The apparent head of a radical transgender cult linked to six killings, including a U.S. Border Patrol agent, told a Maryland judge last week, “I haven’t done anything wrong” while pleading for access to vegan food behind bars.

“I might starve to death if you cannot answer me,” Jack Amadeus LaSota, 34, who goes by “Ziz,” told Judge Erich Bean during a bail hearing in Allegany County District Court in Maryland on Feb. 18, according to audio obtained by the San Francisco Chronicle. “I need the jail to be ordered for me to have a vegan diet. It’s more important than whatever this hearing is.”

During the hearing, LaSota said at another point that releasing him on bail “may be a matter of survival if I don’t get vegan food. . . . I haven’t done anything wrong. I shouldn’t be here.”

He continued, saying that he might be in a “mild state of delusion” due to a lack of vegan options in the Allegany County Detention Center and that he is not a flight risk since he is homeless.

“The second thing is they were on a restrictive diet. In this case, they were vegan,” he said. “So, when you start to mix in the sexual aspect, then with a restrictive diet, now what you’re doing is behavior control.”

A drone flies above a robotic device inspecting a backpack near what appears to be a body on the ground on southbound Route 91 near Newport, Vermont, where a U.S. Border Patrol Agent was shot dead, Monday, January 20, 2025. (David McGlynn for Fox News Digital)

Referencing cult expert Steven Hassan’s BITE Model of Authoritarian Control, Dixon discussed how cults emotionally control their members.

“I’m sure there was a lot of sleep deprivation going on, also, which affects your thoughts, which affects your emotions, which also affects your behavior and your ability to take in and process information,” he said.

“This is part of the emotional control. You’re never allowed to feel your feelings or to discuss your feelings. If you don’t step in line with the party line, you’re immediately reprimanded, sometimes severely, either verbally or physically, or you’re shunned.”

“So, the culmination of sexual identity, food restriction, sleep restriction and emotional restriction, well, now I’ve got you,” he said. “I own you. And I can take you any direction I want to take you now.”