Two employees of a motivational speaker facing manslaughter charges told authorities they had no reason to be alarmed when participants in a deadly US sweat lodge ceremony began vomiting and passing out because their boss told them such responses were to be expected, documents released on Friday showed.
Megan and Josh Fredrickson participated in the October sweat lodge ceremony in Arizona, which authorities say led to the deaths of three people. The event was led by self-help guru James Arthur Ray.
Authorities in central Arizona interviewed the Fredricksons in mid-January on the condition that nothing they said would be used against them.
The couple said staff members at the sweat lodge ceremony provided water to participants and took some other precautions, but few had formal training in dealing with heat stroke and other health problems.
Ray was arrested earlier this week and pleaded not guilty to three counts of manslaughter. He is being held in a Yavapai County jail on US$5 million bond.
The Fredricksons went to work for Ray in 2005 at his California company, James Ray International. Megan Fredrickson most recently was the company’s director of operations, while Josh Fredrickson worked in technology.
Case documents released on Friday showed the Fredricksons were granted immunity.
In lengthy interviews with investigators, they said they couldn’t recall many of the details that participants did when asked what happened in the sweat lodge ceremony at Ray’s five-day “Spiritual Warrior” retreat. Authorities said they expected Megan Fredrickson would remember more because she was seated close to the opening of the sweat lodge and those were the people who stayed in the longest and had a better recollection of the event.
Prosecutors contend Ray recklessly crammed participants into a 122m² sweat lodge and chided them for wanting to leave, even as people were vomiting, getting burned by hot rocks and lying lifeless on the ground. Public records show a pattern of illnesses at Ray-led events that he largely ignored.
Megan Fredrickson said people who were vomiting, unresponsive and unconscious raised no red flags with her because Ray had explained those responses were possibilities.
“Ultimately, the plan is we never really had a plan for the extent of what happened,” Fredrickson said. “Call paramedics, I think is the plan.”
The staff was never instructed to call for help, he said, but Ray appreciated that someone had done so.
Megan Fredrickson, who was seated next to Ray during the ceremony, said three people who were part of Ray’s “Dream Team” were instructed to help passed-out people leave the sweat lodge.
They included Josh Fredrickson and Liz Neuman, a Minnesota woman who was among the deceased, she said.
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