Panama: 7 killed, 14 tortured in exorcism terror rituals

January 16, 2020

PANAMA CITY (AP) — Seven people were killed in a bizarre religious ritual in a jungle community in Panama, in which indigenous residents were rounded up by about 10 lay preachers and tortured, beaten, burned and hacked with machetes to make them “repent their sins,” authorities said Thursday.

Police freed 14 members of the Ngabé Buglé indigenous group who had been tied up and beaten with wooden cudgels and Bibles.

Local prosecutor Rafael Baloyes described a chilling scene found by investigators when they made their way through the jungle-clad hills to the remote Ngabé Buglé indigenous community near the Caribbean coast Tuesday.

Alerted by three villagers who escaped and made their way to a local hospital for treatment earlier, police were prepared for something bad, Baloyes said, but were still surprised by what they discovered at an improvised “church” at a ranch where a little-known religious sect known as “The New Light of God” was operating.

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Things reportedly came to a head Saturday, when one of the church members had a vision.

“One of them said God had given them a message,” Baloyes said. That message apparently boiled down to making everyone repent or die.

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