[4][5] Ross faced criminal charges of unlawful imprisonment over a 1991 forcible deprogramming of United Pentecostal Church International member Jason Scott; a jury acquitted him at trial.

"[12] Ross became concerned about extremist organizations in 1982 when he learned that a fringe religious group had encouraged missionaries to become employees at his grandmother's nursing home where they were targeting elderly residents[13] for conversion to Messianic Judaism.

[15][16] This led the Union for Reform Judaism to appoint Ross to two national committees focused on cults and inter-religious affairs[14] and he also volunteered as a lecturer and researcher for the denomination.

[14] His work in the prison system covered social services for Jewish inmates, advocating for their religious rights, and providing education regarding hate groups.

[24] In 1989, the CBS television program 48 Hours covered Ross's deprogramming of a 14-year-old boy, Aaron Paron, a member of the Potter's House Christian Fellowship.

[25][26] According to his mother, when she distanced herself from the church, Aaron began viewing her as "possessed by the devil"; he became suicidal and ran away from home, refusing to leave the organization.

[26] The program focused on Ross's efforts to persuade the boy to view Potter's House as "a destructive Bible-based group" which took control of its members' lives.

[29] The CBS television network hired Ross as an on-scene analyst for their coverage of the Waco siege and he was consulted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation as well.

She further stated the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms and FBI did rely on Ross when he recommended that agents "attempt to publicly humiliate Koresh, hoping to drive a wedge between him and his followers".

In September 1995, a nine-member jury unanimously held the defendants liable for conspiracy to deprive Scott of his civil rights and religious liberties.

In addition, the jury held that Ross and his associates (but not CAN) "intentionally or recklessly acted in a way so outrageous in character and so extreme in degree as to go beyond all possible bounds of decency and to be regarded as atrocious and utterly intolerable in a civilized community."

[37] According to the book American Countercultures, Ross and others forwarded the notion that charismatic leaders were able to brainwash college-aged youths, and that such cases were in need of forcible removal from the cult environment and deprogramming.

[1] Launched under the name "Rick A. Ross Institute for the Study of Destructive Cults, Controversial Groups, and Movements", and later renamed "Cult Education Institute", it displayed material on controversial groups and movements and their leaders, including Charles Manson, Jim Jones, David Koresh, as well as the Westboro Baptist Church on which Ross had been collecting data since 1993.

[8][42][43] He has also contributed to a number of books, including a foreword to Tim Madigan's See No Evil[44] and a chapter to Roman Espejo's Cults: Opposing Viewpoints.

[3] Ross stated that he does not see Landmark as a cult because they have no individual leader, but he considers them harmful because subjects are harassed and intimidated, causing potentially unsafe levels of stress.

[update][48] Ross was part of the creative team at Ubisoft for the 2018 video game Far Cry 5, involving a fictional doomsday cult.