21 Rajneeshees Face Wiretap Charges

A federal grand jury has indicted Ma Anand Sheela and 20 other former disciples of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh on charges that they created the largest electronic eavesdropping system in Oregon history, the U.S. attorney’s office announced Friday.

Sheela, the Indian guru’s former personal secretary, and the others are accused of conspiring to intercept telephone conversations at the sect’s Rajneeshpuram commune.

Swami Anand Julian, the commune’s electronics expert, and Swami Anand Michel are charged in all five counts of the indictment with installing the system to intercept telephone and oral conversations beginning in January, 1984.

Bugs were placed in about 25 Hotel Rajneesh rooms, in the walls of disciples’ homes and in the legs of a table at Zorba the Buddha Restaurant, the indictment said.

U.S. Atty. Charles Turner said the extent of illegal wiretapping as alleged in the indictment is without precedent in Oregon.

Each count carries a maximum penalty of five years’ imprisonment and a $250,000 fine.

Sheela and Ma Anand Puja, who was also indicted, are jailed in West Germany on state charges that they tried to kill Rajneesh’s physician.

Four Rajneeshees not named in the indictment have pleaded guilty to felony wiretap charges, the U.S. attorney’s office said. Rajneesh, 54, pleaded guilty Nov. 14 to two immigration charges and returned to India. The commune is being disbanded.