It started a little like Watergate. Late one night two years
ago, two men made their way to the third floor of the U.S. courthouse
in Washington. With stolen keys, they opened the office of assistant
U.S. attorney Nathan Dodell and photocopied sheaves of government
documents rifled from his files. They repeated the caper a few nights
later, but when they showed up at the building again, a suspicious guard
called the FBI. The two men, Gerald Wolfe and Michael Meisner, were
described by authorities as agents of the Church of Scientology, a
religious therapy group that claims 4.5 million adherents, among them
such celebrities as John Travolta. Wolfe was subsequently convicted and
Meisner agreed to cooperate with an FBI probe. Last week, the
investigation paid off: a Washington grand jury indicted eleven
Scientologists on charges of burglary, bugging and obstruction of
justice over a three-and-a-half-year period.
Scientology
has inspired controversy ever since founder L. Ron Hubbard, a former
science-fiction writer, published his 1950 best seller, "Dianetics: The
Modern Science of Mental Health." Four years later Hubbard made
Scientology a religion — a move that has saved the church millions of
dollars in taxes. Similar to some self-help therapies, Scientology holds
that by recalling negative experiences or "engrams," a person can free
himself from repressed feelings that cripple his life. That liberation
process, which is called "getting clear," is assisted by a counselor,
called an "auditor," who charges up to $60 a session. The auditor's main
tool is the "E-meter," a skin galvanometer that is said to help him
discover what is bothering his subject. Scientologists, who believe in
reincarnation, say they often dredge up experiences from previous lives
during an auditing session.
Over the years, the
Scientologists have attracted close government scrutiny. The Food and
Drug Administration seized E-meters as deceptive cure-alls, but the
church won the legal right to use them in 1976. Church spokesmen say the
government has disseminated inaccurate reports that enmeshed
Scientology in legal battles in Australia, France and Britain, where
Hubbard now lives. The church responded by establishing an elaborate
security network, known as the Guardian's Office, to protect its
operations. The Guardian's Office has sued numerous church critics,
including the American Medical Association and ABC-TV, and filed 80
Freedom of Information Act requests for 200,000 pages of government
documents.
But as Meisner tells it, the Guardian's Office
also undertook a massive espionage operation against its critics. Based
on evidence from Meisner, the FBI obtained search warrants for one of
the most extensive raids in its history. On July 8, 1977, 134 FBI
agents, armed with battering rams, chain saws and sledgehammers, burst
into Scientology headquarters in Los Angeles and Washington. They carted
away thousands of documents, as well as a lock-picking kit, a
blackjack, eavesdropping equipment, two pistols and even a vial marked
"vampire blood."
There
was no comment last week from the church's world headquarters, which is
located in Sussex, England, on a luxurious 55-acre estate that once
belonged to the Maharajah of Jaipur. There Hubbard lives in retirement,
while his wife, Mary Sue Hubbard, helps run the church's activities.
Last week, dressed in black and looking older than her 47 years, Mary
Sue was in Washington. Charged with conspiracy and burglary, she was
fingerprinted and, like her codefendants, released on personal
recognizance — to await the trial that will give her the opportunity of
legally "getting clear."
—ARTHUR LUBOW with DIANE CAMPER in Washington, MARTIN KASINDORF in Los Angeles and bureau reports
[Picture / Caption: Heldt, Scientologists aping FBI at protest in Washington: Church vs. state]
"If anyone is getting industrious trying to enturbulate
(sic) or stop Scientology or its activities, I can make Captain Bligh
look like a Sunday-school teacher. There is probably no limit on what I
would do to safeguard Man's only road to freedom against persons who . .
. seek to stop Scientology or hurt Scientologists."
— L. Ron Hubbard, Aug. 15, 1967
It
was not the first time that private investigator Eual R. Harrow had
interviewed jurors following a verdict, but in a 1974 Los Angeles case
involving the Church of Scientology, Harrow said the jurors proved to be
"the most difficult group I have ever encountered."
The
case was a civil suit, and the church had hired Harrow to find out why
it had lost. The jury had awarded $300,000 in damages to former
Scientologist L. Gene Allard in his suit in Los Angeles Superior Court
against the church for malicious prosecution.
"Many of the
jury, especially the women members, were concerned for their safety,
and felt that the church may try to do something to the members of the
jury," Harrow said in a sworn affidavit. One juror said several of the
others contemplated asking for protection, Harrow said.
"It
appeared that all the jurors were somewhat intimidated by the doctrine
of the Church of Scientology," the investigator wrote. "Everyone I
interviewed felt they were now 'fair game.' "
Fair game
is the name the church applied to a policy dictum first expressed by
Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard in 1965, and which he reaffirmed in a
written policy communique to the worldwide church in 1967.
The
fair-game policy has been a central focus of Scientology's critics —
among them former Scientologists — who contend that the church pursues
individuals who offend it with the same combativeness it directs toward
government agencies and private groups the church counts among its
enemies.
