A foundation in Panama, a company in Delaware, a private investment fund, assets worth millions and allegations of tax avoidance. The believers of a controversial religious group based in Estrie, the Order of the Essenes, have for years poured their generous donations into a financial structure worthy of a multinational corporation.
Published at 2:41 am. Updated at 5:00 am.
Some of them are now biting their fingers. With the sudden death of its prophet Olivier “Manitara” Martin in 2020 at the age of 56, the group of a few hundred believers – who worship archangels, Egyptian deities and figures of Christianity – is torn apart by a major divide.
It is the legal battle between the group’s two factions that is exposing the finances of the organization, which was detained by the French anti-cult government and from which Immigration Canada tried to expel certain leaders.
The Order of the Essenes (or the Olivier Martin estate) owns a massive estate in Cookshire-Eaton, valued at approximately $6 million in 2018, with the village of Terranova in France having a minimum value of $400,000 , a village in Panama, at least one publishing company (Essene Church Publishing), several foundations, including one in Panama, Judge Johanne Brodeur listed in a ruling last fall. “ [De plus]21 still existing corporations are connected to the Christian Essen Church. Corporate entities, one of which was based in Delaware (Esseway LLC), also owned trademarks. »
PHOTO FROM ORGANIZATION WEBSITE
Olivier “Manitara” Martin
La Presse has not been able to determine the amount of money that has flowed through these structures in recent years. In a 2021 letter included in the court filing, a church administrator speaks of the possibility of a “transfer of several hundred thousand dollars per year” from the Quebec structure to Panama, “a tax haven.”
Given the increasing number of legal disputes between Essenes, Judge Johanne Brodeur had to decide a central question: who should succeed Olivier Manitara as “king” of this religious movement?
His eldest son Nazarh Guérin, allied with his mother Magali Guérin? Or the deceased’s mother, also an Essene, who was allied with the Prophet’s personal secretary?
Lost donations
It was Nazarh Guérin who won the game because “the Essen nation is constituted as a royal dynasty,” judge Johanne Brodeur ruled. The young man thus gained full authority over the church and its property. With his siblings, he also inherited a small hamlet in the south of France, where his father began his career as a religious leader.
Since then, Essenes who describe themselves as “traditionalists” have been expelled from the group because they are accused of “attempting to seize power illegally.”
Frantz Amathy, a member of the group who lives in the French hamlet, said of Olivier Martin’s widow and children: “We don’t recognize them at all as heirs to the tradition. […] For me, a whole deviation happened that no longer has anything to do with it. The small amounts I was able to donate were diverted from their original purpose. There are many Essenes who invested their money that was used for other purposes […] that no longer have anything to do with religion. »
[Les enfants d’Olivier Manitara] thought they could deport us overnight. They tried, they even came here with the intention of deporting us, but in France there are laws.
Frantz Amathy, member of the Essene Order residing in France
The mayor of Montlaur, the municipality to which the disputed site belongs, confirmed that police had been called to the scene at the time of the visit by Olivier Martin’s heirs. The town hall is in conflict with the religious group because of illegal construction work – a similar dispute is between the Essenes and the Cookshire-Eaton community in Estrie.
Control over real estate assets is also causing tensions in Quebec. A “traditionalist” Essen resident is now suing the “company” for $105,000, the value of the house he built on the property.
Pier-Antoine Marier, who was chairman of the Quebec company for a long time, confirmed in an out-of-court hearing that he had given the Essenes “around three hundred thousand”. He is now suing the Small Claims Corporation to recover $15,000 of his bail.
PHOTO ALAIN ROBERGE, LA PRESS ARCHIVE
Pier-Antoine Marier, former chairman of the Essen Order, in 2014
Foreigners by the dozens
The documents released as part of this legal guerrilla war also reveal the method that the Essenes have used for years to emigrate many co-religionists to Quebec: a provision of the immigration law that exempts priests and others from work permits.
Court documents contain reproductions of dozens of letters from the church to its foreign “priests” guaranteeing their care in Estrie. There is also a letter from a lawyer trying to resolve a disagreement with Immigration Canada.
In 2012, the French Interministerial Mission for Vigilance and Combating Sectarian Abuses (MIVILUDES) described the Essenes as a group with “apocalyptic theses” led by a “sinister individual.”
“A group of several hundred people between France and Quebec. It is a somewhat mystical order, a bit like a Masonic order, but outside of all official circles,” explained Serge Blisko, then president of MIVILUDES. He specified that the Essene Church was “very similar” to the Order of the Sun Temple (OTS).
In 2008 and 2009, Ottawa twice tried – unsuccessfully – to expel Olivier Manitara and his wife from Canada on grounds of “serious criminality.”
They had been sentenced in France to eight and ten months’ probation for “misuse of company assets” (i.e. the use of company funds by a director of that company). The courts had ruled that their culpability was not sufficient to justify deportation from Canada.