Suzette Dearing Declaration

[wbarwell]

** AFFIDAVIT **

SUZETTE M. DEARING

7856 Rosswood Drive
Citrus Heigl]ts, CsliforDia 95621

August 10, 1989

My name is Suzette M. Dearing. I live in Citrus
Heights, California and am a Technical Writer for a software
company in E1 Dorado Hills. I have held my current position
for two years.

From January 1975 to July 1983 I was a staff member at
the Church of Scientology, Mission of Davis (COSMOD) at
Sacramento. At Ms. Wakefield's request, I am writing down
what I know of the Church's illegal and bizarre activities.

The thing that stands out most about my first years on
staff is the sheer lack of sleep. We had staff meetings
every Wednesday night that lasted from midnight until 3:00 -
4:00 in the morning. We were all required to work six to
seven days a week from 9:00 AM until 11:30 PM (or later), in
violation of local and state labor laws. However, the party
line was that we were "volunteers" who were paid a
"parsonage allowance", as opposed to salaried employees.
(The "parsonage allowance" ranged, on average, from $0 on
bad weeks to $100 on good weeks.) On Thursdays, then, we
were forced to perform our duties on as little as three
hours of sleep.

During these staff meetings, the ED of the Mission,
Reggie Caldwell, would alternately chain smoke and yell
profanities at us, telling us we were non-productive, that
we had "evil intentions", etc.

After a few months of this, I became quite ill and
decided to quit. Staff members who wished to quit were seen
by a person called an "Ethics Officer", whose job, in
retrospect, was to brainwash us until we "saw the light" and
decided to stay. I was told to remain in a small room,
about 8' by 8' and write up my "O/Ws", a list of everything
bad I had ever done in my entire life. When I thought I was
complete, the Ethics Officer ~ould look over what I had
written, and if I still felt I wanted to quit he would send
me back to the small room to continue writing. I did this
for a couple of days until I "decided" to remain on staff.
Note that this was standard handling for anyone who wanted
to quit staff. I tried to quit staff several times over the
years, and was always forced into a small room to "confront
my O/Ws".

In the first years I was on staff (1975-1979) we were
actively discouraged from seeking medical help if we were
sick. It was felt that all illnesses were "spiritual" in
nature. I remember one man named Tom Stevens, who had
appendicitis that went untreated for a couple of days until
he finally had emergency surgery. He was forced back on the
job by the Church after only two days of recovery and
performed his duties in considerable pain. On another
occasion my supervisor, Cathy Moore, suffered a miscarriage
and called me to her house to counsel her to make the
miscarriage stop. Needless to say, it didn't and she
eventually was hospitalized.

I remember when I was pregnant with my second child in
1983, I asked the director of the Church, Jeff Cota, if I
could cut back my hours. I was very ill (during my fifth
month i lost five pounds) and my physician was concerned
about me. His response was that he was convinced that my
difficulties were "spiritual" in origin and that he wanted
me to receive counselling rather than go home and rest. I
couldn't convince him otherwise.

In the early 1980's the Church went into the
pharmaceutical business with a service called "The
Purification Rundown". It involved exercise, stints in a
sauna, and megadoses of vitamins. Niacin was believed to
flush out effects of radiation and drug poisoning. The
program usually lasted 10 - 14 days, although some people
had difficulty with the vitamins making them ill and spent
longer on the service. Towards the end of my "Purif" I was
taking about 2400 IUs of vitamin E, 200 mgs of Niacin and
correspondingly high amounts of the other B vitamins, A, and
C. A member of the Church would direct your vitamin dosage.
At the time, this was a man named Chris Nesbitt.

In 1982 our mission was visited by a group of people
who called themselves the "International Finance Police
(IFP)". At that time, the mother church was convinced that
other churches and missions across the planet were
witholding tithes (our mission had to pay approximately 10%
of the weekly gross income to the mother church). For a
couple of weeks we were forced to work seven days a week,
anywhere from 14 - 18 hours a day in preparing our files to
document everyone who had ever paid any money to us. They
demanded thousands of dollars from us: I don't know how much
we paid them. I know they demanded $15,000 a day for every
day they were at our Mission. As a staff member I was
making from $40 - 80 dollars a week. My husband was
supplementing his income with a part time job so we could
buy food and rent an apartment. I remember being really
upset because my supervisor, Jeff Cora, would not let me go
home and spend some time with my year-old infant. She spent
her days and nights at a church-run day care center.

The last thing that happened at the Church was a big
meeting the IFP held at the Sacramento Organization. They
invited everyone who had ever been associated with the
Church. They posted staff members as guards at all the
building's exits to prevent people from leaving. The upshot
was everyone who was not on staff had to either pay
thousands of dollars to the Church in Clearwater, Florida
for counselling or be expelled from the Church. Since I was
familiar with the building I was able to sneak out; two
weeks later I left the Church.

I was always told by one of the senior staff members,
Paul Armstrong, that if I quit staff and quit the Church my
life would go to hell. He would attend meetings and tell us
that, through his advanced training and counselling, he knew
what hell was and gave us rather descriptive, horrifying
descriptions to frighten us into staying in line. In 1982
he insisted that the "parishioners" at COSMD Sacramento and
Davis chip in enough to make the payments on his brand-new
Saab. All the staff and public people had to chip in and
buy a $10,000 watch for Martin Samuels, who founded the
missions and lived in a very expensive home in Oregon, built
by staff members. Also, at %hat time, Jeff Cora, the
director of our mission, lived in a very nice 2,000 square
foot home in a suburb of Sacramento. At current prices,
that house would run around $220,000. The mission was his
and his wife's only source of income, yet somehow he could
afford mortgage payments and a new car when my husband and I
barely could make $200 rent payments and feed ourselves and
a year-old baby and were using food stamps to buy groceries.
Looking back on it, I think there was a lot of greed and
graft and dishonesty on the part of these men, yet at the
time we were told we were "flowing power" and making them
more able to do their jobs.

I am not personally aware of illegalities surrounding
"reg cycles", which were when people called "registrars"
signed people up for church services and had them pay.
However, occasionally there would be mission policies issued
cautioning the registrars against kiting checks and acting
as unlicensed loan brokers, so I am positive those
activities were going on. I know that one registrar,
Sherese Graves, acted as an unlicensed loan broker on at
least two occasions.

I realize this is not a formal deposition, however,
all the above is true to the best of my knowledge.

(End)
--

It's all coming down! It's all coming down!
IT'S ALL COMING DOWN!
- Texas Chainsaw Massacre II

Cheerful Charlie