Turning Point: The Bomb and the Cold War is a fascinating and brilliant documentary series on Netflix that puts a historical perspective on one of the most tense conflicts in the present world. The nine-part documentary traces the origin of nuclear weapons, takes us through the long and strenuous Cold War, and then finally arrives at Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine. The show questions whether this present conflict can indeed be seen as a continuation of the Cold War, which officially ended after the fall of the USSR in 1991. Overall, Turning Point: The Bomb and the Cold War provides great detail and insight into world history and politics, making it a must-watch for those interested in documentaries of the sort.

How has nuclear warfare been a constant threat in world history?

The history of nuclear warfare began back in Berlin in 1938, when chemists Fritz Strassman and Otto Hahn, along with physicist Lise Meitner, first “split the atom,” discovering nuclear fission. Making sub-atomic neutrons pass through uranium led to a split in the atoms, the force of which is powerful enough to make a grain of sand jump up. As news of this exciting discovery spread across the Western world, American physicist Robert Oppenheimer first came up with the idea of making a bomb with nuclear fission at its core. This was perhaps a very logical use of the discovery, since the process of nuclear fission created a great amount of energy as output from very little input. The times were also such that physicists and scientists around the world had to think about military uses of their inventions. In 1939, Albert Einstein went on to write a letter to the erstwhile American president, Franklin D. Roosevelt, warning him of this newly discovered phenomenon and its violent potential, suggesting that the allied forces should develop such bombs before the Germans. 

In 1941, the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor brought the USA directly into WWII, and the development of nuclear bombs began as part of the Manhattan Project. The first test of the nuclear bomb took place in 1945 at the Trinity test site in New Mexico, as recently reminded in Christopher Nolan’s 2023 blockbuster film Oppenheimer. What the film and many other reports on the testing do not mention is the fact that the test site was not really far enough from human settlements, as there were almost 500,000 people living within the 150-mile radius of the place. Many of these people were directly and indirectly affected by the radiation, and their lives were altered forever. But these matters were too small for the authorities, in consideration of the war at hand, and the USA finally dropped the two atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki to devastating effect. The authorities and those who had ordered the attack were also shocked and grieved by the exact destruction to civilian life.

Although the US and USSR were on the same side during WWII, there was already enough tension between the two nations because of their respective powerful statures and also because of the vast contrast in political ideology. America was already the strongest proponent of capitalism, where private ownership and accumulation of wealth were the driving forces of society and the economy. On the other side, the Soviet Republic was the ideal communist state, led by Lenin and then Stalin’s strict socialist norms. The US government had a firm belief that these differences would become much more apparent as soon as the war was over, and because of this, they had made all attempts to keep the development of nuclear weapons a secret. As the bombing of Japan truly ended the world war, the rivalry between the two superpowers of the erstwhile world became very evident. Towards the beginning of WWII, the USSR had actually been an ally to Germany and Hitler, as a result of which they were given the countries of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania to be made official parts of the republic. The land of Ukraine had also already been taken over under Stalin’s leadership. After the war, the USSR invaded the neighboring countries of Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria, forcibly turning them into communist states. The USA publicly objected to these invasive policies and named the USSR as the next big threat to the free world, thus beginning the Cold War in 1947. 

During the Cold War era, intelligence and spy networks became immensely important and powerful on both sides, with the formation of the CIA in America and the strengthening of the Soviet KGB. Although the planning of the American nuclear bombs had been kept a secret, the USSR did receive extensive designs and plans about the same through Klaus Fuchs. It was evident that the Soviets had also launched a massive nuclear weapon development program, which was officially confirmed in 1949 after the first Soviet atomic blast was tested. From then on, both countries lived in utmost fear that their enemy states would launch atom bombs on their lands, and the world was finally gripped by a nuclear warfare scare. The USSR also found communist allies in Mao Zedong’s China, and the world’s geopolitical landscape started changing throughout the years. While the USSR was making moves on the Western world through its invasion of Afghanistan, the USA carried out proxy wars and funded uprisings in various countries it wanted to control, like Iran and Nicaragua. 

The Cuban Missile Crisis was the first time that nuclear warfare seemed right at the doorstep, when the USSR placed missiles in Cuba ready to be fired at the USA as a response to the American step of deploying missiles in Turkey and Italy. It seemed certain that either would launch missiles first, turning the Cold War into a direct hostile attack, and that nuclear weapons would be used as well. The crisis was ultimately averted, but such tense moments did take place multiple times over history, ranging from when clouds were mistaken for enemy missiles to when certain actions taken by a country were misunderstood to be preparation for attacks. Ultimately, nuclear bombs have only been used twice in history, till now, with official efforts made and agreements signed between nations to avert nuclear warfare at all costs.

What led to the fall of the USSR, and what were its repercussions?

From a general perspective, the horrific nuclear accident at Chernobyl can be seen as a major turning point in the history of the USSR, as presented in The Bomb and the Cold War. The 1986 disaster had been officially acknowledged by the Soviet Republic, led at the time by the General Secretary of the Communist Party and also President Mikhail Gorbachev. Following the incident, Gorbachev launched the idea of glasnost, which essentially meant more transparency from the side of the Communist Party, to be provided to the masses. Since the USSR was already in a tremendous financial crisis, possibly because of its heavy spending on military and weapons development, the socialist structure could no longer prevail. Gorbachev launched the political reform known as perestroika, which opened up cooperative ownership of businesses and properties and eventually directly led to foreign investments. These decisions were perceived as against the principles and ideologies of the communist lifestyle by many, while the changing world also gave some the scope to attain their own wishes. Thus, in 1991, politician Boris Yeltsin resigned from the party and stood in the presidential election, calling for the formation of a new Russian federation. 

By this time, the USSR had suffered major setbacks on the geopolitical front as well, the most significant development being the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. This resulted in the loss of Soviet power in Germany, and similar losses of communism had also been suffered in countries like Poland. Gradually, other nation-states that had been forcefully made a part of the USSR began their own movements for independence, and there was hardly anything that Gorbachev could do by this time. Finally, after Boris Yeltsin won the election and became the president of the country, he announced that the Russian Federation would be free of Soviet rule as well, thus making the USSR fall truly from the inside. The erstwhile US president, George W. Bush Sr., officially announced the end of the Cold War and the victory of the USA in the long-drawn indirect conflict. 

However, the eradication of communism and the switch to capitalism was not very smooth for the Russian Federation, quite naturally so, since the state was still in extreme economic turmoil. The independence of nation-states like Ukraine had also created pressure on the government for quite some time, and Yeltsin’s rule until 1999 was mostly spent in comparative insignificance for the country. Things stirred up once again when Yeltsin himself named a successor to his post as President of Russia, and the individual he chose was Vladimir Putin.

How did Putin rise to political power?

Vladimir Putin had always had a close connection with the Soviet government, as he was an active member of the Soviet intelligence unit, the KGB. Putin’s specialty was counter-intelligence, meaning that he was responsible for ensuring that those inside the KGB were not betraying their roles and protocols. Always driven by a charge of nationalism and service to the country that had historically defeated the Nazis, Putin was absolutely shocked and dismayed during the fall of the Berlin Wall. At the time, the members of the Soviet Party, including Gorbachev, took no measure to stop the loss of East Berlin, which the young KGB agent could not believe. It is stated that he wanted to do something for the Russian Federation ever since then, and after the dissolution of the USSR, he came closer to politics as an advisor and aide to the mayor of Leningrad, Anatoly Sobchak. Making use of his managerial and communicative skills, Putin rose through the ranks of the political ladder to be spotted and then recommended by Yeltsin as the next leader of Russia.

Although Putin’s role was initially of a temporary nature, he soon won the presidential elections in 2000 and served as the leader of Russia until 2008. Since the laws at the time did not allow a candidate to contest the elections for more than two consecutive terms, he had to step away in 2008, placing his fellow party member, Dmitry Medvedev, in the role. Four years later, Putin once again fought and won the presidential elections in 2012, following which he changed the country’s laws, allowing him to remain the president of Russia until now. Ever since Putin’s rise to power and the image of Russia changing to that of a ruthless and stern nation, the Western nations, particularly the US, have once again started to monitor the developments very closely.

Putin’s rise to power and his political ways have not been perceived well in most other parts of the world, as they involve allegations of widespread corruption, violations of human rights, and even attempts to assassinate political rivals and critics. In fact, Putin’s biggest critic, who launched a long movement to uncover the lies and gross corruption associated with his term, Alexei Navalny, has recently been declared to have died in prison in February 2024. Although The Bomb and the Cold War understandably misses out on this development, since the matter is too recent, it does feature experts sharing opinions of Putin’s reliance on Russian oligarchs and the very real possibility that Vladimir Putin might just be the world’s richest individual, in an unofficial way.

Can the Russia-Ukraine conflict be seen as a continuation of the Cold War?

