16 Victims of the Church of Scientology
annon...@gmail.com
Source: http://brainz.org/16-victims-church-scientology/
For the past 56 years the Church of Scientology has blazed a path of
headlines and mystery across the globe. Once existing only as the idea
held by a single man, the Church has grown into a multinational,
highly organized institution in record time. There is little doubt
that trends in the 60's and 70's of both counter-culture and new-age
thought contributed to the break-neck speed of the Church's growth,
allowing its numbers to swell worldwide to figures that cannot be
accurately counted, but are said to number in the millions.
Despite the great successes the CoS has enjoyed over the last half-
century, the ubiquitous Church has been embroiled in scandal since its
inception. At the heart of every matter of contention lies the bottom
dollar. Though self-described as a religious ministry, the CoS tries
to operate more like a not-for-profit international charity, and has
repeatedly been accused of actually being a for-profit business.
Criminal activities, both proven and alleged, span the entire length
of the Church's short lifespan. Here we take a look at 16 victims of
the most egregious offenses allegedly committed by the Church of
Scientology to date.
Patrice Vic
Patrice Vic was a 31 year old Parisian family man with a wife and two
children. He was relatively happy, until he took a Scientologist's
questionnaire, and was subsequently convinced that with the Church's
help, he could be even happier. That step only cost him 3,000 francs.
He became obsessed, and distant. His wife even tried to save their
marriage by going with him, and subjecting herself to an "audit,"
which made her so uncomfortable that she halted the process and left.
On the advice of the Church supervisor present, Mr. Vic stopped
speaking to his wife altogether, and became more detached than ever.
He started taking vitamins, supplied by the church, and underwent
regular counseling at the local Church center, spending more and more
of his dwindling funds as he went. Finally, late one evening while in
bed next to his silent wife, Patrice Vic got up and said quite simply
"this is the only solution." He took a running dive over their 12th
story balcony to the street below. As it turns out, Mr. Vic was unable
to either find the money, or secure the loans necessary to pay for the
30,000 franc "inner purification" procedure he was assured would fix
his broken life.
Susan Meister
Susan Meister was an impressionable young woman who found Scientology
in 1970's San Francisco. She was incredibly devoted to her new purpose
in life, very motivated, and overzealous. She repeatedly tried to
pressure her parents into joining the then-fledgling Church of
Scientology. She wanted so badly to be a part of the inner workings of
the Church, that after a year in the city, in 1971 she joined the now
infamous "Sea Org." Within a month she made her way all the way to the
flagship of Scientology's miniature naval fleet, the Apollo. This was
a great honor, as it was the seaborne home of L. Ron Hubbard himself.
Just a few short months later, Susan's father would be making his way
to Morocco, to identify the corpse of his daughter. When asked about
the strange circumstances of Susan's death, he replied that she was
"lying on a bunk, wearing the new dress her mother had made for her,
her arms crossed with a long-barreled revolver on her breast. A bullet-
hole was in the center of her forehead and blood was running out of
the corners of her mouth. I began to wonder how Susan could possibly
shoot herself in the center of her forehead with the long-barreled
revolver." There were no powder burns on Susan's forehead, either, her
father noted.
Raul Lopez
When Raul Lopez was critically injured in a head-on collision in 1985,
doctors told him he was lucky to even be alive. The irreparable brain-
trauma that was slowly killing Mr. Lopez was also impairing and
degrading his mental faculties over time, but he still had most of the
multi-million dollar settlement resulting from the wreck that nearly
killed him. Then he found the Church of Scientology. The CoS told him
that they could succeed where modern medicine had failed, and heal Mr.
Lopez. By the time Mr. Lopez realized he had duped, and fired his
Scientologist lawyer/conservator, he had given Church 1.3 million
dollars. The CoS maintains that there was never any wrongdoing, since
the mentally-impaired Lopez had willfully participated.
