Frank Parlato wrote an interesting post yesterday about how prophetic Keith Raniere seemed to be when he talked to Allison Mack about how she would feel if the New York Times newspaper ran a front-page story about her being a “terrible, terrible, terrible” person.
The post featured a video that was filmed sometime around 2016 – which is about the same time that Raniere and Mack were setting up the secret society known as Dominos Obsequious Sororium (DOS).
The video was a classic example of Raniere’s ability to use lots and lots of words to say absolutely nothing.
But it may also have been an early indication that Raniere always planned to have Allison take full responsibility for DOS if its existence ever became known.
After his first business venture, Consumer’s Buyline, Inc. (CBI), blew up in his face, Raniere tried very hard to never put his name on anything.
Not on bank accounts, not on income tax returns, not on legal documents – and certainly not on something as potentially volatile as DOS.
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Fast forward to the Fall of 2017 – which is when Raniere really started worrying about the possibility that he might be prosecuted.
Following the October 17, 2017 publication of the front-page article in the New York Times concerning the existence of DOS and the fact that its members were branded on their pubic region with his initials, Raniere grew concerned that for the first time in almost 20-years, he might be facing scrutiny from law enforcement officials.
By November of 2017 – which is when officials from the Eastern District of New York started interviewing potential witnesses and victims – Raniere decided it was time to flee from his home-base in Clifton Park, NY.
At first, he tried to move to Canada with his baby mama, Mariana Fernandez, and their baby, Kemar.
But when Canadian officials denied entry to Mariana because of her questionable immigration documents, the three of them headed off to Mexico.
It was there the Frank Report found them a short time later, pushing around a baby carriage in the streets of San Pedro Garza Garcia, an affluent suburb of Monterrey.
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Over the course of the next few months, the EDNY investigation continued to expand as more and more people were interviewed by FBI agents.
Meanwhile, with his whereabouts having been exposed, Raniere decided to ditch Mariana and Kemar.
So, off he went to a $10,000-per-week villa near Puerto Vallarta – where he immediately summoned some of his inner-inner circle members to help him come up with a plan to save his ass.
Joining him there at various times were Clare Bronfman, Allison Mack, Lauren Salzman, Loreta Garza, and Nicki Clyne.
On March 26, 2018, Raniere was arrested by Mexican federal police – and immediately escorted to the U.S. border. Frank Report even showed an exclusive video of some of his companions chasing after the police car that took him away.
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Before his arrest, Raniere was trying to figure out how he could avoid being charged with any DOS-related crimes.
Eventually, he settled on a two-pronged strategy: first, get a positive story about him printed by a nationally prominent media organization – and then get someone else to take total responsibility for DOS.
The first part of his plan was fairly easy to enact. He just needed Clare Bronfman to use some of her contacts and wealth to get a journalist to write a very positive story about him.
And, thus, Vanessa Grigoriadis, was selected to do the first interview with Raniere and other high-ranking members of NXIVM in more than 14-years.
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The second part of Raniere’s plan was also fairly easy to pull off.
Allison Mack, the woman that he had chosen to be the putative leader of DOS, was convinced to say that she was in charge of DOS – and that Raniere had nothing to do with it (We don’t know how many Explorations of Meaning – EMs – it took to get Allison to that point but, in the end, she agreed to Raniere’s plan).
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Timing was extremely important if Raniere’s plan was going to work.
And so Vanessa was flown down to Mexico to meet with Clare Bronfman.
After she had passed Clare’s screening interview, Vanessa was allowed to meet with Raniere (According to her report, she spent numerous hours with him).
Soon thereafter, Vanessa was flown to Albany, NY where she was allowed to watch Nancy Salzman conduct an EM on a member of NXIVM. She also got to interview Sara Bronfman, who even made her eggs for her.
Along the way, Vanessa also got to interview Lauren Salzman, India Oxenberg, and Barbara Bouchey. Even Bouchey, who has borne the brunt of numerous legal battles since she left NXIVM, had some nice things to say about Raniere.
Finally, Vanessa got to interview Allison Mack in her apartment in Brooklyn, NY. It was Allison who explained all the details about DOS to her.
According to Mack, DOS was “was about women coming together and pledging to one another a full-time commitment to become our most powerful and embodied selves by pushing on our greatest fears, by exposing our greatest vulnerabilities, by knowing that we would stand with each other no matter what, by holding our word, by overcoming pain.”
It was also Allison who volunteered that she was the one who came up with the idea for branding the members of DOS.
As Vanessa reported, “I was surprised to hear Mack take full responsibility for coming up with the DOS cauterized brand. She told me, ‘I was like: ‘Y’all, a tattoo? People get drunk and tattooed on their ankle ‘BFF,’ or a tramp stamp. I have two tattoos and they mean nothing.’ She wanted to do something more meaningful, something that took guts”.
And, thus, the second part of Raniere’s plan to escape blame for DOS was set in place.
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Unfortunately for Raniere, publications like The New York Times Magazine utilize a laborious vetting process before they publish articles.
Editors review for style. Fact-checkers confirm every detail. And lawyers make sure that there are no inherent legal liabilities in the article.
And so, despite Raniere’s carefully constructed plan, the article written by Vanessa languished for several weeks before it was finally published on May 30, 2018.
By then, Raniere had already spent more than two months incarcerated at the Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC) in Brooklyn, NY.
And by then, Allison Mack had already been arrested, had spent several days at MDC herself, and had then placed under home confinement in her parents’ home.
Thus, the brilliant plan of the smartest man in the world was blown up by the bureaucracy of The New York Times Magazine.
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Allison Mack recently pleaded to one count of Racketeering and one count of Racketeering Conspiracy – and is expected to be a key witness against Raniere and Bronfman at their upcoming trial.
By now, she’s had plenty of time to figure out that she was set up to take the fall for Raniere so that he could continue on with his life of crime and debauchery.
And by now, she’s probably more than a little pissed at how life has turned out for her.
“Heav’n has no rage like love to hatred turn’d”.
William Congreve, The Mourning Bride (1697).