Graduate School 

 

I was accepted to graduate school in the summer of 1984 and began working towards my Master’s degree in the fall of that year. I was also relieved at having conveyed most of my story to the Dean of Students at the University. However, when I met with him I was reticent to disclose the entire story because parts of it were so bizarre, and I thought some of the more esoteric details of my harassment might cause credibility issues. So, I only communicated aspects of the story that would be easy to corroborate, and not bring into question my own sanity. Further, I no longer had my research paper to offer as any kind of proof. Consequently, my story excluded the bizarre stalking episodes, the letters of harassment, the dead animals, the various skits that had been performed at work and most of the other bizarre aspects of what happened. At the time, I really didn’t think this would matter much anyway because I figured my “Mormon persecution” had pretty much abated. Ultimately, because of my meeting with the Dean of Students, the University did launch an investigation into the actions of the ward bishop and his deft ability to manipulate grades. But, unfortunately as these new events began unfolding, I found I was also living in a Mormon owned and managed apartment building while I attended grad-school, although I didn’t know this at the time.

Everyone who has ever had the misfortune affiliating and then trying to disaffiliate with this religion knows that the Mormons are experts at tracking and stalking the people they want to keep tabs on. But, for a short while, they seemed to have forgotten about me, and even lost track of me, and they seemed to have no idea I had enrolled in the University again. I know this because their Mormon persecution, which had been tailor-made just for me, was pretty much nonexistent during this period of time. But, as I mentioned, I happened to be living in an apartment complex that was owned and operated by these people. I certainly wasn’t aware of this when I first moved in, and had they known it my life would have certainly been chaos. It took them a couple of months to realize I was there, which apparently coincided with the end of the University’s investigation into the ward bishop and his impending termination from the University. But, once the Mormons realized what happened to their ward bishop and why, it didn’t take them long to make up for lost time and begin unleashing a new deluge of strategic harassment, once again tailor made especially for me. The only good thing about this new campaign of religious terrorism was that I now knew beyond a shadow of a doubt exactly who was behind the previous campaign of terror that was directed at me.

The first semester of graduate school, I had an 8:00AM accounting class on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, which was located in the BPA building. After class I’d walk out the main entrance and hang out in the outside courtyard to chat with friends before I left for the day. Within the first couple of weeks, I was quite surprised to see my old nemesis, the ward bishop, walking briskly up the steps leading into the BPA courtyard, and hastily making his way towards the main entrance of the BPA building. I hadn’t seen this man since my “fireside chat” with him at his house in January of 1978, about 6-years earlier. And, in the coming weeks, I witnessed this same absurd scene at least four or five more times. For some reason, I’d just look over and see the ward bishop arriving frantically from the direction of the Liberal Arts College, which housed the Economics Department. Next, he’d scramble up the steps leading into the main courtyard, and then scurry over to the main entrance of the BPA building and quickly disappear inside of the building. And, during this entire time he had a look of great consternation on his face. I didn’t know what his destination was inside, he could have been rushing to teach an economics class, or he might have had other business to take care of because the lower floor of the BPA building housed the BPA college’s administrative offices, including the BPA Dean’s office.

I was curious about this, and one day I got close enough to notice he had headed down the stairs after he entered the building, and not up. That meant that he had business with the BPA administrators downstairs, and wasn’t going up to a classroom to teach. At this point, I made an assumption that the ward bishop was being called over to the BPA College for some reason, and of course I had my suspicions about what those reasons might be. Additionally, it also seemed a bit odd that he was always rushing to the BPA College, just as I was leaving it. That almost seemed too coincidental to me. Regardless, I watched this same scene being re-run over and over, and I couldn’t help but think how strange this seemed. Finally, in what was the last time I ever witnessed this man’s frantic journey to the BPA College, he whizzed by me about 5-yards away, and was proceeding to the entrance to the BPA building with throngs of students milling about in the courtyard. Then, he happened to turn and look over at me, and saw me sitting with my friends and looking back at him. When he recognized who I was, his face turned white with terror as if he had just seen a ghost. Throughout all of his journeys to the BPA College, this was the only time he ever saw me; and, it was also the last time I ever saw him as well. Coincidentally, it was also only a matter of weeks before my religious persecution began anew.

