NXIVM | The Mighty Fall | 4

This episode contains descriptions and details that some listeners might find disturbing.

Listener discretion is advised.

It's May 20th, 2017 in Albany, New York.

Sarah Edmondson, age 39, sifts through an endless stack of paperwork at the offices of Nxivm.

Her hands shake as she flicks through a binder.

She's been incredibly anxious lately, constantly on edge, all because the company she used to think changed her life for the better has become her prison.

Two months ago, Sarah's friend, Lauren Salzman, invited her to join a secret society within Nxivm called DOS.

Lauren promised that it would help her realize her latent potential.

But in reality, Sarah's been given the title of slave, and Lauren's kept her in line and on edge with the constant threat of blackmail.

Just thinking about it makes Sarah sick, but she can't see a way out.

Sitting there, she tries to calm herself down so she can focus on her work.

But when the double doors fly open behind her, she nearly has a heart attack.

It's her friend, Mark Vicente, and he blows into the office like a man on a mission.

Mark is one of the few good men among the higher-ups here at Nxivm.

But knowing that Sarah can hardly bear to meet his gaze, she's so ashamed of what she's become, her respect for Mark just makes it worse.

Every time she looks in the mirror, she can see the effects of the starvation diet she's been forced onto.

It's a visual reminder of her plight, of what she's lost.

She doesn't like the idea of Mark noticing that too, so she keeps her head down.

But Mark's not so easily fooled.

He makes a beeline for Sarah and asks to speak with her in private.

He tells her that he thinks something is going on at Nxivm.

He recently stumbled across a weird document stored on Alice and Mac's computer.

It's a vow of servitude to Nxivm's founder, Keith Raniere.

And that's not all.

He's heard rumors about a few of the company's other female employees.

As crazy as it sounds, he suspects that Keith is running some kind of cult.

Sarah doesn't know what to say, but she pulls up a couple of office chairs and they take a seat.

She tries to figure out what she should do.

Here's a friend asking her directly about the very thing she's been terrified to talk to people about.

But she swore to obey Lauren and to never breathe a word about DOS to anyone.

She's even got Keith Raniere's initials branded on her body as a reminder of that vow.

And even though she's desperate to tell Mark everything, what good would it do?

Keith's got millions of dollars, an army of lawyers and blackmail material on her.

Eventually though, Sarah decides she has to say something.

She can't just tell Mark he's crazy and sweep the whole thing aside, but she chooses her words carefully.

Speaking in a low voice, she says that if someone were in some kind of secret society, they probably wouldn't be able to tell anyone about it.

She stares at him, widening her eyes and trying to silently convey her meaning.

Mark starts to answer Sarah, but then he seems to notice her expression.

He sees the tears dotting the corners of her eyes.

He lowers his voice to a whisper and asks her directly about Doss, if she's in the group too.

There's another pregnant pause before Sarah finally nods.

She whispers so softly, he can barely hear her.

She's trapped.

They've got too much on her to break free.

Mark takes Sarah's hand and tells her she has to get out.

Whatever the consequences, they aren't worth this.

Sarah swallows hard and nods.

She can see that she has to stand up for herself, and she's not going to waste any more time being scared.

Right away, she and Mark find a quiet spot in the office and dial the FBI.

They know that blowing the whistle might ruin their lives, but they have to tell the truth.

They have to stop Keith Raniere.

From Airship, I'm Jeremy Schwartz, and this is American Criminal.

By 2010, Keith Raniere had reached the pinnacle of success.

His self-improvement seminar business, Nxivm, had grown into an inexhaustible cash cow.

He counted billionaire heiresses and Hollywood actresses among his clientele.

Hundreds of recruits took his words as gospel, the life-changing wisdom of Vanguard, the world's smartest man.

But it was all a front.

Nxivm was nothing more than a disguise for Keith's twisted criminal empire.

Through his courses, he identified vulnerable young girls and women he could exploit.

He drained their wallets, seized on their deepest insecurities, and went to obscene lengths to manipulate them into serving him.

With millions of dollars at his disposal, a platoon of attorneys standing by and mobs of fawning followers, Keith seemed invincible, but not everyone was so easily controlled.

