In addition to acquiring some sales techniques at the seminar, Avi became fast friends with a young fellow named Dennis who, he said, was Bruce’s right-hand man.

I could have given Avi a derashah about the many takanos Chazal had instituted in order to prevent friendships between Jews and gentiles: pas Yisrael, bishul Yisrael, chalav Yisrael, stam yeinam. But instead, I opted to fulfill a different teaching of Chazal by refraining from speaking words that would not be heard or appreciated.

Throughout Avi’s trying teenage years, I had maintained a close and loving relationship with him, largely because I kept my mouth shut. Avi had always been strong-minded (others might describe him as “stubborn,”) and once he made up his mind to do something, arguing with him was pointless.

In the weeks after Avi returned home from the event, Dennis called regularly to schmooze with him. During one of those conversations, he shocked Avi by offering to arrange a private meeting between him and Bruce, at no charge.

“People pay $7,000 for a meeting with Bruce, and I’m getting it for free!” Avi crowed to me.

I thought it was a little weird. Why would an internationally famed sales trainer agree to waive his usual fee just to meet with a 20-year-old Jewish kid?

“It’s because I’m friends with Dennis,” Avi explained proudly.

Dennis followed through on his offer, arranging a free private meeting for Avi in Fort Lauderdale. Avi couldn’t believe his good fortune.

He flew down to Florida on a Monday. Tuesday afternoon, while at work, I got a call from him. “Abba,” he said gravely, “I want you to know that I’ve been using.”

Avi, using drugs? I had been seeing him every day, and he hadn’t shown any telltale signs of drug use. He had been davening, working, and sleeping on a predictable daily schedule, and he hadn’t seemed spacey, sleepy, twitchy, or secretive. So this revelation came as a total shock to me.

“Bruce told me I need rehab,” Avi continued. “He said he has a fantastic rehab center in Tampa to recommend, and he arranged for me to fly to this place. He himself was treated at this rehab center, and that’s how he became so successful.”

Avi paused, and then delivered a second bombshell. “I just arrived here at the rehab, and I’m about to give in my phone. I’ll speak to you in a few weeks.”

“What?” I yelled. “You’re at the rehab already? Why? This doesn’t make any sense!”

With the phone still at my ear, I went over to my computer and frantically Googled the name of the rehab center Avi had named. To my horror, the first page of results made it clear that this rehab center was operated by a well-known cult that masqueraded as a respectable religion. The rehab center was a front: People entered it to overcome their addictions to drugs and alcohol, and emerged as brainwashed cult zombies.

I felt myself sweating profusely. “Avi,” I said, “you don’t need rehab! You’ve been clean for over a year. I think I would know if you’ve been using. I see you every day!”

“Bruce says I need rehab,” he repeated stubbornly.

“If you need rehab, we’ll find the best place for you. We already sent you to rehab once, we’ll send you again if we have to. But this isn’t how we do things! Please, Avi, come home!”

I tried explaining to Avi that he’d been hoodwinked, that Bruce’s arrangements to have him check into a rehab center were nothing more than a sophisticated kidnapping attempt. But Avi wasn’t listening.

“I trust Bruce,” he stated. “I’m an adult, I’ve made my decision, and I’m just calling you to say goodbye. I have to give in my phone now, they’re waiting to take it from me. I’ll speak to you in a few weeks.”

A coworker of mine was standing near to me during this conversation, and he overheard the entire exchange. “Ask your son to give you 24 hours,” he whispered to me.

I took a deep breath. “Avi, you know that I love you, right?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Avi, I never asked you for anything. I’m asking you now for one thing: Wait 24 hours before you check into the rehab. Can you do that for me?”

With that, I started to cry.

“Um, okay. I guess.”

A reprieve! Hodu laShem!

Another quick Google search revealed that there was a Marriot Hotel in the Tampa airport.

“I’m booking a room for you in the Marriot,” I told Avi. “Make your way over there and I’ll meet you there as soon as I can.”

