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He has been described as knowledgeable, thorough, impartial.
He has been depicted as religiously biased, driven by his conservative Christian faith and unable to make a fair judgment.
Just who is the Rev. Robert Pardon, the man who served as the court-appointed cult expert in the Attleboro sect case?
"Robert Pardon is a man with an agenda,'' says J.W. Carney Jr., the highly respected Boston lawyer now representing David and Rebecca Corneau -- the jailed members of the Attleboro sect whose four children were previously taken from them by the courts, and who are now being held on contempt charges for failing to provide information about another birth in November.
"He is a self-proclaimed `de-programmer' whose job it is to convince people that his view of Christianity is the only correct one,'' Carney says of Pardon, who advised the court during the previous care and protection proceedings involving the Corneau children.
Repeating a comparison he recently made in court, Carney claims that appointing Pardon as a court expert regarding the parental fitness of the Corneaus was as inappropriate as appointing a member of the Nazi party to evaluate a Jewish couple's fitness to raise children, or a Ku Klux Klansman to evaluate an African-American family.
A Boston Globe columnist recently joined the fray, charging that Pardon is a man on a mission to convert others to his conservative way of believing, and to lure people away from any religion that doesn't fit his narrow view of Christianity.
These are harsh allegations for a man the court regards as an expert and praised for his professionalism and thoroughness.
Pardon calls the accusations "absolutely ab-surd,'' and says they are being made by people who have never spoken to him and who are taking his words and his re-search out of context.
"I wish these people would call me,'' Pardon said of his critics during an interview at the Lakeville office of New England Institute of Religious Research, the center he helped establish in 1991 and now directs. "I expect people to disagree with me. They should at least talk to me, and find out what I have done.''
Pardon says he finds it irritating that he is being accused of religious bias, when it was religious bias that led to the deaths of two children, referring to two babies who were buried by sect members in the woods of Maine.
One was Jeremiah Corneau, who died shortly after Rebecca gave birth to him at home without medical care, and the other was Samuel Robidoux, the 1-year-old son of sect members Jacques and Karen Robidoux, who was allowed to starve to death based on sect members' claims of revelations from God. The Robidoux are awaiting trial on charges in connection with the death of their son.
While the Corneaus are not being charged criminally in that death, the court is considering all the parents as one group in the custody cases because the families in the sect lived communally and took care of each other's children. A state Department of Social Services investigator also reported to the court that paddling was a common practice within the sect and that some of the children had bruises and thickened skin consistent with paddling.
The court also believes that Jeremiah may have survived if he had received medical care. The sect does not recognize civil authority and institutions, including legal and medical ones.
Pardon says he evaluated the group based on its behavior, not its beliefs, and his report was only a piece of the evidence the judge considered in deciding custody of the children.
Getting someone within the custody case to talk about Pardon's performance isn't easy.
DSS spokeswoman Carol Yelverton said it would be inappropriate for the agency to comment on a choice made by the court.
Judge Kenneth Nasif, who is presiding over the custody issues involving the sect in Attleboro juvenile court, said he cannot speak outside the court room about a case still before him.
Some of the lawyers appointed by the court to represent the sect's 13 children have been reluctant to comment to the press. But Pardon was praised by attorney John Rego of Bristol, R.I., who is currently representing the baby allegedly born or miscarried in November and who represented Rebecca's last child born in custody.
"He is definitely very knowledgeable,'' Rego said on Friday. "He is definitely an expert in his field.''
In his meetings with Pardon, Rego said he saw no sign of any religious bias, and saw only a man who was trying to determine what would be in the best interests of the children.
He and others also say that Pardon's role in the sect case has been misunderstood and misrepresented.
Pardon was appointed "guardian ad litem,'' which does not mean he was the actual guardian of the children, but that he was to in effect walk in the shoes of the children, speak on their behalf, look out for their best interests and make recommendations to the court accordingly.
Contrary to what was reported in the Boston Globe column, Pardon was not a court investigator, which is a separate role from guardian ad litem, Rego said.
"People want to say he was appointed as a cult de-programmer, but that is not the case,'' Rego said. "People are trying to treat this group as a religious group, but it is a dangerous cult. That is what they should be seen as.''
DSS investigator M. Carol Bridges said in an affidavit to the court that the religious group fits the definition of "destructive cult'' under the criteria outlined by Pardon.
After spending what he said were hundreds and maybe thousands of hours interviewing everyone involved in the case, including sect members, their children and their relatives, and reading all the sect's journals that were being held by the court, Pardon submitted a lengthy report to the court on the history, beliefs, psychology and practices of the sect.
He said he cannot reveal its contents because the report has been ordered sealed by the court, but people can surmise from what he has said that he did not believe the sect was the best environment for children.
His report, he said, was only a part of the evidence, and the judge also considered reports from DSS, the court investigator and others, and the journals and the testimony of the group.
Carney disagrees, saying Judge Nasif adopted in total "the opinions, conclusions and recommendations of Robert Pardon. It is the centerpiece of the judge's findings.''
An Attleboro courthouse source, however, said reports from psychologists, doctors, the court investigator and the social worker all played a role, and Pardon's opinion was not blindly followed.
So why and how was Pardon chosen by the court?
The courthouse source said the type of person needed as guardian ad litem depends on the nature of the case and the issues involved. For instance, if medical issues are a factor, then someone with that kind of expertise would be sought. In this case, the court was dealing with a religious sect, and sought someone with knowledge of how cults operate.
Pardon holds a bachelor's of arts degree in religious studies from the University of Michigan, a master's of divinity from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in Hamilton, and a master's in theology from Princeton Theological Seminary, a separate institution from Princeton University.