Some of Keith's subjects broke free of him.

That was unacceptable.

He wanted nothing less than absolute dominion over his followers.

And as his hunger for exploitation grew and his demands became increasingly unhinged, Keith's people didn't just leave him, they fought back.

Keith's response was to create a group that took the systematic abuse of his victims to shocking new levels and ensured their silence through twisted blackmail.

When his horrific crimes were finally brought into the cold light of day, no amount of money or power could prevent him from getting what he deserved.

This is the final episode in our four-part series on Nxivm, The Mighty Fall.

It's early 2010, and Keith Raniere is fuming.

He paces back and forth across the room he calls his executive library in Half Moon, New York.

The house technically belongs to his business partner, Nancy Salzman, but Keith considers everything she has to be his, from her home to her bank account, even her daughter, Lauren.

The 50-year-old strides past a row of books he hasn't read and stands in front of a whiteboard, furrowing his brow.

He grabs a marker and starts to write out his latest brilliant thought and then gives up and slams the marker back down.

He can't work like this.

He takes a steadying breath and massages his temples, calming himself down.

He'll just have to wait.

He's expecting a visitor any minute now, and once she's here, he knows that he'll be able to think again.

Then, he'll feel completely in control.

There's a knock at the door, and Keith opens it to reveal a 24-year-old woman named Daniela.

She's the source of all his frustrations.

Once a gifted student in Mexico, Daniela came to Nxivm at age 16 when her father gifted her with some of their classes.

Like so many others, she and her parents fell under Keith's spell.

Since then, for the past eight years, Keith's been carefully grooming Daniela to be one of the women in his inner circle.

He had put her to work organizing his library and writing summaries for books so that he could pretend that he'd read them.

But now that she's a fully grown woman, she's testing her independence.

Recently, she announced that she'd fallen in love with some guy.

In Keith's eyes, that's an unforgivable sin, one that taints her purity.

But it's all right now.

She's here to apologize and ask for his forgiveness, just as he commanded.

Keith doesn't say a word to Daniela, doesn't invite her inside.

He won't show her any kindness until she says she's sorry and submits to his will.

He watches Daniela open her mouth, but she hesitates.

The words don't come.

Her chest heaves as she stifles a sob.

She tells Keith she can't do it.

She has nothing to apologize for, she says.

Nothing.

Keith's lip curls and he slams the door in her face.

He listens to her soft footsteps pad away.

When he's sure she's out of earshot, he shoves his books onto the floor with a bang.

The last time he was this angry was a year ago when his girlfriend, Barbara Boucher, left.

He cannot stand to have a woman defying him, and he won't permit it to happen again.

Looking at the books now scattered across the floor, he vows to make an example out of Daniella.

After she leaves his library that day, Keith calls Daniella's parents, who've been a part of Nxivm for years now.

He tells them that their daughter is a thief, a suppressive and worse.

He doesn't tell them exactly what she did wrong, but he compares her to a child murderer.

Her parents are not fluent in English, so they get all this through a translator, and the whole thing is confusing to them.

When they suggest they take their daughter back to Mexico, Keith is outraged.

He tells them that they have to stay here, in New York, and that there's only one way for Daniella to atone for her crime.

She is to be confined to her room until he says she is reformed.

She will be allowed three meals a day as well as a pad and pen to write out her apology, but that's it.

When Daniella hears this plan, she begs her parents to see reason, but they ignore her pleas.

They don't know that Keith Raniere started grooming their daughter when she was 16, that he pressured her into having sex with him the day she turned 18.

They don't understand the ways he's been psychologically abusing her ever since.

To them, Keith is the smartest man in the world, someone who dotes on their daughter.

He's also someone who's made veiled threats about their immigration status.

So, they throw Daniella into her room and lock the door.

The confinement is extreme.

Daniella's room is empty save for a bare mattress on the floor, and the only window is papered over.

Her family are only allowed to visit to bring her food, and they're discouraged from even looking her in the eye.

Lauren Salzman is the only other person allowed to see the prisoner face to face.