The importance of power and the show of it have been stressed by Vladimir Putin ever since his presidential term began. His harshness towards those against his beloved nation is almost similar to that towards his personal critics, and it has even been found that Putin orchestrated false bombings across the country only to create an opportunity to invade Chechnya. The idea of nationalism and citizens identifying as ethnic Russians also came into play in 2014, when the president led an annexation of parts of Ukraine, including Crimea. At the time, many pro-Russian movements began in these parts of Ukraine, demanding that they reunify with Russia, and Putin made use of this opportunity to flex his political muscles. Some experts in The Bomb and the Cold War also see Putin’s stress on nationalism and the idea of a unified Russia as parts of his attempts to impress and win over Russian nationalists with power and wealth. Finally, in 2022, Russia launched a full-scale invasion into Ukraine, claiming the land to be their own, and the conflict is still ongoing, with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy leading a staunch defense against the invaders.

By its end, Turning Point: The Bomb and the Cold War does suggest that this modern conflict can very well be seen as a continuation of the Cold War, with only the participants having changed slightly. Russia is still a self-sufficient nation with nuclear weapons at its disposal, along with other weapons of mass destruction as well. The American alliance has increased in number through the North Atlantic Treaty Organization adding new members, with Sweden becoming the newest member only a few days ago. While the techniques of warfare and the motives for it have changed over the years, the tension between the West and the East, as differentiated in geopolitics, still continues to exist, with the threat of nuclear warfare still as real and alarming as ever before. 

The Program: Cons, Cults, and Kidnapping documents a bizarre incident that the world needed to be aware of. A lot of us didn’t know that there was a troubled teen industry operating in a country like the United States of America and ruining the lives of those poor souls who were sent to those institutes by their parents. It would be more apt to call them torture chambers as their main aim was to subject the teenagers to the worst possible circumstances. Katherine Kubler’s journey was not very easy, and it was gratifying to see how she did not succumb to her trauma but instead decided to tackle it head-on. So, let’s find out what Katherine had to endure at Ivy Ridge, what was the reason she decided to make this documentary, and where she is as of now. 

What made Katherine go back to Ivy Ridge? 

It is not easy to go back to a place that has given you a lifetime of trauma and face the ghosts of your past life. In The Program: Cons, Cults, and Kidnapping, we saw that Katherine mustered all the courage and, together with 4-5 of her colleagues, went back to Ivy Ridge to find evidence so that she could make a strong case against the perpetrators who ruined the lives of so many teenagers under the pretext of rehabilitating them. One could evidently see how shaken all those victims were feeling when they walked through the corridors where they had endured so much. Quinton, one of the students at Ivy Ridge, said that being on campus was probably the most difficult thing he had done in recent times. The students had gone through a lot of mental and physical abuse, and Quinton probably had it the worst of them all. He tried to protest against the torture; he tried to raise his voice against the wrong that was happening, and he had to pay a huge price for it. We saw in the CCTV footage how he was thrashed and flogged and how he was put in solitary confinement, where he was barely given any food.

Quintin took a sigh of relief when Katherine told him that the difference between the last time he was there as compared to the current time was that now he could move out of that god-forsaken place at his own will. Katherine found out that the administration department had left a lot of documents behind when they abandoned the place. Those documents proved to be very useful for Katherine and her team, as she could at least prove to the people the kind of atrocities that they were subjected to inside the facility. The World Wide Association of Specialty Programs and Schools (WWASPS) was no less than a horror house for teenagers, and in the name of behavioral modification and rehabilitation, they were being brainwashed into believing that they were not the victims but the perpetrators. Imagine a person who, firstly, doesn’t understand what they have done to deserve such treatment, is additionally being told that they are responsible for any tragedy or mishap that has happened in their lives. A 15-year-old girl who never picked up a syringe was forced to confess that she was a drug addict. A girl who was merely 2 years old at the time her father died in a tragic accident was manipulated and persuaded to accept the fact that she was responsible for it. The coercion was so intense that these poor souls actually found it better to confess to everything rather than raise a voice against the establishment. Katherine said that they were scared beyond anybody’s imagination, which is why it was so important to come back to Ivy Ridge and make things right. 

Did Katherine reconcile with her father? 

More than the atrocities she faced in Ivy Ridge, what caused distress to Katherine was the fact that her father didn’t believe in her, and even after she told him explicitly the kind of trouble she was having, he didn’t take her out of the institute for the longest time. So, during the making of The Program: Cons, Cults, and Kidnapping, Katherine finally decided to confront her father. It was a very awkward meeting, but after the old man started speaking, we realized that he was kept in the dark and had no clue what was happening inside the facility. The authorities at Ivy Ridge made a very smart move by conducting seminars and therapy sessions for parents, too. The parents saw the truth that the administration showed them, and they bought into it because every piece of information was very carefully curated. It is said that half-truths are worse than lies, and that is exactly what the administration excelled at doing. They took the students out on one day for an excursion, and they presented those pictures in their advertising pamphlets, showcasing what most days looked like inside the institution. Katherine’s father had no clue that the students hadn’t seen the real world before. These innocent kids were not allowed to interact with each other, nor were they permitted to make friends. These students were subjected to various gruesome offenses, the sole intention of which was to break them emotionally and mentally. It was difficult for Katherine to forgive her father, but she realized that people like Robert Lichfield managed to deceive her parents and keep them in the dark. Ken felt embarrassed about the fact that a fool was made out of him, but even he knew that apart from making peace with the past and accepting one’s mistake, he didn’t have any other choice. It was a hard pill to swallow, but Katherine, very graciously, accepted her father back into her life. 

Where is Katherine Kubler now? 

Katherine, as soon as she was taken out of Ivy Ridge by her father, realized that the diploma they were given there didn’t have any sort of credibility. Katherine was an innately creative person, and she went on to make a career in marketing and media. She interned with the Los Angeles Times for some time, and then she joined Paramount Pictures. In between, she also worked for a media agency called Endeavour Group Holdings, Inc. As of now, she is the executive creative director and the owner of Tiny Dino Agency, an award-winning creative agency based in Los Angeles. Her agency won the Clio Awards back in 2022 for the conceptualization of Scream Interactive Game. With The Program: Cons, Cults, and Kidnapping, Katherine Kubler made her directorial debut, and we hope that the entire process will bring her much-needed closure. On a lighter note, I believe that the “Mike’s Hard Lemonade” she had in Ivy Ridge must have tasted like a million bucks and it would have been a liberating and cathartic experience for her as she exposed the perpetrators and brought the truth to light. 

The Program: Cons, Cults, and Kidnapping is not just a documentary; it is an act of retaliation from a survivor who just refused to surrender to her circumstances. Katherine Kubler, the director of the series, was sent to Ivy Ridge, an institute that came under the Worldwide Association of Specialty Programs and Schools. These institutes proclaimed that they catered to troubled teens who were suffering from some kind of disorder or addiction. They claimed to be educational institutes, but it wouldn’t be wrong to say that they were cults whose main agenda was to earn money at the expense of the lives of teenagers.

Why was Katherine sent to Ivy Ridge? 

Katherine was studying in a school on Long Island, and one day, the authorities decided to take action against her when they found her drinking hard lemonade on the school premises. Katherine had no clue that her entire life was going to change in a couple of hours, as any prudent person couldn’t imagine they could have to face months of torture because of such a trivial matter. A few strangers came, and they took Katherine away with them without telling her where she was being taken. Apparently, Katherine’s father had decided to put her in a residential program where the curriculum was created to cater to “troubled teens” and bring them back to the right path. There was an entire troubled teen industry operating in the United States of America and many other countries, too, where the kids had to undergo a behavioral modification program. The facility promised 100 percent results, but the reality was very different from what they showed in their advertising campaigns. Ivy Ridge was located in Ogdensburg, and they operated at such a large scale because they had political backing, and nobody had any clue how the kids were tortured inside. The authorities at Ivy Ridge told Katherine that there were certain rules that she needed to follow if she wanted to graduate from the school.

In The Program, Katherine Kubler told the audience that the kind of deplorable conditions they were put in made her realize that she was not a student but a prisoner there. The facility had some bizarre rules, and if those poor souls wouldn’t have been there to testify to them, one could have never believed that anything like that could have existed in a civic society. But this time, the truth was stranger than fiction, and till now, when Katherine and other survivors like her think about it, it sends shivers down their spines. The girls and the boys were kept in different blocks altogether, and no one was allowed to talk to anybody. Katherine said that they were not allowed to look out of the window; they were not allowed to make friends; they were not allowed to give a call to their parents; and additionally, they were punished if the warden heard them defaming the practices of the college.