I found out the apartment building I lived in was owned and managed by Mormons one day when the apartment manager, who I also found out was Mormon, told me. He and I had been playing racquetball on a weekly basis, but this was the last time we ever played. He did speak to me on occasion after that, but it was strictly on a tenant/manager basis. And, I noticed that whenever he did speak to me, he seemed to treat me with great disdain. It also turns out that the apartment manager was not just any Mormon. He was a “TBM” (true blue Mormon) as Mormons say. This means he went to church every Sunday with his wife and two little girls, had gone on a mission, was “temple worthy” and had the Melchizedek priesthood, which made him a righteous example for other Mormons to follow. During the last racquetball game we played, he actually explained that he was Mormon, and that the owners of the complex who lived in California, were Mormon as well. Looking back, I think this was just their way of letting me know they had identified me, and knew where I lived. I can only imagine their glee when they realized I actually lived in an apartment building that was owned and operated by them. Immediately thereafter, numerous strange events began occurring in and around my apartment, which included harassing phone calls at all times of the day and night, personal items being mysteriously moved inside my apartment and countless other things.

In a new technique that was adopted by my twisted and malevolent stalkers, I suddenly found myself being greeted by a mysterious car that was always parked across the street from my apartment when I got home. And, every time I approached my apartment, this car would flash its headlights on and off just to let me know I was being watched. This new stalking technique took place winter, spring, summer and fall, but only on weekdays and in late afternoon or early evening. Apparently the psycho in the car actually had other things to do during the rest of the day and on weekends. Maybe he had other dissidents he had to persecute during those timeslots. I also figured the guy in the car either really enjoyed what he was doing, or he was a very dedicated member of some cabal who did exactly as he was told to do. In an eerie incident that added a new dimension to this, I met someone in class one semester who I was interested in, and we agreed to go out. I finally got her phone number in class one day, but called her later from my apartment to chat and obtain directions to her house. And, when I arrived to pick her up at her house the next evening around 7:30, there was that same car about 25-yards away facing me on the other side of the street, flashing its lights at me. Oddly, the only way anyone could have known when and where I was going that evening was if my phones or my apartment had been bugged, or both.

Then, the day I dreaded more than death itself finally arrived. My doorbell rang, and I automatically opened the front door, as if I lived in a normal world where I wasn’t stalked, and my friends would be standing in the doorway. But, much to my chagrin, I found myself staring face to face with two guys in ill-fitting suits. And, for those of you who don’t know this, there are only two situations that have ever occurred in the history of the world that involve two men in suites standing outside your front door. And, both situations involve the Mormon religion. In the first situation, two missionaries on bikes just peddled over to your house to see you before you made the mistake of joining this religion, and in the second, the two men standing outside your door are the infamous “home teachers” who are assigned to stalk you once you’ve decided disassociate yourself from this religion. In my case, the two visitors were the dreaded “home teachers”. I hadn’t seen any “home teachers” at all since that fateful evening in the fall of 1977, when I was offered my contract to be a paid member of this religion and was then threatened in my own home, all in the same evening. I also no longer lived in the same “ward” I lived in either, and it had been 8-years since I told the previous ward bishop that I was no longer Mormon.

The only thing more incredible than the fact I had two home-teachers standing in front of me was the fact that I actually recognized the old dried-up sullen one. He looked just like he had gotten off the stagecoach from Tombstone, Arizona, circa 1880, where he was an undertaker. It turns out he was also the same old man who stalked me to work in 1978 and gave me the “lessons” about the derivation of the word “sinister”. I guess he was even a “teacher” back then. I always knew that if this guy was a home-teacher, he’d be the one in the duo who just glared and let his partner do all the talking. His counterpart, on the other hand, was a handsome young lad about my age who still had the look of vitality. I wondered how long it took one of these guys to have their spirit stripped away like the old man next to him. I could also now understand why this old man didn’t like to talk much. Based on what I knew about him, he didn’t really seem like much of a “people person”. Since I had already made the mistake of opening my front door, I had to say “hello”, and they proceeded to introduce themselves as “home teachers” from the local Ward. The vital one asked if they could come in, and I indicated I didn't have anything to talk to them about. Their parting words were, “We’d really like to see you in Church again”. I responded, “I am not Mormon”, and they left without further adieu.

