by Pete Earley
It took Jeffrey several weeks to explain how this process would work and, as always, he first laid an intricate foundation by citing dozens of scriptures and using the pattern to reveal hundreds of hidden messages. But in the end, his plan was actually quite simple. In order to take his followers before God, Jeffrey would first have to become “endowed with the power.” The way for him to obtain this power was by killing the “wicked” and offering them as a human blood-atonement sacrifice to God. Jeffrey wasn’t certain how many people he was supposed to kill or who they were. But once he offered God this blood sacrifice, then he would receive the “power” to take his followers to meet God.
There was only one catch. Everyone in the group had to go before God at the same time, and if any of them had any “sin” at all, God would destroy the entire group. This was because, as Ron Luff later told federal investigators, “nothing unclean can come before God.”
Jeffrey told his followers that he had come up with a way for them to purge themselves of all sin. After Jeffrey made the human sacrifice, the group would isolate itself from the evils of society by going into the “wilderness.” In this case, the “wilderness” would be somewhere remote where the group could camp without being disturbed and focus on becoming “of one heart and mind” with God. “I don’t know where the wilderness is,” Jeffrey said. “But God will lead us there.”
A short time after Jeffrey explained his revelation; he called his followers together and told them to open their Mormon scriptures to Section 105 of the Doctrine and Covenants, a revelation that Joseph Smith, Jr., said he received from God on July 23, 1837. Jeffrey read them the key lines:
“Behold, vengeance cometh speedily upon the inhabitants of the earth. . . . And upon my house shall it begin. . . . First among those among you . . . who have professed to know my name and have not known me. ...”
Jeffrey told the group that God was telling him through these verses that he was to select someone to sacrifice from within his own “house,” someone who had claimed to worship God but who really did not know Him.
Jeffrey didn’t say anything else. The message was clear. The only question was “Who would it be?”
Chapter 35
WHEN Jeffrey Lundgren and his men didn’t come charging up the embankment behind the RLDS church during the night of May 3, Chief Yarborough was relieved. Still, he didn’t want to take any chances so he had his ambush set up on the night of May 4 just in case Jeffrey came late. He didn’t. Yarborough was back to square one. Had Kevin Currie bamboozled him or had Jeffrey simply postponed the takeover because he knew that the police were watching?
Yarborough went to see Kenneth Fisher, an RLDS bishop who lived near the Kirtland temple and was one of the people on Jeffrey’s hit list. Fisher gave the chief a list of fifteen people who were members of Jeffrey’s group. Yarborough didn’t recognize any of the names. All of them were “outsiders,” not from Kirtland. He turned the list over to Ron Andolsek, who immediately began checking with federal, state, county, and city law-enforcement agencies. It didn’t take Andolsek long to discover that none of Jeffrey’s followers had a criminal record.
“On paper they were perfect, law-abiding citizens,” the chief recalled. “It just didn’t fit. How could they be involved in a plot to behead a preacher and his family?”
Yarborough checked out several library books on religious cults and mind control. He found his copy of the Book of Mormon. “I’m going to figure out what makes this guy tick,” he told Andolsek. “I don’t want to spend every May third wondering if this is the year he’s going to attack.” Andolsek had a few ideas of his own. He began parking his squad car on the blacktop near the Lundgren farmhouse. He acted as if he were using his radar to check for speeders, but he was actually spying on the commune. By the end of August, both men had collected a large file on Lundgren. They had found out where Jeffrey did his banking, where his followers worked, what model of cars the group used, and had even obtained a list of the videotapes that Jeffrey had recently rented. But neither the chief nor Andolsek had found a single piece of damaging evidence that would corroborate Kevin’s story. Late one hot Friday night in August, the two men went over everything in their file, piece by piece. When they finished, Yarborough shook his head in disgust. The only crime that Jeffrey had committed was a zoning violation.
“We could arrest him for having too many people in one house,” the chief said. “But that would make it harder for us to do surveillance.”
