Preface I: Joe Collins

Who was involved?

by Joe Collins

In 1996, David and Irene Fraenkl-Rietti were expelled by the Supreme Council of the 'Caliphate' OTO (COTO). Eventually they founded the Ordo Templi Orientis Foundation, (OTOF). The expulsion took place after a so-called "Inquisition" carried out by COTO's representative, the "Grand Inquisitor General" and VI° Frater Artau (otherwise Benjamin Fernee of York) had completed his investigation. He was incompetent and the Riettis ran rings round him. They chose the battlefield, they set the time, date, and manner of the visit, and they said what they had to say without reference to any of Fernee's more threatening questions. Not that I claim that they were wrong in this - I would sooner see someone judged on proper evidence sought out in an objective and detached manner - and this was none of those things.

In fact, it was a good old-fashioned mediæval witch-hunt! Clearly it strengthened the Rietti's position, and won them the OTOF; one does not outwit two 8°=3°s of the Black School so easily. David Rietti is one of the best political players around, and I can only give praise where praise is due for his immense skill, even if I loathe and detest his methods, and the damage he did to those close to me. The Riettis responded to the request from the Supreme Council for any final evidence in their favour by threatening them with legal action if any of the things said about them ever appeared in public. Then they demanded that they be reinstated as IX°s in the Order. The answer was their expulsion. I did not know of a general expulsion of OTOF people from COTO.

Before anyone formally joined OTOF they were asked to send letters of resignation to COTO, and to make copies available to OTOF, and In most cases this was done. However Rose A. Starr, Marion Collins, and I did not actually resign; we preferred to proclaim our involvement in OTOF and in the New Aeon Wiccka [sic], to threaten legal action against COTO if any documents were ever made public linking us to claims made against the Riettis, and threatening violence if our rights under Liber Oz were further transgressed, Magickally or otherwise. We got no response. I wrote to Heidrick recently, asking what I had to do to get thrown out - namely, did I have to come and physically punch the Caliph on the nose? He said that he did not see why I couldn't just resign. Oh well! [Question to Peter-R.

Koenig: What is the historicity behind the Fraturnitas Saturni and the Pentalpha Degree? Answer: In the early 1950's, both H.J. Metzger of the Swiss OTO and Eugen Grosche of the Fraternitas Saturni were concerned about being taken to court by Heinrich Tränker (of the German OTO), in case he tried to seize their OTO documents, which of course he was legally entitled to do as an OTO 'Supremum Sanctuarium'. To oppose Tränker's claims, Grosche and Metzger discussed the idea of incorporating the OTO as the 18° of the 33-degree FS. "Hence the Lodge [FS] takes precedence [over the O.T.O. in Germany] and Tränker cannot oppose it. As a legally incorporated association, it enjoys the protection of the law." That was all, and the incorporation never took place.

After Metzger's fall from grace, Grosche stated explicitly that no OTO could be incorporated in any FS degree.] Collins continues: Yet in April of '96 e.v. when the handover happened NO mention was made of Tegtmeier as Grand Master of anything. In fact it had been specifically stated that this event did not suggest any endorsement from his superiors in that Order, and he even showed us his own Initiation Certificates as evidence that he had the authority to do as he did; though he provided no papers relevant to running an OTO. Did these events transpire later than '96 e.v. then? Would Grand Master status give him the right to transplant that agreement to the UK? It sounds extremely unlikely. Perhaps they hoped to come to an arrangement with Metzger's heir at a later date. In fact I can remember them saying so on one occasion!

If Rietti and Fraenkl-Rietti are 8°=3°s, then I can only count Herr Tegtmeir as a 9°=2°. I experienced him outplaying them on a number of occasions, and he did it with consummate skill. In fact I believe that he assisted we three to extricate ourselves from the Riettis' clutches, which was difficult. However he would never admit to this, as it would not be useful for him to admit that he has anything but the greatest respect for them. Rietti had been translating 'Ice-Magic' as Tegtmeier wrote the German instalments, or at least that was what Tegtmeier was paying him for - but in fact Susanne was doing the translation, and Rietti was adding the appropriate magico-philosophical gloss, and then claiming the work as his own; she never did get to finish the third chapter.

Rose let it slip to Tegtmeier over the phone that Susanne had been translating the work, but we have no idea what mileage he later made out of this. [Question to P.R. Koenig: When Prospero and Phoenix (Rietti and Fraenkl-Rietti) took on an EGC lineage at that time and "regularised" my ordination, was I then finally receiving a real bona-fide lineage going back to St. Peter? Answer from P.R.