Once I ascertained that Avi was on his way to the hotel, I raced over to the local airport. On the way, I called Yocheved and told her that Bruce had convinced Avi to check into drug rehab, and I was taking the next flight down to Florida to talk him out of it.

“This doesn’t add up,” she said. “Avi’s no pushover. How did Slinger get him to agree to go to rehab?”

“I don’t know,” I told her. “That’s what I’m trying to find out.”

As I was driving to the airport, I got a call from Avi.

“Abba,” he said, “I don’t know what just happened! I was about to check myself into Bruce’s rehab place, but I don’t need or want rehab! This is so crazy!”

“I’m on my way to the airport,” I responded. “I’m taking the next flight to come get you.”

“You don’t have to come,” he assured me. “I’m not going to rehab. I don’t know what got into me before, but I came to my senses already.”

I wasn’t taking any chances. When the next flight to Tampa departed that afternoon, I was on it.

Once in Tampa, I heard the whole story. Bruce had met with Avi in his Fort Lauderdale office, and had claimed that the marijuana Avi had used and the Concerta he had taken were still in his system, and until he’d get rid of them, he wouldn’t be able to perform to his maximum potential.

Using his prodigious powers of persuasion — and perhaps with the help of drugs or hypnosis — Bruce managed to convince Avi not only to check into the rehab center, but also to fork over $30,000 to pay for it.

Bruce appointed one of his underlings, Jeff, to ensure that Avi would actually travel to Tampa and check into the rehab center. Jeff accompanied Avi to his hotel room, and while there, he took Avi’s suitcase and had it shipped ahead to the rehab center. Then he escorted Avi to the Fort Lauderdale airport. When Avi landed in Tampa, representatives of the rehab center were waiting for him.

Apparently, this rehab center is one of a chain of similar centers throughout the world that use a “purification” program devised by the founder of the cult. The program uses a combination of exercise (mostly running), lengthy exposure to a dry-heat sauna, and megadoses of vitamins and nutritional supplements to (supposedly) eliminate stored drugs from body fat. But the program is medically unsound, even dangerous. People have actually died at these facilities.

Perhaps equally scary is what happens to the people who survive. By the time they emerge from rehab, they “owe” the rehab center so much money that they have to commit to submitting future earnings to the cult, to repay their “debt.”

Outside the rehab center in Tampa, people have hung posters with pictures of their loved ones who went in there normal and emerged as puppets of the cult, which maintains a disconnection policy aimed at severing its members’ family ties in order to enable their “spiritual growth.”

A percentage of the cult’s earnings from its members go to the recruiters who lure them into the rehab centers — recruiters like Bruce Slinger, who belongs to the cult, but whose website doesn’t mention this affiliation.

Avi told me that when he was in the cab from the rehab to the Marriot, after I had convinced him to give me 24 hours, Bruce himself had called him up and said, “Listen to me, Avi. You’re making a big mistake. You think you’re going to go back to New York and be successful? You’re not. You need rehab.”

Only now, after narrowly escaping Bruce’s clutches, did Avi realize how sinister this whole plot was. Bruce targeted Avi because he was young, impressionable, and already under the Bruce Slinger spell. He appointed Dennis to woo Avi and then put his master sales skills to work in convincing Avi to do something completely illogical.

The cult that Slinger recruits for has long been exposed as a global scam, yet its activities remain legal, for the most part. They don’t recruit minors. They don’t recruit by force. They obtain consent from their recruits in a way that leaves no grounds for pressing criminal charges.

Avi was deeply shaken, even traumatized, by the experience, as were Yocheved and I.

“Bruce always says, ‘I’m dangerous,’ ” Avi reflected, “and he sure is.”

I would never have thought of Avi as a vulnerable target. He’s tough, he’s confident, he’s savvy, and he’s over six feet tall. Yet once he stepped into the Slinger web, he almost didn’t make it out.

I will always be grateful to Hashem that my big, strong son listened to that one request I made of him — he gave me 24 hours, and he gained back his life.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha Issue 673)