Sect Allows Glimpse Into Its N.Y. Office Leader’s Likeness Dominates Apartment Near Grand Central

Up the stairs and behind the red door with a sign reading “Aum Sublime Truth,” a man sat cross-legged on a carpet, staring at a shrine and listening to the soft hum of Buddhist chants on tape.

The office is one of several around the world of the Japanese-based sect Aum Shinri Kyo, suspected by Japanese authorities of being behind the nerve-gas poisoning that killed 10 people and injured more than 5,000 in Tokyo’s subways Monday.

The walls of the cramped apartment in midtown Manhattan are plastered with posters of the sect’s bearded leader, Shoko Asahara, and a bookcase is filled with tracts of his teachings.

Asahara and his top aides vanished after police found evidence of suspicious chemicals at the Buddhist sect’s commune in Japan. Former followers and investigators said conditions in the cult’s compounds and communes were filthy, bizarre and cruel.

An FBI spokesman, Joseph Valiquette, refused to say Thursday whether agents are watching the New York office, just blocks from Grand Central terminal.

Down the hall from the office, tailor Manuel Barraza said the sect’s quarters always have been quiet during the day, with very few comings and goings. “I don’t know about at night,” he said.

Asahara visited the office about six months ago, and an aide brought Barraza a pair of the leader’s blue jeans to be shortened.

Subha, a young Japanese woman who identified herself as office manager, reluctantly invited three reporters into the apartment but spent most of a brief interview politely parrying questions.

“I am not in a position to tell you anything,” she said. “Please ask the master why we are here. I am only one of the disciples. I do not want to make trouble for the members.”

She said she has spoken with Asahara once since the gas attack. When asked about their conversation, she handed out copies of a statement denying the sect was involved.

Subha allowed a glimpse into the larger room, where the man was meditating. He glanced briefly over his shoulder at the visitors, then turned back to his taped mantras and the shrine with Asahara’s picture.

Subha described the group’s activities in New York as typically Buddhist: practicing yoga, teaching meditation and self-discipline. “Every practice here is to build personal energy,” she said.

She said the media purposely were trying to undermine the group by linking it to the subway attack and “degenerating the consciousness” of its members.

“I have to purify our word for the benefit of the people. That is the teaching of Buddhism,” she said.