In 1985, a group of high-ranking Rajneeshees, followers of the Indian mystic Rajneesh (later known as Osho), conspired to assassinate Charles Turner, the then-United States Attorney for the District of Oregon. Rajneesh's personal secretary and second-in-command, Ma Anand Sheela (Sheela Silverman), assembled the group after Turner was appointed to investigate illegal activity at the followers' community, Rajneeshpuram. Turner investigated charges of immigration fraud and sham marriages, and later headed the federal prosecution of the 1984 Rajneeshee bioterror attack in The Dalles, Oregon.
The conspirators included Sheela; Sally-Anne Croft, chief financial officer of Rajneeshpuram; Susan Hagan, head of security at Rajneeshpuram; Catherine Jane Stork, who bought weapons and suppressors and volunteered to be the actual murderer; Ann Phyllis McCarthy, fourth-in-command of Rajneeshpuram; and co-conspirators Alma Potter, Carol Matthews, Phyllis Caldwell, and Richard Kevin Langford. Two of the conspirators obtained false identification to purchase handguns out-of-state, stalked Turner, and planned to murder him near his workplace in Portland, Oregon. The assassination plot was never carried out and was only discovered later, as a result of the investigation by federal law enforcement into the bioterror attack in The Dalles and other illegal acts by the Rajneeshpuram leadership.
Prosecution of the conspirators began in 1990, when a federal grand jury brought indictments against several of the key players. Some had fled the country, and extradition proceedings against the perpetrators and subsequent prosecution and conviction was not completed for sixteen years. The final conspirator was convicted in 2006, when Catherine Jane Stork agreed to return to the United States from Germany in order to be allowed to visit her terminally ill son in Australia. Eight perpetrators received sentences ranging from five years' probation to five years in federal prison and an additional member of the Rajneesh commune pleaded guilty to murder conspiracy. Rajneesh was never prosecuted in relation to the conspiracy, and left the United States after pleading guilty to immigration fraud and agreeing not to reenter the country without permission from the U.S. Attorney General.
Planning
Hit list Seven followers (called Rajneeshees) of charismatic leader Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh (now known as Osho), were convicted of a 1985 conspiracy to assassinate Charles Turner, and an additional unindicted eighth member of the Rajneesh commune pleaded guilty to murder conspiracy. The perpetrators were high-ranking followers within the Rajneeshee organization. Prosecutors in the case stated that the perpetrators had planned to murder Turner after he was appointed to head an investigation into the group's activities in Rajneeshpuram, Oregon. Turner's investigation focused on sham marriages organized by the group, as well as other illegal activities including immigration fraud, and he later headed the federal prosecution relating to the 1984 Rajneeshee bioterror attack in The Dalles, Oregon. Oregon Attorney General Dave Frohnmayer was also involved in investigations of the group, working alongside Turner.
In May 1985, Rajneesh's personal secretary and second-in-command, Sheela Silverman (Ma Anand Sheela), gathered the leader's key followers and formed a group of conspirators in order to consider what to do with the growing concern of Turner's continuous involvement with the Ranch. Sheela stated that Turner's grand jury investigation "threatened the existence of the commune", and exposed Rajneesh and several of his disciples to criminal prosecution. Sheela hoped that by removing Turner's influence they would be able to thwart the federal immigration investigation which could have resulted in deportation of Rajneeshee leaders. Three former leaders of the commune including Ma Anand Sheela, Dianne Yvonne Onang (Ma Anand Puja), a registered nurse from the Philippines who managed the Rajneeshee medical corporation, and former treasurer of Rajneesh Foundation International and Catherine Jane Stork (Ma Shanti Bhadra) of Australia, put together a hit list which included U.S. Attorney Charles Turner and Oregon Attorney General David Frohnmayer.
Susan Hagan (Ma Anand Su), a top official in the Rajneeshpuram hierarchy, was also a participant in the assassination conspiracy. Hagan was in charge of the security force at Rajneeshpuram, ran the Rajneesh Investment Corporation, and supervised construction on the commune.U.S. v. Croft, 124 F.3d 1109 (C.A.9 (Or.), 1997), United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, Decided September 5, 1997 Other conspirators in the assassination plot included Ann Phyllis McCarthy (Ma Yoga Vidya), president of the Rajneesh commune, and Alma Potter (Ma Dhyan Yogini), Ma Anand Sheela's bodyguard and traveling companion. Potter was manager of the Hotel Rajneesh in Portland, Oregon, and a member of the commune's security force. The Oregonian reported that nine people were on the hit list, including: Turner, Frohnmayer, former assistant attorney general Karen H. Green, Wasco County planning director Daniel C. Durow, Wasco County commissioner James L. Comini, investigative journalist for The Oregonian Leslie L. Zaitz, former member Helen C. Byron (Ma Idam Shunyo), who had been awarded US$1.7 million in a lawsuit against Rajneesh Foundation International, her daughter Barbara J. Byron (Makima), and Rajneesh's former secretary Laxmi Thakarsi Kuruwa (Ma Yoga Laxmi).
