Mexican officials broke up a bizarre cult that allegedly ran a sex-slavery ring among its followers on the U.S. border, authorities said Tuesday.

The "Defensores de Cristo" or "Defenders of Christ" cult allegedly recruited women to have sex with a Spanish man who claimed he was the reincarnation of Christ. Followers were subjected to forced labor or sexual services, including prostitution, according to a victims' advocacy group that said it filed a complaint more than a year ago about the cult.

Federal police, agents of Mexico's National Immigration Institute and prosecutors raided a house earlier this week near Nuevo Laredo, across the border from Laredo, Texas, and found cult members, including children, living in filthy conditions

The institute said 14 foreigners were detained in the raid and have been turned over to prosecutors, pending possible charges.

Those detained include six Spaniards, and two people each from Brazil, Bolivia and Venezuela. One person from Argentina and one from Ecuador were also detained.  Spain's Foreign Affairs Ministry confirmed its citizens were among those arrested.

The institute said 10 Mexicans were also found at the house, mainly women, and are presumably among the victims of the cult.

The Attorney General's Office said the investigation was still under way as to what charges, if any, might apply in the case. Given the binds of sect loyalty that had been built over an estimated three years, prosecutors were still trying to work out which of the detainees may be considered victims, and which were abusers.

The institute said the sect's leaders made members pay "tithes," with money or forced labor.

An official of the institute who was not authorized to be quoted by name said that women were recruited to the sect and then were forced to have sex with sect elders; the official described it as a form of human trafficking that included prostitution.

Spaniard Ignacio Gonzalez de Arriba set up shop in Mexico about three years ago, after a stint in Brazil and other parts of South America.

He quickly became involved in offering courses on "bio-programming," an esoteric practice that claims to allow practicants to 'reprogram' their brains to eliminate pain, suffering and anxiety.

But according to the Defenders of Christ website, he quickly moved on to claim that he was Jesus Christ reincarnated.

Photos of Gonzalez de Arriba are juxtaposed with a painting of Christ, purportedly showing how the Spaniards eyebrows, nose and mouth are "exactly like" those of Christ.

Myrna Garcia, and activist with the Support Network for Cult Victims who has worked with victims of the Defenders of Christ cult, said Gonzalez de Arriba "mixed bio-programming, Christian and New Age doctrines and fears about the end of the world ... to control followers, to keep them terrorized."

"He made them believe he was Christ," said Garcia, whose group filed a complaint with Mexican authorities about the cult's abuses about one year ago. "Like Christ, they have to adore him, if not they will lose their souls ... they have to give their lives for him."

"There were women who were forced into prostitution," Garcia noted. "It was a form of human trafficking that was extraordinarily effect from the criminal point of view," she said, because the women were terrified of being separated from the sect.

How the cult managed to thrive in an area of Mexico that is tightly controlled by the violent Zetas drug cartel remains a mystery. However, there could be some link; Gonzalez de Arriba first set up shop in the northern city of Torreon, which also has a strong Zeta's influence.

The immigration institute said in a press release that the Defenders of Christ was headed by Venezuelan citizen Jose Arenas Losanger Segovia, but according to Garcia and the cult's website, he was clearly a lieutenant of Gonzalez de Arriba.

The Interior Department said the Defenders of Christ had not registered as a religious group, as required under Mexican law. Garcia said cells of the cult might still be active in Peru and Argentina.

Ariel Schalit / AP

Books by American science fiction writer and founder of Scientology L. Ron Hubbard on display at the Scientology center in port city of Jaffa, Israel, where Scientology opened a new center in August.

TEL AVIV, Israel —The Church of Scientology has apparently found one place where its presence doesn't set off alarms, protests and demonstrations, and that place is one of the world's most religiously fraught countries — Israel.

In August, Scientology opened a gleaming new headquarters in the ancient port city of Jaffa, part of Tel Aviv. Since then, visitors and the curious have streamed through with no incidents.

And this in a country where Jews and Muslims harbor clashing claims over the same holy sites, sometimes sparking violence, and competing Jewish streams disparage each other openly and often.

