Machine linked to anthrax threat has a distinctive past

Monday, Feb. 23, 1998 | 10:46 a.m.

A mysterious machine with alleged miracle powers helped put Ronald G. Rockwell at center of the anthrax scare last week in Southern Nevada.

The machine, which Overton medical researcher William Job Leavitt Jr. had discussed with Rockwell, was supposed to assist Leavitt in finding cures for today's deadliest diseases, including AIDS.

Rockwell was known in alternative medical circles for owning the patent to the centuries-old device, called the Rife Regenerator.

In addition to discussing the Rife Regenerator, Leavitt wanted to buy Rockwell's own invention, the AZ58 Ray Tube, which supposedly kills bacteria, Rockwell said.

The Rife Regenerator has a colorful history, according to research in alternative health journals.

Supporters claim the first reported treatment with the machine was conducted by Franz Anton Mesmer, who, in conjunction with his noninvasive device, applied magnets to his patients' bodies in trying to cure the sick. He is reported to have treated Mozart, Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette.

Skeptical French government officials launched an investigation into the magnets at about the same time that American inventor Benjamin Franklin and French chemist Antoine Lavoisier concluded Mesmer was a fraud.

Along came Royal Raymond Rife, a San Diego inventor.

Attempting to improve on the technique in the 1930s, Rife developed instruments, including a 200-pound microscope, that he thought would kill bacteria and viruses by using rays and magnetic energy that did not invade the body.

In about 1933, Rife built a giant microscope to view living viruses. He reported that it magnified them 70,000 times or more.

As he studied the polarized light that lit the viruses and bacteria, he thought that the Rife Regenerator, as it is now called, could kill any virus or bacteria harmlessly in the body, without a patient having to take drugs.

By tuning the instrument in to a special frequency, known as the Mortal Oscillatory Rate, the infection cell explodes, Rife said.

But before his work was done Rife died in 1971, broke and unknown in San Diego.

Even so, some adherents swore by the product.

Those include Rockwell, the informant who alerted the FBI Wednesday to a Green Valley research institute, where Leavitt and another man, Larry Wayne Harris, planned to test new machinery.

Rockwell sells the Rife Regenerator through Rockwell Scientific Research , L.L.C., and owns and operates Rife Research Laboratory in Las Vegas.

As an example of the machine's effectiveness, Rockwell cites his own experience.

In a brochure, Rockwell said he suffered in 1973 from a large tumor blocking his sinuses, the area "with the root of the tumor" growing back inside his head.

Given eight months to a year to live, Rockwell spent six weeks treating the growth with 3 percent hydrogen peroxide, magnetic polarizers and an AZ58 ray-tube frequency instrument, according to the pamphlet. When he returned to his doctor, the tumor was gone, Rockwell says.

Skeptics might wonder what Leavitt and Rockwell hoped to achieve with the machine.

Neither Leavitt nor Rockwell is a registered microbiologist, said a spokesman for the professional organization that counts 44,000 members worldwide.

"The American Society of Microbiology expects that all members will use their knowledge and skills for the advancement of human welfare and deplores any misuse of microbiology and information derived from the microbiological sciences," Jim Sliwa, ASM director of public relations, said.

"We have a code of ethics that discourages any use of microbiology contrary to the welfare of humankind," Sliwa said.

The Rife Regenerator is not endorsed by the Food and Drug Administration.

Leavitt had mentioned the Rife technology in a two-hour appearance Feb. 13 on the Lou Epton Show broadcast on KXNT 840-AM radio.

Leavitt said he had planned to test the device on viruses and cancer cells.

Epton asked, "So, you find the frequency of the virus or the bacteria, you create a counter frequency that would destroy the bacteria or the virus, the problem would be gone, now have I missed anything?"

Leavitt said, "That's essentially it, Lou. But in combination with it, you've got to involve an overall systemic approach with the patient, because we need to be very careful not to overload in any way, because when we break down the virus, toxins are released, so that's one of the important components and why Mr. Rockwell and I are working together, because I have a piece of technology that will take care of the detoxification aspect of this, and you couple the two together and you've got the original Rife technology with Mr. Rockwell's innovative technology and couple it with mine, and you've got something that provides a really unique opportunity to be safe physiologically for the patient, and then we monitor the patient."

Epton asked, "Is that much toxicology possibly being left when the bacteria or virus are destroyed?"

Leavitt said, "Yes, once they're broken down they're releasing toxins, and with this technology of Mr. Rockwell's, one of the concerns is you don't want to overload the excrematory function of the body. We bring in my technology, which really assists in that process."

"Is it also electronic?" Epton asked.

"It's another form," Leavitt said. "We're using an excrematory circuit to help and assist the body's normal excrematory functions through liver, kidneys, etc., to detect so that you don't get any overload of normal organs."

Epton asked, "If I had the (Rife) generator here right now and was involved in the useage of it, am I possibly creating a problem for my body?"

"It depends," Leavitt said. "The patient has to be looked at on a real individual basis. Obviously, someone who is in really good health and everything's functioning with good hydration, etc., it would be safe."