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Buddhist leader arrested after trying to control followers' minds with mercury-laced 'medicines'
Date: 2023-11-26 Source: The Daily Telegraph

The leader of a Buddhist sect who is accused of trying to control his followers’ minds by giving them homemade medicines containing mercury has been arrested in Spain.

José Manuel Cánovas, a 50-year-old Spaniard who was known as “Total Transcendence” to his acolytes, had run a 10-hectare Buddhist settlement in the region of Murcia for 15 years, teaching Eastern philosophy, yoga, meditation and spiritual healing techniques.

According to Spain’s National Police force, Mr Cánovas spent most of his time inside one of the property’s several cave houses, where he had a laboratory in which he claimed to practise alchemy as he worked to create an elixir with supposedly revitalising effects. He called the concoction “purified mercury”, after the highly poisonous metal it contained.

The products of these experiments were administered to members of the sect and also sold online and in herbalist stores.

“Using different techniques of coercive manipulation, including the administering of psychoactive substances dangerous to health, he sought to manipulate the will of his followers to gain power over them and for financial gain,” the police said in a statement.

According to investigators, the sect followers who helped Mr Cánovas in his work were affected by various symptoms, apparently caused by the neurotoxic effect of exposure to mercury.

The police also noted that the detainee had no safe disposal method for the chemicals he used and was washing substances containing mercury into the site’s septic tank.

Police found a bunker containing 180 kilograms of mercury and cinnabar, or mercury sulphide, an ore from which the metal can be extracted.

Mr Cánovas, who had travelled to India and claimed to have learned from Buddhist lamas, was assisted by several women who the police said had broken off all contact with their families.

They also joined their leader in lengthy vows of silence.

Membership of the so-called Mahasandhi Foundation cost up to €2,000 a year and the organisation also asked for donations on its website.

The foundation included among its aims the building of the “biggest Buddha statue in Europe”.

Source Link: https://ca.sports.yahoo.com/news/buddhist-leader-arrested-trying-control-155020505.html