As a member of Keith's inner circle, she's been tasked with guiding Daniella's supposed recovery.

Lauren's eager to take the job because Keith has told her that he'll give her a baby if she successfully reforms Daniella.

She's always wanted to be a mother, and thanks to years of Keith's manipulation, this seems like a great way for that to happen.

Lauren spends hours with Daniella, going through intense coaching sessions, where the two discuss her ethical breach of falling in love with a man who's not Keith.

They debate ways for Daniella to change her mindset, to find a way to repent and apologize.

Relying on standard Nxivm practices, Lauren pushes Daniella to share her deepest insecurities.

The hope is that she'll reveal some hidden trauma that can be manipulated to mold her into compliance.

At first, Daniella maintains that she has nothing to apologize for.

But, as time wears on, she realizes that her ordeal isn't going to end unless she bends to Keith's will.

Eventually, she's ready to do anything.

She tries apologizing to Lauren, but she isn't allowed to see Keith himself.

So, she writes letters to him instead.

But it seems he doesn't believe her.

As each letter goes unanswered, she gets more and more desperate.

She and Lauren start workshopping the notes, trying every combination of words they can think of to get Keith to forgive her.

When that doesn't work, Lauren goes to Keith and asks him to relax Daniela's punishment.

He refuses.

He insists that Daniela is manipulating Lauren, that she isn't really sorry for what she's done.

Of course, he doesn't care if she's sorry or not.

He just wants Daniela to suffer.

And who does he get what he wants?

Days turn into weeks and then months.

Lauren visits less and less and the solitude starts to bear down on Daniela.

She talks to herself, obsessively counts calories to stay thin, just like Keith commands.

Spends hours translating the ingredients on shampoo bottles just to stay busy.

She does 1500 jumping jacks a day and spends the rest of the time sitting against the cold wall with her head in her hands.

It's maddening that she's stuck in her parents' house only a few feet away from her family yet she can't even talk to them.

In the winter of 2011, she passes the year mark of her imprisonment.

She observes the occasion by acting out.

At some stage, she manages to sneak out of her bedroom and into the kitchen where she swipes a pair of scissors.

Back in her room, desperate to do something, she still has control over.

She cuts her long hair into a bob.

Keith's not impressed when he hears about this and says that as punishment, her sentence will last until her hair grows back, which would be years.

He also strikes out at Daniela's mother, who he discovers has been leaving her daughter encouraging notes in the bathroom.

He convinces Daniela's father and younger brother to lock the mom in a separate bedroom.

Their women need to be controlled, he says.

But after a couple of months of isolation, Daniela's mother is allowed out to visit Mexico for a funeral.

And you guessed it, she never returns.

Meanwhile, Lauren is feeling guilty.

Not for her role in Daniela's imprisonment, no, but for letting Keith down, for failing to rehabilitate his subject.

He agrees that she's a failure and says that she's not ready to be a mother after all.

By the winter of 2012, it's been two years since Daniela was first locked in her room and she starts to lose all hope.

She thinks about taking her own life, but realizes that she wants to live, even if it means leaving behind everything she knows.

So, she makes up her mind to leave.

Along with that thought comes an odd sense of freedom.

No longer ruled by fear, she waits until the next time her door is left unlocked and walks out.

She brazenly passes by the security cameras her father installed and runs out of her parents' home into the sunshine.

It's overwhelming to be out in the open after so long locked inside, but she doesn't have time to revel, not yet.

She's got something she has to do first.

She marches a couple of blocks down the road to a volleyball court that Nxivm owns.

There, she finds Keith watching a game.

Some of the other spectators recognize Daniela and an excited crowd forms to greet her.

No one knows about her imprisonment, so people are just excited to see her after two years.

Daniela is happy to see her friends, but mostly, she's here to look Keith in the eye.

She barely gets the chance, though.

When he sees her, he hides his face, stumbles down the bleachers and awkwardly runs away from the commotion.

He's too cowardly to face Daniela, not when she's surrounded by so many people.

She'd wanted to confront him, to make him answer for what he's done to her.

But this will have to do.

For now.

A couple of days later, Daniela's father drives her to Laredo, Texas.

