BUENOS AIRES (AP) — An Argentine yoga group sexually exploited vulnerable women it called “geishas” for money and influence from rich and powerful men around the world, including opera star Placido Domingowho had known the organization’s leaders for more than two decades, according to interviews with former members and local authorities.
An extensive investigation into the Buenos Aires Yoga School, a kind of sect that operated for more than 30 years in the Argentine capital, has uncovered what the authorities call a criminal organization involved in sex trafficking, money laundering , servitude, the illegal practice of medicine and other crimes. Nineteen members have been arrested in the framework of an investigation that reaches the United States, where six suspects are being sought.
Despite its name, the school did not offer yoga classes. The leaders are accused of recruiting people to join their ranks with promises of eternal happiness and then sexually and economically exploiting them, according to the judicial investigation.
Former former members of the school and investigators of the case told Associated Press that the group forced the women who were part of it to work as “geishas” and who were assigned to the guests to make them feel welcome at the school, with sex as part of the expectations. Influential or wealthy men had access to the “Geishado VIP”, one of the many groups of women who were forced to have sexual encounters in exchange for money and influence that benefited the leaders of the sect, according to the judicial investigation.
Some of the women were sent to the United States and Uruguay to have sex with men, a practice that amounted to slavery, according to authorities.
Pablo Salum, a former member of the group, said his mother and sister were among the exploited women in Argentina and claimed that orgies and even sexual abuse of children took place.
“When you were 11 or 12 years old, the leader told you who you had to have sex with,” Salum said. He also claimed that young children were made to witness sexual acts.
Salum recounted that his mother introduced him to the organization at age eight, which he left at 14. Salum’s accusations helped trigger the current investigation.
Some members of the group lived in “a situation of slavery,” forced to have sexual encounters and given menial tasks at school such as cleaning and cooking, according to investigative documents and a police official who spoke to the AP on the condition of anonymous because the investigation is ongoing.
Male and female “slaves” were required to follow instructions without asking any questions, said a former member of the group who asked to be identified only as Carlos, his first name, because he left the organization many years ago and could not confirm. the details of the current investigation.
Placido Domingo was involved in the scandal after police carried out dozens of raids on school premises in August. The famous tenor was a “consumer of prostitution” but is not charged with a crime because prostitution is legal in Argentina, said an Argentine police source who, like other police and judicial officials in Buenos Aires, spoke to AP on condition of anonymous because the investigation is ongoing.
Authorities released tapped telephone conversations in which a man they identified as Domingo appears to have arranged a sexual encounter in April at his Buenos Aires hotel with Susana Mendelievich, a concert pianist who prosecutors say was a leader of the sect. in charge of the “Geishado VIP”.
In one of the listens, Mendelievich talks with another cult leader about how the group had tried unsuccessfully for years to use their musical connections to recruit Domingo, but that it was worth trying again while he was in Buenos Aires — last April. — to give a series of concerts.
In another wiretap, Mendelievich asks the alleged leader of the sect, Juan Percowicz, if he can take Domingo to the “museum”, the name used to refer to the top floor of his 10-story building, where influential men had sexual relations. with group members. Mendelievich, 75, and Percowicz, 84, were arrested in the raids in August. Both were released, although subject to house arrest.
Domingo has tried to publicly distance himself from the group, which reportedly had multiple offices in the United States.
“Of course, I have nothing to do with that,” Domingo, 81, said last week, referring to the organization’s allegedly illegal activities. Speaking to a television channel in Mexico, where he was performing, he did not deny being the man of the taped recordings, but he said he felt betrayed by musicians he considered friends. “It makes me sad when you have had friends for many years and you realize that you have been used.”
The tenor has not responded to numerous requests made through his representatives to grant an interview or comment to the AP.
In 2019, numerous women told the AP that they were sexually harassed by Domingo, considered one of the greatest opera singers of all time. More than 20 women came forward to accuse the tenor of inappropriate behavior that included groping and other unwanted touching, persistent late-night phone calls, harassment in dressing rooms and pressure to have sex with promotions in the opera world. Several of the women said he professionally punished them when they rejected his advances.
The Spanish opera singer denied at the time that he had done anything wrong and said that it hurt him to think that he made women uncomfortable. Investigations by the American Guild of Musical Artists and the Los Angeles Opera, where Domingo had been general director, found the allegations of sexual harassment credible. These last ones and the subsequent results stopped his career in the United States, although he continues to act in other parts of the world.
The revelations in Argentina have once again drawn attention to the opera star.
The promoter of a concert in neighboring Chile announced last week the cancellation of a Sunday concert scheduled for October 16 at a stadium in the capital, although he said it was due to logistical reasons.
Authorities have not released the names of other powerful men they say were targets of the group. But investigators say they are looking at hard drives and “boxes and boxes” of erotic photos and videos seized in the raids. Judicial officials claim that many sexual encounters took place at the Buenos Aires Yoga School and were recorded on video.
Carlos told the AP that he saw Domingo visit the school several times in the 1990s, including once as the guest of honor at a dinner. Carlos said he was a waiter at the party where the singer made a generous offer at the end of the night to take several of the group’s leaders with him to Europe on an upcoming trip.
“At dinner, Plácido Domingo said ‘let’s all go to Europe,’” said Carlos, who says he left the group in 1999, after staying there for 10 years. “He invited everyone, the whole table, to Europe.”
At Domingo’s table there were classical musicians who, according to the police, were part of the organization’s leadership: Rubén D’Artagnan González, Verónica Iacono and Mendelievich, among others, according to Carlos, who said it was public knowledge at the school. that the three accompanied the tenor on his trip.
González, who died in 2018, was concertmaster of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra from 1986 to 1996 and is accused of having a key role in the group’s operations in the United States. Iacono is a soprano based in New York, who used the stage name of “Loiacono”, and on whom an international arrest warrant weighs. Another presumed leader, called Mariano Krawczyk, is an oboist who goes by the stage name of Mariano Krauz.
The extent of Domingo’s professional or personal ties to these musicians is unknown, and he has declined to comment. But the artist has performed with several of the detainees, including at a 1996 concert allegedly involving the three he invited to Europe, and Krawczyk.
During that concert in Buenos Aires, Domingo and Iacono sang a part of “Cartas Markas”, an opera that soprano, Mendelievich, González and Krawczyk wrote together and that is based on a book by Percowicz, the founder and leader of the school of yoga.
The sexual encounters were presented to members of the organization as a form of “healing” and offered a path to climb the seven levels of the school’s strict hierarchy that had Percowicz at the top, according to court documents.
Former members interviewed by the AP say Percowicz was known as “The Master.” Others ranked in the seventh tier included Iacono, Krawczyk and Mendelievich, according to prosecutors. A judicial source says he has seen documents showing that González was at a higher level in the organization before he died. Krawczyk is among those arrested.
To move quickly, members could also donate money and donate goods. The group had an income of about half a million dollars a month, according to a judicial official.
Among the members of the sect were lawyers and accountants who advised the leaders in a complex money laundering network that included the creation of companies and the purchase of real estate in Argentina and the United States, according to the investigation documents.
Members also allegedly sold medical treatments for various ailments, including AIDS and drug addiction, including “sleep cures,” which essentially meant giving people drugs to help them sleep for days. The authorities affirm that the pseudo-medical treatments were also carried out in the United States, where the group’s clinic, CMI Abasto, had subsidiaries.
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