Mary Florence Barnett
Flo, as she liked to be called, was the Mother-in-law to David
Miscavige, who after Hubbard's untimely demise took power within the
Church. In Hubbard's absence, Miscavige took on the roles and
responsibilities that could be equated to those of the CEO of a
corporation. At the time of her death, Flo had become entangled in
some of the Church's worst sequences of in-fighting. She had been
following a splinter-sect within the Church that had been declared
apostate, and the fact that she was directly linked to Miscavige was a
constant source of embarrassment to both him and his wife. At the
height of the scandal, Flo was found dead in her bedroom, a victim of
suicide, as it was initially called. She had been shot three times in
the chest, and once in the head with a .22 caliber Ruger semi-
automatic rifle, which was found near the body.
Roxanne Friend
Roxanne Friend, a former Scientologist, described her experience at
the Church's "Flag" facility in depositions for a law suit she filed
against the Church in 1999. Ms. Friend had been "forced" to
participate in participate in practices of which she did not want to
be a part. When she attempted to leave the facility she was stopped
and not allowed to leave. She was held there for several months, and
denied proper treatment for both Mono and Pneumonia. She was not
allowed to see her father when he travelled to see her, nor was she
allowed to attend a wedding, at which she was slated to be Maid of
Honor. A year later, she tried to re-enter the Church in Florida, and
was forced back into the initial procedure she refused in California.
When she tried to leave at that point, she was taken, placed under
guard, monitored, cut off from communication outside, and finally
drugged only to be transported to another location where she was held
for over a month.
Paulette Cooper
In 1973, Paulette Cooper, then a journalist in New York, found herself
under federal indictment for sending bomb threats to the Church of
Scientology. What was happening would come to be known as Operation
Freakout. As Ms. Cooper was in the business of publishing books
speaking out against the Church of Scientology, she was made a target,
with the express goal of "to get P.C. incarcerated in a mental
institution or jail, or at least to hit her so hard that she drops her
attacks." The actual internal CoS documents for this officially-named
project were acquired during an FBI raid of CoS offices in 1977, which
in turn cleared Ms. Cooper of the earlier charges for which she had
been indicted. CoS members had stolen stationary from her home, along
with the means to recreate her finger prints, and forged the bomb-
threats. They also sent letters to her neighbors declaring that she
had venereal diseases, and imported her books to countries with libel
laws that allowed them to sue her overseas, for what she had written
stateside. They even found a women with similar voice characteristics
to make threatening phone calls to arab consulates in New York City.
The harassment didn't stop there; graffiti with her phone number was
found throughout the city, the IRS was told that she had lied to them
on tax returns, men would seek her out and date her, only to be
discovered as Scientologist "agents," and legal documents were stolen
from her lawyer's office in attempts to gain an edge on any of the 14
different law suits filed against her.
Quentin Hubbard
L. Ron Hubbard's son, Quentin, was 22 years old when he died in 1976.
Sources who later left the organization have stated that Quentin was
"an embarrassment" to Hubbard. In fact, upon hearing of his son's
apparent suicide, Hubbard's only expressed concern was over the
publicity problems the event was sure to cause. Quentin was found on
the side of road, in his car, with a hose piping exhaust fumes into
the cabin. He was unkempt, unshaven, sitting next to an empty bottle
of liquor, missing his wallet, and with needle-tracks in his arms. The
license plate was missing from his car. Quentin Hubbard was well-known
among his friends for being meticulous about his appearance, and
always clean shaven. His friends also noted that he did not drink or
use drugs of any kind.
Casey Hill
In 1984 the Church of Scientology in Ontario, Canada sparked what
would become an expensive battle with Crown Attorney Casey Hill. They
inevitably lost the fight, though it tooks several years of
litigation, and smear campaigning against not only the government
lawyer but also the court and ministry he represented. In an attempt
to sabotage the prosecution of a case against them, the local CoS had
a practicing barrister of the court stand on the front steps of the
courthouse in full garb and proclaim that he was initiating criminal
contempt proceedings against Mr. Hill, who was prosecuting the case
against them. Hill, in turn, sued for libel. The ensuing court battles
that took place would cost Hill tens of thousands of dollars and his
name was smeared in every newspaper in the northern hemisphere. Later,
court judgements amounting to a 129 page document would reveal
findings that the CoS had in fact willfully engaged in a seven-year
long campaign to ruin Hill, stating that "Scientology decided Hill was
the enemy and it set out to destroy him." When all was said and done,
the Church was ordered to pay the largest ever sum awarded for libel
in Canadian history, at 1.6 million dollars.