He gives her some money, some food, and tearfully says goodbye.

From there, she crosses into Mexico on foot.

She's terrified for what's to come, but also hopeful.

For the first time in a decade, her life is truly her own.

If Daniela hadn't broken free, Keith Raniere no doubt would have kept her imprisoned indefinitely.

But by the time she leaves, he's made his point to his inner circle.

Defying his orders comes with consequences.

That fear of punishment pushes his closest devotees to prove their loyalty however they can.

Like Lawrence Salzman, they either look the other way or get directly involved in Keith's crimes, the abuse, the lies.

It's a vicious cycle that keeps him on top and his true nature a secret from the majority of his followers.

So despite Keith's increasingly despotic behavior, by 2013, Nxivm is doing better than ever.

His subordinates are too afraid of him to rebel, and everyone works around the clock to keep the money rolling in.

Keith also squeezes his wealthy benefactors for all their worth.

And with plenty of funds, he sets his sights on growing the business even more.

Nxivm opens additional chapters in Canada and Mexico, expanding its offerings to include intramural sports, courses on female empowerment, and even acting classes.

Keith feels invincible, but, as always, he hungers for more.

His greed causes him to become even more brazen in his manipulations.

He demands that many of the women in his orbit wear chains around their necks to symbolize their status as his slaves.

He restricts their calories even more, then blames them if he can't perform in the bedroom.

He's totally out of control, and even his most loyal followers take notice.

Kristen Keefe has been with Keith since the 1990s, and has spent much of that time intimidating and harassing Nxivm's critics.

But by early 2014, even she's uncomfortable with Keith's unhinged schemes.

Most disturbing to her, though, is Keith's treatment of their 8-year-old son Galen.

Ever since he was an infant, Kristen's been completely sidelined in the raising of her own kid.

Keith is literally experimenting on the boy, putting him on bizarre untested diets, and running him through an absurd educational curriculum.

He claims he's creating a super child who speaks 8 languages, the peak of human potential.

But to Kristen, it just looks like child abuse, plain and simple.

This realization hits her one day like a bolt of lightning.

All of a sudden, when looking into her son's eyes, she sees Keith's crimes in a new light.

It's a terrible, painful epiphany.

The man she's loved for so long has been abusing her this whole time, and she never saw it.

But she doesn't have any time to despair.

For Galen's sake, she needs to get out.

In February of 2014, Kristen gets in touch with a lawyer to explain her situation.

She doesn't just want to leave all of this behind.

She has to atone for the things she's done in Keith's name and prevent future victims from falling into his hands.

She wants to take him down.

That means alerting the police, but it also means joining forces with the other women Keith has hurt.

Women like his ex, Barbara Boucher.

If they're going to topple his empire, they'll have to work together.

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It's February 2014.

Keith Raniere, now 54, sprawls on a couch in one of Nxivm's townhouses in Clifton Park, New York.

His phone buzzes and he answers it absentmindedly while turning down the TV.

It's one of the women in his inner circle.

He can immediately tell something's wrong.

Her voice sounds clipped and nervous.

He knows that no one likes giving him bad news so he can feel his anger rise before she's even done talking.

The woman tells him that Kristin Keefe and her son Galen have gone missing.

The bluish green vein on Keith's forehead pulses.

He hangs up without a word and storms into a bedroom to have a full on tantrum.

He can't believe that another one of his followers is rebelled.

Who do these women think they are?

His mind races to process the new thread as rage courses through him and fear.

Perhaps more than anyone else, Kristin has dirt on him.

She knows what he's done to harass his critics, knows about the girls like Daniela he's brought across the border.

He doesn't give a lick about Galen.

This son is the last thing on his mind.

All he cares about is silence and Kristin.

Like always, he has no interest in trying to negotiate.

For the people who cross him, there's only one tactic for Keith.

Scorched earth.

He's gonna make Kristin suffer.

Beat her down until she's too intimidated to fight back.

He pulls out his phone and finds his lawyers, not surprisingly, on speed dial.

He barks into the receiver spraying spit on his forearm as he orders them to find Kristin Keefe.

They need to stop her before she talks to the police.