Remember the story about the “lady” and her “husband” who stalked me to work in 1978, but really turned out to be actors in a scene? And, in this scene the “lady” cried to her “husband” about being victimized by a man who was peeking at her while she was in the change room? But, then in the surprise ending, she pointed her finger at me? Well, almost a carbon copy of that scene was acted out behind my apartment right around this same time. I was in my kitchen making dinner one evening, and noticed a man and woman right outside my kitchen window in the “alley” between the apartment complex and an auto dealer’s lot next door where they kept their overstock of cars. There wasn’t supposed to be anybody in that area, so all of the commotion was hard to miss. And, in this latest fictitious scene, acted out right outside my kitchen window, a woman acting very distraught, almost crying in fact, and talked to a gentleman who was ostensibly her husband. She went on and on about how she had been looking at cars in the overflow lot when she spied somebody who was flashing her from an apartment window. She then pointed to my window and said, “The person who did it was in that apartment”. Again, nobody every approached me about this because it was a lie. And, I also now knew these people were obviously Mormons, but I only got to see them as bad actors in perverse skits.

I have another good story, which interfaces with the Mormon rumors of me being a drug user and a drug "pusher". One day, I began noticing a rather conspicuous looking car that always seemed to park across from my apartment during mid-morning. This latest “event” started in late April and occurred over the period of about 4-weeks. The car also didn’t belong to anybody who lived in the apartment complex. Rather, it just showed up and parked outside of my apartment around mid-morning or mid-afternoon after most of the other tenants had gone for the day in their cars. It also got pretty hot during the day around this time of year, so it had to be really hot sitting inside that car, and whoever the driver was would just sit there for hours without ever getting out, and then he would just drive off. What made the car so conspicuous was that it was such a piece of junk. It looked like it was the same car that Peter Faulk used in his television investigations, in Columbo. After about 3-weeks of watching this guy just sit in his car everyday and bake, I walked up to him one day and commented, "Are you undercover? Let me know who you’re watching cause I know everybody on this side of the building, and maybe I can help”. He looked at me oddly, and replied, "I'm not watching anyone". And, in that exact moment, I realized he was staking me out. I never did see the guy again after that.

One dusky evening around 7:00 PM, I was sitting inside my apartment watching TV when I heard a lot of yelling and screaming from the main lot of the car dealer located across the street. The yelling escalated to a point where it began to get very loud and started sounding quite violent. So, I rushed to my bathroom window so I could get a better view of the scene that was playing out across the street, about 40-yards away. From my vantage point, I now could now make out the vague images of two cars parked along side of the main showroom of the car dealership across the street, and the shadowy figures of three or four men and a woman who were standing outside of the cars yelling at each other and frantically moving about. Suddenly, the women let out a blood-curdling scream and I heard two gunshots. Immediately, everyone jumped back in their cars and sped from the area with their tires squealing. One of the cars headed west on Speedway and the other one headed east. But, as I studied the location where the scene was staged, I noticed there wasn’t a body on the ground, and nobody had “gone down” after the gunshot or had been “assisted” into either of the vehicles either. Actually, the whole thing seemed a bit scripted as well, just like the gunfight scenes I had seen out at “Old Tucson”, and I also noticed the gunshots sounded more like blanks rather than real ammunition. So, I immediately figured this was just another lame effort to harass me, albeit a creative one.