Francis Diamond
In 1981, an antique dealer in Clearwater, Florida, was committed to a
mental hospital after being declared insane. Francis Diamond, who was
45 at the time, led a happy if somewhat mundane life before the Church
of Scientology moved into town. Scientologists frequented his store,
and he befriended many of them. It wasn't long before he began reading
the literature they gave him, and he decided to get audited. Not long
afterward, the police had placed him in special custody pending the
court's ruling on his sanity. He stood before a judge, and explained
that other Scientologists' "Thetans" had invaded his body. Three of
them, in fact, and they wanted him dead. According to Diamond, these
Thetans drove him to smoke five packs of cigarettes a day and overeat
until he had gained 50 pounds. When asked why he had not done
something about what was happening to him, he told the court that he
feared not only his reputation, but the Church's retaliation. Diamond
had absolutely no history of mental illness or propensities towards
mental illness prior to his "auditing."
Jennifer Stewart
in 2000, a 16-year-old Jennifer Stewart, raised as a Scientologist,
became a supervisor, under a man named Gabriel Williams. Williams,
then 27, lived with his fiancee at the time. Stewart's new working
hours were to be from nine in the morning to nine at night, so the
Church ordered her to move in with Williams at his San Jose residence.
The first night she stayed there, she reports, Williams raped her, and
continued to do so for months. Stewart believed at the time that if
she had gone to the police, that she would have been made to see a
psychiatrist, something that is beyond unacceptable in Scientology. A
member of the CoS Office of Special Affairs told Stewart's father that
if he were to say anything, she would be taken away by child-services.
Williams was arrested in 2002, and Stewart married her boyfriend, Tom
Gordon. the couple moved in with Gordon's family. That's when the
Gordons began receiving death threats and harassment phone-calls on a
regular basis. The message delivered was quite clear; "SPs don't live
long. Your son and his wife, Jennifer, will be dead soon." SP is a
Scientology phrase meaning Suppressive Person, or enemy of the Church.
Maria Pia Gardini
Maria Gardini was a Class Nine Auditor for the Church of Scientology.
She originally entered the Church through her daughter, who had
learned of it through Narconon. Maria was very good at what she did,
and made the Church millions of dollars through her work. She was a
member of the Sea Org., which by Church rules, means that not only her
room and board, but also her own auditing are supposed to be covered
by the Organization. Maria was told by her superiors that it would be
selfish for her, who had money, to take such charities from the
Church, and that she should be donating her money for the betterment
of the CoS. When she realized that nobody else paid the amount of
money she was being made to pay, she demanded her money back. She was
coerced into taking only a portion back, and being content with it,
while her own supervisor bought a 40,000 dollar car with the
commission she got for Maria's money. After several more attempts to
get her money back, in 2001, Maria contacted the Lisa McPherson Trust
to request that they assist her in reclaiming the 1.5 million dollars
she lost.
Jeremy Perkins
On March 13th, 2003, which also happens to be L. Ron Hubbard's
birthday, Jeremy Perkins stabbed his mother 77 times with a 12 inch
kitchen knife. He did not want to take the vitamins that the Church
had given him, nor did he want to take a shower, both of which his
mother, also a Scientologist, had tried coaxing him into doing.
Professionals believed that, had Jeremy been on proper medication,
under actual medical care, his mother would still be alive today and
he would be functional. Jeremy was fully delusional and believed at
the time that his mother was not only trying to make him worse with
the vitamins, but that she had an "evil eye." Jeremy stood alone in
court, a murderer.
Nanna Anderson
In 1985 the CoS decided it was going to infiltrate the Ontario Medical
Association. They sent Nanna. Nanna was only 17 when she joined the
Church, and at the time, a doctor who was also a member of the Church
had convinced her that she had cancer. She was asked to get money from
her family, in order to pay for treatment, and 10% of that was a
commission to the doctor. She had signed a vague loyalties contract
that she was told had authority anywhere, so when she left England to
move to Ontario, Canada, the Church maintained control over her. She
got a job working for the OMA, and began the long process of siphoning
information for the Church. She also divorced her husband, because
Church heads had told her he was bad for her. She described the
loyalty simply, stating that "if they said march, I would march."