But Kristin knows how Keith operates, and she's wasted no time.

When Keith's on the phone with his lawyers, she's already at a police station, ready to tell them everything she knows.

She's led into the office of State Trooper Roger Kersop and sinks into a low cushion chair.

Once the door's closed, she drops a series of bombshells, telling Kersop stories of the harrowing abuse she witnessed at Nxivm.

She tells him about Daniela's imprisonment and about the private investigators Keith uses to torment his critics.

In the middle of Kristin's statement, Trooper Kersop's phone rings.

It's Keith's attorneys.

They tell the officer that they know who he's talking to and then hang up.

Kristin can tell he's unnerved by the call.

As she walks out a little later, Kersop warns her, Nxivm is like the mafia, but worse.

Kristin hardly needs the warning.

After that, Keith's armies of attorneys, private investigators and fixers chase Kristin across state lines.

Every time she tries to hide, they find her, even at police safe houses, forcing her and Galen to move again and again.

And for some reason, the police don't follow up on her report for years.

But while the authorities don't seem interested in pursuing the matter, Kristin refuses to be kept silent.

She reaches out to Barbara Boucher and the two of them team up to spread the word about Keith.

They tell as many people as they can about what he's done and what he's still doing.

Eventually, they believe someone will listen.

While all this is going on, Keith takes further measures to shore up control over his inner circle.

He can't afford to have another woman like Kristin defect.

They simply know too much.

And clearly, his previous methods of control aren't enough anymore.

It's time for something different, something more violent and twisted.

But he doesn't want to be too overt.

He believes he's too smart for that, too sophisticated.

What he needs is a proxy, someone to act on his behalf and do his dirty work for him.

He selects 30-year-old Allison Mack for this role.

A rising star in Nxivm, as well as a somewhat famous TV star, Allison has been with Nxivm for nine years.

She's long been one of Keith's favorites and genuinely believes that the group has changed her life for the better.

It's allowed her to overcome her insecurities and helped her deal with the pitfalls of increasing fame.

She's grateful to Keith and fiercely loyal to him, which he knows.

With that loyalty in mind, he asks her to head up a secret society within Nxivm, a group designated to empower the organization's most promising women.

He's calling the group Dominus Obsequius Sororium, or DOS for short.

Allison agrees without hesitation.

She also doesn't bat an eye when he asks her to hand over blackmail material to prove her loyalty to him.

She trusts that he'll never use it against her.

In fact, she believes such self-sacrificing acts are necessary to deepen their relationship.

But the truth is that Keith's empowering new group is built on a lie.

It's just his twisted way of tricking women into becoming his sex slaves and ensuring that they never try to leave him.

These women will be subjected to more extreme abuse and dehumanizing treatment than most of Keith's circle, and there won't be any illusions that they're his girlfriends.

They'll be prisoners, kept in check thanks to the collateral they'll willingly give him.

Once Allison is on board, the Doss induction process takes shape fairly quickly.

Allison sells the group as a sorority, a women-only club with no involvement from Keith.

She promises new recruits that it's about female empowerment and sisterhood.

And, enticingly, it comes with life-changing benefits.

Though those can only be truly explained once a person has gone through with the initiation.

So the inductee simply has to take Allison's word for it.

It's a surprisingly effective pitch.

One of the first members is former prisoner Daniela's younger sister, Camilla.

Allison tells 24-year-old Camilla that the first requirement is for her to provide DOS with blackmail material, like a confession or a sex tape, to prove her loyalty.

She says it doesn't even have to be true, so Camilla writes a note falsely claiming her father is gay.

With that done, Camilla goes through a bizarre ritual involving a blindfold, an eternal vow of servitude, and a permanent brand on her body, sometimes presented to initiates as a tattoo representing the four elements, the brand is actually a scar made by a medical cauterizing tool, and it's unmistakably in the shape of Keith Raniere's initials.

From there, Camilla's steadily broken down emotionally.

She's ordered to text Allison, Good morning, Master, when she wakes up every day.

She's expected to be ready at any hour of the day or night to respond to orders.

