Almost 20 years after a fringe religious group renounced practices that included child sexual abuse and incest, a murder-suicide carried out in two states has brought the group's sordid past back to the fore.
Last week, Richard P. Rodriguez, 29, the disaffected son of Karen Zerby, current leader of the communal Christian ministry known as the Family, allegedly killed longtime group member Angela M. Smith, 51, in his Tucson, Ariz., apartment. Then, after driving to Blythe, he apparently took his own life.
In a videotape recorded a day before the deaths, Rodriguez described his desire to exact revenge for an isolated childhood in which he was routinely sexually abused.
Sitting at the kitchen table in his Tucson apartment and speaking directly to the camera, Rodriguez, who had been groomed since birth as the church's heir apparent, said he had been contemplating suicide ever since being forced as a young adolescent to participate in "teen training." In a posting on the Internet in 2002, he described how the training required him to have sex with different girls in the cult each day.
On the tape, a copy of which was obtained by The Times, Rodriguez said that after leaving the group in his mid-20s, he had decided that suicide would not be enough: He would take members of the group with him. Although he hoped Smith would lead him to his mother, who keeps her location secret, he made clear he would settle for what he could get.
In the video, he displays for the camera a variety of weapons before picking up a long knife. "This is my weapon of choice," he says. "I only want it for one purpose. That is for taking out the scum." Smith was stabbed multiple times, police said.
Now the Family, which claims a membership of nearly 8,000 living communally and ministries in 100 countries, is scrambling to shore up its reputation as a worldwide Christian evangelical ministry in the wake of a police investigation, national media interest and accusations from former group members who say that a childhood of sexual abuse growing up in the commune drove Rodriguez to murder and suicide.
The group has issued statements disavowing any responsibility for Rodriguez's actions, saying he was responsible for his choices in life. It also has gone on the attack, warning detractors that "the enemy will rue the day," in a message they said came from Jesus Christ, and calling them "vitriolic apostates."