The CCTV camera footage that is shown in The Program, where the wardens and the caretakers are ruthlessly thrashing the teenagers, is just a peek into the trauma inflicted upon the teenagers. The parents also didn’t have any knowledge about what was happening with their kids, and there came a time when the kids also stopped telling them anything because they were scared of being demoted and forced to start the curriculum all over again from scratch. Katherine could never understand what she had done to deserve such behavior, and her experiences made her so bitter that after she came out of the institution, she stopped talking to her father. Katherine was one of the lucky ones, as her father realized that something was not right at the school, and he took her out in 15 months. There were others who were there in captivity for more than 3 years, and one cannot even begin to understand how they would have survived there.

What happened during the seminars? 

As if the daily torture was not enough, there were seminars organized by institutes like Ivy Ridge where the coordinators used pseudo-psychological tactics to mentally break the kid and make them believe that whatever was happening in their lives was completely their fault. There were girls who had lost their parents when they were toddlers, and somehow, during the seminars, these self-proclaimed coaches made them accept that it was their fault. The first exercise was always something that would drain the teenagers physically, and then coercive persuasion methods were employed so that the students would give up their individualism and accept what was being told to them. A few survivors said that they were locked inside a room for more than 12 hours and had to continuously repeat one single sentence. They said that after a point in time, they entered into a trance-like state where their mind wasn’t able to function. Their self-esteem was broken, they lost faith in their own abilities, and they were forced to accept that they were at fault. There were girls who said that they hadn’t touched drugs in their lifetime, but in their report, they accepted that they were drug addicts, as they were too scared to go against the organization, and they wanted to come out of that god-forsaken place. Imagine the plight of a young person who realizes that nobody will believe in them and nobody will come to their rescue, even if they are dying. The entire philosophy of tough love was propagated by such illegal institutions, and the most shocking thing was that not even one of the teachers or coordinators working there had any kind of certification in psychology to give that kind of advice. In The Program, we saw how helpless and shattered Katherine and other girls felt, but kudos to them that after so many years, they came back to Ivy Ridge to bring the truth to light. 

Why didn’t the parents believe their children? 

These institutions, like Ivy Ridge, were the brainchild of Charles E. Dederick, who started Synanon back in the day, which was supposed to be a drug rehabilitation center. He had these bizarre therapies, like the attack therapy, where the patient was assaulted and tortured. The experts found the weak point of the patients, and they were often beaten to the extent that they had to be hospitalized. Now, the centers under the Worldwide Associations of Specialty Programs and Institutes also functioned on pretty similar lines. The practices that were incorporated could be safely termed child abuse. There was CCTV footage shown in The Program, where a teenager named Quinton was mercilessly beaten by the wardens. He was the one who organized a protest inside the institute, and he had to bear the consequences of his actions. Now, the main question that would come to anybody’s mind is: amidst all this, why didn’t even a single parent report the issue, and why didn’t they believe what their kids were saying? First of all, Ivy Ridge and all the other similar institutes made sure that information about what happened within the walls of the facility didn’t go out at all. They misled the general public with their fake marketing campaigns, and in addition to that, the masterstroke was that they conducted seminars for the parents, too. So basically, it could be said that they were running a cult not for the teenagers but for the parents. The parents, too, were brainwashed into believing that he had sent their kids to the best place. There were times when they got suspicious about the practice, but the internal team of the Worldwide Association of Specialty Programs and Schools made sure that they did everything to suppress those doubts and make the parents believe in their genuineness. 

What Happened To Lichfield brothers? 

Since the time Katherine decided to hold people accountable and started doing research for her documentary, she wanted to find out where all the money was going and who was behind this entire scam. She figured out there were several shell companies where all the money was being transferred, and that’s when she realized that a man named Robert Lichfield was the one who owned most of these specialty institutes. His brother, Narvin Lichfield, was also an active participant in the scheme of things and played a key role in the administration. Robert started the WWASPS around 1998, and since then, he has opened quite a few institutes throughout the US.

The first school that Robert opened was called Cross Creek Manor, and it served as a testing ground where he created a blueprint for how he was going to scam the parents and destroy the lives of the teenagers. As of today, neither Robert nor Narvin have been charged with any crime, and they were able to take complete advantage of the loopholes in the system. Robert and Narvin knew that a situation might arise where their fraudulent activities would come to light, and so they made sure that they had the written consent of the concerned parties before doing anything, though we know how the brothers influenced that decision. Katherine Kubler says that the Netflix documentary is just the beginning, and she will not stop until she has put the perpetrators behind bars. Katherine got to know that Narvin was in La Verkin, Utah, and she went to a local pub just to look at the man who had ruined their lives. She didn’t go and talk to him because she knew that she still didn’t have solid evidence that could establish a direct link between the Lichfield brothers and the abuse the children had to go through in the various specialty institutes. 

As of now, Robert and Narvin are still running many specialty schools, though they have changed the name of the initiative so that they do not come under the radar of the law enforcement authorities. After the scandal, the Lichfield brothers kept a low profile and remained out of the limelight; therefore, not much is known about their current whereabouts. But according to Narvin’s son, he still does not feel even an ounce of guilt for what he has done. Katherine hopes that one day some government agency will take action on the issue and find a way to put them behind bars. 

Netflix’s The Indrani Mukerjea Story is about one of those cases that, in today’s time, has become a conundrum, and even the court of law is having a hard time solving it. A botched-up investigation, the involvement of certain rich and powerful people, the lies, the deceit, and the weird relationship dynamics have made it impossible for the court to find the truth, and as we know, no decisive conclusion has been reached as of now. In cases like these, it is a battle of narrative, and the perception of general people is influenced by their own preconceived notions and stereotypical beliefs, as well as by what they are shown by the media. After watching the Netflix documentary, even though I couldn’t take an unbiased stand, in this article I would refrain from making any sort of judgment. What we can try to do here is speculate on the facts and testimonies at hand and weigh both sides. So let’s find out the kind of relationship that Sheena Bora shared with her mother and her fiancé, Rahul, and more than anything, try to speculate if she is dead or, as Indrani Mukerjea asserts, alive and hiding somewhere.

Did Sheena and Indrani share an amicable relationship? 

Indrani claims that she was sexually abused by her father when she was around 16 years of age and that Upendra Kumar Bora is the biological father of Sheena. Indrani moved to Shillong to pursue further studies, where she met her first husband, Siddharth Das, who adopted Sheena. Indrani left her first husband and then married Sanjeev Khanna in Kolkata and then later met Peter Mukerjea, her third husband, and settled in Mumbai. For about 15 years, Indrani didn’t contact or meet her kids, which was something that really hampered her public image when her case came under media scrutiny. Sheena and Mikhael lived with their grandparents, and the first question that would come to anybody’s mind is that if it was Indrani’s own father who had abused her, then why would she leave her children in his care? Sheena was a very smart and intelligent lady, and she was curious to know what her mother was like. She wanted to know why she had abandoned both the kids when they clearly didn’t deserve such behavior.

Finally, Indrani’s parents reached out to her when she was already married to Peter Mukerjea and asked her to help them financially. It was around 2005 when Indrani called both Mikhael and Sheena to meet her. The kids were very excited as they were finally going to meet their mother, but the way they were treated left them feeling that they shouldn’t have ever met her and instead, lived under the illusion that she was a great mother. Indrani asked both the kids to not address her as their mother but to tell them that she was their elder sister, in case nobody asked. Now, I do not believe every word spoken by Mikhael to be true, but it was evident that Indrani did hide the fact that she had two children from Peter, and that spoke tons about the kind of woman she was. Nobody is judging her; we don’t have the right to do so, but what is clear is that she was a social climber, and probably her attachment to her kids was superseded by many other aspects of her life. There was a diary that Sheena had in which she wrote about how she hated her mother. Obviously, any child would feel bad when their own mother is ashamed to call them her kids. Sheena did come to Bombay later, and she lived at Indrani’s house while she was pursuing her studies at St. Xaviers. Even then, when Sheena was staying with Indrani and Peter, she was not allowed to reveal the fact that she was not the younger sister of Indrani Mukerjea. Now, these things obviously would have made Sheena feel a certain way about her mother. Yes, she was being supported financially, but that was not enough. Indrani, throughout the documentary, sticks to the fact that she loved her kids and she never treated them poorly. 

What happened between Sheena and Rahul? 

Sheena and Rahul got very close to each other during the time the former was staying with Indrani in their Mumbai house. From the very onset, Indrani was against their alliance, and according to some people, it was because she knew that if Sheena got married, then she would have to tell the world that she was her daughter. But still, Sheena went ahead and got engaged to Rahul, and then on April 24, 2012, all of a sudden, she disappeared from Mumbai and was nowhere to be found. For 3 years after 2012, no formal inquiry or any sort of complaint was made, though Rahul continuously asked his father and Indrani about Sheena. They gave all sorts of strange answers, and if one just listened to the voice recordings of those calls, they would get to know that Indrani was lying or maybe intentionally hiding some fact. She clearly had more knowledge about the issue, and the discrepancies in between her answers and the reality made her motives clear to some extent. The prosecution claimed that Indrani impersonated Sheena until a year after her disappearance, as she didn’t want anybody to suspect her. Rahul received a message from Sheena’s phone saying that she wanted to break things off and that she was going away for some time. Even Vidhie, Indrani’s youngest daughter, received an email from a new ID that was allegedly made by Sheena. Vidhie went on record to say that it didn’t seem like it was Sheena who was writing it. Rahul proved to be the prosecution’s strongest witness, though Indrani’s lawyer tried to discredit his testimony in every way possible. After watching “The Indrani Mukerjea Story: The Buried Truth,” one can’t deny that it felt like Rahul was the only person who cared for Sheena, and after her disappearance, he was the only one who tried to find her. 

