James R. Lewis (scholar)

James R. Lewis is a professional writer and academic specializing in new religious movements and New Age. He was born in Leonardtown, Maryland, and raised in New Port Richey, Florida. He received his Ph.D. in Religious Studies from the University of Wales, Lampeter, in the United Kingdom, and pursued a career as a professional reference book writer in the 1990s. He currently teaches in the University of Wisconsin system and, on an adjunct basis, at DePaul University. A prolific author, he won Choice book awards for his Cults in America and for The Oxford Handbook of New Religious Movements. He currently edits a series on Contemporary Religions for Brill, and co-edits a series on Controversial New Religions for Ashgate.

Aum Shinrikyo
In May 1995, after the sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway, he and fellow scholar Gordon Melton flew to Japan to hold a pair of press conferences in which they announced that the chief suspect in the murders, religious group Aum Shinrikyo, could not have produced the sarin that the attacks had been committed with. They had determined this, Lewis said, from photos and documents provided by the group. Police reports describe that they had discovered at Aum's main compound in March a sophisticated chemical weapons laboratory that was capable of producing thousands of kilograms a year of the poison. Later investigation showed that Aum not only created the sarin used in the subway attacks, but had committed previous chemical and biological weapons attacks, including a previous attack with sarin that had killed seven and injured 144 persons. During the Aum Shinrikyo incident Lewis and Melton's bills for travel, lodging and accommodations were paid for by Aum, according to The Washington Post.