In a policy order dated Oct. 18, 1967, concerning a "suppressive person" (SP) or "enemy" of the church, Hubbard wrote:
"SP
Order. Fair Game. May be deprived of property or injured by any means
by any Scientologist without discipline of the Scientologist. May be
tricked, sued or lied to or destroyed."
Spokesmen for the
church insist that the intent of the fair-game policy has been widely
misunderstood by outsiders, and that it signified only that a
"suppressive person" could be deprived of the special protections the
church seeks to provide from a hostile society.
Equally misunderstood, the church contends, is a controversial Hubbard dictum label "R2-45,"
which the church's enigmatic founder never has chosen to elaborate. The
dictum comes from Hubbard's book "The Creation of Human Ability" and
reads: "R2-45: An enormously effective process for exteriorization but
its use is frowned upon by this society at this time."
Exteriorization, in Scientology terminology, is the ability of the mind, or "thetan" to physically leave the body.
A
number of former Scientologists who are now critics of the church
assert that R2-45 is meant to authorize killing its antagonists with a
.45-calibre pistol.
Church spokesman Jeffrey Dubron, of the principal American Church of Scientology in Los Angeles, says "it was only a joke."
There
is no evidence that R2-45 has ever been carried out, nor is there any
indication Scientologists have ever, as a matter of policy, physically
harmed anyone.
There is, however, abundant evidence that
the church has sought — and to a significant extent succeeded — to
suppress criticism of Scientology, in part by simply promulgating
policies such as fair game and R2-45 and also by the church's quickness
to file civil and even criminal charges against its critics.
In
a 1955 publication by Hubbard still sold in the church's bookstores, he
said the purpose of a lawsuit against those who make unauthorized use
of Scientology materials "is to harass and discourage rather than to
win."
He also said in the same publication, "... We do
not want Scientology to be reported in the press anywhere else than in
the religious pages of newspapers ... Therefore, we should be very alert
to sue for slander at the slightest chance so as to discourage the
public presses from mentioning Scientology."
Eight years
later, a five-page policy letter put out by Hubbard entitled "press
policies" suggests "We prefer no press because it slows our
word-of-mouth amongst the people."
As with its war on
government agencies that the church perceives as hostile to it,
Scientology's conflict with individual critics are the business of the
church's Guardian Office, a legal, public relations and intelligence
staff represented in each Scientology church in the United States and
other countries.
Directed from the organization's
headquarters in Sussex, Eng., the Guardian Office is a world apart from
the thousands of predominantly young people devoted to the church, and
who feel that its form of counseling, called "auditing," has benefited them.
Indeed,
the Guardian Office poses what would seem to be the central paradox of
Scientology: It is a sternly disciplinarian, combative — and by the
acknowledgement of church officials keenly litigious — unit of a
religious organization that says it seeks to "increase the spiritual,
cultural, and moral values of man" and to ameliorate the "harsh demands
of a modern society."
According to various sources:
— A New York federal grand jury is currently trying to determine whether Scientologists framed Paulette Cooper,
the author of a book critical of the church, by mailing two bomb
threats to a Church of Scientology in New York containing clues pointing
to Miss Cooper. A grand jury in 1973 initially charged Miss Cooper with
mailing the threatening letters, but the charges were dismissed by the
prosecutor two years later.
— The FBI in its July, 1977,
search of Church of Scientology offices in Los Angeles and Washington
seized documents indicating that two Scientologists staged a phony
hit-and-run automobile accident involving a pedestrian in an effort to
discredit Gabriel Cazares, a former mayor of Clearwater, Fla., and a vigorous critic of Scientology.
—
The FBI also seized documents indicating unspecified "operations"
planned by the church against Florida journalists critical of
Scientology in 1976. The church was at that time establishing a $2.3
million center for its elite "Sea Organization" in the Clearwater area.
The
FBI also has alleged in an affidavit that one of the 11 Scientologists
indicted by a federal grand jury Aug. 15 on charges of burglarizing
federal offices intended to use fictitious Internal Revenue Service
identification cards in an "operation" against one of the journalists,
but decided instead to use the cards to gain entry to a U.S. Justice
Department office.
In litigating to curb its critics, the
Church of Scientology has brought more than 100 civil lawsuits in the
past decade in the United States and Canada alone — most of them for
libel — against journalists, publishing companies, radio and television
stations, libraries and outspoken individuals who criticize the church.
Moreover,
on at least four occasions the Church of Scientology or its members
have lodged criminal charges against vocal critics. In each of the four
known instances the charges were dismissed by a local prosecutor or a
judge before the case was presented to a jury.
The
doctrinal writings and policy statements produced over the last 14 years
by the church's 67-year-old founder, L. Ron Hubbard, have set
Scientology's basic strategy in meeting attacks by government agencies,
private groups and individuals.
Among the earliest such
statements is a formal "policy letter" issued on August 15, 1960,
directing his followers to conduct themselves more forcefully.
"If
attacked on some vulnerable point," Hubbard wrote, "always find or
manufacture enough threat against them to cause them to sue for peace."
Six
years later another policy directive over Hubbard's name exhorts
Scientologists to investigate "noisily" individuals who attack the
church.