Is Sheena Bora dead or alive? 

Shyamvar Rai, Indrani’s driver, was caught with a gun in his possession, and he confessed to having conspired to kill Sheena Bora together with Indrani and Sanjeev Khanna. But obviously, Indrani’s lawyer, Ranjeet Sangle, refuted every argument, and the prosecution wasn’t able to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that what Rai was saying was the truth. The biggest breakthrough in the case was made when a dead body was found in the Raigad district. A DNA test was conducted, and as per the results, the skeletal remains did belong to Sheena Bora. Even Sheena’s passport was found which proved that she couldn’t have gotten out of India as Indrani and Peter claimed for the longest time.  At this juncture, one would feel that everything was plain and clear, but once again, Ranjeet Sangle questioned the credibility of the test, and he claimed that the results were not right. It is to be taken into consideration that the accused in this case is not a commoner, and it is a harsh truth that the system is rigged.

As of now, the skeletal remains are still lying in the court locker, and it has not been proved that they belong to the victim, who, in this case, is Sheena Bora. Indrani feels that Sheena is out there somewhere, but I personally feel it is a very preposterous claim, and she has no means to prove it. There is no solid, concrete evidence that can prove that Sheena is alive or dead, and apparently, she has become a ghost. Obviously, there is foul play involved, and no one, from Indrani to Peter, is as innocent as they are portraying them to be. Mikhael from the very onset believed that Sheena was killed by their mother, and there could be multiple reasons why they would have done so. He even went on record saying that there was a time when he felt that his life might also be in danger. Maybe it was a property matter, or maybe it had something to do with her marriage to Rahul but whatever it was, it is going to be very difficult for the court to come to a conclusion, though I personally hope that justice is served, and the truth comes to light. 

Netflix’s latest true-crime documentary venture, a short docuseries titled American Conspiracy: The Octopus Murders, is a fascinating watch to say the least, both because of the content as well as the style. The main subject of the four-part documentary is the mysterious death of journalist Danny Casolaro in 1991, who had been supposedly on the brink of uncovering a vast political scandal and a shadow network controlling most of world politics. But the show also throws enough light on those asking the questions—filmmaker Zachary Treitz (the director as well) and journalist Christian Hansen. While the potential conspiracy at its center is tremendously intriguing, the impact of such research on the two friends desperately chasing for answers is also very interesting, making The Octopus Murders an absolute must-watch.

Who was Danny Casolaro?

The story in The Octopus Murders begins at the very important but unfortunate point of the death of Danny Casolaro, a man loved dearly by his friends and family. Danny was a freelance investigative journalist by profession, with a reported background in computers and technology, which were booming topics in the 1980s. According to his brother, Tony, Danny was simply passionate about writing and did not have too much interest in politics or world leaders until some scandalous discoveries shook his core. While his work, especially his reporting on a certain situation, did cause a stir, what brought Danny further into the spotlight was, unfortunately, his mysterious death. In August of 1991, the man was found dead in his hotel room at the Sheraton in Martinsburg, West Virginia. Although the authorities immediately stated that it was a case of suicide, a number of things stood out as unnatural.

To begin with, Danny’s body was found in the bathtub inside the bathroom, which would suggest that he took his life at that very spot in a relatively composed manner. However, there was blood spatter in his room, making it clear that he walked from there to the bathroom in an injured state, and there were quite a few blood stains on the walls of the bathroom as well. Those being questioned about the matter at present find it extremely odd that an injured man who had slit his own wrists could paint the walls with blood in such a manner. An expert also claims that the slashing on Danny’s wrists also looks very unlikely to be the work of his own doing, as it is physically difficult to do so. 

Based on these signs, it was immediately predicted that Danny had not taken his own life but had actually been murdered. Tony reported that his brother had indeed warned him a few weeks earlier that if he died suddenly, then it would most definitely be an act of murder, making it evident that he feared for his life at the time. Although the statements of the family members and even some figures of authority were taken into consideration, and a more severe investigation was launched, it ultimately did not yield any results. The police declared that Danny Casolaro had died from suicide, and the case was closed right there. The reason for all of Danny’s research information being missing from the hotel room was left unanswered.

What was the INSLAW conspiracy that Danny wrote about?

Danny Casolaro’s first major breakthrough in the field of investigative journalism came in the first half of the 1980s, through a report he wrote about the INSLAW conspiracy. At the beginning of the decade, the Washington, DC-based computer company INSLAW developed new software to help law enforcement authorities keep track of cases and past records of individuals. The physically large space that paperwork took up and the sheer effort required to go through these files were getting out of hand for authorities, and so there was a much-needed shift towards making use of technology. INSLAW’s pioneering software was named PROMIS, and it was supposed to revolutionize its market, which it did too, but after a few hitches along the way,

The United States Department of Justice (DOJ) soon wanted to install the PROMIS software in its offices, and a deal with INSLAW was made about the same. However, in the second year of the three-year contractual tenure, the DOJ stopped making payments to INSLAW for the use of their software, creating a rift between the two parties. The founder and owner of the computer firm, Bill Hamilton, stated that there was a considerable effort by the DOJ to take over his software’s capabilities and ensure that he would not have to be paid. Over the next few years, proof of certain DOJ workers having intricate knowledge about the PROMIS software was indeed found, perhaps suggesting that the software was indeed being studied very closely for replication. Hamilton also stated that at the time, he had received a few threatening calls from a rival computer firm named Hadron, who wanted to buy off the PROMIS software. The owner of Hadron, Earl Brian, had close ties with the Department of Justice, being very good friends with the higher authorities, and so this seemed like a double-sided plan to get hold of the software. INSLAW had been pushed to bankruptcy on one side and was being offered money to sell off their product on the other. 

The whole matter was taken up a few notches when Danny Casolaro managed to get in touch with a man named Michael Riconoscuito, who made some seriously astonishing claims. Riconoscuito had been interested and skilled in matters of science and technology from a very young age, but had wasted all his potential by getting involved with drugs. After being arrested and detained in federal prison for a few years on the charge of producing and distributing drugs, the man was supposedly noticed by the federal authorities, who wanted to make use of his exceptional talent. When Riconoscuito agreed to talk to Danny, he essentially worked as a whistleblower, wanting to reveal dirty secrets about the DOJ and the government, and the claims he made were terribly bold. According to him, the reason why the DOJ was going to such severe lengths only to get hold of the PROMIS software was because they had decided to use it for spyware.

Over the next few years, the PROMIS software was indeed sold to various other countries, including both friends and foes of America, via shady sources who did not have any official ties with either the government or INSLAW. However, Riconoscuito still maintains that the software was spread by the U.S. government, for it had been manipulated to contain spyware that could easily monitor data on the computers of other nations. Information directly from the secretive files of the administrations of various countries would be highly beneficial for the U.S., and Riconoscuito admitted to being the lead programmer in installing the spyware into the PROMISE software. While Riconoscuito’s statement was immediately questioned by the authorities, he was arrested by the Drug Enforcement Agency within a few days on the charge of running a drug racket. The DEA is indeed a branch of the DOJ, making the arrest look like a desperate attempt to stop the man from spilling more secrets. As a police officer in the documentary says, Riconoscuito was sentenced to twenty-six years in prison, which is considerably higher than any other criminal with the same charges as him.

What is the Octopus organization?

The INSLAW case gradually led Danny to a larger conspiracy in the works, as he found out that the DOJ and other organizations like the CIA and the FBI were all involved in a certain shadow network. Over the next few years, Danny researched and attempted to write a conclusive article to reveal the existence of this shadow organization, which he named Octopus, as the group apparently had their tentacles spread all across the world. According to Danny’s writings, the group was involved in what is known as the October Surprise, which is a conspiracy theory that states that the Reagan authorities intentionally kept the American embassy workers hostage in Iran until the election results in order to ensure that he would win. The same group was reportedly involved in funding the Nicaraguan Resistance by manufacturing weapons and distributing them in foreign countries, with the purpose of creating shadow governments and fighting against communism. 