Koenig: I need to know more about this EGC lineage; you will need to supply me with all the pertinent dates, before I can tell you anything about its validity.] Collins continues: The statement goes like this, from memory, "as is traditionally the case, when an OTO lineage is bestowed, with it comes the responsibility and the obligation of an EGC lineage also, with our reception from the Master Scorpio of an OTO lineage, which we shall incorporate in Panama [N.B. using Susanne's money - she financed most of this] as OTOF, we thereby accept an EGC lineage to be run as a separate organisation." [Question to P.R. Koenig: On that basis, was our prior Ordination into EGC and the related EGU re-confirmed and regularised under the new and lawful lineage of EGC held through the OTOF Joint Headship?

They claim that they will dissolve the whole thing if it is not viable within five years, and that they aim to withdraw from running it then. I expect it will go to a personal AA student of theirs. P.R. Koenig: it seems that I simply know too little about your personal journey through the OTO reality. Collins: I'm trying to do this as we progress.] Collins continues: Rose was V° and KRE at the time of the split, and was to be the International EGC Treasurer under Prospero and Phoenix. I was also a V° and KRE and to be one IX° opponent to the UK King in OTOF, while Susanne was a V° and being groomed to become international secretary of OTOF. We were all three of us ordained in EGC, Rose in Canada; she worked the Mass every week for two years there, and ran a New Aeon Wiccka Circle too.

I was ordained by Clive Harper (along with David Rietti) in York Minster Cathedral's Chapter House. Since he was given his ordination some two minutes before me, he made petty claims of "seniority" over me for ever after! They were very big on the seniority thing. Irene Fraenkl-Rietti had her ordination before the first Mass in Manchester, with me as Priest - with my arm in a sling after a motorbike accident the night before! That was in August 1988, and they moved here that December. She then claimed seniority over Rose as "the first Priestess of EGC ordained in England in over 40 years!" It was all very pretentious, yet surprisingly effective for keeping control.

We did maybe fifty Masses over the years, and had a congregation as large as a hundred and twenty for a wedding, and as small as fourteen on one occasion when we clashed with the Glastonbury Festival and the family holiday season. We had about sixty people on the books as paying members at our largest, and that still didn't cover our costs. I was Dean of the Brigantia Sacred Grove. There was a definite sense of community, but it was largely engendered in an "us against them" way... Then again, just because you're paranoid doesn't mean that they aren't out to get you, and the COTO were!

We were being far too successful, and Rietti's public statement claiming to have sworn the 8°=3° Oath after an OTO ceremony in London in 1987 e.v. had got up a lot of people's noses - especially Heidrick's, as he misrepresented this for years on the basis of Ben Fernee's faulty testimony that this was in an "open OTO Temple" - it wasn't, but he did use the OTO to gather those people together, including a few from Thee Temple ov Psychick Youth [sic] (TOPY). He had Gerald Suster smash up his Magickal ring as part of the ceremony, and with it Frater Thanatos (his then public Magickal Motto) passed away, and headship of the London Encampment went to Rose A. Starr, as the Albion Oasis was born. The ring was to be ceremonially cast into the Thames, where the ashes of Grady McMurtry had been scattered; this was done by Gerald and James.

In this sense only was the event an 8°=3° claim. What had actually happened was that Suster had magically attacked Rietti and seen his best efforts go for nothing. So after the 'First Thelemic Symposium' in Oxford in October 1986 e.v. when this happened, he drew the correct conclusion - namely that Rietti had claimed that his HGA forced him to do as he did - and duly set the record straight in public. This he stated on that occasion, but privately, he said that it was to be his task to be seen and to be shot at, so that weaker brethren could survive and progress in the Great Work over the years following his action.

Since then both he and Irene spoke "as 8°=3° by attainment" when the plan to found the OTOF was formally announced at a special Mass in Hulme in Manchester, on Yule 1995 e.v., with the 'Call of the Thirty Aires' of the Enochian system (David claims to be Dee) being used to call the Magickal Universe to witness. He used Rose's New Aeon Wiccka to announce that he was speaking from the 'Urn of Salt' on the Empress Path, and thereby close to completion of the Magus grade of the AA, also in 1995. Whatever next? [Comment by P.R. Koenig: Regarding the Independent European Grand Lodge, I heard that several other meetings were planned, but one of them failed because Norbert Straet from Aachen couldnt make the trip to London. Collins: I have only vague memories of these things.