Scientology has confronted charges in many countries that it is a dangerous cult that brainwashes its followers and confiscates their assets. Its leaders deny that.

"Like any new religion, people have misconceptions and much doubt, but we simply use logic to think life out for ourselves and are taught to question and debate everything," said Sefi Fischler, the church's spokesmen in Tel Aviv.

According to its website, Scientology believes man is an immortal spiritual being with unlimited capabilities. Its practices include spiritual counseling.

Created by American science fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard in 1954, the Los Angeles-based movement claims millions of members worldwide, including celebrities like actors Tom Cruise and John Travolta. It has been blamed as the catalyst behind the well-documented breakup of Cruise and his ex-wife Katie Holmes.

Church of Scientology denies it seeks to censor TomKat comments

Germany, France and Russia are among the governments that keep a close eye on Scientology, and court cases have been filed against the church in some places.

In contrast, there hasn't been much public opposition in Israel.

While a 1987 Israeli parliamentary commission declared it a cult, the practice of Scientology in Israel is legal. The new headquarters has some 200 staff and claims to serve thousands.

Read more Israel coverage on NBCNews.com

Eytan Schwartz, a spokesman for Tel Aviv's mayor, said the new center is a testament to Israel's spirit of religious tolerance.

"Within just a few blocks of the center, you'll find numerous synagogues, several mosques and churches, 4,000 years of Abrahamic monotheistic religions expressing themselves," he said. "The Scientology center is simply showing that Tel Aviv is one of the most pluralistic cities in the Middle East."

Too warm a welcome?
Despite the lack of public protests at its new center, the church has no shortage of detractors. A group of Israeli Scientology defectors, claiming corruption within the church, started a breakaway center in the northern city of Haifa.

Yad L'Achim, an Israeli anti-missionary group, criticized the government for what it said was too warm a welcome.

"Politicians have diplomatically welcomed the center, because politics is all about being nice," Daniel Asor, a spokesman for the group, said. "Scientology is a cult, and this is a dangerous development."

Rock Center: Tom Cruise's former Scientology auditor speaks about Cruise/Kidman divorce

Israeli movie director Erez Meshulam said the presence of the new center is disastrous. "Scientology ruined my marriage by convincing my wife, in return for thousands and thousands of dollars, that her soul could be cleansed," he said. "I fear this means more people will be fooled."

Church officials dismiss such criticism as baseless.

Fischler said the center hopes to bridge gaps among religions in the country. He noted its anti-drug and literacy efforts and outreach programs to prison inmates.

"Now with the building open, we can invite everybody in and show them who we are," he said.

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Updated at 6:20 p.m. ET: Practitioners of the Falun Gong spiritual movement in San Francisco claim they have been the targets of a series of assaults orchestrated by the Chinese consulate, and they’re urging police and prosecutors to investigate the incidents as hate crimes.

Falun Gong practitioners have been harassed and assaulted at least nine times in past eight months -- seven times in Chinatown alone, said Sherry Zhang, spokeswoman for the Falun Gong in San Francisco. Police reports were filed in at least three cases, she said.

“We definitely want them to take this very seriously. It definitely is not an isolated incident anymore,” Zhang told msnbc.com on Wednesday.

San Francisco police said there's no indication to date that Chinese authorities are behind the attacks.

Falun Gong is outlawed in China, where the Communist Party leadership in 1999 declared it a “heretical organization” and views it as a destructive cult. Falun Gong leaders claim their adherents are persecuted and tortured in China, and that followers in the U.S. and other countries are harassed by people loyal to the Chinese government.

Falun Gong followers in San Francisco last week showed a video of an alleged assault to the Board of Supervisors and also held a demonstration outside City Hall.

The video was of a June 10 incident on a street corner in San Francisco's Chinatown where a group of Falun Gong practitioners had gathered, holding signs and handing out literature detailing what they said was the persecution and torture of followers in China. 

