December 1, 1987. Chicago, Illinois. While speaking with his mother on the phone, 39-year-old Charles Sarton

cherished his plans to take a trip to India. After not hearing from him for weeks, Charles

parents checked his house and discovered his missing. But they found what appears to be a

Las-Weele Antismen, where Charles names a woman named Terry Hathman as the executor of his

state. Hathman runs a spiritual movement called Conscious Development, a call-like organization

with Charles had joined. While several people associated with Hathman will die under suspicious

circumstances over the years, she's not charged with any of their debts, and Charles Sarton

is never found. After that, the trail went cold.

Hello everyone and welcome to our latest episode of The Trail Went Cold. I'm your host

Robin Warner, and we've got an unusual missing persons case to cover today, the 1987

disappearance of Charles Southerne. That voice you just heard narrating our intro was

Carolina Young, the winner of our most recent Trail Went Cold listener voiceover contest,

so thank you very much Carolina. This is a recurring monthly contest which we've been doing

for over two years now, and if you would like to enter, I will be providing instructions

for how to do so near the end of this episode. Anyway, this story is going to stretch far

beyond your typical missing persons case, and delve into a topic which has not received

too much coverage on this podcast, cults. It involves an English professor named Charles

Southerne, who had been a member of a spiritual movement called Conscious Development of Body,

Mind, and Soul before he vanished without explanation. But in the ensuing years, Conscious

Development and its founder, Terry Hathman, would find themselves immersed in scandal

as it turned out that a number of the group's members, including two of Hathman's former

husbands, died under suspicious circumstances. There were accusations that the movement

...