Melanie Wilking has spoken out about the death threats being sent to her sister Miranda Derrick following the release of Netflix documentary Dancing for the Devil.
"Of course, we never wanted any sort of violence to come her way, and I'm very sorry that she has experienced that because our only intent was to save her from an unsafe environment and to give her love and know that we're here to support her," Wilking said in a new interview with People.
"Before this documentary, my husband and I, we felt safe," Derrick said in an Instagram video posted on June 11. "Now that this documentary is out, we feel like our lives have been put in danger. We have both been followed in our cars, we have received hate mail, death threats, people have been sending us messages to commit suicide, we've been stalked."
She went on to give disturbing examples of the things that have been said to her and her husband James Derrick.
Dancing for the Devil posits that Miranda Derrick is part of an alleged "dance cult" led by Robert Shinn—who is both the founder of production company 7M Films (which represents social media stars) and the pastor for the Shekinah Church in Los Angeles.
The docuseries investigates claims made by Derrick's family—her sister Melanie Wilking and their parents—which they first made in an Instagram Live in 2022. The Wilkings alleged that Derrick had cut off all contact with them at the time, because of her involvement with 7M and Shekinah Church.
Since then, Derrick has been in touch with her family, but they describe any exchanges they have with her as superficial.
"Of course, we want a relationship with my sister," Wilking told People. "That is why we did this from the start. But once we started to learn about other people, it was also that we did not want other people to fall victim to this group, and we knew we needed to use our voices and share this.
"All the steps that we've taken, trying to resolve it quietly for a year, then going live and then having all of these dancers and members leave because we used our voice... all of these things have resulted in positive outcomes, so I have to believe that my gut and intuition has been correct."
Wilking explained that she hasn't spoken to her sister since the doc came out on May 29, though Derrick did attend her recent wedding on May 25.
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