According to Danny, the Octopus was a consort of eight men—John Nichols, George Pender, Tom Clines, Ted Shackley, Howard Hunt, Richard Helms, Ray Cline, and George Bush. As is evident, all of these men held very important and high roles in the CIA and the American government or were diplomats. It is also believed by many that it was ultimately this very group that murdered Danny Casolaro in the Sheraton Hotel room. Suspicions were on a few select men, including Robert Booth Nichols, who claimed to know the truth behind the JFK assassination, and even a different man who had evidently been allowed to kill people only because he was an FBI informant. But on the day prior to his death, Danny had also met with a soldier named Joe Cuellar, who also seems like a very possible suspect because his very specialization in the army was intelligence gathering and manipulation.

Could Danny have been misled?

Although the theory of a shadow network pulling strings across the world is truly interesting, there is also a possibility that Danny was actually misled into this whole matter, and The Octopus Murders presents this perspective as well. Danny Casolaro had simply gone down a rabbit hole in the search for answers behind numerous mysterious occurrences in American politics, and this had gotten him tremendously involved in the matter. He had left all other journalistic endeavors to investigate this very matter, and he dedicated the last few years of his life totally to finding evidence of the existence of the Octopus group. In the process, he had grown extremely fatigued and had also become severely bankrupt. As a single father to a young son, Danny had to gather funds soon, and he had written a book based on all his findings about the Octopus group, intending to get it published. There is evidence of him having approached publishers, too, but because of the sheer intensity of the claims in the book, Danny was asked to produce some strong proof of his support. This led him further into the rabbit hole, and it is actually possible that he took his own life, perhaps even wanting to undo his action, which led to the suspicious bloodstains. 

It was also later found out that Bill Hamilton, who was the one to first introduce the journalist to this idea of a shadow government, had lied about his sources. Hamilton claimed that he had found various connections between the DOJ and illegal activities through a source from the CIA, whereas they were all just from an acquaintance who gathered information from strangers in Washington, D.C., with no connection with any intelligence agency. It can be perceived that Danny had actually been misled in the wrong direction in this manner, and once he gave his everything to prove the theory, it was too late to come out of it. After hitting a dead end and realizing the tremendous harm his research had done to his life, Danny probably killed himself.

Does the documentary present any conclusive evidence regarding Danny’s death?

Although The Octopus Murders does present the other perspective, it still sides with the conspiracy theory at its end, for some more striking details about Danny’s death are presented. The journalist at the lead of the investigation in the documentary, Christian Hansen, had filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for the police investigation case file of Danny Casolaro’s death. The findings include a certain statement from a woman who had been staying in the hotel room right beside Danny’s on that fateful night. The woman had written to the police that she and her partner had seen a different man entering Danny’s room that night, and although the composite sketch is not very good, the details might match those of the soldier, Joe Cuellar. However, the police never looked into this piece of information, and like many other things, for example, the fact that Danny’s research had gone missing from his room, this too was buried. 

The body had not been sent for an autopsy, and it was instead embalmed, which made the autopsy process difficult and less effective later on when the family members asked for it. Hansen and Treitz’s conversation with the son of Cuellar also ascertains that the man could have very well been sent to the Sheraton hotel to execute Danny. The makers also manage to get in touch with Scott Erskine, the former FBI agent who investigated the Danny Casolaro case, but Erskine hilariously gets a call immediately when Cuellar’s name is mentioned by the makers, never receiving any more calls ever again. This, and many other details about the Danny Casolaro case, suggest that the journalist was definitely killed because he knew certain secrets. Whether his theories were absolutely true is not something that The Octopus Murders can prove or deny, but the documentary surely makes for a thrilling watch.

Can I Tell You a Secret?, the 2024 Netflix 2-part documentary series, makes us privy to a modern-day crime where the accused made the lives of innumerable girls a living hell by stalking them on social media and harassing them. Matthew Hardy crossed all boundaries, and the girls felt threatened and extremely paranoid because of his actions. So, let’s find out who Matthew Hardy was, what he was accused of, and how he got caught.

When did Matthew Hardy go to college?

Abby, Lia, and Zoe gave their testimonies in Can I Tell You a Secret? and showed us the extent to which Matthew Hardy went to make the lives of these young ladies a living hell. Matthew was suffering from autism spectrum disorder, and he got to know about it quite late in his life. Because of his lack of confidence, he wasn’t able to socialize or mingle with people that much. He stayed mostly by himself, though that was not out of choice. He had suppressed his feelings for years, and with the advent of social media, he found a way to disguise himself and give it back to the world that was never kind to him. Hardy started stalking people, and he created rifts between them and their loved ones. Hardy felt powerful as he could literally play with the lives of the people, and he got a lot of sadistic pleasure when he saw them getting anxious or stressed out. Hardy’s colleagues got to know that he was the stalker who was messing around every day, and they reported the matter.

An article also got printed in a leading newspaper, and after Hardy disappeared, he never troubled his colleagues again. But stalking was addictive for him, and he just couldn’t give it up, and again, he started troubling a different set of people. Hardy followed the girls at times, sent messages to them from fake accounts, and threatened them in some way. He then contacted other people on that person’s friend list and spread all kinds of rumors about them. He damaged their reputation, and the girls had no clue how to deal with him. Lia had gotten a photoshoot done in the past, and Matthew somehow came to know about it. He talked to the photographer, pretending to be Lia, and then later sent the photos to people who knew her personally. Lia tried going to Ibiza because she didn’t know any other way to deal with the situation, but Matthew messaged her, saying that he knew where she was going. Matthew told the girls that there was no point in going to the police as they wouldn’t help them, and he was right to a certain extent. 

How did Matthew get caught? 

The problem that the girls encountered was that whenever they went to the police, they were always asked if they felt their lives were under imminent threat. The girls didn’t have any evidence to prove the fact that they were in imminent danger, and so the police, for the longest time, didn’t take any sort of action. Maybe there was no imminent threat, but Matthew had gone to bizarre lengths, and the girls did feel like their lives were in danger. They didn’t know what he was planning next or how he was getting to know about their movements, and now they realized that they couldn’t even go to the law enforcement authorities.

In Can I Tell You a Secret?, we got to know that the police department gave out a statement and said that they had followed the due process of law and done everything that they could in that situation. But, as a matter of fact, they didn’t help the cause of the girls when they could have easily pursued the matter and at least tried to find some incriminating evidence that would have made Matthew stop. Kevin Anderson from Cheshire police took Matthew into custody after one of the girls told him about what he was up to, but he was not able to find any evidence that could make him arrest the guy. Matthew stated during the interrogation that he was an easy target because of his past. He told the officers that he was involved in a similar kind of situation back in the day, and his image was tarnished by the newspaper article that was published after that. Kevin had no option but to release him, and for a moment, he also felt like somebody else was probably using Mathew’s name to stalk the girls. But as soon as Matthew was released, he bought a new phone, and he once again started stalking and messaging the girls. Matthew was using a fake account, and by mistake, he went live on the social media app. A woman named Sabrina, who knew Matthew, realized what he was up to, and she tried talking him out of it. When Matthew denied any sort of involvement, Sabrina told the police about him. Kevin knew that he finally had evidence to arrest and take the man into legal custody. Additionally, Kevin got his hands on the mobile downloads that Matthew had done, and after he went through it he realized that he had struck gold. Matthew Hardy was finally taken into custody, and it was only because of Kevin’s persistence that it happened. 

Where is Matthew Hardy now? 

The lives of the girls were never the same again after what they went through. They really hoped that Matthew was put behind bars, though they knew that the odds were not in his favor. 

Generally, in these cases, the court refrains from awarding any kind of sentence to the perpetrators, and the victims, in this case, didn’t want that to happen. Matthew pleaded guilty, but he took the defense that he was not of sound mind to understand the nature of his actions since he was suffering from autism spectrum disorder. The girls knew that it was a blatant lie, as when he talked to them, he knew what he was doing, and he derived a great deal of pleasure from it. Finally, the trial happened, and the court sentenced Matthew Hardy to nine years on January 26, 2022. As of now, Matthew is in prison, and upon appeal, his sentence was reduced by one year. 

Little Nicholas: The Life of a Scoundrel is a new documentary miniseries released on Netflix that looks back at one of the most infamous political scandals in Spain in recent times. The original Spanish name of the show, Picaro: El Pequeno Nicolas, is more appropriate as a clever twist on the words picaro and icaro, the latter pointing towards the story of Icarus. Like the Greek figure who soared too high to the sun, Francisco Nicolas Gomez also had an undoing because of his own steeply ambitious actions. Little Nicholas is a detailed and well-made documentary, and although it would perhaps be more enjoyable with some prior idea about the Spanish scandals mentioned, it is an intriguing watch overall.

Who is Francisco Nicolas Gomez?