Thinking the show was over, I sat down and started watching TV again, but about a minute later I began hearing the revving of an automobile engine and the squealing of tires all over again, only this time it came from the other side of the apartment complex. It turns out the car heading east on Speedway just went down to the next block, traveled over one block and was now coming back towards the apartment complex on the next street over. Then, as it approached my side of the complex, it turned into the parking area and drove right up to the front of my apartment where it stopped, turned on its bright lights and shined them at the front of my apartment. The car sat there for a few of moments and revved its engine as though it was possessed, and then it turned and sped off into the night. That got my blood pressure up a little because I didn’t know if anyone was actually going to get out of the car. But, when it sped off I knew it was just more Mormon nonsense. And, in a hilarious twist that resulted from this mock murder mystery, my neighbor in the next unit over literally moved out of his apartment the very next day. I didn’t know him very well because he had only moved in about 3-months before this occurred. He had also just graduated from a small liberal arts college in Ohio, moved to Tucson to start his career and didn't even have a job yet.

I saw him the next morning as he was moving out, and he asked me if I had seen what had happened the night before. He explained that there were too many weird things happening around his apartment, and mentioned that he thought maybe someone was trying to scare him. I have to admit, these latest and more creative attempts to harass and intimidate me were beginning to annoy me, but I didn’t have the heart to tell him what was really going on. Further, understanding that these actions were the crazy religious manifestations of a bunch of whacky religious zealots who pretended to be “man-Gods”, and who had been “called” to force me out of my apartment, gave me the will to ignore them. Getting upset was exactly what they wanted me to do, and I couldn’t afford to lose focus right now. Consequently, I used all of my mental powers to simply block out these idiots and instead focus on studying and graduating. However, I did take time to go downtown to the Police Department and complain about these latest events, just to get them on record. I asked to speak with a Detective, indicated what had been going on and why, and mentioned that the Mormons were behind it. I asked for a police report, but the Detective refused to provide me one, and the next day around 6:00 PM, I could hear faux police sirens coming from the dealership garage across the street.

After my neighbor in the next unit over was literally scared out of his apartment, it remained empty and became a secret testing base for the religion’s local detachment of it’s special-ops danite harassment unit. Seriously, the apartment began being used as a base for developing and testing new experimental methods for harassing me. My bed also happened to be right next to the adjoining wall that separated my apartment from the empty one my neighbor had been scared out of, and the wall was constructed of one layer of block, with no insulation. Almost immediately, I found myself constantly being awakened at 2:00 or 3:00 in the morning by the sound of some low-level undulating frequency. I could also tell it was coming from the other side of the wall right next to me. I think I finally identified it as the sound of an electric sander being placed on and vibrated against the wall, literally about 6 inches away from me. Because of its very low frequency, you could hear it in the dead of night even if you put a pillow over your ears, but I was finally able to foil this latest nuisance by masking the sound with two electric fans I used to keep my place cool at night. In addition to that, almost on a nightly basis, someone usually also tapped on my kitchen window from the alley and whispered, "kill", "kill", Kill" over and over again. Unfortunately, this was also exactly the type of thing you wouldn’t want to tell anybody about because it all sounded so crazy.

At the height of this latest round of religious persecution, by members of the only true church on the planet, I mentioned that on occasion I’d arrive at my apartment and find that some of my personal effects had been moved around. There were instances where I actually had to search for things because perhaps something in the bathroom had been moved into the kitchen. I’m pretty anal and also have a photographic memory, so after this happened more than once, it was obvious that this was just another part of the game. I had nothing to hide, so I really wasn’t too worried about anything they were doing, other than the violation of my constitutional rights. But, one such incident has some very interesting implications. I kept a valise on the top shelf of my closet that held important documents like tax returns, insurance policies and other important documents. It also had a handle and could be carried like a briefcase. One day I went to get it because I needed some papers out of it, but when I looked up at the shelf where it should have been sitting it simply wasn’t there, and I hadn’t misplaced it either. I immediately knew my Mormon friends had taken it, and initially wondered why. But, now I believe they took it because they thought my copy of the research paper from May of 1978 might be inside, which at the time they thought I still had. Then, about two weeks later, there it was again, sitting on the top shelf just like it had been there along.

