NAFPS Forum

There is also a 2024 article, outlining the death of Brandon Begley:

https://www.vice.com/en/article/the-bankrupt-ayahuasca-church-where-negligence-led-to-death/

At the Soul Quest Ayahuasca Church of Mother Earth retreat center, on the opposite side of Orlando to Disney World Florida, guests are promised a “profound journey of spiritual discovery.” But in 2018, 22-year-old Brandon Begley died there after drinking ayahuasca. A court later found that the people who were supposed to be taking care of Begley while he drank the powerful Amazonian psychedelic were at fault for his death.

A bitter legal fight is now underway for the $15 million that the court ordered Soul Quest and its owner to pay Begley’s family, who say they will use it for charitable good. It’s all a far cry from what you’d think psychedelic medicine is supposed to be about.

We received an email from her sister. I'm posting the whole thing unedited.

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Hello,

My name is Caroline Rouwalk, enrolled member of the Navajo Nation, and descendant of the Pawnee Nation and Bad River Band of Lake Superior Tribe of Chippewa Indians. I recently came across a posting questioning the validity of Michele Meiners' claims to Native American heritage, specifically to her claims of Chippewa heritage. I am her sister, as you found out in the obituary from our sister, Bernadette Byrd from 2020. I am just writing to clear up the question of Michele's mentioning Chippewa heritage.

We are half Navajo from my mother's side and we are also Pawnee and Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians descendants from my father's side. As I mentioned before, I am enrolled with the Navajo Nation, however, Michele has chosen to enroll with the Pawnee nation and holds a Pawnee Nation ID card and has a Certificate of Indian Blood, as do all my sisters. The claims for "Chippewa" heritage comes from our great grandmother, Rose Denomie, who was half Bad River Band of Lake Superior Tribe of Chippewa Indians, and half French Canadian. She was married to our Pawnee great grandfather, Henry Roberts, son of the Pawnee Chief Rush Roberts. Here is the Carlisle Indian link to her records there that show she was a member of Bad River Band of Lake Superior Tribe of Chippewa Indians:

https://carlisleindian.dickinson.edu/student_files/rose-denomie-student-file

Also another good resource:
https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Denomie-19

Rose and Henry were parents to my grandmother, Edith Roberts Beardsley of Pawnee, OK, who was mother to my father, Donald Dean Rouwalk (deceased).

Following the blood quantum of Rose Denomie to our generation, that makes us 1/16th Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians.

I hope that clears up Michele's claims to Chippewa heritage.

Please feel free to contact me if you have further questions about our heritage. I am a long time supporter of denouncing pretendians and appreciate your work.

FYI, I was trying to register and join the forum where the posting was, but kept getting an error message.

Sincerely,
Caroline Elizabeth Rouwalk
Enrolled member of the Navajo Nation

Another Ayahuasca tourism center that has not been mentioned before at NAFPS:

https://www.ecstaticintegration.org/p/serious-harms-and-a-death-at-the

Serious harms and a death at the Ayahuasca Foundation
Clients and former employees of the 17-year-old school say its ‘initiation course’ has become dangerously unsafe, and Foundation owner Carlos Tanner is not heeding their concerns

The Ayahuasca Foundation is one of the oldest and best-known ayahuasca retreat centres in the world. The 17-year-old Foundation offers healing retreats at one centre in Peru, and, at another centre, two-month initiation courses offering Westerners the opportunity to study Shipibo curanderismo under the guidance of a maestro. Thousands of people have been to ayahuasca retreats at the Foundation, and it has many five-star reviews on Retreat Guru. Many of the graduates from the initiation course went on to set up their own centres or ayahuasca churches around the world. Carlos Tanner, its founder, is a prominent figure in plant medicine culture and even featured in the Netflix series Down To Earth, with Zac Efron.

But in January of this year, tragedy struck, when an attendee of the initiation course had a heart attack during an ayahuasca ceremony. His name was Diogenes Ianakiara, founder and CEO of blockchain and cryptocurrency company Klever.

Headlines further down in this long article:

1. Insufficient screening and preparation of students is causing serious harms
2) Facilitators are reportedly inexperienced and some flirt with students during courses then have sex with them shortly afterwards
3) Alumni are sent out into the world to serve medicine with insufficient training, putting others at risk
4) Tanner has not been responsive to clients’ and staff’s warnings and complaints, even after a client’s death

Please note; The webisite that published the article is pro-psychedelics, etc.:

https://www.ecstaticintegration.org/ — https://www.ecstaticintegration.org/about

There is so much praise around, a few examples:

https://news.miami.edu/sonhs/stories/2021/11/a-conversation-with-john-lowe-phd-96.html
https://emu.edu/now/news/2021/alumnus-of-the-year-award-john-lowe-81/
https://www.rnmentor.org/rnmentor-podcast/jlowe
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8468-9276
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eg46tJpV_Y0  [Indigenous Nurses Dr John Lowe Dr Eugenia Millender S1 Ep7]

… the TAAF Facebook page … on July 17 … demanded:

"Come on, University of Texas!  FIRE THESE FRAUDS!  Especially Circe Sturm and John Lowe!"

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=pfbid0aYXKgmkSnNw3NGwXRsfdQ45GRcpG5d1UdQQFkLSznL56TQ5zaUDn1vLTWKNgXDsul&id=100067952795892

There is now a new topic: http://www.newagefraud.org/smf/index.php?topic=5727.0 [John Lowe, Professor UT Austin]