At the center of Netflix’s Little Nicholas documentary is obviously the eponymous young man, Francisco Nicolas Gomez Iglesias, who managed to dupe multiple high-ranking authority figures, ranging from the King to the CNI intelligence agency. Nicholas’ story began from a moderately humble background, as his parents were middle-class, living in a fairly ordinary region in the city of Madrid. As a young boy, Nicolas was sent to the Saint Francis of Assisi school in the wealthy El Viso neighborhood, and he developed a childish interest in becoming the next Pope. But when asked about the motivation behind such a dream, it was evident that Nicolas had his eyes set on wealth and influence. Instead of any religious or social cause, he wanted to become the Pope solely because of the influence that the religious leader had over the world. 

From a very young age, Nicolas grew a profound interest in politics and administration, even making his mother take him down to the People’s Party (Partido Popular) headquarters at the mere age of ten. However, there was not much academic interest in him, as he was doing terribly in high school, and the institution did not want him any longer because of his bad grades. This was probably the first time that Nicolas used influence to wield a certain power, as he threatened to complain against the school to both religious and governmental leaders in the city about his situation. He managed to get into an elite athletes’ school despite having no connection with any sport whatsoever, and as he himself admits in the documentary, it was a result of him getting in touch with some influential people. Soon after, Nicolas started becoming friends with the children of businessmen and politicians, making himself quite a popular face among the youth.

Nicolas already had great communication and leadership skills by this time, and he started using them to full effect. It is no wonder that people from various sectors started to take note of the young boy, who could bring in crowds with him wherever. Nicolas reveals that having just two of the most popular students in each of the different schools in Madrid ensured that he could have numerous youngsters as followers, and so he started promoting parties at nightclubs. But very soon, he realized that mere parties were of no interest, and so Nicolas started attending talks at the Foundation for Analysis and Social Studies (FAES) research institute. Within some time, the young boy started recruiting other youngsters to attend FAES talks and programs, in the same way in which he had brought people to nightclubs. Therefore, the FAES foundation grew close to Nicolas, the latter even being nicknamed “FAES Fran,” and this, in turn, started to get him close to politicians, as the FAES organization had close ties with the People’s Party. 

At just fifteen, Nicolas hosted a meeting with the erstwhile Prime Minister of Spain, and after the event went rather well, the Secretary General of FAES, Jaime Garcia-Legaz, started working with the boy directly. Nicolas states that he was genuinely accepted into the organization and the party as an analyst, and that he grew a connection with the newly elected prime minister. According to him, he made acquaintances with the leader and then celebrated the night on the balcony of the People’s Party. The new government was actively trying to help the Spanish economy, which was terribly suffering at the time, and so they apparently got in touch with Nicolas and his friends from the finance side. Naturally, Nicolas’ power and fame grew at this time, and he started participating in various business deals, even meeting extremely rich and influential people in the country. 

Francisco Nicolas was basically acting in favor of the People’s Party, despite not being a direct member of it, as he explains. He was meeting various people and trying to get them to support the political party, and according to him, he was receiving commissions in exchange for every deal that he could get through. Around this time, Nicolas also got in touch with various people who worked for the National Intelligence Center (CNI), which is the highest intelligence agency in Spain. According to the boy, he was asked to come to work certain jobs for the CNI, and he quickly started to enjoy this information-collecting work.

How did Nicolas gain attention and controversy?

The supposed political career of Nicolas had already started, as he was working for the CNI and was being paid for it dearly. The boy, who was about twenty at this time, also started to have a lavish lifestyle, making it evident that he was doing quite well in life. An exquisite villa in the posh locality of Madrid became his new home, where he apparently held numerous political and diplomatic meetings with politicians and businessmen and also some happening parties with his younger friends. Nicolas also mentions that a number of these meetings did not have him participating in them, but his villa was preferred by politicians nonetheless because they felt safe there. While most other buildings could have had hidden surveillance devices, Nicolas’ villa had no such scare. According to the young man, the extremely high rent for this villa was paid by CNI, but there is no proof of this statement at all. Rather, what seems more likely is that a construction company, which had been in the favor of Nicolas in making business deals, was paying the rent for him. 

With his increasing influence and visibility in the Spanish political and economic scene, various dubious matters about Francisco Nicolas started to come out. Around 2012, Princess Cristina of Spain faced a major political scandal as it came to light that she had misused her identity to fraudulently gather public funds. Being a supporter of the royal family, Nicolas decided to try his hand at solving the matter and also make a name for himself through it. The man approached Miguel Bernad, the general secretary of the Manos Limpias trade union, which was one of the primary accusers against Princess Cristina. Nicolas either paid Bernad a lot of money or convinced him that he had direct ties with the royal family and managed to get the case against Cristina dropped. This habit of simply pretending to know certain high-powered, influential people did get Nicolas a long way. 

The media was most stirred by Nicholas when the young man was seen to be present during the coronation ceremony of the new king, Felipe VI. Nicolas learned of the abdication of King Juan Carlos I, apparently from his sources at the CNI, a few days earlier than it was publicly announced, and he personally messaged the King, thanking him for his rule. There is clear evidence of both this text and King Juan Carlos’ personal text reply to the young man. Then, during the coronation ceremony of the new king, Nicolas was present at the royal palace, and it is still not very clear as to how he got entry to the place. Nicolas, his mother, and his close friends still state that he had gotten an actual invite from the royal palace, and he claims to have used his influence in the CNI to get hold of it. A businesswoman named Catalina Hoffman had a close friendship with Nicolas at this time, and according to him, he got hold of official invites for both himself and Catalina. The woman, on the other hand, denies this claim altogether, saying that her invitation was from an official, legitimate source. Some still believe that Nicolas actually sneaked into the event with an invitation that he had forged, as faking identities and contacts was not something new to him.

During his college examinations, Nicolas got hold of fake IDs so a friend of his could go to the center and take the exam for him. Soon after the coronation ceremony fiasco, Nicolas also started claiming himself to be associated with either the royal family, some governmental organization, or an official connection between the two in various instances. All these lies were simply to get special treatment and to get access to various chances that no ordinary citizen could get. He would rent out cars and modify them, attaching police sirens and plaques, enabling him to pretend to be some high-ranking officer. Eventually, the police and the authorities found out about the scam that Nicolas was committing, and the young man was finally arrested on charges of impersonation and fraud.

How did Nicolas’ case uncover other scandals?

As the police investigation into Francisco Nicolas began, the name of a police officer, Jose Manuel Villarejo, came up in particular. Nicolas had been involved in the sale of a certain villa in the country, and Villarejo was also found to be indirectly involved in it. As soon as the police officer’s name got included in Nicolas’ case, he started reaching out to high-level authoritative figures and threatening them that he would leak information against them. In fact, Villarejo had been involved in such matters earlier in his professional career, too, and at present, it is widely believed that a highly confidential recording of a meeting between the CNI and the police department had also been made and leaked by Villarejo. Along with being a high-ranking police officer, Villarejo was also a businessman, and the journalists who first reported Nicolas’ arrest, as well as the ones believed to have made the secret recording, belonged to a company owned by the man himself.

Over the next few months, the Nicolas case got sidelined, and the investigation into this newly unearthed political scandal took over in the media. Villarejo directly refuted the claims made by the CNI and placed himself as an opponent to the intelligence unit led by Felix Roldan. Amidst all of this drama, everyone kept cutting ties with Nicolas, claiming that they had never known the young man personally. It can be guessed that at the peak of his short career, many officials and authority figures took the help of Nicolas, making use of the contacts and the relationships he had gathered and built. But now, when there was the risk of facing legal persecution, almost everyone turned away, claiming that they never had any personal acquaintance with the young man. Everyone, ranging from Jamie Garcia-Legaz to Jose Manuel Villarejo, claimed that Nicolas was just a petty impersonator who had managed to infiltrate various levels of the Spanish bureaucracy without any real connection whatsoever.

Have Nicolas and the others been found guilty?

Nicolas had committed all his acts out of a deep yearning for attention, power, and influence, but as he himself admits, much of it was done when he did not even fully understand the gravity of his actions. According to him, those who allowed him and even reaped benefits from his actions at the time are equally culpable in the matter, if not more. But by the end, Fernando Nicolas also had to face the repercussions of the misleading and deceitful acts he had committed. He has been ultimately found guilty of four charges, including fraud, forgery, and identity theft. With all the cases put together, Nicolas has to serve a total of twelve years and three months in prison. However, as it happens in many nations still struggling with corruption, the rest of the individuals named in the scandal, including Jose Manuel Villarejo, have not yet been proven guilty of any of the charges against them. As one of the reporters notes, Villarejo most definitely has sensitive information and recordings of all or most of the authority figures, ensuring that no severe action is ever taken against him.

Lover, Stalker, Killer is the latest addition to Netflix’s true-crime documentary library, and the case here is a rather intriguing and bewildering one. The documentary film is based on events that took place around 2012 in Omaha, USA, in which a vengeful ex-lover crossed all limits to cause harm to a man named Dave Kroupa and truly turned his and all his acquaintances’ lives into a living hell. Lover, Stalker, Killer is satisfyingly precise and well-presented, making it an intriguing watch despite lacking varying perspectives in it.

