He was blind of one eye, very resentful and had a megalomaniac perception of himself. His policies included assassinations, forced drugging, imprisonment of dissent, gassing of humans and animals, torture techniques going from having people being hung upside down to being given shock therapy and a of variety of other crimes and offenses from the murder of a whole family to the shooting of police officers, among them the chief of the National Police.
His followers acted in teams and ambitious young graduates from top universities joined them. In the late 1980s there were accusations of deception of recruits, and of holding members against their will and even of murdering a member who tried to leave.
They saw themselves as "special" people with a special mission.
They carried on the "RUSH HOUR" ATTACKS in subway stations. .
They were/are followers of Shoko Asahara, leader of the cult Aum Shinrikyo.
Dr. Robert J. Lifton , author of "The Nazi Doctors: Medical Killing and the Psychology of Genocide" and "Destroying the World to Save It", among other books, addressed the issue of doomsday cults such as Aum Shinrikyo.
On Destructive Cults - March 17, 2000
The attack was usually referred to in the Japanese media as the Subway Sarin Incident, the Sarin attack on the Tokyo subway. It was an act of domestic terrorism perpetrated by members of Aum Shinrikyo on March 20, 1995.
The Aum Shinrikyo is a Japanese religious movement that was founded by Shoko Asahara in 1984.
Among the main perpetrators of the attack:
Ikuo Hayashi - senior medical doctor at the Ministry of Science and Technology.
Kenichi Hirose - Phd in Physics
Toru Toyoda - Master's Degree in Physics
Yasuo Hayashi - Physics graduate from Tokai University's Engineering Department
Yasuo Hayashi - Artificial Intelligence Graduate - Kogakuin University; after graduation he traveled to India where he studied yoga
Other topics of reference:
Sakamoto family Murder - 1989
Takaji Kunimatsu, chief of the National Police Agency shooting - 1995
Judges gassing - June 27, 1994 - a computer-controlled system released a cloud of sarin, a nerve agent, over a dormitory that was the residence of three judges sitting on a panel hearing a lawsuit over a real-estate dispute in which Aum Shinrikyo was the defendant. http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/EID/vol5no4/olson.htm
"A" - A documentaries by Tatsuya Mori - followed by "A2" -
(2006)- "My purpose with 'A2' was different," he says. "Rather than explain Aum, I wanted to show how Japanese society has deteriorated." says Tatsuya Mori
The subject of the two documentaries is the religious cult Aum Shinrikyo and the author's approach looks into how one country changed for the worse after acts of megalomania by the a secretive group.
(http://search.japantimes.co.jp/member/member.html?ff20020327a1.htm)