Andolsek agreed.
It looked as if they’d hit a dead end.
What neither of them realized was that only a few miles down the road from the Kirtland police station, the one person who could provide them with the help that they needed was busy working as a waitress at Chi Chi’s Restaurant, serving platters of chicken tacos and bean burritos. Shar Olson was not on the list of cult members that Bishop Fisher had given Yarborough. Shar had arrived after Jeffrey had been fired by the church. Fisher didn’t know her. During his stakeouts, Andolsek had spotted Shar’s 1986 Nova at the farmhouse but she had quit the group in June, and since she never showed up at the farmhouse again, he had assumed that she had just been passing through. Shar didn’t plan on contacting the police. She didn’t want to get Greg, Richard, or herself into trouble. She just wanted to be left alone.
In August, a fellow waitress told Shar that her father was in the lobby waiting to speak with her.
“My dad?” she replied. And then Shar realized that it was Jeffrey.
“What do you want?” she demanded.
Jeffrey told her that Richard had received a letter from his parents, Wilmer and Twylia Brand, who were trying to get him to quit the group. Richard’s parents had been suspicious of Jeffrey from the start, particularly when they learned that Richard had sold his prized truck shortly after moving to Kirtland and given Jeffrey all of the money that his grandmother had left him. In the letter, the Brands mentioned the sexual affair that Jeffrey had engaged in while at the Lake of the Ozarks Hospital. How could Jeffrey be a prophet, the Brands had asked, if he was guilty of adultery? Richard had shown the letter to Jeffrey and he had immediately known that Shar was the source. Alice had once told Shar about the affair.
“Why’d you tell Richard’s parents?” he asked, “and what else did you say?”
“I didn’t tell Richard’s parents anything,” Shar replied innocently. Technically, she was telling the truth. “Jeffrey had always played word games with us,” she later explained. “I was turning the tables on him because I hadn’t told Richard’s parents, I’d told Richard’s sister and she had told them.”
Jeffrey seemed unconvinced. “Well, someone told them,” he replied.
“Listen,” Shar snapped, doing her best to sound assertive, “let’s not play games. I’m not out to get you in trouble. All I wanted was out of the group. I’m not going to say anything about your teachings and plans.”
Jeffrey changed tactics. “Danny loves you,” he said. “Sharon and Debbie are going to pick out engagement rings. You could do that too.”
“Just leave me alone,” Shar repeated. She turned and walked away.
The Brands telephoned Shar a short time later and pressed her for more details about the group. Why had she quit? Shar avoided answering but they were persistent. Finally, she blurted out: “Jeffrey’s threatened me. He told me my flesh will rot. I can’t say anymore.”
Jeffrey returned to Chi Chi’s several weeks later to see Shar. The Brands had written their son another letter. This time they were threatening to report Jeffrey to the Internal Revenue Service for tax evasion since he hadn’t paid any income taxes on the money he received from his followers.
“Jeffrey was furious and he accused me of telling them things,” Shar recalled, “so I said, ‘That’s right, Jeff. I’m tired of your stupid games. I did tell them and if anything happens to me, there won’t be any questions about where it came from.’ He stormed out of the restaurant.”
A week later, Dan
ny’s stepmother called Shar. Obviously, the Brands were spreading the word to other parents that Shar had left Jeffrey’s group. On September 20, Shar got yet another call, but this time it was Dale Luffman on the phone. He was conducting his own probe, he explained, because he wanted to get Jeffrey thrown out of the RLDS. The squabble between fundamentalists and liberal factions had finally reached the breaking point in the Kirtland congregation. The church was splitting. A group of fundamentalists was starting its own “restoration RLDS” congregation. Luffman felt Jeffrey was partly to blame and wanted to bring him up on charges within the church of encouraging members to quit the RLDS. After some prodding, Shar agreed to meet Luffman at a Bob Evans restaurant in a neighboring town. After swearing Luffman to secrecy, Shar unloaded her story. He was horrified. Chief Yarborough hadn’t told Luffman about the temple takeover plot nor had anyone told the minister that Jeffrey had been planning to behead him and his family. As soon as they finished talking, Luffman raced to the Kirtland Police Department. Ron Andolsek happened to be on duty.