I had returned to Manchester in '88 and lost touch with happenings in London.] [Question by P.R. Koenig: Please tell me about Ben Fernee and Clive Harper (but only in the context of the OTO). Collins: Fernee I will not describe, for I do not want to make myself ill. Clive Harper was always a solid and personable man. I cannot fault him. He fell foul of the difficulties between Rietti and Grand Lodge while running the Albion Lodge, and basically did his best. He's an accountant by profession, and a scholar of Magick and Wicca. He was closely involved with a publisher called Mandrake, the last I heard of it, but there are two of them and I'm not sure which one it is; Mog Morgan of the Oxford Golden Dawn is with one of them.

Anyway, I do know that he has an accountant's eye for detailed record-keeping, and has extensive records on the Rietti Phenomenon. At least a dozen ex-OTO members left after exposure to them over the years, so naturally he has an interest. Rietti did his III°, and resents the fact that Harper progressed up through the COTO ranks and he did not. When Harper asked a seamstress of Rietti's acquaintance to make a special robe for him in time for a visit by Breeze, it was reckoned that he was about to get his IX° - one of just three in Europe, probably including Norbert in Germany and Arild in Norway - as preparation for National X°s to be made later. I don't know what happened to those plans, but it did start to fizzle out around the time that the dispute with Rietti was going ballistic.] [Question by P.R.

Koenig: Is is true that someone nearly threw Breeze out of a window when he was in England? Answer: No! Really? I'm sorry they held back! Who could have done such a thing? I wonder if it was when he came and took back the status that he had given to Fernee and his cronies in York. One of them was Bruce Derling. I do know that there was a mass resignation rumoured up there as a result. It seems that the Caliph felt that they had not been doing a very good job. He was right.] Continuation: What happened was this: When the Master Scorpio handed on the OTO contained within his holding of the Pentalpha Degree to Prospero and Phoenix,... [Question by P.R. Koenig: can I see a copy of a document with Tegtmeier's signature on it, which says that the 18° gives rights to found a new OTO? And is there a "founding charter" of the OTOF that I can see?

Answer: We were shown no evidence of this; it was simply claimed to be so - often. Nor was there any signing of documents performed publicly at that ceremony. If anything was signed later, then we were not made aware of it. We will forward all of the documents in our possession.] Continuation: ...they responded to the request from the Supreme Council for any final evidence in their favour by threatening them with legal action if any of the things said about them ever appeared in public. Then they demanded that they be reinstated as IX° in the Order. The answer was their expulsion. Again, I don't know if the Riettis ever put out anything on paper about this. They told it to everyone in the community as soon as it happened, however.

Tegtmeier has evolved a self-styled "new approach" to magic which he calls "Ice Magic", and says it's "a new Paradigm". Susanne and Rietti were translating the instalments of this work together. Though Tegtmeier has no interest in Thelema as such, and still less in the earlier Paradigms - such as Spirit (named spirits, angels, demons and so on) or Energy (such as healing, orgone etc.) or Psychological (where he places Spare) or Information (Chaos-magical approaches using information matrices) - he is still a very powerful operator. His books on Sigil Magick and on Sex Magick are basic, but sound. His "Ice Magic" is very interesting indeed. I once saw him overpower two people (the Riettis) and before that date I had never seen the Riettis bested in any arena. He outplayed them, out-tricked them, and out-manoeuvered them at every step.

He knew what was happening to Susanne under their influence without ever being told; so he took her aside and asked her to tell him what was going on, and offered to help her. Almost nine months to the day after that, assistance was given by a laying-on of hands (on the forehead and back of the head in one motion) and she was free of the control of Moston. He also did the whole thing in a way that preserved a perfect cover of "plausible deniability". She could never have used what he did to cause any trouble between him and the Riettis, because anything that he said or did could be taken both ways. I saw a master at work that night. We have had dreams of him on occasion since - just as I did before he arrived - and he assisted me then in my battle with the Riettis. As far as I know he is very much alive.

As to EGC validity: I seriously doubt that validity! Nothing was given as documentary evidence. It was a verbal claim that within the OTO contained in the Pentalpha Degree is an EGC lineage - as per "tradition" - but the truth may well be that Rietti simply fancies himself as a Patriarch, and Tegtmeier has given him as much validity as his enemies in COTO possess, which may be in fact none at all! As to Fernee: Well, he ran a bookshop in York for many years with his then girlfriend Jane. Later she took on the shop, and he kept the mail-order part of the business. He toadied his way up the grades of the order. He wanted York to be the central nexus for COTO in England, arguing that York was once the English capital.

