Things are heating up.
Cynthia Liberatore, the sister of Barbara Jeske, is calling for a criminal investigation into whether Keith Alan Raniere poisoned Barbara.
Barbara was a longtime follower of Raniere, one of his closest inner circle members, who died of brain cancer in 2014. Her will left everything to him.
New information, arising from an investigation by this writer and documented in the film, ‘The Lost Women of Nxivm’, which airs on Sunday at 9 pm on Investigation Discovery, provides evidence that supports sister Cindy’s request for law enforcement to get involved.
At my request, Cynthia gave an interview with the SUN’s Emma Parry, and the story was published today in the SUN, under the provocative headline, CANCER MYSTERY Leader of sex cult Nxivm may have poisoned four female followers, killing two, bombshell investigation claims, adding mainstream media weight to the call for a criminal investigation.
“I do believe Raniere poisoned my sister and those other women – and I think he should be held accountable, ” Cindy told the SUN.
True, the purely circumstantial evidence – that four women contracted cancer – who all lived with Keith Raniere – in and of itself is not proof of foul play.
But in the film, I obtain a hair sample from one of the surviving cancer-stricken women – taken from the time she lived with Raniere.
It was tested in a laboratory by forensic consultant Jason Kolowski. The report found extraordinarily high levels of two toxins – Barium and Bismuth – both of which can cause serious health problems and even death.
Barbara died in 2014 at the age of 63 from brain cancer. Pam Cafritz died two years later at the age of 57 from renal cancer. The other two women survived bladder and cervical cancer.
The cancer house, 3 Flintlock Lane, the townhouse on right, was owned by Keith Raniere and Karen – and occupied by four women who contracted cancer, all of them inner circle members of Keith’s harem. Barbara and three other women – Kristen Keeffe, Pam Cafritz and Karen – lived with Raniere in the smallish, 1,200 square foot townhouse, with three bedrooms in Half Moon NY, a suburb of Albany, for years from the late 1990s into the 2010s.
Barbara Jeske
Cindy told me about a “medicine” prescribed by Keith she called “Do-do balls” which Raniere made her take every day.
“I remember her coming to see our mother, who was very sick, the Christmas before she died and I saw her taking these things and I said ‘What are they? They stink to high heaven’,” Cindy recalled.
“They were something that he [Raniere] had come up with, saying ‘You need these to build up your immune system’. She was wrapped around his little finger.
“She would just chew them and go ‘Ugh these are terrible’ then follow them with a bunch of water or juice. Who knows what was in them – probably some kind of poison inside some type of excrement. When she became semi-comatose, I stopped her from taking them.”
I confirmed with another source, a friend of Pam Cafritz, that Pam also was prescribed this same “medicine” by Keith.
Two sources told me that Keith claimed this was medicine obtained from the Dalai Lama’s former physician, Yeshi Dhonden, who passed away recently.
Yeshi Dhonden [Photo by Lhakpa Kyizom] He died Nov 26, 2019.
Cindy Liberatore cared for sister Barbara Jeske in her last days [Photo: Investigation Discovery]
Barbara lived with Raniere for years before buying her own home before she died. She made her will over to Raniere shortly before her death.
Cindy said she thought Barbara was trying to leave Nxivm for several years and retire to Florida to be with her family.
Cindy said, “I think Barbara started figuring out what was really going on in the group and once he [Raniere] realized she was figuring it all out, I think he just wanted to do away with her.
“Along with the fact that she was aging and he wanted younger women to take their place. So, he got rid of the older ones and replaced them with younger ones…
“Barbara wanted to leave the group many times but they had control of her money and they would cut her off every time she tried. All of a sudden she got sick. I remember telling her she didn’t look good and she needed to get to a doctor and not long later, she called and said she had a brain tumor.
“I really didn’t know much about the rest of the group until I went up there to take care of her the last six weeks of her life and it was quite a trip.”
Barbara Jeske and Pam Cafritz.
Not only the women but also four cats – who lived in the house – became sick with various types of cancer.
Cindy, a nurse, cared for Barbara during the last six weeks of her sister’s life. She told me [and the SUN] how Raniere tried to control Barbara even during her last days – banning her from taking pain medicine and arranging for her to change her will.
Dr. Brandon Porter, a Nxivm member and physician [he recently lost his license because he failed to report a large scale poisoning or mysterious outbreak of illness at Vanguard Week, 2016, and because he conducted gruesome, unmonitored human fright experiments on Nxivm members], attended Barbara during her final illness.
Even in her last days, Raniere, Porter and Nxivm followers tried to stop Barbara from taking pain medication. Cindy gave her sister morphine when Nxivm watchdogs weren’t looking.
Raniere even refused to give her money to pay for her prescriptions – so Cindy had to buy the medicine for her and sneak it to her, she revealed.
“He also made her stay so skinny she was barely 65 pounds when she died and even before that, she was only around 100 pounds – just skin and bones,” Cindy said.
Shortly before she died, Raniere, Nancy Salzman and Clare Bronfman arranged a “will party” where Nxivm members were invited and celebrated Barbara’s turning over her estate and residual income to Raniere.
Members at the party told Barbara how great she was to give the money to a humanitarian like Raniere who would use it to help others.
Because she recruited so many early high ranking members into Nxivm, Jeske had a large income from the pyramidal operation.
Cindy told the SUN and Frank Report how Raniere and Nancy Salzman tried to keep Barbara’s body for placement in a cryogenic tomb.
When the family would not allow Raniere to keep the body, Nancy Salzman asked them if they would permit them to chop the head off and freeze it.
Raniere, whose followers believed he was the world’s smartest man, told followers that he was on the verge of discovering how to restore the dead to life and he wanted to preserve Barb’s head at least so when he completed his invention he could restore his beloved friend to her old life.
Cindy explained “When I first got down there where Barbara was living… I asked her what she wanted to be done with her body and she said ‘I want a Christian burial and I want it at my mom and dad’s’.
“But then the group told me they were going to take her body and freeze it, that they had the rights to it, and at this point, she started going into a coma.
“I had to seek out the help of an attorney who said it was illegal for them to take her body.
“They still wanted to take the body and I said ‘No way’ and Keith said ‘Ok we’ll take the head’.
“It was extremely upsetting for me and also very suspicious. I even had to follow them all the way to the funeral home after her death to make sure they didn’t take her body.”
According to her sister, Barbara was only 65 pounds when she died
It’s worth pointing out that, according to his classmate at RPI, and one of the survivors of the cancer, [Karen] told me that Raniere had a degree in biochemistry.
It is also worth pointing out that Keith inherited millions of dollars from Pam Cafritz’s [$8 million] and Barbara Jeske’s [I estimate $3-4 million] estates.
Furthermore, the women who were getting cancer went to Keith and asked why they were getting cancer.
He said that Edgar Bronfman was trying to poison him – and they were collateral damage. Of course, Keith never got cancer, just the women around him.
One more point, Keith controlled the refrigerator at 3 Flintlock Lane. Sometimes he even locked the refrigerator so the women couldn’t get too much food until he gave them permission. Could he have stored poison there?
Did he use poison in their food?
Or maybe it was the water. Karen told me he never drank water in the house; he refused to drink tap water.
Could this smiley-faced Vanguard, a man who claimed to be the most compassionate man on the planet, have poisoned his closest female followers?