Around this time another incident occurred, which was humorous, but still constituted harassment. Strangely, this harassment didn’t involve the normal perverted and clandestine behavior that seemed to typify this religion the people in it. This time, the apartment manager came to my apartment to talk to me, and without wasting much time, he came right out and told me I had to move out of my apartment. I responded to his illegal request by stating, "I haven't done anything that would warrant an eviction", I then told him, "The semester is just about over, I’ll move out when I graduate in May”. He said, "OK", and left. It was a glorious spring day, and by now I had survived months of most sophisticated and comprehensive torture techniques ever created or unleashed by the Mormon religion’s danite secret police against any dissident, ever except for castration or death, seriously. This was also one of the few times the apartment manager had spoken to me since being ordered to ignore, ostracize, not play racquetball anymore with me and assist harassing me by his superiors. Incredibly, I wasn't bothered or harassed again the rest of the time I lived there, which was only a few more weeks anyway, I guess my own powers had been too much for them. It seemed like after being foiled at every attempt to make life hell and scare me out, they finally decided to see if they could just tell me to move out. I just figured the apartment manager and his band of idiots were just tired of all their sleepless nights.

Years before, as undergraduate student, a professor of engineering who was on the bishop’s council used to stalk me around campus and try and intimidate me. I soon noticed he was back on the job as well, and he could stalk like no other. Soon he was stalking me all around the University campus once again, just like he had done when I was an undergraduate student. His starting point was usually from the BPA College, where I had most of my classes. From there, he’d follow me around to wherever I was going, the student union, the gym, other buildings where I had classes and even out to the parking lot where I parked my car. I also noticed there was a major difference in the manner in which he stalked me compared to the style he used when I was an undergraduate student, 7-years earlier. Now, he no longer tried to intimidate me with the myriad of terrible facial expressions had had. I guess after telepathically communicating to him that he was a sick bastard, he just decided to do his job stoically. He was even stationed at the placement center for about a month as I interviewed for prospective jobs towards the end of my final semester. He always stood just inside the main entrance as I left the interviews I just completed, so I’d be sure to see him. And, he’d just glare at me without any emotion at all. Just like always, this was also another subtle message designed to communicate that they would continue monitoring and stalking me, even after I graduated. But, again I never could have imagined this in a million years.

In June of 1985, after graduating with my Master’s degree, I went to go visit my Grandparents one last time before moving to Los Angeles where I had accepted a position at the premier real estate consulting and accounting firm in the nation. And, because I also happened to be in the neighborhood, and was still curious about what happened to my former tormentor, the ward bishop. So, I drove over to his house just to reflect on a period of time, which I hoped was now behind me. When I arrived, much to my surprise, I saw the house was completely vacant and a “For Sale” sign was staked in the front yard. The house appeared as if it had been empty for quite sometime and looked unkempt, almost like it had been abandoned. The grass in the front yard was dead and had turned yellow from the scorching heat of the summer sun; and, the windows didn’t even have any window coverings, which really created a sense of abandonment. The sight of this emptiness gave me a sense of remorse over what had transpired during the last 7-years; it had all been so senseless. But, at the same time I knew he got what he deserved. I just hoped this was the end of my ordeal, but of course it wouldn’t be. And, in another bit of irony, I later learned the ward bishop had been hired by Brigham Young University, which is known for its esteemed honor code.