To that end he readied a set of rooms for initiations, but had no legal right to work there, as he was paying some squatters for the privilege! We unearthed this fact after a falling-out which happened when he tried to talk people from Manchester and Rochdale into having initiations performed in York, so that he could afford to keep the premises going. He was aiming for Lodge status, and the Manchester members didn't see why they should in effect help him to build an empire on the back of their hard work. When David Rietti went into a self-imposed "suspension" in 1988 e.v. for allegedly "tweaking Monica Tobin's nipple" during a III° ceremony, Fernee said that he had noticed the way David looked at one of the sisters (Lyn) when she was getting changed, and he could well imagine that he might have done it.

However, he neither chose to implicate him, nor to back him up. The way we used to do the III° grip made it difficult to tweak anything, but (I suppose in retrospect) not impossible. This left them as sworn enemies; Rietti said later that if he ever had the money to do it, one day he'd have Fernee taken out - but he is rather given to saying things like that. (Rietti called forth "The Angel of Vengeance" on those who bore false witness against him, or on himself if he lied. None of his detractors stayed in the COTO to see him come out of that six-month retirement-cum-suspension. In this case we took it to be an attempt to frame him.) It was believed in Manchester that Fernee got his advancement in COTO specifically to work against Rietti. Finally he became a V° and the COTO's "Grand Inquisitor General".

He made a monumental mess of that job; indeed, it was his ringing up Tegtmeier and seeking anti-Rietti statements that Tegtmeier cites as the turning point in his decision to bestow an OTO on Rietti. Rietti says that Fernee was angling to be taken on as a student in the AA under his tutelage, and he had to tell Fernee that he only took on those whom the 'powers' told him to accept, and that he was out of luck (to my knowledge that is how Rietti approaches his AA work); as a result Fernee resented him for ever after, but Fernee denies this. Fernee was also a Priest of EGC and Jane a Priestess, and I attended a few of their Gnostic Masses. They were uninspiring, and once we even had the police called out to a Mass because of the noise, but then that's York for you!

(It wasn't late, and it wasn't noisy.) I don't have a copy of it, but I'm sure it was the usual lack of basic security around Fernee and his cronies which resulted in a tabloid newspaper (probably the 'News of the World') taking photos of a Gnostic Mass through a window! The Rochdale group had walked out on its leader Barry Fitton, and he and his wife Ann broke with the Riettis and associated increasingly with York, so she was Priestess on that particular day; I'm unsure who the Priest was. Fernee reeks of ambition. When I was in Aachen, waiting for hours on end for them to get around to doing my V°, I had to pass the time with him. He said something then about some contact that he and Jane had with Mike McGee, or is that Magee? {{The second is right}} He was very cagey about it; all very private and so on.

So maybe he also had links in Amookos, or Jane did. [Question by P.R. Koenig: I would also like to know where Breeze usually stayed when he was in England. Answer: Mostly at Clive Harper's, though he spent time with the Porridges {{they are really the Megsons}} of TOPY on at least one occasion. He sometimes had business out near Blackpool, only 50 miles from Manchester but he never visited us. Rietti was given the Word of the Equinox by him once, in recognition of his AA claims. This was motivated by Wilfred Smith. Must have been in 1987 e.v. or thereabouts.] [Question by P.R. Koenig: Does Fernee's ringing Tegtmeier to fish for an anti-Rietti statement mean that Tegtmeier had been involved in the 'Caliphate' before? Answer: No.

Fernee telephoned him in Dusseldorf and launched into his anti-Rietti speech, but Tegtmeier didn't even know the man! Here was a self-proclaimed "Grand Inquisitor General" of COTO unable to show any credentials, ringing him up out of the blue, and wondering if the rumours were true about a falling out between the Riettis and Tegtmeier.] Continuation: I think this may be in the Transcript, but I'm unsure, so I will continue... Tegtmeier assured Fernee that he was very good friends with David Rietti, that he had never had any organisational authority over them in the first place, and that there had been no "falling out" between them. He then ordered a few books from Fernee's business so that he could use them as a link back to him, should he feel the need!

He was rightly appalled that an investigation was being conducted in such an unbalanced fashion. Fernee had no interest in hearing anything positive about the Riettis, having already assured himself of their guilt without sufficient evidence. It was a clear case of a witch-hunt in which the COTO sought evidence to justify throwing them out. [Question by P.R. Koenig: why Tegtmeier? Why at this precise point in time? Answer: The reason was that they were already afraid of the association between Tegtmeier and Rietti, which had been established during McMurtry's travels across Europe (with Rietti in tow as resident psychic).

McMurtry said that they should both stick together.] Continuation: The COTO feared Tegtmeier's claims of Pentalpha authority, and he took to winding Heidrick up about it by posting to some Newsgroup or Discussion Forum or some such.... (this I was told. I saw none of it.) So Heidrick certainly knew of the threat.