CAPITAL REGION, N.Y. (NEWS10) — The lawyer challenging incumbent Saratoga County District Attorney Karen Heggen is slamming what he says was “negligence” in a lack of local prosecution of the sex cult, NXIVM. According to Heggen, her opponent’s comments on NXIVM show a lack of knowledge when it comes to the scope of the job.

Democratic candidate for District Attorney, Michael Phillips, was joined in Albany Thursday by “Dynasty” actress Catherine Oxenberg, whose daughter, India, spent several years as a member of NXIVM, and a victim of Raniere, the disgraced self-improvement guru.

Oxenberg is endorsing Phillips, after she says local prosecutors did nothing when she brought forth concerns about NXIVM, forcing her to turn to the press for help. Federal prosecutors in the Eastern District of New York eventually took on the case.

“I had to expose my own daughter as a branded sex slave on national media,” Oxenburg said, “which was really, like, a low point in my life.”

“What was going on? Law enforcement was aware of this,” Phillips said, “why weren’t the prosecutors moving on it?”

Keith Raniere is currently serving a 120-year sentence in federal prison on charges including racketeering, sex trafficking, and extortion.

Heggen told NEWS10 in an interview that the leaders of NXIVM being prosecuted at a federal level was the right way for the case to be handled, as parts of the scheme took place in New York, other parts of the U.S., and internationally.

“My office has jurisdiction only as it relates to matters that occur in the county of Saratoga,” Heggen said, “and so therefore, I think Mr. Phillips is demonstrating a lack of knowledge of the scope and the abilities that the Saratoga County District Attorney has to handle matters that have multiple jurisdictional issues involved.”

Heggen added that, while she was working as an Assistant DA in the county, the office would not play ball when NXIVM leaders wanted to go after former members who got out of the group.

“The people like Mr. Raniere and those on his behalf tried to convince us to, in fact, prosecute people who had left their organization,” she explained, “and we declined to do that.”