Jean-Marie Abgrall

Jean-Marie Abgrall (born 12 April 1950) is a French psychiatrist, criminologist, specialist in forensic medicine, cult consultant, graduate in criminal law and anti-cultist. He has been an expert witness and has been consulted in the investigations of cults. Abgrall is known as a proponent of brainwashing theories.

Early life
Abgrall was born 12 April 1950, in Toulon, France. In his youth, he was active in the AMORC Rosicrucian order, as well as a related organization, the Renewed Order of the Temple. Between 1989 and 1994, he was a member of the Green Party in France.

Career
He is a psychiatrist in private practice. He has been an expert witness when it comes to cults. Describing his opinion on cults, he stated in a television interview that, “Notwithstanding what they claim, cults are not religious movements but rather criminal movements organized by gurus who use brainwashing techniques to manipulate their victims." He was a member of the board of MILS, though resigned in May 2004.

Various sects, including the Aumism movement and the Raelian Movement, have opposed Abgrall. For his opposition to them, he was attacked by some groups, including the Church of Scientology, who in one instance called the secretary of the Greens and told them Abgrall was a secret service agent. In 1996, the French government set up an observatory body to investigate cults and sects, the Parliamentary Commission on Cults in France. Abgrall was a "key actor" in these investigations, preparing official reports in France and Belgium, and was an active anti-cult movement spokesperson in the European media, in particular television.

In the 90s, Abgrall was appointed as an expert in the French investigation of the Order of the Solar Temple cult; his involvement was subject to some criticism, as the Renewed Order of the Temple group (that Abgrall had attended meetings of) had counted among its membership Luc Jouret, one of the leaders of the cult. He never personally undertook any field work related to the group, though often discussed it on television.

The families of many victims of the Solar Temple (including skiier Jean Vuarnet) had believed that the official investigation was botched, and launched a class action lawsuit against the investigating authorities of the second Vercors massacre, for what they perceived as relying too heavily on brainwashing theories and ignoring evidence that suggested foul play at the scene. They appealed the result of this several times from 2003–2006, but the case was declined. During this period, Abgrall had published two books (La mécanique des sectes and Les sectes de l'apocalypse: gourous de l'an 2000) in which he revealed confidential information about the case; Alain Leclerc, the lawyer of some of the victim's families, succeeded in getting Abgrall disqualified as a witness in the trial as a result.

Leclerc further demanded an investigation into his finances, which was initially blocked by the courts twice, but was eventually granted. This resulted in a scandal: it was revealed that, in 1996, Landmark Worldwide (a company that had been designated a cult in the Guyard Report list of cults), displeased by their designation, contacted Abgrall to audit the organization and have their designation removed. Abgrall wrote a report on the organization arguing that they were not a cult, and they were removed from the list; from the period of 2001 to 2002 Abgrall had been paid €45,699.49 by Landmark. Abgrall complained in 2004 when interviewed by Le Parisien that this had only been revealed to block his involvement in the OTS trial, and that he had no conflict of interest as he "wrote an unfavorable report and paid my taxes."

Soon after this, he appeared to testify in the trial of Néo-Phare, a controversial sect.

Works
Abgrall is the author of several books, including La mécanique des sectes and Les sectes de l'apocalypse: gourous de l'an 2000. Susan J. Palmer retrospectively criticized the arguments the books made about the OTS, judging them a "psychological interpretation" that, given later evidence, was "premature" and "incompatible" with the facts.

Reception
Dick Anthony and Thomas Robbins have written that in their view, Abgrall's theories of brainwashing are pseudoscientific, and so unsuitable for use as a basis for legal judgments in cases involving cult membership. They qualify Abgrall as the "leading psychiatric consultant to government agencies and legislative bodies concerned with controlling and suppressing non-traditional religions", noting that Abgrall's brainwashing theory has served as the primary psychiatric rationale for anti-cult laws, governmental rulings, and legal cases brought against alleged cults in Europe. Abgrall has also influenced former communist countries through the dissemination of official governmental reports from France and Belgium that he helped produce.

According to Dick Anthony, Abgrall emerged as a key "cult expert" in France, because he was the first psychiatrist in France willing to embrace brainwashing theories. He describes Abgrall's theories as "essentially identical to the pseudoscientific theory that was developed first by the American CIA, as a propaganda device to combat communism, and second as an ideological device for use by the American anti-cult movement to rationalize efforts at persecution and control of minority religious groups".