Суд над Бхагавад-гитой / Attempt to ban Bhagavad-gita

Dharmatma's testimony implicates Radhanath in the Sulocana murder
Radhanath (Richard Slavin) the Slayer Swami, ordered and paid for the murder of Sulocana


Dharmatma's testimony implicates Radhanath in the Sulocana murder
BY: KRSNA DASA - originally published at Sampradaya Sun


Dharmatma das - alias Dennis Gorrick


Some time go we were able to read article on the Sun written by Janmastami dasa entitled, "The Truth, the Whole Truth, and Nothing But…". What caught my attention was a legal document attached to the article. These are photos of the testimony of witness Dharmatma das (Dennis Gorrick) regarding the murder of Sulocana das (Steven Bryant). I don’t know if readers really noted the contents of the letter. Usually such subjects raise a lot of dust, but this one went by quietly, unnoticed. I would like to focus attention of readers on parts of this testimony, which particularly deals with the involvement of Radhanath Swami in this case. The characters in this testimony are Dharmatma (Dennis Gorrick), Kuladri (Arthur Villa), Radhanath (Richard Slavin), Hayagriva (Howard Wheeler), Tapahpunja (Terry Sheldon), Tirtha (Thomas Drescher) and Kirtanananda (Keith Ham, Bhaktipada, Mr. Swami, Number One).

Quotations from the Court Documents:

A. Arthur was quite disturbed, as I was, at the fact that Mr. Bryant had been murdered in California.
Q. Did he say anything to you about the murder?
A. Well, in discussing how disturbed we were and how surprised we were, he had mentioned to me that –
MS VANSUSTERN: Objection.
THE COURT: Overruled.
A. He had mentioned how he was very disturbed and how it shouldn’t have been done like that. And that how Mr. Slavin, Mr. Wheeler and Mr. Sheldon were pushing like crazy for this to happen, and how he had told them not to do it.

From Dharmatma’s testimony it is clear that he was disturbed by murder, and quite disturbed also was Kuladri das (Arthur Villa). Kuladri mentioned to Dharmatma that this murder should not happen, and how he told them (Radhanath, Hayagriva and Tapahpunja) not to do it. He mentioned that Radhanatha (Mr. Slavin), Hayagriva (Mr. Wheeler) and Tapahpunja (Mr. Sheldon) were pushing like crazy for the murder to happen.

In our ISKCON slang, we know exactly what "pushing like crazy" means. It means they were pushing real hard, they were really into it, working hard for it to happen over an extended period of time. And Dharmatma mentions Radhanath in the first place. One can conclude from this that since Radhanatha was the first one who came to Dharmatma’s mind in connection with the murder, it may be that he was the main organizer. This will be later supported by another incident.

Later on we can read how Tapahpunja (Mr. Sheldon) was describing to Dharmatma about how neat it was, that the demon (Sulocana) was killed on the Appearance day of Nrsimhadeva. Dharmatma states that he was freaked by this. Tapahpunja was present at the murder, and he was describing it in detail.

And then starts the description of an arrangement for escape money. Now Tapahpunja (Sheldon) and Tirtha (Drescher) had to get out of the country, so they needed money. Tapahpunja came to get money, but Dharmatma told him to go to Number One (Bhaktipada, Mr. Swami). The testimony then continues to describe how the next day, Mr. Swami along with **rot not (Mr. Slavin) came to pick the money. Please note that at this point of testimony, Dharmatma actually used the name Radhanath, but the court stenographer, not knowing what that word Radhanath is, typed it as “**rot not”. Rot not sounded similar to Radhanath, so the typist wrote that, preceding it with **, which shows that stenographer was not sure about the correctness of the typed word.

So, Kirtanananda and Radhanath came with the car to Dharmatma to pick-up the money for murderers Tirtha and Tapahpunja, to help them escape out of country. Kirtanananda asked Dharmatma to give 6,000 dollars. Dharmatma went inside the house to get it, and gave it to Kirtanananda, who waited in the car.

Then Dharmatma describes how he asked about the purpose of money, if it was for the murderers to get out of country. And in answer, Kirtanananda and Radhanath smiled, and nodded their head in confirmation, that yes, this was for the murderers to be able to escape out of the country. And then Kirtanananda and Radhanath drove off.

This testimony by Dharmatma clearly implicates Radhanath in the murder of Sulocana. Radhanatha was involved in arranging for the murder, being one of those who were “pushing like crazy for murder to happen”, possibly the leader. His leadership position in the conspiracy against Sulocana is confirmed also by his picking-up the escape money, together with Kirtanananda.

http://www.harekrsna.org/gbc/black/radhanath-dharmatma.htm