If she doesn't answer a text within one minute, she's punished with sleep deprivation, cold showers, or by being whipped with studded leather straps.

Soon enough, a sense of hopelessness sets in for DOS recruits like Camilla.

At that stage, Allison typically asks them to get closer to Keith.

They're encouraged to email him, to win him over through flattery by offering favors.

It's very confusing to members who still believe this group is about female empowerment, but their master is not to be questioned.

And when they reach out to him, Keith tells the women nonsense, like love can only be measured through pain, all in an effort to keep them under Allison's control.

After months of this BS, Keith finally reveals to each of the DOS members what they already suspect.

He's actually Allison's master.

Therefore, by some twisted transitive property, he's their grand master.

So they have to do what he says.

He blindfolds and rapes them.

Sometimes, while other people are in the room watching, then he backs off, not touching them for months and pretending to counsel them like a therapist.

Once he's sure they aren't going to run or tell the police, he assaults them again.

By this stage of the process, it's usually been somewhere between six months and a year of psychological and sexual abuse.

These women's lives have been warped by shame, fear and despair.

By October of 2016, Keith and Allison have done this to four women.

As for the promised benefits of the group, they never materialize.

Of course they don't.

The closest thing to self-improvement the members of DOS get is a weekly meeting to discuss their life goals and catch up.

Almost like real friends might.

But the sense of camaraderie never lasts long.

At the end of each gathering, the women have to line up, undress and take what Allison calls a family photo, which she then texts to Grandmaster Keith.

After 2015, DOS becomes Keith Raniere's major focus.

He spends as much time as he can dreaming up new ways to abuse and manipulate the women around him, both in DOS and without.

The actual day-to-day process of running Nxivm is less interesting to him, so he delegates many of those responsibilities.

But since he sits at the top of the pyramid, most of the money from the group's courses still funnels up to him.

All that money funds his empire, which includes a collection of homes in Clifton Park, where many DOS members live.

He flies around on his private jet, rubs elbows with influential figures, and is always on the prowl for new women to recruit into his circle.

He also has legions of private investigators and attorneys who protect him from any outside critics or would-be defectors.

The trouble is that even with all of this, Keith's dominion is still fragile.

The bigger DOS becomes, the harder it gets to keep things under wraps.

The abuse gets worse and worse, and soon enough, even the threat of blackmail isn't enough to keep everyone in check.

In 2017, DOS grows to eight members, including Lauren Salzman, the daughter of Keith's business partner Nancy.

Like Allison, Lauren becomes a master in her own right, recruiting people like her friend Sarah Edmondson.

Only after Sarah is forcibly branded, she starts to have serious regrets.

Her diet is restricted, and the psychological abuse takes a heavy toll.

Then, on May 20th, two months after her initiation ceremony, her friend Mark Vicente tells Sarah he suspects Keith is running a cult.

It's the push she needs to speak out, and she comes clean about DOS.

After Sarah tells Mark what's been going on, the two of them call the FBI, who quickly open what will become a massive investigation into Nxivm and Keith Raniere.

With the authorities on the case, Mark, Sarah and her husband Anthony are eager to get the hell out of Nxivm.

But they don't want Keith to know they've told anyone his secrets.

They don't even want him to suspect that they've betrayed him.

Leaving in the middle of the night?

No, that would definitely get his antenna up.

It would look planned like they're trying to hide something.

So instead, they decide that deliberately causing a scene is a better strategy.

That way their leaving will seem impulsive rather than calculated.

On May 31st, Anthony barges into a gathering of about a hundred Nxivm coaches, including Lauren Salzman, the woman who recruited his wife into DOS.

In front of everyone, he gives Lauren a piece of his mind.

He talks about the branding and calls Lauren a criminal.

Then he storms out, and he and Sarah hop in the car and leave.

A little while later, Mark uses the news of Anthony's startling outburst as an excuse to resign.

This whole episode throws Lauren into a panic.

She texts Keith 911, and he gives her the signal to deny, deny, deny.

But that tactic will not get them far.

A week later, accusations about DOS appear on The Frank Report, a blog critical of Nxivm.

The rumors set off a mass exodus at the company and incite a round of rabid infighting among the remaining employees.

