JP Miller's Church Helped Track Mica — Now They Claim They Were Never Close

Tony Brueski (0:01)

This is Hidden Killers Live with Tony Brueski and Robin Dre.

Robin Drake (0:08)

Solid Rock Church is shuttered, the multi-million dollar property is sold, and Pastor JP Miller is left preaching in pop-up tents, and storage containers, and defunct piggly wigglies to whoever's straggles in.

Tony Brueski (0:23)

I heard bananas are on sale.

Robin Drake (0:25)

Welcome to Pastor JP's church.

All while staring down the barrel of an October Federal Cyberstalking Trial. We'll see if that happens on time. Now the feds are involved in the massive Netflix docu-series has laid Mica Miller's tragedy bare for an entire world to see. His loyal inner circle. Well guess what? They're finally running for the exits. And you know what we call the folks who are super tight to the narcissist, and sociopaths, and borderlines? Flying monkeys! And well, they've found their wings, and they're flying.

But this time not necessarily to do his bidding, they're just trying to get the hell out. Let's be honest. Where was all this moral outrage from these flying monkeys, these close friends of JP, two years ago, when Mica was literally begging for help? Today, psychotherapist Shavaun Scott joins us to break down the twisted ecosystem of the enabler. We're talking about the flying monkeys, the people who hold the coat of a narcissist, and why they only scatter once the ship is already at the bottom of the ocean. Of course, with this as always, Robin Drake retired to FBI Special Agent, Chief of the Counterintelligence Behavioral Analysis Program as well. We're back on JP Miller because I think we could talk about this guy for hours and weeks.

There's so much darkness going on here, the ecosystem to which he operated. Shavaun, let's start by talking about the massive difference between just ignoring red flags and actively joining in on the abuse. Because we're seeing court filings describing congregants, friends, followers of JP, who actually participated in the tracking and the harassing of Mica. And now they're all going, we weren't that close. We, I knew of kinda, sorta, psychologically. What flips in a supposed normal person's brain before the exodus? But let's go back to the actual assisting of the monster to turn them into an active hitman of sorts for someone like JP, if the allegations are true.

Shavaun Scott (2:47)

Yeah, we're really looking at the social dynamics of high-controlled cult-like religious groups. And it's an absolutely fascinating study because you see a lot of that. But you've got the charismatic leader, and he is, as bizarre, I think most of us look at him and find him way over the top and histrionic and manipulative and all of that. A lot of people are fooled by a charismatic person. And in a religious setting, this person, there's a clear stated belief or implied belief that he is being appointed by God to lead them. He interprets their reality. And this is very seductive for people who are, as we've talked so much about, not really critical thinkers and they're looking for guidance. They're emotionally vulnerable. And they trust the leader. And so anybody who criticizes the leader, behaves in a way to thwart the leader's agenda, is interpreted as malicious. And anything said against the leader is persecution of the leader.

And their loyalty to the leader becomes loyalty to God. And so they're filtering everything through that. And it's a very us versus them dynamic that we're the people that know God's will here. And anybody who doesn't see it this way, they're either of the devil or they're just misled. Generally, they're of the devil. And so they justify and rationalize really atrocious behavior.

And we see this kind of thing going on a lot, but I think it's in religious groups, we've talked a lot about people who get into these cult-like weird religious groups. And it doesn't mean, as I always say, the disclaimer, there can't be healthy religious groups. Certainly, there are.

But you get this, the bad things that come out of these cult-like high-control groups are really extreme.

SPEAKER_4 (4:56)

Yeah, we talked about this a little before we started, Shavaun.

With guys like JP here, especially JP in particular, do you think this was and is premeditated with him or this is just his natural state of being, of this is just how he lives his life? Because it has that appearance of being very fluid. It's not like he's just living life. And so it's easier, I think, to get wrapped up into it when he doesn't look like he's contemplative or is it premeditated? What do you think?

Shavaun Scott (5:26)

It could be a mix of both. I think a person like this, it's their natural way of moving through the world. You know, when we look at people with certain, as we always talk about the Cluster B personality types, which include narcissism and antisocial behavior and histrionic behavior, they go through life looking at what can I get out of this? And how do I manipulate? How do I have control? And I don't think much of the time they have any conscious awareness like they wake up in the morning with, here's how I can manipulate people today. It's just their natural state of being. It's just what they do.