CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and eight disciples were arrested Monday by U.S. marshals who surrounded the guru's two private jets during a stopover on a flight from Oregon to Bermuda in an apparent attempt to flee immigration charges.
Rajneesh, 53, and 12 others were led away in handcuffs but the planes' four pilots and two followers who had been waiting to meet the jets were questioned and released.
The self-proclaimed 'rich man's guru' apparently was trying to avoid arrest on charges he broke immigration laws by arranging sham marriages that allowed his followers to remain in the United States, U.S. Attorney Charles Turner said in Portland, Ore.
Meanwhile, West German officials arrested three former lieutenants of Rajneesh on charges they poisoned the guru's personal doctor, Swami Devaraji, who was hospitalized for two weeks, officials said.
Four more members of Rajneesh's sect surrendered to the U.S. marshal's office in Portland to answer the same immigration charges lodged against Rajneesh.
Rajneesh and his six followers jailed in North Carolina appeared at a federal court hearing Monday and were denied an initial bid to go free on bond, prompting an angry outburst from the bearded guru.
Rajneesh, wearing a turban and a silver robe with stars, complained of having to sleep on a steel bench in jail and demanded a pillow. Defense lawyer Swami Prem argued that Rajneesh's health is so frail he needs 'almost a bubble boy-type environment.'
'I have been sickened the whole night,' Rajneesh said. 'I cannot sleep on that bench. I cannot eat anything that they can give.'
Rajneesh was issued a standard jail uniform and spent the night in a cell with three other inmates. But U.S. Magistrate Barbara Delaney ordered federal marshals to give the guru a pillow, an extra cotton blanket and vegetarian food rather than standard jail fare.
Delaney ruled Rajneesh and the six disciples would remain jailed until a bond hearing Thursday, granting a government motion to hold the seven until witnesses could arrive from Oregon.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Deborah Stuart said Rajneesh should be denied bond 'chiefly because of substantial risk of flight but not to be ruled out is danger to the public at large.'
Stuart said a pistol was seized from a bag believed to belong to one of the disciples and said she had been 'informed that the group has been involved in violent activity in Oregon.'
Federal authorities tracked the two Learjets by radar after they took off from Rajneesh's commune airstrip in Oregon Sunday afternoon and U.S. marshals made the arrests at 2 a.m. when the planes stopped at the Charlotte Airport.
'To say the least, they were shocked,' Chief U.S. Deputy Marshal Raymond Abrams said.
Rajneesh apparently was trying to avoid arrest on a 35-count secret indictment handed down by a federal grand jury last Wednesday and charging him with harboring illegal aliens and conspiracy to lie to immigration officials, Turner said.
Turner said a lawyer representing Rajneesh called him Sunday and asked about bail, indicating Rajneesh was aware of the grand jury action.
'He (Rajneesh) knew when the indictment was returned. As soon as that happened, the guy fled,' he said.
Before the court hearing, Rajneesh drank water and ate a light meal in a private cell at the marshal's office, while North Carolina followers wearing amulets with pictures of the guru around their necks gathered in the corridors.
The arrests came less than two months after a split in the sect's leadership. The guru accused his former assistant Ma Prem Sheela of stealing money and plotting murders.
West German authorities arrested Ma Anand Sheela, Ma Anand Puja and Ma Shanti Bhadra to answer charges of attempted murder returned by a Wasco County, Ore., grand jury last Friday but sealed until their arrest, District Attorney Bernard Smith said.
The women were among several top leaders who left Rajneesh's central Oregon commune last month in a bitter split with the guru, who accused them of trying to murder his friends and turn his settlement into a concentration camp.
Sheela also was arrested on immigration charges.
The bhagwan, which means 'blessed one,' wears a diamond studded watch and has a collection of at least 90 Rolls-Royce automobiles. In the past, he has called himself the 'rich man's guru.'
