Board of Directors
Our Board Members are dedicated to our success through steering the Lalich Center to a sustainable future. With many years of combined experience and expertise, they have each made a strong commitment to help us reach our goals.
Phil Elberg
Phil Elberg is a retired New Jersey lawyer. For many years he was managing partner at the Newark litigation firm, Medvin and Elberg, where he worked extensively in litigation involving there presentation of youth abused in institutional settings. That work caused him to become an activist for issues associated with abuses at “behavior modification” and “tough love” facilities, including a New Jersey facility where he exposed horrific abuse of New Jersey adolescents.
He has consulted with numerous lawyers around the country on adolescent abuse issues and with investigators from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) in the Congressional investigation of Residential Treatment Programs for Troubled Youth.
With several other activists, he formed a website called ASTARTFORTEENS.ORG.
He was a founder and served as Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Newark Public Radio (WBGO), Newark Essex Legal Services, and the International Cultic Studies Association.
He lives in Montclair, New Jersey.
Dr. Natalie Fabert
Dr. Natalie Fabert is a licensed psychologist and university lecturer. She holds a B.A. from the University of California, Santa Barbara, a Master’s in Counselor Education, and a Ph.D. in Counseling Psychology from Arizona State University, where she also completed a postdoctoral residency at the University of California, Davis. She teaches at Arizona State University, where she developed and launched the undergraduate course The Social Psychology of Cults, and teaches across areas including social psychology, psychopathology, addiction treatment, and professional practice.
Dr. Fabert is also an active clinician, specialising in trauma and abuse recovery, health psychology, and anxiety and adjustment disorders. She has been in private practice for the past six years and previously worked in university counselling centres and integrated primary care settings.
Polly Thomas
Polly Thomas is a California attorney, retired after a long career in Legal Aid and as an Administrative Law Judge. A survivor of involvement in a political cult, she has a longstanding interest in recovery from coercive and abusive relationships. She advocates for greater legal recognition of the harms caused by coercive persuasion and its use in controlling others. Thomas previously served on the Advisory Board of Survivors of Institutional Abuse.
Adam Kunz
Adam Kunz is an assistant professor at the University of Wisconsin–Eau Claire, where he teaches political philosophy and constitutional law. He holds a Ph.D. from the University of California, Davis, and a J.D. from The George Washington University Law School.
Raised in a rural Mormon community in southeastern Idaho, Kunz spent the first 25 years of his life deeply embedded in that environment. His subsequent move to Washington, D.C. for law school marked the beginning of a significant shift in his perspective on religion, society, and the treatment of others. His research and teaching focus on tolerance, the limits of religious freedom, and theories of justice.