Throughout it all, Keith lays low.

He hides and refuses to comment to the press or his colleagues, pretending he has nothing to do with DOS.

But if he's hoping everything will blow over like it has in the past, he is wrong.

On October 17th, 2017, The New York Times publishes a front-page exposé on Keith Raniere, detailing, among other things, the branding and sexual abuse allegations.

The article sparks comparisons to Harvey Weinstein, who's recently been accused of sexually harassing, assaulting and raping more than a dozen women in Hollywood.

Thanks to these comparisons and the rising tide of the MeToo movement, the story gets extra attention.

Overnight, Keith Raniere becomes a household name.

Once that would have been a dream come true for him.

Now, it's a nightmare, a wish made on a monkey's paw.

And even he, the self-proclaimed smartest man in the world, starts to suspect that there will be no getting out of this one.

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It's October 2017, just days after The New York Times published an exposé about Nxivm and the secret of DOS.

Keith Raniere arrives at a resort in Punta Mita on the Pacific Coast of Mexico.

The 57-year-old climbs out of the car and stretches his legs.

To his west, sparkling sand gives way to crisp water dotted with lemon-colored sailboats.

Soothing wind tugs his thinning hair to one side.

For anyone else, this would be paradise.

But for Keith, Punta Mita is a mark of his failure.

He's been forced to flee here because of the multiple police investigations threatening him back in the States.

There's the case Kristen Keefe's accusations kicked off some years ago, the damaging claims of his exes, like Barbara Boucher and Tony Natale, and the FBI investigation sparked by DOS member Sarah Edmondson.

Over the past few months, his multi-million dollar company has become nearly worthless.

Most of his followers started jumping ship after the existence of DOS was revealed to the whole company.

Still, there are a few loyal subjects, like Lauren Salzman, who followed him to Mexico.

He stares out at the ocean and wipes a snotty nose.

Despite everything, he won't give up.

He's the vanguard, the world's smartest man.

He'll find a way to rebuild his empire brick by brick.

For the time being, Nxivm still has a foothold in Mexico, and Keith's counting on what's left of his fortune to protect him from prying eyes.

He even plans to hold a ritual for the five remaining members of DOS, something he calls a recommitment ceremony.

In early 2018, he has them fly to a remote fishing village near Punta Mita, and spends days planning what he envisions as a twisted group sex party.

Unfortunately for him, the ceremony never happens.

Acting on information provided by Kristin Keefe, Sarah Edmondson and Barbara Boucher, the FBI have been steadily building their case against Keith for months.

And on March 26, 2018, they cooperate with Mexican police to raid his compound.

When Keith hears their trucks roll up outside, he dives into a closet, leaving Lauren Salzman to run interference on his behalf.

She can hardly believe it.

After years of insisting that women should be submissive to men in exchange for their protection, now he's the one cowering?

In that moment, she realizes that she's been played.

Keith's pitiful attempt to hide doesn't work.

He's pulled from the closet and pinned to the ground, his arms twisted painfully behind his back, handcuffs ratchet onto his wrists, and he's dragged out into the sunlight for the final time.

From there, he's transferred to a prison in Brooklyn.

Soon enough, other high-ranking members of Nxivm join him, including Lauren and her mother Nancy, Allison Mack, and heiress Claire Bronfman.

They're stuck with a variety of racketeering and conspiracy charges, while Keith faces even greater allegations.

In total, he's saddled with seven charges.

The first two are similar to those faced by the others, racketeering and racketeering conspiracy, which essentially mean organized extortion.

The next two are forced labor conspiracy and wire fraud conspiracy, which encompass the illegal ways Nxivm exploited its employees and students.

The last three are the most disturbing.

One count of attempted sex trafficking, one count of sex trafficking conspiracy, and one count of sex trafficking.

Keith's indictment sparks a fresh media firestorm.

All of a sudden, the critics he stifled for years feel confident enough to come out of the woodwork.

The press amplifies the voices of his victims and their families, exposing just how deep and severe Nxivm's corruption was.

By the time the trial comes around in May of 2019, the public's attention is fixed on the case.

