What's Next for "Guru" James Arthur Ray?

Historic cannon at entrance to town of Camp Verde.                               True Crime Author Camille Kimball in front of cannon.

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The sentencing date for James Arthur Ray, the sweat lodge "guru," was originally set at July 25. That date has now been vacated, due to filings by the defense. We'll get into that in a bit. The next time the sweat lodge trial will see court action is August 16 for a "pre-sentence hearing." First, let's talk about what's on the table as Ray's debt to society for "negligently" leading three people to their deaths.

As of June 22, James Ray stands convicted of 3 counts of Negligent Homicide, one each for the deaths of Kirby Brown, James Shore, and Liz Neuman. Because the jury did not find two aggravators (well, they did, but more on that quirk of law here), Ray won't be getting an "aggravated" sentence. He still gets a chance to put on a mitigation phase (the opposite of aggravation: character references, pics of him as a sweet little boy, etc.) so the mitigated sentence is still a possibility for him.

AZ Attorney Dan Barr, from the firm Perkins, Coie has spelled out what the possible Arizona penalties are for these convictions.

"As Class 4 felony, each charge of negligent homicide carries a maximum prison sentence of 3.75 years. The range of prison sentences for negligent homicide are as follows:

Mitigated: 1.1 years
Minimum: 1.5 years
Presumptive: 2.5 years
Maximum: 3 years
Aggravated: 3.75 years

The jury consider[ed] evidence* on whether Ray's sentence should be reduced or increased from the presumed sentence of 2.5 years, which would be 7.5 years if the three sentences are served consecutively. The lowest possible sentence for Ray would be 1.1 years (3 sentences served concurrently) and the largest would be 11 years and 3 months (3 sentences serve consecutively)."

Since he did not collect sufficient aggravators and presuming mitigation goes well for him, James Ray could even get probation on all counts. The fact that he has no prior record will serve him well when it comes time for Judge Darrow to calculate his sentence.

This mystery won't be solved for us on July 25, though. Because the defense has filed a very aggressive motion for a whole new trial. Not satisfied that Ray escaped the more serious charge of Reckless Manslaughter, his attorneys want to start completely anew which would mean seating a whole new jury and putting all the witnesses back on again. Ray's lawyers identify quite a few instances of what they call "prosecutorial misconduct" in the trial we just went through.

One of these was the fact that Prosecutor Sheila Polk played a short audio clip of James Ray speaking to his followers at the Spiritual Warrior weekend during her address to the jury at aggravation. In the audio clip, Ray can be heard making reference to the "investment" that the people made to participate in the event, encouraging his followers (or egging them on, depending on which lawyers you listen to) to get the bang for the buck. For most of them, that was about $10,000 bucks.

Polk argued that "The Secret" motivational speaker's conduct was motivated by "pecuniary gain," a specific aggravator. She had earlier argued to the jurors that the near-death experience of passing into heat stroke was the very thing that Ray was selling for such a high price (the ten grand did not include food or lodging). The clip fit well into her theory that if the Spiritual Warriors didn't experience the delirium-like state that signals the beginning of heat stroke, they would not feel satisfied with their ten thousand dollar expenditure afterward. But he didn't tell his followers it was the "altered mental state of near-death" he was selling; Ray told them it would be a spiritual "breakthrough" that felt like impending death.

Defense attorney Tom Kelly was incensed that the clip in which Ray talks about the money had never been admitted into evidence before and therefore she should not have used it. (Interesting, Kelly and the team have also argued vigorously that Ray himself didn't make the money off the event, his company did and that he literally cannot be held responsible for gains or actions of his self-named company).

Polk has fired back that the jurors did not find for the "pecuniary gain" aggravator anyway, so the issue is moot.

What do you think? No harm no foul? Or sinister prosecutorial villainy?

*that was the aggravation phase.

Full disclosure: Dan Barr is attorney of record to certain media interests (cameras in the courtroom/release of documents/etc.) in the James Ray case.

ADD: Has James Ray ever eaten here?

Camille Kimball's books are:

What She Always Wanted

A Sudden Shot

The Mammoth Book of Tough Guys