Keith Raniere may be infamous as one of the biggest frauds and sex cult pyramid scheme. He recruited numerous women and forced them to have sex with him. His victims included upper-class socialites.
His crimes as a sex-offender, fraud, and left the lives of many women in pieces. However, there were some women that helped and even took part in the criminal actions of the NXIVM leader. Read about some of the victims or allies who were in a relationship with a cult leader.
Barbara Bouchey: A High Ranking Member Of NXIVM
Barbara Bouchey was entangled with the case of NXIVM since the very beginning. She dated Keith and said in an interview that she was terrified how a “strong-willed, intelligent, and a self-made millionaire by age 40” was drawn into a sex-cult by a maniac.
Bouchey started her work with the cult in the early 2000s and at the time Raniere was a brilliant and successful businessman.
She described Raniere’s presence as almost overwhelming.
Their relationship started when she began to admire and respect his vision and thought. The way in which Keith Raniere drew in victims was a self-help workshop that he held via his company.
Barbara herself attended many 10-hour self-help workshops. She told the Oxygen Correspondent that she grew to admire him over the course of many of these sessions.
The cult leader has been described by many of his victims including Barbara as incredibly charismatic and manipulative.
The prosecutors of Keith’s case also accused Bouchey of various crimes but she has denied her involvement in the cult. She was facing identity theft, money laundering, wire fraud, racketeering conspiracy, and sex trafficking.
She has denied all charges and helped the prosecutors get information on Keith Raniere.
Kristin Keeffe
Kristin Keeffe was also close to the leader of NXIVM, in fact, she spent 24 years with him. She was a member of the inner circle like Barbara Bouchey. She even has a son with him.
In similar fashion to Barbara, she was also accused of running the operations from behind the scenes. Moira Penza claimed that many of her actions were criminal.
Keeffe never faced any serious legal action and she cooperated with the US Attorney’s office. The inner-circle member gave the court evidence that would eventually put Keith behind bars.
She was one of the longest-serving members of NXIVM and was as much a victim as she was involved in the cult herself. For over 24 years she was used by Keith and was one of his most affected victims.
Kristin left the organization along with the son she has with Raniere.
Toni Natalie
Toni Natalie is one of the victims that exposed Keith in a detailed memoir. She spent several years gathering information in her basement in the form of stacks of papers in manila folders. She spent eight years in a relationship with him and even moved out of her hometown to be with him.
She dated Keith for over 8 years and revealed the twisted and mysterious ways in which the criminal allured victims into becoming his sex slaves.
Her memoir The Program: Inside the Mind of Keith Raniere and the Rise and Fall of NXIVM, revealed that he was an incredibly smart man with a lot of charisma.
He had a group of devoted followers who called him Vanguard and believed he was a super-intelligent philosopher, entrepreneur, and inventor.
Keith first started his operation in the Albany-area and branded himself as a self-help coach. He started NXIVM as a self-help organization and slowly started brainwashing many of his female workers using them for his own sexual gratification.
Natalie calls him her ex-boyfriend, her legal combatant, and her antagonist.
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