Flashing cameras and shouting reporters crowd the Brooklyn Courthouse steps, desperate for a glimpse of the most infamous cult leader of recent memory.

Keith's association with Allison Mack attracts special attention.

Seeing as how he got a Hollywood actress to do his bidding, people are predicting that other high-profile witnesses might be brought in to testify on his behalf.

But in the end, the proceedings strike a lower key.

Most of Keith's collaborators deal with their legal problems outside the court run.

Claire Bronfman pleads guilty to conspiracy to conceal and harbor illegal immigrants for financial gain, along with fraudulent use of identification.

She is sentenced to just under 7 years in prison.

Allison Mack pleads guilty to racketeering and racketeering conspiracy.

She is given 3 years.

Nancy Salzman is sentenced to 42 months and a $150,000 fine for racketeering conspiracy.

Her daughter Lauren pleads guilty to similar charges.

But because she is offering crucial testimony against Keith, she is given a lesser sentence.

She gets 5 years probation and 300 hours of community service.

Then, at last, it's Keith's turn.

During his 6-week trial, the prosecution brings several victims of Nxivm and cult educators to the stand.

Daniela finally has her chance to confront Keith face to face and tell the world what he did to her.

But when it comes time for the defense to respond, there's not a single witness to call.

Keith's friends have all deserted him.

On June 19th, 2019, the jury pronounces Keith guilty for each and every charge against him, and the judge hands down a sentence of 120 years in prison.

In the courtroom gallery, his first primary consort, Tony Natale, watches with an enormous sense of relief.

Ever since escaping Keith's abuse 19 years ago, she's been praying for this moment.

She recalls the last time she saw him in person.

After ruining her business, Keith told Tony, the next time I see you, you'll be dead or in jail.

Well, as it turns out, he had it backwards.

Barbara Boucher once pointed out to a journalist that one aspect of Keith Raniere's story gets understandably buried beneath the staggering weight of his crimes.

He wasn't all talk.

Throughout the decades, his self-improvement programs did actually help some people.

He had a knack for convincing people to take agency in their lives, to change themselves for the better.

But only if he felt like it.

Only if he deemed it useful to his goals.

But he never really wanted to help people.

He only wanted to help himself.

So, for 20 years, Keith preyed on the vulnerable.

He sexually abused girls and women, played games with people's minds, and subjected hundreds to unhinged psychological experiments.

Countless people lost time and money by placing their faith in Keith's promises.

For the women in Keith's inner circle, including those tricked into joining DOS, they lost even more than that.

For them, deeper scars remain.

Obviously, Keith Raniere was never the smartest man in the world.

He was just a born salesman with an oversized ego.

And the fact that he could continue his abuse for so long doesn't reveal him as some mastermind.

Rather, it shows just how far an empty con man can go when he's protected by immense wealth and influence.

Keith stayed in power by terrifying and harassing his critics.

Enabled by a legal system that allowed him to use his money to ruin the lives of others.

Even so, many of his victims refused to be intimidated.

If they had caved, Keith might still remain free today, amassing even more wealth and power.

They stood up for themselves, even when the resources of their abuser seemed inexhaustible.

That's the real story of Nxivm.

It's a tale of women who, despite being manipulated, abused and tormented in unbelievable ways, refused to stay quiet.

From Airship, this is our final episode in our series on Keith Raniere and Nxivm.

On the next series, a pair of killers team up for a cross-country murder spree that will claim hundreds of lives.

At least, that's the way they tell it.

We use many different sources while preparing this episode.

One we can particularly recommend is Don't Call It a Cult, the shocking story of Keith Raniere and the women of Nxivm by Sarah Berman.

This episode contains reenactments and dramatized details.

And while in most cases, we can't know exactly what was said, all our dramatizations are based on historical research.

American Criminal is hosted, edited, and executive produced by me, Jeremy Schwartz.

Audio editing by Christian Peraga.

Sound design by Matthew Filler.

Music by Throg.

This episode is written and researched by Terrell Wells.

Managing producer, Emily Burke.

Executive producers are Joel Callen, William Simpson, and Lindsey Graham.