When I was in graduate school, the bulk of my Mormon persecution focused primarily in and around my personal life, and where I lived. However, there were many incidents of being stalked and harassed that focused on my accessibility as a University student. Aside from my grades being manipulated, these incidents included being stalked around campus, being the subject of rumors that “Young Adult Leaders” would infuse into my peer group and other things I probably don’t even know about. Another example of this was when I accidentally overheard the accounting department’s secretary bad mouthing me behind my back, even though I had never even met this woman and didn’t know her at all. Then, I saw her at my apartment complex, and realized she actually lived there. After that, I always assumed she was Mormon as well, and was just another part of the machinery that was designed to destroy my reputation. On another occasion, when I was the Treasurer of a University sponsored club on campus, a vicious note was posted on the door to my office so that every student who walked by could view it. Amazingly, what I’ve documented is still just a small portion of everything that I was forced to endure. And, strangely, even though there was a major investigation by the University into the grade-changing incident, I was never once contacted by University officials or anyone else for that matter for any kind of follow-up. Had there been any follow-up whatsoever that involved me, I would probably have been able to provide additional information about what was going on, including the whole harassment phenomena.

I think the implications are rather obvious. I don’t think the University wanted a cheating scandal on their hands, and I know the Mormons certainly didn’t want the kind of bad publicity that being exposed as a farcical religious organization that bribed, harassed, coerced, lied, threatened, and wanted to hide the truth about their horrible past would bring. Because of this, the “higher powers” made a “gentleman’s agreement” to sacrifice the ward bishop, whitewash this entire incident and hope I would just graduate and move away. That would have been fine except for the fact that the University was not in a position to understand the full extent of what had occurred, or what was continuing to occur as a result of me coming forward, which I had been forced to do to gain control of my life. Consequently when this “gentleman’s agreement” was made, without me being involved in anyway, it gave the Mormons carte blanche to continue their strategic pattern of harassment and the systematic dismantling of my life. They must have been laughing hysterically in their secret meetings about how stupid the “gentiles” were. My Grandfather, who was pretty well connected, talked to me one time only about what happened, and stated matter-of-factly, “Lyle, the Mormons said they’re just trying to teach you some discipline." Prior this enlightened comment he had never spoken to me once about this whole phenomenon. I guess everybody just knew more about my life than I did.

After earning my undergraduate degree in 1979, I left the University with an unwavering faith in American justice and the Constitution of the United States. It was 1985, and I was leaving again with a Master’s degree, and for some strange reason I still felt the same way. I still felt I would be able to put this whole Mormon debacle behind me. I don’t know how anybody in America could have ever imagined in their darkest nightmares that an organization actually existed in America, which claimed to be the only true church in the world, and dedicated itself to the destruction of anyone who didn’t want to be associated with them. But, there was such an organization, and this is exactly what it was doing to me. I chose not to accept their gifts and bribes, which were actually designed to exhibit their power and coerce me into staying in their church, because I had integrity and didn’t ever want to owe them anything. But, that didn’t matter; they were still determined to become masters of my life. It will become clear enough that their sole aim at this point was simply to destroy me. By now, their agents had tried to bride me with grades and money, had assigned failing grades or kept them superficially low, stalked and harassed me, spread rumors that I was gay, a drug addict and a drug pusher and tried to make student life so difficult that I would have to drop out. And, these are only the things I know about.

Even after I went through everything I was forced to go through, I only wanted to move forward and leave this bizarre religion behind me. If I had wanted to make a bigger issue out of what had happened, I wouldn’t thrown away my copy of the research paper, which provided the only real proof and motive for what was happening to me. And, even though there was an entire investigation into the grade-changing incident, nobody ever followed-up with me once about what had happened. Consequently, this malevolent organization simply continued on with their secret persecution without sanction whatsoever. What normal American, brought up in the comfortable surroundings of decent society, could ever imagine that anybody could be caught up in anything as bizarre as this, and in America no less? Even if someone could come to the stark realization that such a dark and malevolent organization really does exist, who could have imagined it would turn out to be a religion, and that everyone in America would simply close their eyes and look the other way? How could anybody’s constitutional rights be violated in such a heinous manner? It would have been bad enough if this religion didn’t already have a long documented history of violence and treacherous activities such as this, but this religion’s history is well documented. I never ever thought I’d have to go back and find the evidence I threw away in 1977, but maybe if I was ever going to have a chance to live any kind of a normal life, I might have no choice but to look for what I accidentally found in 1977.