After hearing her story the court dismissed charges against her, and
she turned State's Evidence.
Gabe Cazares
Clearwater, Florida has been a nexus of activity for the CoS, to
include illegal activities. Cazares spoke out publicly against the
Church when they arrived in the town in 1975; the Church immediately
fired back with a smear-campaign of the usual sex-allegatons, and also
attempted to set him up in a staged hit-and-run car accident. Cazares
hadn't been saying anything that wasn't clearly visible already to the
public; he called out the Church for the quiet way they went about
buying any property in town they could get ahold of, and questioned
why a church would need a security force to begin with, much less one
that carried clubs. Again, internal documents were obtained during a
federal raid on CoS offices detailing plans and operations in regard
to Clearwater politics, and Cazares in particular. In the criminal
investigations that followed, 11 CoS officials were jailed for
breaking into federal offices. Cazares later filed suit against the
Church for 1.5 million dollars in damages, which was settled out of
court in 1986. He filed several more times in the years since.
Lawrence Wollersheim
Mr. Wollersheim reveals that in 1969, when he joined the Church, he
signed a "billion-year" loyalty contract. He found himself confined to
the hold of a ship, off the coast of California, which he described as
a "thought-reform gulag." His mental state steadily degraded until he
came just short of the point of suicide, and it was later discovered
that he suffered from bi-polar disorder. As psychiatry is forbidden,
he had to choose between leaving the Church or suffering the
consequences of his mounting problem. He had already paid the Church
150,000 dollars when he decided to leave. He filed suit in 1980, and
won millions of dollars in court awards. The Church had no intention
of paying him, however, and an ensuing legal battle raged on for over
a decade. Wollersheim created a website, FACTNet.org, to inform the
public of the illegal activities carried out by the CoS.
Lisa McPherson
Lisa McPherson joined the Church of Scientology at the age of 18, and
in 1994 moved to Clearwater, Florida. The following year, the Church
noticed problems with Lisa, and placed her in a status of
"Introspective Rundown," and three months later was declared "clear"
again. Two months later, she was involved in a minor car accident that
resulted in a suspected head trauma, but she refused further
evaluations in lieu of treatment from the Church instead. She was
transported to the Flag Land Base and subjected to another
"Introspection Rundown," and placed on an "isolation watch." In the
last 17 days of McPherson's life, her health quickly deteriorated past
the point of emergency. She was kept in isolation and denied proper
medical attention. Other Scientologists who inquired about her care
were told to "butt-out," and a Scientologist doctor prescribed her
both Valium and antibiotics, without seeing her. When the decision was
made to take her to a hospital, the execution was curious. Four
hospitals were passed along the way, and upon arrival she had
flatlined. The personnel at the emergency room attempted resuscitation
for 20 minutes, but Lisa McPherson was already dead. During her
autopsy, the corner said she had likely died of a Thrombo-embolism,
caused by severe dehydration while lying in bed. The coroner also
noted several bruises, and abrasions consistent with animal bites. The
Church called her family and told them that she had died from either
Meningitis, or a blood-clot, while at Fort Murray for rest and
relaxation. In May of 2004, a civil suit filed by her family against
the Church was settled.
--
annon...@gmail.com
http://digg.com/search?s=scientology
full_f...@hotmail.com
>
> read more
This Cult is based on nothing but science fiction, that preys on the
weak and panders to their insecurities, and then sucks the life and
money out of them all in the interest of political, organisation and
influential gain. While hiding behind and taking advantage of the
freedoms afforded by most governments. It disgusts me and I applaud
any outcry against this particular organisation.
Danny Costa
> On 12 mai, 17:36, annoncia...@gmail.com wrote:
>> http://www.anti-scientologie.ch/english-index.htm
>
> and more: http://digg.com/search?s=scientology
Ethics people?
http://tinyurl.com/capire-il-negativismo
http://tinyurl.com/codice-morale-salute
Out_Of_The_Dark
Thanks for posting this. Always good to see new people post here and
speak thei mind on this subject.