Psychic Says He Talks to Dead People, and He's Coming to Mission Viejo

It's been a rough week for psychics.

At least it has for Sylvia Browne, the medium who, back in 2004, told Louwana Miller, the mother of Amanda Berry -- who'd been missing from her Cleveland neighborhood for 19 months -- that her daughter was dead. 

“She’s not alive, honey,” Browne told Miller on an episode of Montel Williams' TV show. “Your daughter’s not the kind who wouldn’t call.”

As has been widely reported over the past few days, Miller died in 2006 believing her daughter was dead.

But, as everyone around the world now knows, Berry wasn't dead. She was found alive this week after escaping with two other women from a house where she was held captive all these years.

Browne, for her part, has been mea culping all over the place, telling the Huffington Post "only God is right all the time."

James Van Praagh is another famed psychic, one who claims to speak with dead people. He's made a lot of loot doing this. And he's coming back to Orange County. On June 6, he'll charge $100 a head for a three-hour "special evening of connecting to the spiritual realms" at the In-Spirit Center for Spiritual Living in Mission Viejo.

Then, on Aug. 5, comes an even bigger paycheck: a five-day "Mastering Mediumship Class" at the Aliso Creek Inn in Laguna Beach, where Van Praagh will -- for the low, low price of $425! -- teach you to, among other things, "understand all six of your senses ... enhance your aura ... and connect with deceased loved ones."

"Through lecture, experiential meditations, and developmental and intuitive exercises, James will share effective techniques for accurately describing personality traits, physical appearance, names, dates, and other details of those with whom you make contact," the class description claims.

Lunch will not be provided. But maybe you predicted that.

Is this a crock? The James Randi Educational Foundation folks sure think it is. They're the ones who dressed up in their zombie best and staged a highly entertaining caught-on-video protest against Van Praagh -- a Praagh-test? -- when he held a previous event, also at Aliso Creek, in 2011. 

[You can watch the video by clicking the YouTube icon in the photo box above.]

"We're not rabble rousing," JREF president D.J. Grothe said at the time. "(T)his is a guy who is taking advantage of people's grief. He's not performing for entertainment, he's claiming he's giving messages from dead relatives. He gets people when they are at their lowest and sees them as his target market."

Grothe tells Patch his group likely won't demonstrate against Van Praagh on any of his summer swings through Orange County, largely because Van Praagh has beefed up his security to prevent people -- dead and undead -- from dropping by uninvited and calling him out.