention away from the fact that it was Actually it was almost a red herring, right, I mean, you know it was. It was. It was part of the ritualized sex abuse, but it didn't really seem like these members were in it for much more than flexing some weird power thing, you know, and and getting what they want, which in this case was young children. You know. I mean it's you know I mean in the show, is what I'm saying. Yeah, Well, in any case, in this real life example, there were ostensibly real children affected by this, um perhaps more than we know, UM, or that officially got to have their day in court or at least be represented in some way. And UM, it's really horrible and we're just putting this out here because we have had we've done several episodes now at this point where young people, including children, have been abused by adults. I can't even count the number actually of specific cases that we have discussed this on at least four. I want to say, UM, I think objectively it's one of the most abhorrant things that can occur in reality. And we're just we're putting this out there that, UM, if you know of anything like this occurring, do not be afraid to speak out and do not be afraid to seek help because there are people that can help. You. Make sure to talk to your kids about always being honest with you about if they're putting any kind of uncomfortable situation, whether it's at school or wherever. Not that we're trying to launch a witch hunt or anything, but it's just important to like have that dialogue because that's uslate. How these things fall between the cracks is when there's no communication. If you know of or suspect that a child may be in danger of abuse, do not hesitate to take action. You can visit sites like child Welfare dot gov here in the States, where you can find a state by state list of resources and twenty four seven abuse reporting hotlines. You can also report anonymously, so do not We cannot emphasize this enough. Do not hesitate if you are capable of helping someone, or capable of getting the authorities involved and preventing further crimes of this nature. We also want to know what other stories are out there, Matt. You you mentioned that True Detectives seem to be teetering on the edge of cosmic horror for so long. Uh, we want to know what else is out there? Just a little bit past the light. What are the strange stories in your neck of the woods. What are the bizarre things that happened that were maybe reported for a weekend and then disappeared. You can tell us about these on Facebook. You can tell us on Instagram. You can tell us on Twitter. We particularly recommend our community page. Here's where it gets crazy on Facebook. If you want to give us a call, your voice made gun on the air, but your voice will at least be heard by us. That number is one eight three three S d w y t K and really quickly back to the Here's where it gets crazy. If you want to join UM, it'll ask you a question and all the question is his name, one of the hosts of the show. But folks often go the extra mile, and our fantastic mods send us some of these screenshots. And this one says Matt the nice guy who loves phone calls Noel, who gets irritated as hell if you call him, and it could have been taken care of through text. And then there's been who really really hates phone calls. Heaven forbid anyone us to talk to him. L O L. People who just want to talk to you, Ben, They really do have no regrets, but though it is seriously a great way to get in touch with us. We when I say we, I mean Matt compiles these fantastic recordings and we learn a lot. So please feel free always to give us a call. Yeah, no pressure, All right, here we go. Guys. If you don't want to do any of that, you can still get in touch with us with a good old fashioned email. We are conspiracy at i heart radio dot com. 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