APn 02/14 0137 Mummy-Health Cult

   Copyright, 1988.  The Associated Press.  All rights reserved.


   CHICAGO  (AP)  -- A family that secretly kept a mummified body
in their home for more than eight years has been linked to a cult
that  preaches  use  of  nutrients  and  exorcism  in  place   of
traditional medicine, investigators said.

   "I  think  we  are  touching on something, a group that hasn't
been known before -- a group that is almost  a  secret  society,"
Knox  County  Sheriff  Mark  Shearer said in a story published in
Sunday's Chicago Tribune.

   Shearer  said  those  involved  in  the  cult,  known  as  the
"Holistic  Society,"  included several suburban Chicago dentists,
but he would not identify them because of pending investigations.

   Carl Stevens, the man whose withered corpse was found  in  bed
last  month  in  his rural Knoxville home, was a diabetic who was
persuaded to rely on vitamins and powdered mixes in place of  his
daily  insulin  injections, according to investigators and family
members.

   His body was found more than eight years after he died May 12,
1979, at age 40.  His brother also died  at  a  relatively  young
age,  and  investigators  were  told  that  his death may also be
related to unorthodox health practices.

   The Holistic Society disdains traditional health  methods  and
relies  instead  on an extreme form of "holistic health care," in
which the mind and body are treated with only  natural  vitamins,
herbs and nutrients, Shearer said.

   Treatments  are administered in a quasi-religious fashion that
involve the use of healing crystals, the exorcism of "black souls
or Satan," and "channeling" to communicate with spirits,  Shearer
said.

   There is no evidence that the health cult is violent or guilty
of  anything  other than encouraging bizarre health practices for
the unwary, Shearer said.

   In the weeks before his  death,  Stevens  had  cut  his  daily
insulin  intake  in  half and was taking up to 20 vitamin pills a
day, according to an aunt, Frances Kennelly of Lambe, Mo.

   Stevens, who had been a member of the  Knoxville  High  School
Board  of Education, died after vomiting a "black substance," his
42-year-old wife, Carole, told investigators.

   The only criminal charges in the case were lodged against Mrs.
Stevens, a former nurse, and former  Aurora  dentist  Richard  G.
Kunce, 56.   Both are charged with forging the dead man's name on
legal and bank documents and  with  cruelty  to  children.    The
Stevenses'  teen-age son and daughter lived in the house with the
mummified corpse.

   Kunce, who is in custody, and Mrs.  Stevens,  who  is  out  on
bond,  have  already  pleaded  guilty  to a misdemeanor charge of
failing to report Stevens' death.

   In another twist to the case, investigators say they  found  a
"travel  permit"  from  the  right-wing  Posse Comitatus anti-tax
group in the wallet of Kunce,  who  moved  in  with  the  Stevens
family 18 months ago as their "spiritual leader."

   Kunce  was  introduced  to the Stevens family by Carl Stevens'
brother, Roger, a St.  Charles  lawyer  who  was  apparently  the
first  family  member  to  become  involved  in  the health cult,
Shearer said.

   Investigators and family  members  said  Roger  persuaded  his
brother  to  use  the vitamins and powdered mixes in place of his
daily insulin injections, and said Carl even  began  selling  the
substances from his office.

   Roger  Stevens  died  at age 43 in 1985 at a Chicago hospital.
His death  was  attributed  to  gastrointestinal  hemorrhage  and
hepatic cirrhosis.      But  a  nurse  who  cared  for  him  told
investigators, "I  think  it  was  his  diet  that  killed  him,"
according to the Tribune.