“Jeffrey Lundgren is running a cult,” Luffman announced, “and is planning on killing me and my family.”
Ten minutes later, Andolsek telephoned the chief. “I got something you need to hear,” he said. “We got another informant.”
Shar was angry when Andolsek telephoned her early the next morning. She had told Luffman not to tell anyone about the plot. But she finally agreed to meet Andolsek a day later, on September 23, at 11:30 P.M. at Maxx Doogans Tavern, a popular college hangout about fifteen miles west of Kirtland.
Shar was nervous during the meeting, but she told Andolsek everything that she knew about the plot, and then Shar pulled out a spiral notebook. She had kept detailed notes during Jeffrey’s classes.
“When he started talking about killing people,” she told Andolsek. “I paid real close attention.”
Andolsek flipped through the pages. Written in flawless script were descriptions of various types of bullets, instructions for how to use gas masks, lists of military terms. Instructions for dismantling an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle were followed by scriptural notations about ancient Hebrew warfare.
The next morning, Andolsek typed a nine-page single-spaced account of his interview with Shar and gave it to Yarborough. As soon as he finished reading it, the chief dialed Special Agent Robert Alvord’s number. This time, the chief was certain that he could get him to listen.
Across the street at the RLDS church, the Reverend Dale Luffman was putting the finishing touches on his own report about Jeffrey. He had already telephoned various church officials in Independence and briefed them. He’d also warned them—if Jeffrey did something crazy, it was going to reflect badly on the entire RLDS denomination.
“We’ve got to get this guy out of the church,” Luffman had said. “Fast.”
In his letter, Luffman had asked the church to take the extraordinary step of excommunicating Jeffrey. On October 10, Luffman received a package of documents from the church. According to the church’s bylaws, Jeffrey was entitled to a formal hearing, similar to a court trial, before he could be excommunicated. If he wished, he could argue his case in person before a church council. Jeffrey would have three days to reply to the charges that Luffman had filed.
Luffman had been careful not to mention the temple-takeover plot in his formal charges against Jeffrey. Yarborough had asked him to keep that hush-hush until the police could get more evidence. Jeffrey was being accused of teaching doctrines contrary to the church’s beliefs and of encouraging members to quit the church.
Luffman telephoned an elder in the Kirtland congregation and asked if he would ride with him to the farmhouse. Luffman needed a witness from the church to prove that Jeffrey had been served the excommunication papers. Luffman also figured it would be safer if someone went with him to the farm when he confronted Jeffrey.
When Luffman turned his sedan into the farm’s driveway, he spotted Jeffrey working outside in the yard. Neither man wasted time with social niceties. Luffman walked up to Jeffrey and stuck out the excommunication papers.
“Do us both a favor, Jeff,” Luffman said. “Don’t bother fighting this.”
“I’ll think about it,” Jeffrey replied coldly.
Luffman turned around and left.
At about six o’clock that same day, a thunderstorm rolled through the Kirtland area. It left a beautiful rainbow behind. Jeffrey noticed that it was really two rainbows side by side, and he began yelling to everyone in the farmhouse to “come and see-come and see.” There was a reason why he used those particular words. After everyone saw the double rainbow, they hurried back inside and grabbed their scriptures. They wanted to discover what significance the rainbow had since it had appeared on the same day that Jeffrey was served with excommunication papers. Jeffrey sat at the kitchen table watching Greg, Richard, and Danny searching their scriptures. He already knew what they were going to find and if they didn’t, he would nudge them toward it. He had known from the moment that he spotted the rainbow exactly what the scriptural importance of it was—or at least, what he would tell them it was. That night in class he would announce that God had sent them a sign. It was time for them to make preparations to go into the wilderness. It was time for them to make a human sacrifice. Jeffrey was certain of it and he knew exactly who he was going to kill.