He was ordained by the National Association of Congregational Christian Churches and was a pastor for a number of years before starting the institute in 1991, initially as a research and information center.
Gradually he began working with former members of high-control destructive groups and cults, including Twelve Tribes in the Boston area that Pardon said has also led to the death of children.
Pardon said there is no college degree program in cults, and much of his knowledge has come from research and study he did on his own, and from experience.
He said he is not a "de-programmer'' as Carney has claimed, but he has done "exit counseling,'' which involves providing people with enough information to make their own decisions. He said he does not tell people what to believe, and does not expect them or try to convince him to believe as he does as a conservative Christian.
Both the courthouse source and Pardon himself said Pardon was recommended by the court-appointed investigator in the case, who is a licensed social worker. That person, who Pardon identified as Linda D'Ambly of Taunton, searched for a cult expert, located Pardon, and arranged for him to be interviewed by Judge Nasif. The court also checked Pardon's credentials, and found him to be highly qualified, the courthouse source said.
D'Ambly could not be reached by The Sun Chronicle for comment on why she chose Pardon as the expert she recommended to the court.
When Carney criticized Pardon's credentials in open court Feb. 5, Judge Nasif referred to Pardon as a nationally-recognized expert, and called Carney's criticism "inaccurate, inappropriate and unfair.''
Some of the criticism stems from the Web site for the religious institute. It does state emphatically that the institute believes in the rights of individuals to embrace any ideology they choose, but that no one has the right to kill, injure or hurt anyone else based on religious beliefs, or to exploit, manipulate or coerce anyone into acting in a way that violates their conscience.
But the institute belongs to, and its Web site links to, evangelical organizations that urge its members to defend the conservative Christian faith, evangelize cults, and persuade others to "Christian truth.''
The institute also lists a host of religious groups it considers cults or aberrational groups, and the list includes such established religions at Jehovah's Witnesses, Christian Scientists, Mormons, and Unitarian Universalists. The site also currently includes a history and critique of Mormonism that debunks the claims of Joseph Smith, the founder of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Carney calls the critique on Mormonism Pardon's "special of the month'' and one that is aimed at attacking the validity of a church that is one of the largest in the nation.
"I fully support Robert Pardon's right to practice his own faith, but I strongly object to his attempts to impose his beliefs on others,'' Carney said. "This person cannot conduct an independent assessment of the fitness of a couple to raise children if he believes that they are an aberrant Christian cult because they do not accept his view of the Bible.''
Pardon said people are misinterpreting the Web site, which was set up by someone else but which Pardon said he will now revise to better explain the information it provides.
He said the list of aberrational religions is an attempt to evaluate various religious groups in light of historical Christianity, and to list those that do not agree with the basic beliefs of original Christian doctrine, which the Catholic Church and most Protestant denominations accept, namely the divinity of Jesus, the Trinity, and the Bible as God's word, although there is disagreement on how literally that word should be taken.
By providing that information, Pardon said he is not telling people what to believe, and is not saying that other religions are bad or wrong, but is trying to help people evaluate religious groups for themselves.
Religious groups only become dangerous, he said, when they develop practices that undermine the basic principles of society, and lead to such behavior as sacrificing children.
Pardon said he defines a cult by its behavior, and by its impact in taking away people's freedom to make choices and to decide their religious beliefs for themselves.
"Whenever a group leader is perceived as having a direct pipeline to God and has no checks and balances, that is a very dangerous situation,'' he said.
His critique of Mormonism was done in response to that church's claim to be the only true church, Pardon said, and by doing so, he was pointing to the fact that its dogma does not fit into historical Christian doctrine.
Carney points to letters written by Pardon to the Corneaus as evidence that Pardon is trying to convince them to believe as he does or he will recommend that their children be taken from them.
The letter talks about Pardon's training and beliefs, and the beliefs and practices of the group, and is aimed at trying to get the Corneaus to meet with him and listen to him before he turns in his report to the judge.
"I can testify to you that your beliefs and practices are not consistent with His Word, nor, more profoundly, with His character,'' is one of Pardon's sentences that Carney criticizes.
Pardon said the religious language in the letter is an attempt to reach the Corneaus on a religious level, show them he is a Bible-believing Christian who understands the scriptures, and try to convince them that what the sect and its leader, Roland Robidoux, were claiming to be the word of God was not what God would want, especially that children should die.
Some of the sect members began hearing things in their head, Pardon said, and that was interpreted as God's revelation, which could not be questioned. It was this type of revelation that led to the starvation death of Samuel, he said.
"Freedom of religion does not mean you can do anything in the name of God,'' he said.
Pardon has been defended by former sect member Renee Horton, who responded to the Boston Globe column by writing that Pardon's recommendations to the court were correct, and were based on abuse of children, which was done in the name of God.
"It is dangerous to leave ANY child in such a group,'' Horton said.
She also said Pardon and his associates treated her with kindness and compassion, assisted her in sorting through the doctrines of the sect, and allowed her to decide for herself what was right and true.
Pardon also gets high praise from cult expert, author and licensed mental health counselor Steven Hassan of Cambridge College, a member of the Jewish faith who has worked on cases with Pardon.
But Carney is not convinced. Asked to comment on Pardon's assertion that he based his recommendations to the court on behavior rather than on beliefs, Carney said, "My response would be a one-word comment one could use on a farm but not in print in a newspaper.''
Asked if he planned to officially challenge Pardon's credentials and alleged motives, Carney said, "Yes, on appeal.''