The FBI vs The Cult

0:00 Speaker 1: Imagine being told that paradise exists, a place where children

0:04 Speaker 1: can play without fear, where violence doesn't exist, where families

0:08 Speaker 1: live together in peace, and where everyone works toward a

0:11 Speaker 1: better future. Now, imagine that behind the gates of that

0:14 Speaker 1: paradise lies one of the darkest secrets in modern American history.

0:18 Speaker 1: This is the story of the Nuwabian Nation and the

0:21 Speaker 1: little girl who escaped. Hey, a small child smiles and

0:26 Speaker 1: waves directly into the camera, what's your name? The footage

0:30 Speaker 1: seems innocent. Children laugh, family smile, people wave cheerfully at

0:36 Speaker 1: the person filming. But investigators would later discover that many

0:40 Speaker 1: of these children had been reported missing by their own

0:43 Speaker 1: parents for years. Relatives across the United States desperately searched

0:47 Speaker 1: for sons and daughters who had vanished into a mysterious

0:50 Speaker 1: religious community hidden deep within rural Georgia. The children had

0:55 Speaker 1: all been taken to a strange, four hundred acre compound,

0:58 Speaker 1: surrounded by fences and arms and guards, a place outsiders

1:02 Speaker 1: rarely entered. The property looked like nothing anyone had ever seen.

1:07 Speaker 1: Massive Egyptian pyramids stood in the middle of open farmland.

1:11 Speaker 1: Gigantic sphinx statues watched over the entrance. Ancient looking monuments

1:16 Speaker 1: stretched across the landscape. It was called Tomrie Egypt of

1:20 Speaker 1: the West. To followers, it was heaven. To investigators, it

1:24 Speaker 1: would become a nightmare because behind the smiling faces and

1:28 Speaker 1: colorful robes, authorities suspected something horrifying was happening. Hospitals across

1:34 Speaker 1: Georgia had started noticing an impossible pattern young girls eleven, twelve,

1:40 Speaker 1: thirteen years old pregnant, and almost every one of them

1:44 Speaker 1: came from the same isolated compound. The FBI began quietly

1:49 Speaker 1: building a case, but there was one major problem. Nobody

1:53 Speaker 1: inside would talk. Long before the pyramids rose from the

1:57 Speaker 1: Georgia countryside, the story began hunting dreds of miles away.

2:01 Speaker 1: In New York City, it was nineteen seventy seven. Two

2:04 Speaker 1: year old Nicky lived with her single mother in Queen's

2:08 Speaker 1: The neighborhood was rough, Violence was common. Gang's controlled entire blocks.

2:14 Speaker 1: Drugs and murders filled the nightly news. Every morning, Nicky's

2:18 Speaker 1: mother walked to work, wondering if her children would survive

2:21 Speaker 1: growing up there. She prayed for a better life. Then

2:25 Speaker 1: one day, a man wearing a long white robe approached her.

2:28 Speaker 1: He handed her. A small book. On the cover was

2:31 Speaker 1: an address seven seventeen Bushwick Avenue. That night she read

2:36 Speaker 1: every page. The words promised unity, protection, black, empowerment, a

2:42 Speaker 1: new beginning. The next day, she visited the address. As

2:46 Speaker 1: she approached the building, she heard singing. Children were laughing,

2:51 Speaker 1: Families embraced one another. People smiled warmly as they welcomed

2:55 Speaker 1: her inside. For the first time in years, she felt safe.

2:59 Speaker 1: She had found a community, or so she believed. The

3:03 Speaker 1: movement was led by a charismatic preacher named Dwight Malachi York.

3:08 Speaker 1: He could captivate almost anyone. He spoke of freedom, He

3:12 Speaker 1: spoke of pride. He spoke of creating a better future

3:15 Speaker 1: for African Americans who had spent generations facing discrimination and hardship.

3:20 Speaker 1: To many people, York wasn't simply a preacher. He was

3:24 Speaker 1: a savior, a visionary, a man with answers. Throughout the

3:28 Speaker 1: nineteen eighties, his following exploded. Thousands joined among them was

3:33 Speaker 1: little Nicki and her family. At just eleven years old,

3:37 Speaker 1: Nicki moved into the Bushwick compound. Life immediately changed. The

3:42 Speaker 1: clothes she wore, the food she ate, the language she studied.

3:46 Speaker 1: Everything revolved around the teachings of York to Nicki, he

3:50 Speaker 1: became more than a leader, he became family. Eventually, her

3:55 Speaker 1: mother became one of York's wives. That meant Nicki was

3:58 Speaker 1: now considered one of his children. She trusted him completely.

4:03 Speaker 1: As the movement grew, New York became too small, York

4:06 Speaker 1: announced a bold plan. The entire community would relocate nearly

4:10 Speaker 1: one thousand miles south to rural Georgia. There they would

4:14 Speaker 1: build their own nation, a place separate from American society.

4:18 Speaker 1: Followers arrived to find nothing but open farmland, but they

4:22 Speaker 1: worked day and night. Pyramids appeared, Giant statues rose from

4:27 Speaker 1: the earth. Walls covered in Egyptian artwork surrounded the property.