Chapter 36
MARTIN Luther, the German theologian and leader of the Protestant Reformation, didn’t believe the Book of Revelation belonged in the Bible because of its graphic accounts of how God would someday torture and kill the wicked. The book was written at a time when the Roman Emperor Nero was setting Christians on fire in his garden to provide light for his evening meals, and Luther claimed that its message of retribution was aimed more at building up morale among the suffering Christians than establishing some long-lasting Church doctrine. The angry bloodletting in Revelation certainly didn’t fit with Christ’s tum-the-other-cheek teachings.
It was Jeffrey’s favorite New Testament book.
No one would later remember who was the first to turn to the Book of Revelation shortly after the double rainbow appeared. But someone mentioned chapter 6 of the book and within minutes everyone in the kitchen was reading the story of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and the seven mystical seals that were to be opened just before Christ returned to rule the earth for one thousand years. Verse one read:
And I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seals, one of the four beasts, and I heard, as it were, the noise of thunder, saying, Come and see.
Everyone in the group saw the similarities:
• The verse contained the words “the noise of thunder.” Just after Jeffrey received his excommunication papers, a thunderstorm had rolled across Kirtland.
• The verse contained the words “Come and see.” That is what Jeffrey had called out.
“Is it possible,” one of the men said, “that God opened the first seal today?”
Jeffrey was enjoying himself. “Read the second verse,” he told them.
And I saw, and behold a white horse; and he that sat on him had a bow; and a crown was given unto him; and he went forth conquering; and to conquer.
• The verse said the man on the horse had a “bow.” A rainbow had appeared after the storm.
Jeffrey was quick to tell the group that the word “bow” also had a secret meaning. It could be used to describe a pair of eyeglasses, he explained, because the piece that connects the two lenses and holds the glasses on a person’s nose is shaped “like a bow.” That was significant, Jeffrey continued, because eyeglasses were invented to help people see. “Helping people see is also the job of the seer or prophet,” Jeffrey said. Accordingly, the word “bow” could also mean “seer or prophet.”
“What this verse is telling us is that God has given the rider of the white horse a bow or the ability to prophesy.”
That night at class, Jeffrey told his followers that the similarities between what had happened that day and cha
pter 6 in Revelation were not a coincidence. He told them that God had opened the first seal and that now it was up to the riders on the four horses to begin opening the other seals that would eventually bring about the earth’s destruction. Jeffrey then announced that he was going to reveal to them, by using the pattern, the identity of the riders.
During the next few nights, Jeffrey led his followers on an incredible, intricate trip through the Bible, Book of Mormon, and Doctrine and Covenants that was designed to ultimately lead them to one inescapable conclusion: God had chosen Jeffrey to be the rider not only of the white horse but of the next three as well.
“I am God’s prophet. I am the last messenger. I am the destroyer. I am the rider of the white horse. God has chosen me to open the seals.”
Now that Jeffrey had made that declaration, he told his followers to continue reading the story of the opening of the seven seals. The next verse read:
And when he had opened the second seal, I heard the second beast say, come and see.
And there went out another horse that was red; and power was given to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth, and that they should kill one another; and there was given unto him a great sword.
Jeffrey told his group that God had opened the first seal by causing the rainbow to appear. Now it was up to Jeffrey to open the remaining ones.
“The rider of the red horse is required by God to show blood,” he declared. “His job is to kill.”
Jeffrey continued. “This verse in Revelation is another sign from God that my job is to destroy the wicked.”
As far as Jeffrey was concerned, everything that he had learned by using the pattern to interpret scripture was beginning to fit together and it all pointed to one event.
God had told him in the “parable of the vineyard” to kill.