How did Dave Kroupa find himself in a troubling romantic situation?

The story of Lover, Stalker, Killer begins with an introduction to the man who found himself caught in the middle of a bizarre and dangerous situation around 2012–13. An automobile mechanic by profession, Dave found his first true love in a woman named Amy Flora. As the two were colleagues at a truck stop, they started dating, soon fell in love, and started a family of their own within some time. As parents to a young girl and a boy, both Dave and Amy had to work very hard to earn enough to keep the family afloat, and they had to do multiple shifts throughout the day. The work pressure became such that the couple could hardly spend time with each other anymore, and this started to wedge a distance between them. Over the next few years, Dave and Amy grew apart from each other, and upon realizing that they were really not in love any longer, the couple decided to split and part ways. However, since they still had to look after their children, who would be staying with Amy, Dave decided to move in somewhere close to his ex-partner so that the children would not be affected by their split.

It was at this time that Dave first moved to Omaha, in Nebraska, and started working at a repair garage as a mechanic. Still full of age at thirty-five, the man wanted to meet new people and possibly even try his luck at love once again, and so he decided to check out the online dating scene. Creating an account on the Plenty of Fish dating website, which was quite common at the time, he waited for responses and finally found one match with a woman named Shanna “Liz” Golyar. The match instantly excited Dave, for he was of the opinion that he and Liz had quite a few common interests, and their first date was also equally promising. Dave was not looking for any serious relationship and had been clear about this from the very beginning, and Liz was also of the same opinion. Their unattached romantic frenzy took off, and Dave and Liz had quite some fun together for a few weeks. He maintains in the documentary interview that he had expressed to Liz that he had no intention of settling down yet and that the woman was fine with it as well.

A few weeks later, Dave was back on the dating website once again, and he now found the profile of an attractive woman named Cari Farver, whom he instantly recognized. Sometime earlier, Cari had gone to the repair garage where Dave had fixed her car, and the man had remembered her because of how pretty she looked. Seeing her on the dating site made Dave reach out to Cari, and they soon went out on a date, which went pretty well, too. There were similarities and matching interests between this couple as well, and soon, they started their own fling, getting intimate over multiple instances. But during one of the initial times, when Cari went over to Dave’s apartment, Liz suddenly appeared outside his door, wanting to take something of hers from his place. Although the situation was extremely awkward, it did not deter Cari at the time. Dave had been honest about his wishes and intentions for Cari as well, and the woman did not mind getting casually involved with him.

But Dave Kroupa’s life took a sudden turn one day when he received a message from Cari asking him to make their relationship more permanent. Merely weeks after meeting and getting casually involved with each other, Cari wanted to move in together with Dave. The man, who had been open about his disinterest in any serious relationship, naturally denied the request but immediately received threatening responses from Cari. The first few texts were mostly about how he had played with her feelings and how she was left hurt by this bitter experience, and it eventually stopped for a few days. Dave believed that it was only an emotional response from Cari, and although it was genuinely weird for someone to ask to move in together only after a few weeks, especially after agreeing to keep things casual, he did not pursue the matter anymore. However, after a few days, the messages started once more, this time becoming much more threatening and abusive, stating how Dave’s life and that of his close ones would be hampered because of these decisions.

The threatening texts took on a very real form when Dave was visited by Liz one evening, and he was shown that the side of her car had been intentionally scratched by someone with a sharp object. To make matters even worse, Cari had texted Liz as well, threatening to hurt and kill her if she did not leave Dave. There was nothing going on between Dave and Liz at the time, and yet Cari wanted to hurt the woman. Within the next few days, all limits were crossed by Cari as she kept stalking Dave, messaging him threats whenever he met Liz or any other women who simply came to his garage for repairs. The threats extended to his ex-partner Amy and their children as well, as Cari started to text Amy, telling her to be away from the man’s life. There were tremendously frightening instances as well, like when Cari followed Amy and her children to a park and threatened to kill the kids over similar texts. But all hell finally broke loose when Liz’s house was broken into and set on fire, killing all her pets and causing significant damage. Although Dave and Liz had come close to each other during this time, the woman decided to move away from the town with her kids after the horrific fire, and Dave obviously supported her decision.

Why did the police not catch Cari for stalking?

The stalking and threatening against Dave and his close friends and family continued for more than a year, and it even continued when the man changed his address, phone number, and job. Despite starting afresh, Dave did create a profile on a dating website, and he was once again tracked down by the vengeful Cari, who continued to threaten him. Dave had already asked for the help of Omaha police quite a while back, and investigators did take up the case, but the most difficult part of the matter was that Cari had been missing for all this time. Cari Farver had been last seen and found track of on the 13th of November, 2012, the same day when she asked to move in with Dave over text, and nobody had seen her since then. Her mother, Nancy Raney, had also contacted the police when her daughter did not return home after a few days, and Dave was contacted by the authorities regarding the matter.

An official investigation began as Cari seemed to have left her house, deserting her mother and her young son behind. However, she did keep messaging her mother as well, stating that she was safe but did not want to return home at the time. Cari then also told her mother that she was moving away and had found a new job and a new life in Kansas. The police searched Cari’s house and found all her clothes and belongings intact, as if she had simply vanished from existence and not moved away. She had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and had been prescribed medications for it, but these medicines were also found in the house, making it seem like she had intentionally left them behind. Therefore, the Omaha police were of the opinion that Cari’s stalking and blackmailing episode was because of her bipolar disorder getting out of hand because of the lack of medication.

However, when the Pottawattamie County police took over the case in their own interest, their investigation resulted in some very different results. The text messages sent by Cari were looked into by an IT expert, and although numerous different internet servers had been used, the most frequently used server was tracked down to a house in the area. The police were now of the opinion that Cari was not the real perpetrator and that someone else was impersonating her, and soon, their suspicion took a definite shape. The ISP address led to a man who reported that his on-again, off-again girlfriend stayed with him for a long time after her house had burned down.

Could the investigators find Cari Farver?

It was indeed Liz Golyar who became the suspect in this sudden twist in the tale, but she could not be directly approached by the police. The investigators knew that they needed to know more about where Cari Farver was, and the whole case was looked into as one of murder and not just simple stalking. It was gradually becoming clearer that it was Liz who had been pretending to be Cari for all this while, out of sheer jealousy and obsessive behavior toward Dave Kroupa. The woman even went to the extent of breaking into Dave’s new residence, removing a handgun he had bought for his safety, and then shooting herself with the same gun, claiming that Amy Flora had attacked her. But the cards gradually began to fall for Liz when the detectives managed to gain her trust and place her in a trap of her own doing. Liz continued with the lie that Cari still frequently sent her threatening texts, and she forwarded these to the police upon their asking.

In this manner, the authorities managed to make Liz reveal more things about Cari as she forwarded these fake messages, and it was roughly estimated that Cari Farver had been stabbed to death around the 13th of November, when she had gone missing. By this time, Cari’s car had also been found and intensely investigated, with blood stains from the woman being found inside. Interestingly, a box of mint found in the car revealed Liz’s fingerprints, placing her at a possible crime scene. Liz Goylar was arrested by the police for the suspected murder of Cari and the impersonation that followed, but the police still needed some more incriminating evidence against her. Sadly, Cari Farver’s body was never found, and her grieving mother and son had to settle with only the confirmation of her passing.

What happened to Liz Goylar?

Towards the end of the prosecution investigation, the authorities managed to find an old memory card from some of Dave’s belongings, which Liz had clearly used during 2012. Going through the contents of the card, the police finally found a single photograph of what looked like the foot of a dead woman. Although it could not be proved that this was most definitely the body of Cari, the police were sure that it would be enough to put Liz behind bars for a long time. The judge did express apprehensions regarding the exercise of the law in the matter since Cari’s dead body was not found. However, he did admit that all suggestions pointed towards Liz being the suspect behind the woman’s disappearance, and ultimately, Liz Goylar was sentenced to life imprisonment. At the moment, Liz continues to be in jail, as her sentence also came with no chance of parole, while Cari’s mother, Nancy, and her son Maxwell still live on with the memory of their loved one, just like Dave Kroupa, who still bears the guilt of introducing Liz and Cari, which ended in such a tragedy.