Weapons Catherine Jane Stork volunteered to be the follower who would carry out the assassination, and bought guns and suppressors. Stork was known to fellow followers as Ma Shanti Bhadra, and was also one of the three "Big Mammas" in Rajneeshpuram. Sally-Anne Croft (known by followers as Ma Prem Savita), an accountant and the group's Chief Financial Officer, provided money for the purchase of weapons related to the plot. Phyllis Caldwell (Ma Deva Ritka) described in a federal affidavit how members of the murder conspiracy obtained handguns, referring to Catherine Jane Stork and Sally-Anne Croft: "Shanti B went down to Jesus Grove, and Savita gave us several thousand dollars to use to buy guns." Jesus Grove referred to a group of trailers where all the leaders of the Rajneesh commune resided, except for Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh.
Ma Anand Sheela and three other Rajneesh followers traveled to New York in the spring of 1985 to acquire false identification. According to a federal indictment, the perpetrators of the assassination plot used a false birth certificate to purchase guns. Two members of the group then traveled to Texas to purchase handguns. Caldwell stated she and Catherine Jane Stork flew to Texas to purchase guns there. They purchased five guns in Texas, but encountered difficulty purchasing handguns in Texas with out-of-state identification and traveled to New Mexico instead. Caldwell said they called back to the commune but the women were instructed "not to come back without the guns".
In New Mexico, they obtained false identification, and purchased several pistols. Their intention was to purchase guns which were difficult to trace. Caldwell said it was easy to obtain guns in New Mexico: "we found it was pretty easy to buy guns. All you had to do was show some identification and it was easy to get." Caldwell said she and Stork went to a university library to find the identity "of someone dying very young", next went "to public records and asked for a copy of a birth certificate" and described how "we got a rent receipt book and just made up a rent receipt". "And then we were able to go to several different gun shops in Albuquerque with those two bits of identification and buy five different guns and bullets," said Caldwell. They were able to obtain one Colt .38-caliber revolver, and four Ruger .357-caliber Security-Six Magnum revolvers. The conspirators smuggled the guns into Oregon by packing them in luggage and putting the luggage on a Greyhound Lines bus. Caldwell said that she and Stork traveled by bus back to the Rajneesh commune so as to avoid airport metal detectors.
Surveillance After obtaining guns the conspirators returned to Portland, Oregon. They rented out an apartment in Portland to serve as their base of operations for the assassination of Turner. Rajneesh follower Carol Matthews (Ma Prem Samadhi) attempted to obtain the home address of Charles Turner, as she was doing research on him and his work in order to find another way of relating to his animosity toward the commune. According to federal prosecutors Matthews obtained a college yearbook of Turner's, and learned his car's license plate number and his parking location. Court records state that Matthews and an unindicted co-conspirator told officials they were conducting "a voter survey", in order to obtain Turner's route number and post office box number. The two tried repeating the story with members of the U.S. Postal Service, but the postal officials did not give them Turner's address. They then drove around Turner's neighborhood and were able to find his home by locating a sign in front of his residence that said "Turner". Matthews had pictures of Turner's residence developed; these were later obtained by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) during an investigation of the Rajneesh commune, and verified after being shown to Turner. The whole process was done in order to try and meet with him to interview and determine what his concerns were, as he refused to meet with anyone at his office.
With this information, however, several members of the group of conspirators watched Turner's office, home and car, and discussed methods to assassinate him, hoping that his death would hinder the efforts of the federal investigation into Rajneeshpuram. Their plan was to shoot Turner in the garage of the federal office building where he worked, in Portland, Oregon, but the conspirators also debated whether to murder Turner in downtown Portland or closer to his home. After spending multiple nights watching Turner's house, the conspirators decided on the parking garage because they felt it would be too risky to murder him on the drive to or from work, or in front of his home. Turner had a reserved parking spot in a federal garage underneath Terry Schrunk Plaza in Portland, Oregon. In an affidavit given to the FBI, conspirator Alma Peralta described how the perpetrators decided on the federal parking garage as the location: "Shanti Bhadra [Catherine Jane Stork] said this seems like a good place to bump this fellow off."
The conspirators practiced different ways of murdering Turner. According to informant statements to law enforcement, one of the conspirators was to pretend there was car trouble, and the others would then approach Turner with their guns. Informants later told law enforcement officials that the conspirators intended to hide out at an international network of Rajneesh communes if the plan was successful. According to The Oregonian the assassinations were not carried out because Ma Anand Sheela became distracted by political power plays within the Rajneesh commune and other members of the organization who were trying to remove her from her position within the group. According to witness information, Ma Anand Sheela was persuaded not to carry out this action through conversations with Carol Matthews, who stated to her that this was not a solution in any way and would be a horrendous action.
Prosecutions Investigation