A former Newton business executive is now living in Miami and has a new career as a psychic, claiming amazing mental powers, that can only be described as "supernatural."

Charles Collins, who now uses the title "Reverend." according to local people who hear from him often, is reported by his friends here to be engaged in full time psychic healing in Florida.

He was the subject of a startling feature story with a photograph in the January 11 issue of the "National Enquirer", January 11 issue a tabloid which is one of the leading national periodicals and which has had a reputation for offering sensational articles, particularly dealing with UFO's and psychics.

When he lived in Newton for about 10 years, before moving away in 1972, he had a yarn brokerage business here. A former resident of Charlotte before coming to Newton, Collins comes from a blue-blood background and was educated at Duke University.

His gray flannel suit businessman lifestyle here is in sharp contrast with the exciting adventures friends credit him with after leaving Newton and with the profession he now follows in Miami, where he reportedly asserts he can put positive energy into an object and remove negative energy.

Friends here say that when Collins uprooted himself from his lifestyle here, he took off for Alaska in a camper, traversing the rugged Alaskan Highway across Canada's Northwest Territory and the Yukon.

In the years to follow, his friends here heard from Collins as he was involved in such ventures as a real estate development on a desert mesa in Colorado, a project in Utah to develop windmills as a power source, and a strip mining venture in the West.

A couple of weeks ago Collins telephoned Ed Warren, an old friend and fellow textile broker, from Key West and alerted Warren to see the "National Enquirer" article.

"In a stunning show of mind power, a psychic has transferred energy into and out of plant leaves in a University, of California laboratory in Los Angeles -while he was nearly 3,000 miles away in Miami." the tabloid article begins.

It continues by quoting John Hubacher, research associate who conducted the tests at UCLA's Neuropsychiatric Institute, as saying: "Charles Collins is incredible. The results of our tests on him were both significant and very dramatic.

Another quote was from Dr. Stanley Krippner, "internationally famous parapsychologist," who reportedly said of Collins: "I am familiar with research in this field and nothing to my knowledge like this experiment has been reported."

The newspaper claims that Hubacher first tested the former Newtonian a year ago in California. The test included photographing six leaves with a sensitive camera which photographs the electrical discharge around objects. The scientist maintains that leaves are excellent detectors of energies associated with healing.

According to the report, Collins then held his hands a few inches from the leaves and tried to put energy into them. The leaves were then re-photographed and the energy fields around them allegedly got brighter, which meant they had more energy than before.

Then Collins is supposed to have tried to extract the energy and subsequent photos indicated less energy in the surrounding area.

The article says the experiment was repeated once a week for six weeks in February and March of 1976 while Collins was 2,826 miles away at his home in Miami.

He said that at an appointed time he faced west and held his hands up, imagining that they were placed over the leaves in the UCLA lab. He said that when he sent energy to the leaves he felt his hands get warmer and warmer, and when he reversed the process he felt his hands grow heavier, -just as they fell when I'm extracting energy from a patient."

The California scientist asserted in the newspaper article that the electrical changes were not random fluctuations.

The story quoted Dr. Thelma Moss, director of the UCLA parapsychology lab and an "internationally known parapsychology researcher," as saying they got some "very dramatic changes in the leaves."

She is quoted as saying the photographs of the before-and-after leaves show that Collins is a unique individual.

Dr. Robert N. Miller, a former professor of chemical engineering at Georgia Tech and a research scientist, reportedly tested Collins and found that he can put about twice the amount of energy as the average person into water.

Dr. Miller is quoted as saying: "He definitely has shown scientifically that he has healing powers."

The article asserts that Dr. Miller's tests show Collins generates an energy different from the energies recognized by science -- heat, light and electricity.

He reportedly said that up until now medical doctors were skeptical about healing by the laying-on-of-hands. Dr. Miller reportedly continued: "Now we've verified that there is a very real energy and it can be measured over great distances. Even the most skeptical doctor has to admit that something amazing is happening! "

Dramatic Photo

A former Newton resident, Charles Collins, now a psychic healer living in Miami, shows how he uses his power to transfer energy into and out of plant leaves. The leaf, superimposed in the foreground, was photographed with special heat sensitive equipment and seems to show far more energy than normal. It was shown in the National Enquirer.