Novelist testifies 'psychic' claimed she could reunite her with dead child
Sun Sentinel, Florida/September 10, 2013
By Paula McMahon
Unlike the characters in her epic romance novels, best-selling author Jude Deveraux testified Tuesday that she was miserable and unlucky in love.
So much so that the 65-year-old writer turned to a clairvoyant for help with her divorce, the novelist told a packed federal courtroom in West Palm Beach. But her life only deteriorated more over the next 17 years — leaving her financially broke and suicidal, she said.
Deveraux, the grand dame of romance, is the star witness against Rose Marks, who is fighting federal charges she masterminded a conspiracy that defrauded clients to the tune of $25 million, including about $17 million from the writer.
"She said money is energy and money is evil and if I had money in my bank account, I was attracting evil," Deveraux said.
Along the way, Deveraux's 8-year-old son died in an ATV motorcycle accident and she testified that she endured eight miscarriages and went through a turbulent divorce. She said she was also duped by Marks into believing she was secretly corresponding with then-Secretary of State Colin Powell and actor Brad Pitt.
Marks, 62, of Fort Lauderdale, has pleaded not guilty to allegations she and her family fleeced and preyed on customers at their psychic stores in Fort Lauderdale and Manhattan.
Marks claimed to be a psychic consultant for the pope and the FBI and that her clients included former presidents, Powell, Pitt and actress Jane Seymour, Deveraux said.
Marks decided Deveraux would marry Colin Powell and Deveraux said she believed she was corresponding with him — for four years — until she eventually cut it off because he would never meet her. An Arizona woman testified last week that she typed up letters and emails – that appeared to be from Powell and Pitt but were dictated by Marks — that she thought were a role-playing writing exercise for Deveraux.
As Deveraux grieved for her son, Sam, who died in October 2005, Deveraux testified that Marks tormented her with claims that the child had not gone to heaven and that Marks could transfer the child's soul or spirit into the body of another person, reuniting mother and son.
"She said all she saw were flames and I had to keep him out of the flames," Deveraux testified.
Marks told her she had foreseen the tragic death and prepared for it by saving an embryo from the in-vitro-fertilization procedures Deveraux had undergone to give birth to Sam, Deveraux testified.
Marks claimed that a virgin, who looked like the late Princess Grace of Monaco, had used the embryo to give birth to a child — the full blood brother of Sam, Deveraux said. And Marks predicted Deveraux would die, assume the body of this woman and be reunited with her child, Deveraux said.
Deveraux said the woman turned out to be Cynthia Miller, who is married to one of Marks' sons. Miller has pleaded guilty to a related fortune-telling fraud conspiracy charge and is scheduled for sentencing next month.
Marks had Deveraux go to a South Florida beach where she was told she could watch the woman with a 4-year-old boy. Marks told her that she couldn't really interact with Miller because she "wasn't a real person, that she didn't have a soul ... [that] she hardly spoke."
At another stage, Marks told her that Brad Pitt had secretly married Miller, and Deveraux would be married to him when she "went into" and assumed Miller's body.
Deveraux, 65, of Southwest Ranches, has written more than 65 successful romance novels and about half made the New York Times bestsellers list.
"[I write] happy little romantic novels that have romantic endings and a lot of fun in them," she told the jury.
Deveraux said she met Marks in New York City in the early 1990s when Deveraux was suicidal and trying to get out of a "horrific, horrible, terrible" marriage. Deveraux went into Marks' store near New York City's Central Park. But Deveraux said Marks told her she did her work in a special room in St. Patrick's Cathedral on Fifth Avenue.
She began consulting with Marks, who she knew only as Joyce Michaels, the business name that several of the Marks women used.
Deveraux said she didn't really believe in psychic powers at the time, but Marks gave her a reading of some kind. Deveraux just wanted someone to listen to her problems, she said.
After the first couple of visits, Marks told Deveraux she could use her powers to guarantee her "a peaceful divorce" for a fee of $1,200, Deveraux said.
Deveraux said she came to trust Marks after some of her predictions proved uncannily accurate — including foreseeing that Deveraux's now-former husband would file for divorce and predicting the precise hour when the divorce filing was delivered.
Marks also warned her to leave her Manhattan apartment and change the locks because her husband was coming. She checked into a hotel and staff at her apartment building told her that her husband unexpectedly showed up and was angrier than anyone they'd ever seen, she said.
The author said Marks told her she would use other money and gold coins that Deveraux turned over to her to do "the work" but that anything more than the $1,200 fee "would come back to me."
Eventually, Marks told her that she would use $1 million of Deveraux's money in trancelike meditations to achieve the peaceful divorce but it would all be returned at the end of a year, Deveraux said.
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