Is there a cult impersonating Alcoholics Anonymous in Spain? Complaints against the 24 Hours Group are trickling in.

In 2021, Luis Labarga woke up at home with bloody hands, glass embedded in the soles of his feet , and a head wound. He could barely open his eyes, suffered severe dizziness, felt like the living room was moving like a ship, and had a gin bottle shattered on the floor. The Logroño native was suffering from severe depression, which had been brewing for years due to "very cruel life events" and which led him to fall into alcoholism .

He tells El Confidencial that a childhood friend, who had also had drinking problems , convinced him to seek help from Alcoholics Anonymous (AA). Labarga searched online , and the first thing he came across was the "24-Hour Group of Alcoholics Anonymous Madrid." He called and was greeted by Pedro 's kind voice, who invited him to come to their office in the Vallecas neighborhood the next day.

When he arrived, he was greeted by Pedro himself, who would proclaim himself his sponsor , a figure who in AA should serve to offer support and guidance to a new member. He showed him around: a large room with a row of chairs facing a tribune , "some strange, smelly rooms with mattresses lying around" (the spaces known as "annexes" where members are sheltered), and all of it filled with " emaciated people."

After a conversation in which he barely let her speak, Pedro invited her to join a "meeting," a space where they would individually take the stage and share their life stories. Labarga heard three different stories, all gruesome, barbaric, and humiliating: "They were expelling their demons, but in a way that made them wallow in the worst of their lives." "In one of them, they made a girl gloat about the moment she had been raped," she exemplifies.

Labarga's alcoholism was in its early stages, so his condition was "good" compared to the others around him. His lucid state allowed him to realize that this "wasn't normal." After the third testimony, he decided this wasn't his place , expressed his desire to leave, and after a brief struggle, he was released.

Upon leaving, he reproached his friend for the place he had sent him, but his friend told him that his experience had been unrelated. The latter questioned an acquaintance, who explained that he hadn't gone where Luis had thought he would , but to " an association denounced for sectarian practices and for impersonating Alcoholics Anonymous."

At that time, Labarga began researching the 24-Hour Groups , a movement that emerged in Mexico in the 1970s. Although it follows the fundamental principles of the AA 12-step program , its more radical approach and unique structure have made it a very particular and controversial phenomenon within the world of addiction recovery. In addition to his bibliographical knowledge, the Logroño native also collected around twenty testimonies and captured them all in several chapters of his book. The Darkest Night of Alcoholics Anonymous . In addition, after the publication, dozens of testimonies have reached him that point in the same direction.

Beyond the testimonies collected, El Confidencial has had access to a trickle of complaints against the 24-Hour Groups filed with courts and the National Police in different parts of the country. In addition to these, the National Police has received complaints through a dedicated email channel at [email protected] , which this newspaper has also verified. Lagarba explains that this is the main means of communication for the "victims" because many of them live in small spaces and are afraid of being identified at police stations.

In Spain, this group has offices spread across municipalities throughout much of the country : Madrid, Galicia, Murcia, the Valencian Community, the Balearic Islands , Catalonia, and the Basque Country. "A lot of desperate and deceived people come to them every day. And every day , new and increasingly younger people come; which means that, even if someone dies, there's always a retraining process," warns the book's author.

Slaves, humiliated and dead on the platform

Labarga explains that although traditional detox clinics have a wealthier profile, the people who come to places like the one in Vallecas are people who have lost practically everything and are in an advanced stage of alcoholism. So the supposedly free service they initially encounter is what makes them turn to it: " A priori, it's free, and at first, they do take care of you, but in a very basic way. You sleep there, even if it's on a urine-soaked mattress; you shower there, even if it's every two weeks; you eat there, even if it's shit..." A combination of issues that makes them even more vulnerable to staying in these groups.

According to the testimonies he's collected, "they brainwash you and enslave you." And to do so, they employ three key elements of the original AA , but which "lead to the ultimate perversion" : they take the idea of a higher being to rely on to overcome alcoholism (which is often associated with a god), the image of the godfather (who should be an equal with whom you have special trust and who accompanies you in the process), and they follow the aforementioned 12-step methodology.

“In the 24-Hour Groups, the godfather becomes the higher power ; for the godchild, he's practically a god. This breaks down the barrier of equality, and they become the mafia that enslaves them,” he explains. “The kids become slaves to their godfathers , who order them around: 'Paint my room,' 'Clean my car,' 'Take me for a walk,' 'Go find my wife'... From these small things to obedience in absolutely everything,” he exemplifies.

Among the most gruesome issues he's covered is "the relapse ceremony." Although it's very difficult to leave the annexes where they live, "when they do , they relapse, no matter what ; and when they return, they undergo this ceremony in which they are placed in the front row, and all their classmates pass by and humiliate them for hours. Anyone who suffers this ends up completely annihilated."