4:32 Speaker 1: York reinvented himself over and over. One day he claimed

4:36 Speaker 1: to be a spiritual master, the next an extraterrestrial being. Eventually,

4:42 Speaker 1: he declared that his followers were descendants of ancient Egyptians

4:45 Speaker 1: from another planet. No matter how bizarre the claims became,

4:49 Speaker 1: his followers believed him. The compound grew larger and more isolated. First,

4:55 Speaker 1: Nicki loved her new home. Then one day one of

4:59 Speaker 1: York's wives appro She led the young teenager into a

5:02 Speaker 1: private room. The woman calmly explained that Yorke himself would

5:06 Speaker 1: teach her about becoming a woman. Nicki was confused, but

5:10 Speaker 1: everyone around her treated it as normal. York entered, locked

5:14 Speaker 1: the door, and everything changed. The man she had trusted

5:18 Speaker 1: her entire life suddenly became someone she no longer recognized.

5:22 Speaker 1: She later recalled begging him to stop, but inside the compound,

5:27 Speaker 1: saying no to York was impossible. He was their prophet,

5:30 Speaker 1: their teacher, their father figure. Children were taught that pleasing

5:35 Speaker 1: him meant pleasing God. Afterward, Nicki kept silent. She believed

5:39 Speaker 1: she had no choice. Her own mother remained loyal to York.

5:44 Speaker 1: The community praised him daily. Nobody questioned him. But as

5:48 Speaker 1: years passed, Nicky noticed something. She wasn't the only victim.

5:53 Speaker 1: Other girls began disappearing into private rooms, Younger girls, terrified girls.

5:59 Speaker 1: She recognized the same sadness in their eyes, the same fear,

6:03 Speaker 1: the same silence That was when she decided she had

6:06 Speaker 1: to leave. Escaping wasn't easy. The compound was isolated, Armed

6:12 Speaker 1: guards watched the entrances. Followers believed the outside world was evil.

6:18 Speaker 1: Leaving meant abandoning everything she had ever known. Even worse,

6:22 Speaker 1: when she told her mother she wanted to escape. Her

6:24 Speaker 1: mother sided with York. The betrayal shattered her, but Niki

6:28 Speaker 1: refused to stay. She contacted a former member living in Atlanta.

6:33 Speaker 1: One day, she walked away, terrified alone, certain she might

6:38 Speaker 1: never survive, but she knew she had to tell someone

6:41 Speaker 1: what was happening behind those gates. Meanwhile, law enforcement had

6:45 Speaker 1: been watching for years. Parents from across America called investigators,

6:51 Speaker 1: My daughter joined a cult, my son disappeared. Can you

6:55 Speaker 1: help us find them? Whenever officers visited the compound, armed

7:00 Speaker 1: guards met them at the gate. Nobody was allowed inside.

7:04 Speaker 1: Then hospitals began reporting pregnant children, girls barely old enough

7:08 Speaker 1: to attend middle school. Every trail led back to Tommrie. The

7:13 Speaker 1: FBI feared what might happen if they stormed the property.

7:16 Speaker 1: Only a few years earlier, the Waco disaster had ended

7:20 Speaker 1: with dozens of people, including children dead. No one wanted

7:24 Speaker 1: history to repeat itself. Investigators needed one thing, a survivor

7:29 Speaker 1: willing to testify. Then Nicky came forward. She told them everything,

7:34 Speaker 1: how York gained trust, how he manipulated families, how children

7:39 Speaker 1: believed obedience was sacred, how abuse was hidden behind religion. Finally,

7:45 Speaker 1: authorities had enough evidence. On the morning of May eighth,

7:49 Speaker 1: two thousand and two, more than two hundred law enforcement

7:52 Speaker 1: officers prepared for one of the largest operations in Georgia history.

7:56 Speaker 1: But they had a plan. Rather than raid the compound immediately,

8:01 Speaker 1: they waited for Yorke to leave. Hours passed. Finally, a

8:05 Speaker 1: black car rolled through the gates. FBI agents followed from

8:09 Speaker 1: a distance. The vehicle stopped at a grocery store parking lot.

8:13 Speaker 1: Everyone waited. If the wrong person stepped out, the entire

8:17 Speaker 1: operation could fail. Then the rear door opened. Dwight York

8:21 Speaker 1: stepped onto the pavement. Within seconds, agents surrounded him. The

8:26 Speaker 1: self proclaimed prophet had nowhere left to run. At the

8:29 Speaker 1: same time, hundreds of deputies and federal agents entered Tomrie.

8:34 Speaker 1: They expected resistance, gunfire, chaos. Instead, the compound fell quietly.

8:41 Speaker 1: Years of secrecy ended without a single shot fired. For investigators,

8:46 Speaker 1: it marked the beginning of justice. For survivors like Nicki,

8:50 Speaker 1: it marked the beginning of freedom because after spending her

8:53 Speaker 1: entire childhood believing one man controlled her destiny, she had

8:57 Speaker 1: done the impossible. She escaped, and by telling her story

9:02 Speaker 1: she helped save countless other children from the man they

9:05 Speaker 1: once called their savior.