In the video, which Zhang said was a compilation of shots by Falun Gong practitioners and bystanders, an older Chinese man in a hat allegedly curses at a Falun Gong member and then punches him in the face. As police arrive, another Chinese-speaking man in the crowd gestures toward a person filming the incident and, according to the videomaker’s translation, yells, “Don’t stare at me. If I in mainland China I would break your leg.” A 72-year-old man is being investigated for alleged battery in the case, according to the police report.

In another case on June 16, a Falun Gong member told police a Chinese man struck her wrist with a protest sign. The man was cited by police and released.

“These are hate crimes. The only reason for them is because people influenced by the Chinese Consulate want to attack Falun Gong,” Zhang told The Epoch Times, a newspaper founded by followers and supporters of Falun Gong.

“This attack targets a group of people because of their belief. In the United States, if you attack an individual or their belongings because of their belief, it’s regarded as a hate crime,” Ye Ning, a New York-based human rights attorney, told New Tang Dynasty Television, a broadcaster based in New York. “This incident in San Francisco does not appear to be a simple act of violence. There was no motive aside from hate."

The Chinese Consulate-General in San Francisco did not respond to a telephone call and email from msnbc.com for comment on Wednesday.

Police Officer Carlos Manfredi said Wednesday there's no indication in the police reports that the June 10 and June 16 incidents were the work of the Chinese consulate. 

"As of right now the two separate incidents were simple battery. The suspects were charged and have court dates," he said.

Manfredi said, however, that police are still collecting information on all the incidents.

San Francisco Police Chief Greg Suhr told New Dynasty Television that authorities take allegations of hate crimes seriously.

“If the investigation shows that the folks were attacked based on their religion, then absolutely that would be the motivation and that would be a hate crime,” he said.

He said he couldn’t comment on allegations the attacks were coordinated until the investigation is completed, the TV station reported.

Claims of abuse of Falun Gong practitioners by government authorities in China are not new. Amnesty International recently issued an appeal on its website calling for international action to free two Falun Gong practitioners it said were detained and “at risk of torture.”

In 2005, Chen Yonglin, a diplomat at the Chinese Consulate-General in Sydney, defected to Australia and later said his job entailed collecting names and reporting on Falun Gong practitioners.

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Asahi Shimbun / AFP/Getty Images

FILE PHOTO: On March 20, 1995, subway passengers waited to receive medical attention after inhaling nerve gas.

Updated at 7:11 a.m. ET: TOKYO - After 17 years on the run, the last remaining member of the Japanese doomsday cult wanted for the deadly 1995 sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway system was arrested by police Friday.

Katsuya Takahashi, a former member of the Aum Shirikyo cult who is believed to have been responsible for transporting cult members to the site of the subway attack, which left 13 dead and 54 wounded.

He was arrested at a 24 hour comic book cafe after a tip-off to Tokyo police from a cafe employee.

The search for Takahashi had been dormant for close to two decades, but took a dramatic turn earlier this month when another former cult member Naoko Kikuchi who had been wanted for her involvement in the sarin production, was apprehended by the police.

Suspect in 1995 Tokyo gas attack arrested in Japan

After questioning Kikuchi, investigators were able to piece together the last 17 years of Takahashi's life, leading them to the construction company where Takahashi had been working up until Kikuchi's arrest.

From there, surveillance videos surfaced capturing images of Takahashi at a nearby bank and a shopping center.

Takahashi has told police that he was only following orders from the cult, and wasn't aware of some of the operations' objectives.

AP / Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department via Kyodo News

Video footage of a surveillance camera released by Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department shows Katsuya Takahashi, a former member of Aum Shinrikyo cult, at a bank near Tokyo.

Although the principle ringleaders of the cult have long been convicted and sentenced, authorities are hoping that this arrest of the last Aum Shirikyo suspect will shed new facts and details on the cults' most heinous crimes.

The cult was founded in 1984 by leader Shoko Asahara on a doomsday principle that World War III would be instigated by the United States. Asahara predicted the world would come to an end in 1997.  

Msnbc.com staff contributed to this report.

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