He has also found testimonies of the "body present ceremony." He explains that when a person dies, before calling the police or an ambulance , their body is exposed. "I've heard of two hours in Madrid and two days in Galicia," he says. "They show it so people can see how they can end up." He says the types of deaths that have occurred to him have been "natural": lack of hygiene or malnutrition. He adds that people who arrive there with medication are taken away from them and "they are only given it if they deem it necessary. This causes some to 'go crazy,' ending up destroying something and hurting themselves."

This newspaper has had access to several testimonies from people who claim to have been involved, both from the aforementioned complaints and from spoken and written conversations. Among the messages, some stand out, such as that of a man who was within the groups for years , who explains that "the usual modus operandi is to 'protect' the female members by making it seem as though they are more vulnerable than the men and that they need different treatment. They are usually submissive, even more so than the men, and they comply with all the requests of the sponsors (in almost all cases, men)."

A woman who spent months in one of these centers describes the space where she lived: "The women in the annex are kept in a barn that was previously a workshop, and has no ventilation whatsoever. [...] In the event of a fire , the women's annex, which is the furthest from the exit door, would be completely trapped."

Added to this are the testimonies from WhatsApp groups where they mock a man's fainting spelling, "another Simon," as they call someone who suffers an alcohol coma.

How they take money from people

The Logroño resident explains that when a person arrives at these centers, they keep their ID , ask for their bank account details , and withdraw all the money they have on them .

As for the supposedly free care , it ends after 30 days: “After a month, they start asking you for money and always use the same arguments: 'We saved your life. Do you know what your life costs? Is that how you value your life?' With all these phrases, they force you, little by little, to give everything you have. And since they know what you have left in your account, they squeeze you accordingly.”

They also ask families for money , “who are usually unhinged by the alcoholic and are easier to play with.” “Since public health care doesn’t really take in alcoholics for more than two days, that’s where the cunning of the members of the 24-hour groups comes in because they know it’s easy to convince the family. They call them, pretend to be Alcoholics Anonymous, and tell them, ‘Look, I have your son here, he’s well cared for, but we need x money,’ and the desperate families pay,” she explains, adding that if they want to go and see the center, “that day they are in charge of showering the person they’re going to see and keeping everything clean.”

" They're also experts at getting money from all over the place. For example, they get the alcoholic a job and keep his salary; and they even have the crap to pretend they're going on a trip and ask families for 'x' amount of money for that weekend, but then they don't actually take them to the accommodations or restaurants they claim," the book's author adds.

The Network for the Prevention of Sects and Abuse of Weakness ( RedUNE ) has also received several reports that all of the practices described above are currently occurring in Spain, according to its president, Juantxo Domínguez, who explained to this newspaper.

El Confidencial has contacted the 24-Hour Group of Alcoholics Anonymous to hear their version of events. Initially, they decided not to participate, acting in accordance with their "statement": "We cannot enter into any type of public debate or controversy, nor evaluate the opinions or statements of others." However, they open the door to providing information "if at any later time I wish to write an article about a specific 24-Hour Group, about the work it does, or about the 24-Hour AA Free Services Movement as a whole." When asked directly about the enslavement of people, the emotional destruction , the exhibition of corpses, or the impersonation of the original AA, they insist on "not participating in any type of public debate or controversy."

Is it a cult?

Labarga summarizes that the 24 Hour Group is "a cult that masquerades as Alcoholics Anonymous. It's actually a perversion of the latter and uses elements of AA in a perfidious way."

For cult expert Luis Santamaría del Río , this movement fits perfectly into the concept of a cult : “It's a sectarian movement that has parasitized Alcoholics Anonymous. Using the name and appearance of traditional Alcoholics Anonymous, it is recruiting people in extremely vulnerable situations in order to exert total control over them. And it fulfills Vicente Jara's definition of a cult to the letter : a predatory social group that practices mimicry and decoy.”

Santamaría, a founding member of the Ibero-American Network for the Study of Cults (RIES), explains that all the elements are present : "There's predation involved in this search for victims, especially in extreme life situations. There's also mimicry, posing as Alcoholics Anonymous. And there's also the lure, which is offering liberation from alcohol."

In addition to those mentioned, he also points to other cult practices he has discovered while investigating the 24-Hour Groups, such as "surrounding the person who arrives so that they feel they need that group at that moment in their life and think that they are people dedicated to helping them. They also cut ties with the outside world , with an isolation that in this case is less subtle than in other cults , here it is brutal: they go so far as to isolate people physically in the annexes they have in the premises, in addition to withdrawing their documentation and the possibility of telephone communication. To all this we must add that what seemed to be done to help alcoholics ends up turning into a business in which they make money off alcoholics and their families ."

The cult expert also speaks of the "slavery" they suffer, since "the group takes ownership of the person, which happens thanks to the figure of the godfather . The godfather ends up being the person's personal guru, whom they make believe owes their life and salvation to the group's work. That person is then obligated to do everything, and having supposedly pulled them out of that self-destructive situation that was leading them to hell, the follower becomes a slave to this supposed paradise they have entered."

