Terri Hoffman and the Conscious Development of Body, Mind and Soul Inc. cult

Self-made spiritual guru, Terri Hoffman, attracted all kinds of people, from all kinds of different backgrounds, with her own brand of new age spirituality. 

She ran a free meditation class out of Southern Methodist University, where she gained followers and taught subjects familiar to most spiritual classes, such as astral travel, reincarnation, the theory of karma and meditation.

During meditation sessions it was said that she would have the participants surround her to form what she referred to as a psychic shield, to protect her from the “black lords” that she said were constantly trying to attack her.

Some of the members who had attended multiple classes were said to have been psychologically effected over time by constant apprehension of war with the dark lords.

Despite the classes being free, students were allegedly encouraged to hand over any items of jewelry that harbored “negative energy”. Allegedly, her followers shelled over thousands of dollars in cash and jewelry whilst alive, and the dollars kept on rolling in even after they were dead.

Terri Hoffman (Now Terri Lilya Keanely) was accused of driving the members of her Dallas Texas based “Conscious Development” cult to suicide following the untimely deaths and sudden suicides of at least ten members and even associates, all of which had left recently changed wills citing her as the exclusive benefactor of their money, property and assets. 

 A few alleged examples are:

One of Hoffman’s previous husbands, Glenn Cooley, wrote a will handing over the entirety of his real estate to her before OD-ing in 1977. 

She lost another husband, Don Hoffman, to suicide in the 80’s. He killed himself as he was convinced he had inoperable brain cancer. The autopsy showed no sign of the disease and from where the false diagnosis came is unknown.

A couple, Mr. and Mrs. Goodman were introduced to each other by Hoffman, and even married by her. Investigation found that She collected somewhere in the sum of $110,000 from them over the last few years before their deaths.  

"You are no longer David Goodman, son of Alice & Leonard. That person is gone

Because the programming is wiped out. You are Jupiter now" She told them.

The couple committed suicide; they ejected themselves from their seemingly perfect and successful lives with a bullet each to the head.

It was said that they lived in fear of the black lords and had been doing everything within their power to ward them off- including rejecting their friends, family and children, from the fear of negative energy transferal. 

Mrs. Goodman left behind an unfinished note, screwed up into a ball in a nearby trash can; it was addressed to her son and detailed the terror and pain she was going through in this war against the black lords. She told him that she was severely depressed and would kill herself if only she could find the courage to do so.

The discarded letter wasn’t the only record of their ordeal that the couple had left in their wake. There were journals that told of God, and how everything they did was dictated by him, right down to the guns pressed at their temples. 

The also wrote about Terri Hoffman, how she was enlightened by God and how she could help them transcend. They paid her cash and assets and in return would be propelled towards infinity, souls awakened, to the “purple ream” with its glittering pools and temples.

In ’87 another associate by the name of Robin Lynn Huntoon Otstott left assets, jewelry, money and land to Hoffman before shooting herself.

A young girl Deveraux Cleaver who was a follower of the cult, along with her mother, drowned. She left Hoffman her $125,000 trust fund. 

Following her daughter’s death, Sandra Cleaver singed over the ownership of her home over to Hoffman, she also took out a life insurance policy and died later after driving her car off a cliff.

The list goes on.

The allegations, however, drained Terri Hoffman of her profits and she was convicted on bankruptcy fraud. 

Many believe that Hoffman hypnotized or brainwashed members of her cult to commit suicide. Others propose that she deliberately chose and attracted emotionally unstable individuals who would be easy to manipulate. 

The suicides and untimely deaths could be put down to plain coincidence had it not been for the profiteering on Hoffman’s part. One of the old motives for murder is money, and this case has homicide and dollar signs written all over it.

If this is not the case, Terri Hoffman is a very unlucky individual to have been a part of the lives of so many people taken from life all too soon.

 Links to articles, go HERE <<

Article from D Magazine"The Rise and Fall of a North Dallas Cult"  HERE<<