In Rael: The Alien Prophet, we saw how the self-proclaimed messiah brainwashed people into believing that the aliens had contacted them, and he got to know that it was not some supernatural power or God behind the creation of life on earth, but the aliens who had created everything. Rael, whose real name was Claude Vorilhon, claimed that he saw a UFO land on the ground in front of his eyes. He had written a book titled “The Book That Tells the Truth,” in which he mentioned his bizarre and absurd theories about how the aliens manipulated DNA and created humans. One would believe that the world would not pay any heed to such a person and consider him a lunatic, but no, that’s where the twist comes in. There were people according to whom the book that tells the truth enlightened them and made them feel that they were not the only people who believed in such things. Now, there are a few things that every fraud godman says or does, and I believe that if you look closely, you will realize they follow the same template. Firstly, they are perverts of the highest order, and they find ways to legitimize their actions. Often, under the pretext of devotion or some bizarre, unsubstantiated theories, they influence young and vulnerable women to get intimate with them. Secondly, in almost every case, they are the only ones who can hear or get in touch with the supernatural powers. In this particular case, Rael said that Elohim constantly communicated with him, and his followers blindly believed in him. The most bizarre claim made by Rael was that he was taken by a UFO and that he met all the prophets that graced the earth with their presence in the past. He said Jesus told him that he was his brother, and he also met the likes of Buddha and the prophet Mohammad. I mean, I don’t understand how the interviewer did not laugh at his face and still talked very seriously to him.

Why did Damien Marsic lose faith?

Damien was an important member of the cult, and he worked very closely with Brigitte Boisselier and was the mind behind whatever happened in Clonaid. Damien was shocked when Brigitte declared in front of the world that they would be able to develop a human clone soon. In Rael: The Alien Prophet, Damien Marsic very clearly said that Clonaid didn’t have the technical know-how about making a human clone, and he quashed all the claims made by Brigitte and called it a big hoax. Damien had been a part of the cult, and there were a lot of things he knew were quite objectionable. He never complained about it, but when the entire clone theory was put in front of the world, and he saw how Brigitte was giving her testimony in the congressional session as well as during the trial, he realized that it was his duty to first keep himself out of their mess and tell the world that the so-called messiah was a fraud.

What did Brigitte McCann find out about Raelsim?

Before Brigitte McCann came to the helm of affairs, Christophe Dechavanne, who hosted a show called Ciel mon Mardi, called out Rael for being a pedophile and a fraud. He had a witness with him too on the show who told the audience how Rael committed adultery and just wanted to find ways to validate and justify his lecherous intentions in front of the whole world. The best thing was that for the longest time, he was able to do that, and nobody raised any objection to it.

Brigitte McCann was a journalist from Quebec, and she infiltrated the cult premises, pretending to be a devotee and somebody who believed in Rael’s theories. There was a screening process where the officials wanted to make sure that there was no undercover agent who wanted to sabotage their agendas, and once they were sure, Brigitte was given the green light. What she saw shocked her beyond any measure. She saw through the real intention of the godman and how he treated women. There were groups that were given specific tasks inside the commune. There was a group called the Pink Feathers, and the women who were a part of it were told to do as the prophet said, i.e., Rael, and get physically intimate with him. The girls willingly did that because they were brainwashed to that extent and believed that they were serving the almighty. Rael took advantage of his position, and he had a great time. From girls to money, he got whatever he wanted even after he gave such theories all the time. A tenth of the salary of each and every person was to be given to the cult, and some percentage of it was kept by the messiah for his personal use. Brigitte saw that Rael lived an opulent life, and he somehow managed to make his followers believe that his intentions were very pure and that he was trying to help them connect with their higher selves and understand the true purpose of their lives on Earth. Brigitte published her report, and after that, the cult’s reputation was tarnished. A lot of people left the commune, and a lot of outsiders requested the government do something about the issue and put him behind bars.

Where are Brigitte McCann and Damien Marsic now?

Damien Marsic studied biotechnology at the University of Alabama, and as of now, he lives in Suzhou, China, and works as the Executive Vice President for a company named Maibo Biotech. Brigitte McCann, on the other hand, went on to write a book about her experiences when she had infiltrated the commune, and it went on to become a bestseller. She was also given many awards for her investigative work. At the end of the documentary, we saw how Brigitte McCann was surprised by the fact that Rael still preached in Japan and that he faced no legal consequences for his actions, even when it was blatantly clear what he was doing in his cult. Brigitte studied journalism at Concordia University, and in 2008, she started working for La Semaine. She continued to do her other freelance work for various prestigious media houses.

Rael: The Alien Prophet made us privy to one of the most bizarre cults that ever existed, and after watching the documentary, any sane person would find it extremely hard to understand how so many people became followers and how the leader made them believe in his bizarre narrative that seemed to be stolen from a sci-fi film. Brigitte Boisselier was one of the important members of the cult, and she rose through the ranks after Rael figured out that she was a chemist and that she could help him in his ventures. So, let’s find out what Brigitte sought to achieve, if she was able to accomplish her goals, and where she is as of now.

What was Clonaid?

Brigitte Boisselier was one of those few members of the Raelian religious movement who was well educated, had two PhDs under her belt, and was working as a research chemist for a company known as Air Liquide. Brigitte had separated from her husband just before joining the movement, and she was looking for something that could bring meaning to her existence on Earth. Brigitte had three children, and, as she claimed, they meant the world to her. As soon as Rael, aka Claude Vorilhon, got to know about her, he realized that he could put her to good use and do something with her help that would create a sensation. Rael, anyway, didn’t miss an opportunity to take a dig at the Catholic Church, and he believed that attempting human cloning could be the first step to proving to the world that the entire philosophy of the church was based on a big lie and had no scientific basis. It was around the same time that the first mammal to be cloned, Dolly, the sheep, made a lot of waves in the media. Just after a year, in 1997, it was decided by Rael that a separate wing would be opened, which would be dedicated to doing research and experiments in the field of cloning.

The organization was called Clonaid, and Brigitte became its scientific director and headed operations. Together with other experts from the field, she began her experiments. Brigitte, from the very beginning of Rael: the Alien Prophet, was very confident about the fact that they would be able to achieve the feat and produce the first human clone. A US politician named Mark Hunt came to Clonaid and asked them to clone his deceased son. Mark Hunt backed the Raelian initiative by funding the project and making sure they had all the equipment they needed. But in 2002, Brigitte had to shut down her secret lab in the USA as the Bush regime put a ban on human cloning. Before this ban, Brigitte and Rael appeared in front of Congress, and they had to justify why they wanted to do human cloning and provide evidence that their experiments wouldn’t put human life at risk.

In 2002, Brigitte claimed that they had created the first human clone named Eve. Around this time, Bernard Siegal, a lawyer, initiated legal proceedings under the Child Welfare Act. Brigitte revealed to the judges that Eve was born in the lab in Israel, though she kept the identity of the parents a secret. No accusations against Brigitte could be proved in a court of law, though a lot of people considered her claims to be a hoax.

Did Brigitte make false claims?

Damien Marsic, who worked closely with Brigitte in Clonaid, said that he never found any evidence that could substantiate the claims made by her boss. He said that, according to him, Rael and Brigitte were both bluffing, and they were well aware of the fact that no such clone had been born. So when Brigitte and Rael were asked about it, they replied to the question in a very peculiar and absurd manner. Rael, during one of his gatherings, said that if he had been able to create a clone, then it was a great scientific discovery, but if there was no such thing and he was selling lies, then it was a brilliant advertising campaign that got them a lot of publicity. Rael always said that no publicity is bad publicity, and probably the entire venture was a sham. The way even Brigitte Boisselier replied in the end made me feel like she didn’t have any kind of knowledge about what was happening there. She said that if Rael came today and told her that it was all fake, then she would have a good laugh, as she enjoyed her time back in the day and was proud of the work she did. There was a point in time in Rael: The Alien King when we saw Brigitte very stressed as her own daughter decided to be a surrogate mother for the entire cloning initiative. As of now, Rael has entirely changed his stance, and he said that he had no clue what was happening in Israel and that it was Brigitte who was handling everything there. So basically, to conclude, there is no solid evidence that can prove that a human clone was born in Israel, and be it Rael or Brigitte, they were such unreliable people that it is better we not believe in their narrative.

Where is Brigitte Boisselier now?

According to the documentary, Brigitte is in Mexico as of now, and she is still an active Raelian. She said that she had no reason to give up on her beliefs, and apparently, she didn’t find that they did anything wrong. She has a huge farmland in Mexico where she lives a happy life, is content with the choices she made, and is proud of her work as a Raelian.

It is absolutely surprising for me personally to see how these people function. She was of a sane mind, and obviously, she knew what was happening in the name of the religion in their group. Rael was not a prophet. He was just a lecherous man who wanted attention, and that is why he created these baseless and absurd theories, which he knew would cause a sensation in the media. Brigitte very casually said that she would have a good laugh if whatever they had claimed was untrue. She testified in front of Congress that cloning was something that mankind needed, and then during the legal proceedings, she declared in front of the whole world that they had created history as the first human clone was born. At the end of Rael: The Alien Prophet, when Brigitte was told that the majority of the world considers her claims to be a hoax, she didn’t seem adamant to prove her point, and in fact, it felt like it didn’t concern her at all. It is as if she is proud of the fact that she was able to fool the world on such a large scale.