He also emphasizes the recruitment of people who are especially vulnerable due to their economic situation, adding, "That everything happens in an atmosphere of verbal and psychological violence , which is done explicitly and which, to any well-off observer, would immediately cause rejection. But when a person arrives destroyed, with no other options, seeing that everything around them and inside them is crumbling because of addiction... in these groups, no matter how violent, vile, or brutal they may be, the person ends up clinging to that burning nail."

The president of RedUNE, for his part, agrees: "It can be considered a sect or coercive group, which is the term we currently use most commonly." And to argue that it is, he uses the same arguments as Santamaría.

Police sources tell this newspaper that no investigation has been opened as such so far, and that the difficulty in investigating is due to the fact that, according to the president of RedUNE , "with today's law, complaints fall into disuse , because the Penal Code does not, as such, define coercive persuasion; it only refers to coercion. And as we see every day in the courts, coercion is so broad and vague that depending on who interprets it, you don't go any further." In fact, given this legal vacuum, last year RedUNE submitted 300,000 signatures to Congress to include coercive persuasion of sects in the Penal Code.

Both the cult expert and the author of the book, having both immersed themselves in the 24-hour Groups, clearly see the impersonation of the real AA.

In 2018, the Mexican AA headquarters —the country where the organization in question originated —distanced itself from the 24-Hour Groups of Alcoholics Anonymous , following a news report alleging that “the name of Alcoholics Anonymous was being associated with an event that does not correspond to AA or its affiliated groups.” On that occasion, in a statement , they bluntly stated that “they do not recognize as AA any association that illegally uses the name Alcoholics Anonymous as a surname and engages in practices that are foreign to traditional principles.”

The letter also emphasized that “AA does not operate 24 hours a day , does not offer any type of inpatient or residential service; it also does not have a rehabilitation center , farms, annexes, clinics, or any shelter.” “The name Alcoholics Anonymous , its initials AA , and its logo are not in the public domain,” the letter added.

When asked by this newspaper whether this impersonation exists in Spain, the Spanish headquarters, located in Asturias, responded with a statement adhering to one of its principles: "We do not wish to intervene in disputes." However, the aforementioned document does clarify that AA "does not provide accommodation, food, work, or money."

Regarding the reaction to AA in Spain, the cult expert points out that although he is unaware of the internal reality of the organization, "from experience, these reactions to parasitic cult strategies like the one AA is suffering from the 24 Hours Group are usually due to a complex reality that ranges from the opinion that 'it's not that big a deal' [for not seriously listening to the victims and mistakenly believing that silence will avoid reputational damage] to complicity and even infiltration in the highest levels of the organization."

AA's evolution towards the Minnesota model

Labarga signs The Darkest Night of Alcoholics Anonymous with Jorge A. and Manuel P. , a way of indicating their surnames in keeping with AA's philosophy of anonymity. The book, in addition to analyzing the denounced group, also speaks of an evolution in addiction treatment models , a fact that has contributed to the former's greater popularity. More specifically, the book criticizes the "invasion" of the Minnesota model in AA groups . This way of operating follows a therapeutic approach to the treatment of addictions based on a structured program that originated at the Minnesota Foundation Addiction Treatment Center (which later became the Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation). This model is primarily known for its 12-step approach and has a strong orientation toward total abstinence from addictive substances.

Jorge A. recounts that when he first joined an AA group in 1987, it was characterized by a “much freer and more flexible” approach . He explains to this newspaper that for him, one of the most important aspects of these groups was the identification and empathy between members, rather than a “rigid and dogmatic” structure. He recalls that when he joined, “people accepted you just because; they didn’t try to get anything out of you or demand a certain behavior from you,” which generated an atmosphere of genuine appreciation and personal commitment. This type of community, in which autonomy was practiced, allowed each member to participate at their own pace and understanding of spiritual principles, always emphasizing freedom and mutual respect.

Following a personal tragedy, Jorge returned in 2009 , having been sober for 22 years, to a completely different atmosphere. “The atmosphere had changed radically, and instead of the freedom and respect he had experienced at the beginning, he began to notice that the meetings had become more dogmatic and rigid, with a focus on obedience and a moral structure that felt alien to him,” he explains. “I began to see how they were ignoring me… turning it into a terrifying dogmatism, robbing us of our ability to interpret,” he adds. This change made him feel that, instead of offering empathy and support, the members were beginning to impose a strict methodology alien to what he had previously experienced.

Without a doubt, Jorge believes that the change he experienced was due to the implementation of the Minnesota model, which began to gain ground in the groups starting in 2009. Jorge, Labarga, and Santamaría believe that the establishment of the Minnesota model responds to a commercial and control interest on the part of some clinics that practice this approach . In their view, the model was implemented to adapt the groups to the needs of these clinics , which, by charging large sums for their treatments, needed to create groups that replicated their structure, rather than the free, open-access AA meetings. As Jorge points out, “what they needed was to tailor the groups to their clinics… anyone charging you that kind of money, to me, is exactly the same as a drug dealer, all they're doing is trafficking in your pain and that of your family.” For him, the Minnesota model represents a form of “indoctrination” and “emotional exploitation” that turns recovery into a business, rather than a genuine experience of support and personal growth.