Body of woman believed to be leader of 'cult' "Love Has Won" discovered by SCSO deputies in Moffat

website photo of Amy Carlson known as "Mother God" to followers

MOFFAT — On April 28, 2020, SCSO deputies served a search on a house in Moffat where they discovered the remains of a woman believed to Amy Carlson, aka "Mother God" and leader of "Love Has Won", a religious group that resided in the Crestone area until last year. Seven individuals were taken into custody and charged with Abuse of a Corpse and two counts of Child Abuse on April 28. Appropriate placement was found for the two children.

Arrested were Jason Castillo, Ryan Kramer, Karin Raymond, John Robertson, Christopher Royer, Sarah Rudolph and Ma Obdulia Franco Gonzales. They are currently being held in the Rio Grande County Jail in Del Norte, due to limited capacity in the Saguache County Jail.

The arrest warrant, obtained by the Courier on Friday from the Saguache County Clerk’s office, stated that Miguel Lamboy, who made the initial report, knew the deceased woman as Lia Carlson. When asked to confirm the identity of the woman as Amy Carlson, Saguache County Sheriff Dan Warwick stated no positive identification had been made by the coroner at this time and, due to it still being an active investigation, he was reluctant to comment any further.

However, the arrest warrant listed the birthday of Lia Carlson as November 30, 1975, the same date listed in the "About me" section of Carlson's website. Warwick was also familiar with Carlson from previous encounters and confirmed that Amy Carlson went by the name Lia Carlson.

Miguel Lamboy, who is believed to be a member of “Love Has Won”, lives with his two-year-old son in the house in Moffat. According to the warrant, Lamboy said he spent all day Wednesday, April 27, away from his house. When he returned he said, according to the arrest warrant, “people were needing a place to stay.”

Lamboy was gone much of Thursday, as well. When he returned home, he found the deceased body of a woman whom he said he said was Lia Carlson. He said Ms. Carlson’s skin was “grey in color” and “her eyes were missing”, adding that she was wrapped in a blanket and appeared “mummified” with “her teeth exposed through her lips.”

At that point, Lamboy attempted to leave with his son, but the people staying with him would not allow him to take the child. Lamboy left and drove to Salida where he reported the death of a woman to Sergeant Orth with the Salida Police Department (SPD). Orth immediately contacted the sheriff’s office in Saguache who obtained a search warrant for Lamboy’s residence.

According to the arrest warrant, deputies found the “mummified remains” of Carlson lying on a bed in a back bedroom, wrapped in a sleeping bag. There was “glitter type makeup around the eyes”, and her body was “decorated with Christmas lights” and “set up in some type of shrine.”

When making the report to the SPD Sergeant Orth, Lamboy said he believed the people had transported the remains to his house from California, adding that the vehicle they showed up in was a Nissan Rouge. SCSO deputies found such a vehicle on the property with license plates from California. When looking in through the window, deputies saw the rear passenger seat “in a way consistent with someone transporting the mummified remains.”

The arrest warrant stated that “Love Has Won” is known to “take in people from all over the world” and the “Saguache County Sheriff’s Office has received many complaints from families in the United States saying that the group is brainwashing people and taking their money.”

When asked, Sheriff Warwick said that he had “had calls from family members of people in the group who were concerned about them” but “there was never any criminal activity.”

“Love Has Won”, which reportedly began roughly fifteen years ago, was known to be in the Crestone area in 2018, which may lead some to believe the group is primarily local.

But the group’s Facebook page has close to 20,000 followers with page managers located in the United States, Mexico and Slovenia. Daily livestream events appear on Facebook, featuring followers who deliver messages that will last two and three hours long. Those people appear to be streaming from various places, including South Africa and Australia, and the messages are delivered in several languages.

Carlson, aka Mother God, is the nucleus of the group and claims that she is 19 billion years old and has been reincarnated over 580 times. In past lives, she says, she was Jesus Christ, Joan of Arc and Marilyn Monroe. Carlson claims she is here to save the planet and will ultimately lead 144,000 enlightened people from this world to a mystical fifth dimension and those who do not worship her will be “recycled” to a burning sun.

According to family members, interviewed on a two-part segment of the Dr. Phil show, prior to becoming “Mother God”, Carlson was a three-time-married mother of three children who was working at McDonald’s. And then, in 2006, she left it all behind to fulfill, what Carlson describes as, “her mission on earth.”

In addition to “Mother God”, there is Jason Castillo, who goes by the name “Father God” or Lucifer. Like Carlson, Castillo has his own pre-Love Has Won history, which, according to a short documentary which aired on Vice, included run-ins with the law for drunken driving, breaking and entering and neglect of a child. In other videos that have surfaced, Castillo appears to have been responsible for “disciplining” some of the followers.

“Love Has Won” describes itself as a religious organization but many, including both observers and former followers, claim the group functions more as a cult. Former followers report being regularly limited to 4-5 hours of sleep, banned from sitting down for long periods of time and allowed to only eat a certain amount of food. There are also disturbing videos that have surfaced, some of which show Carlson screaming into the camera and verbally abusing members of the group for failures, such as bringing her the wrong kind of Italian food.

Nonetheless, those who are still believers in “Mother God” are quick to explain the videos away, stating they were taken out of context or are demonstrations of how others – who are driven by their egos – fail to understand the pain Mother God experiences as she “carries the hurt of us all.”

“Love Has Won” was essentially forced to flee the Crestone area when an incident occurred involving the banishment of a new member to the desert where he was left, naked, to fend for himself. His family, concerned when they couldn’t reach him, came searching for him and found him, three days after being abandoned, severely dehydrated and disoriented.

Upon leaving Crestone, part of the group – including Carlson, Castillo and Lombay – traveled to Hawaii where, as was reported by Keith Cerny in a September 9, 2020 edition of the Valley Courier, a group of roughly 100 protesters demanded they leave. The group then resurfaced in Mt. Shasta where, according to coverage in the local news, they received a less than welcoming reception.

It is not known at this time where Carlson, Castillo and other members of the group went from Mt. Shasta. Neither is it known when Carlson passed away. 

However, when asked if he was aware that members of “Love Has Won” had returned to the Crestone area, Sheriff Warwick replied, “When did they come back? Some of them never left.”


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