James Arthur Ray-Open Letter to "Civil Matter" Theorists (sweat lodge)

I have seen the most amazing chatter on the net about what happened to three people in an Arizona sweat lodge and the man who kept tight control of that sweat lodge, James Arthur Ray.

Today I would like to address legal chatter incessantly repeating that the three victims were responsible for their own "choices," especially as evidenced by the releases they signed. This theory is often propounded on websites run by lawyers not involved with the case.

Author Camille Kimball at Yavapai County Courthouse.
pointing to 2nd story courtroom where James Arthur Ray trial takes place.

May I share a personal anecdote about "releases?" When I was in my twenties, I found myself being wheeled into an OR for emergency surgery over the 4th of July. I was in a great deal of pain and was suffering from dehydration, nausea and other distressing medical findings. I was frightened emotionally and physically very weak. With tubes coming out of me, I remember the green one that traveled over my head vividly, and orderlies chafing to speed up my gurney, my doctor leaned in and handed me a release.

"Just sign here," she said.

Even at that fragile moment, I still had the soul of a journalist: I read it.  The release essentially indemnified the doctor for everything that could possibly happen including error and malice and, oh, say, sewing an earring into my gullet cuz it looked cute and cutting off a foot cuz it didn't.  I looked up at her and said, weakly, "I don't think I should sign this."

"Well," she said, sitting down, "we'll have to stop all this until you can find a doctor you trust, then."

Remember this was emergency surgery...on a major holiday.

I stared at her from the gurney. I reviewed all my physical miseries.

"I would just add," she said, clearing her throat, "that every other surgeon who comes in here will require you to sign the same form."

I signed.

I'm still kicking up trouble today, no earrings in my gullet and all my feet accounted for, but I was forever bothered by the exortionate circumstances of having signed that release.  I cheered and felt appropriately smug when, some years later, courts ruled that such waivers are, in fact, extortion and not at all valid.

So let's look at the circumstances of the sweat lodge waivers required by JRI (James Ray International).  The participants had paid about $10,000 each to be there. Some had tried to get out of it--many had signed up during a high pressure sales blitz--but had found their money unrefundable. $10,000 is a lot to walk away from for anyone. An amount, one might even say, that sounds like extortion.

The waivers were presented to the folks in a haphazard fashion as participants arrived and were not included in sales or orientation materials that could have been reviewed in advance. The people handing out the waivers were untrained and, according to their own testimony, answered "I don't know" when some participants asked for more details or explanations.

The waivers do not reveal that:

• a sweat lodge is planned, nor that the sweat lodge will be "kickass" and "much hotter than those wimpy sweat lodges;" 
• nor that plastic tarpaulins will be used instead of traditional "breathable" materials; 
• that excessive amounts of hot rocks will be used; 
• that the lodge will continue much longer than traditional sweat lodges; 
• that it will be tiny and packed with over four dozen people nor information given to compare to a traditional sweat lodge that typically houses  6 - 10 and the upper limit is usually considered 15 people; 
• that no one associated with the lodge is trained in CPR or heat death and specifically that the leader of the sweat lodge who controls the heat and the doorway has no training; 
• nor does this waiver list symptoms of heat stroke for participants to use their own judgement. 
• And, finally, the waiver does not inform the participant that others have experienced serious injury including death (just 3 months before) while participating in one of these seminars. 
• The person signing the waiver is also never told, certainly not in writing, that they will be deliberately kept on a protein free diet to keep them "off balance," will be deprived of sleep all week, and will enter the sweat lodge only after a 36 our "vision quest" involving a total fast and for many, no water.

If the participants had been furnished with a list of symptoms of heat stroke, they would have seen that symptoms relating to mental confusion are prominent. It turns up on every list. Here, at random, is the CDC--
Symptoms of heat exhaustion include:

• Heavy sweating
• Extreme weakness or fatigue
• Dizziness, confusion
• Nausea
• Clammy, moist skin
• Pale or flushed complexion
• Muscle cramps
• Slightly elevated body temperature
• Fast and shallow breathing  

Symptoms of heat stroke include:            

• Hallucinations
• Chills
• Throbbing headache                             
  
• High body temperature
• Confusion/dizziness
• Slurred speech       

Symptoms of heat syncope include: (a fainting or dizziness episode that can also be associated with lack of acclimatization)

• Light-headedness
• Dizziness
• Fainting

In the law we recognize that a criminal act may be mitigated by the fact that the perpetrator was under the influence of an intoxicating or impairing substance. We charge him with second degree offenses, not first, and give him lighter sentences. We don't let people drive when they are impaired. Impairment is a well established legal concept.

Therefore, by definition, once the people had heat stroke, even as they were on their way to heat stroke with the much milder conditions of heat exhaustion or heat syncope, they were incapable of making good decisions or communicating properly what their condition or needs were.   Much is made that Liz Neuman said "no" when she was asked if she needed help. Who knows what question her mind was answering? who knows what word her brain thought her lips formed?

Right now in Arizona we are suffering from a prolonged heat wave. 122 to 112 every day. Tempers flare, cars break down, traffic snarls. And our emergency personnel want us to know to take it seriously. They have us under an official "excessive heat warning."

I remember a story I did on heat deaths as a TV reporter several years ago. Indelibly recorded in my mind is the county medical examiner telling me on camera, as he cheerfully described the medical process of a human being dying by heat, "we are, after all, meat." With that medical/culinary description in mind, at this time, it might be helpful to invoke the image of an iconic ad campaign against illicit drugs.

Crack an egg.
Drop it in a hot frying pan.
This, quite literally, is your brain on heat.

So this is my open letter to those who rail against an Arizona jury for what they claim as "confusing what should have been a civil matter." Please check your lawbooks about things like "informed consent" and "impairment."  Then check the thermostat in the hallway, undoubtedly set to a pleasant number, and give thanks that your brain is not in a frying pan and therefore you can actually still read.

Camille Kimball's books:

What She Always Wanted

A Sudden Shot

The Mammoth Book of Tough Guys