A Nxivm “slave master” took the stand Friday against her one-time “grandmaster” Keith Raniere, divulging the alleged upstate sex cult’s naked meetings with the Svengali-like leader.
Raniere kept his eyes glued to Lauren Salzman as she was grilled in Brooklyn federal court about her high-ranking role within Nxivm’s women-only subset, DOS.
“He was my master. He was my most important person,” Salzman, dressed in all black, testified in a soft voice. “I looked up to him. I wanted to be like him.”
The now 42-year-old was introduced to Raniere in 1998 by her mother-turned-co-defendant Nancy.
Nancy said she and Raniere were starting a “human-potential school” and urged her daughter to take courses for six months, Salzman recalled.
Salzman, then 21, enrolled in the program — and soon became “a slave with Keith as my master” before being promoted to a “master with others under me,” she said.
Prosecutors say slaves within DOS were forced to be branded with Raniere’s initials in their nether regions, keep dangerously thin — and sleep with their “grandmaster.”
The exclusive group, Salzman said, met three times a week for 10 hours at what was known as “the sorority house.”
“At the start of every meeting, we would take a naked photograph for Keith. It had to be fully frontally naked and our brands had to show,” she explained. “We had to look uniform and fully happy.”
Raniere also showed up on occasion.
“When he attended, we would all get undressed and sit below him,” Salzman said. “He would sit above us on a chair” with his clothes on.
She ticked off a list of other “first-line slaves,” including “Smallville” actress Allison Mack.
Salzman, her mother Nancy and Mack were all charged alongside Raniere when feds busted the Albany-area cult last year. Seagram’s heiress and Nxivm bookkeeper Clare Bronfman was also arrested.
All of the women have pleaded guilty to charges — though Salzman is the only co-defendant known to be cooperating with the feds.