"You find out where he or she works or worked,
doctor, dentist, friends, neighbors, anyone and phone 'em up and say, 'I
am investigating Mr./Mrs. ... for criminal activities as he/she has
been trying to prevent Man's freedom and is restricting my religious
freedom and that of my friends and children, etc. ...'
"You
say now and then, 'I have already got some astounding facts,' etc. etc.
(Use a generality) ... It doesn't matter if you don't get much info.
Just be noisy — it's very odd at first, but makes fantastic sense and
works."
A subsequent May 30, 1974, confidential Scientology board policy letter entitled "handling hostile contacts/dead agenting," incorporates part of the church's earlier policies regarding attacks and specifically attributes to Hubbard:
"It
is my specific intention that by the use of professional PR tactics any
opposition be not only dulled but permanently eradicated. This takes
data and planning before positive action can occur."
At
another point in the policy, to counter what Hubbard labeled the "black
propaganda" of others against Scientology, the founder wrote:
"If
there will be a long-term threat, you are to immediately evaluate and
originate a black PR campaign to destroy the person's repute and to
discredit them so thoroughly that they will be ostracized."
Scientology
spokesman Kenneth Whitman said the 1974 policy had been rescinded, but
church officials declined to produce any written documentation to that
effect.
According to court documents, L. Gene Allard
believed that the Church of Scientology instigated criminal charges
against him in 1969 in an effort to discredit him after he left the
church with financial records which he later turned over to the Internal
Revenue Service.
Allard, an artist from Ft. Lauderdale,
Fla., who was then 28 years old, had joined the church in 1969 in Texas.
The same year he moved to Los Angeles, where he signed a symbolic
"billion-year" contract of loyalty to the church and joined
Scientology's elite management corps, the Sea Organization.
Allard
held the position of banking officer for the United States "Mother
Church" in Los Angeles until June 8, 1969, when, he said in court
testimony, he fled the church after a superior urged him to alter $1.25
million in receipts so as to make it appear that the money had been
received by a tax-exempt portion of the church rather than a nonexempt
entity.
Soon after Allard fled, church officials called
the police and accused him of stealing the equivalent of $27,713 in
Swiss francs, along with unspecified records, from the church safe.
Allard was subsequently arrested in Florida and jailed for 21 days
before the Los Angeles district attorney's office dismissed grand theft
charges against him "in the interest of justice."
Expanding
on the reasons for the dismissal, the prosecutor, in his recommendation
filed in Superior Court, said church officials had been "evasive" in
discussing the allegedly stolen Swiss francs.
Allard did
admit taking financial records from the safe that reflected income and
disbursements by the church, but he said he turned those over to the IRS
in Kansas City, which the prosecutor confirmed.
The Los
Angeles prosecutor also told the court he found Allard's contention that
the charges were leveled at him by Scientology in an attempt to
discredit him "plausible" and "well founded" because Allard might
someday be a witness for the IRS in a case against the church.
The
1974 trial of Allard's malicious prosecution suit against the church
focused on whether he had been subjected to Scientology's fair-game
policy and the church's contention the policy had been canceled.
Attorneys
for the church vigorously argued that the policy was irrelevant to
Allard's suit and, failing that, tried to show that it had not been
applied to Allard.
Introduced into evidence was a policy
order signed by Hubbard in 1968 which called a halt to declaring
individuals fair game "because it is bad public relations."
But
the same policy stated it "does not cancel any policy on treatment or
handling of any SP (suppressive person)," referring to being "tricked,
sued, or lied to or destroyed."
The jury May 31, 1974, found in favor of Allard and awarded him $50,000 general damages and $250,000 punitive damages.
An
appellate court — which upheld the Superior Court verdict but reduced
the amount of punitive damages assessed against the church to $50,000 —
observed that Superior Judge Parks Stillwell had given the church
"almost the entire trial within which to produce evidence that the
fair-game policy had been repealed." The appellate court said the church
had "failed to do so."
The California Supreme Court
refused on July 15, 1976, to review the case. Allard was last reported
by his attorney, W. Marshall Morgan, to be working as a woodcarver in
San Diego County. Efforts by The Times to reach him for comment were
unsuccessful.
In a similar finding, the December, 1971,
report of an official British inquiry into Scientology rejected the
church's contention that the fair-game policy was "just a theoretical
sanction."
Sir John Foster, a member of Parliament who presided over the inquiry, wrote:
"In
at least one case which has come to my notice, a defector from
Scientology who had risen through the ranks to a high position in the
organization was declared fair-game over Mr. Hubbard's signature when he
decided to dissociate himself.
"Thereafter, members of
the Scientology leadership were found writing to third parties to say
that the defector had been 'excommunicated for theft and perversion.'
"Another
Scientologist, who had sued for the return of his auditing (counseling)
fees, found himself the subject of a private prosecution for theft by
the Scientology leadership. Fortunately for him, he was acquitted."
The
Church of Scientology has since circulated an affidavit bearing
Hubbard's signature that disavows any harmful intent to the fair-game
policy. The March 22, 1976, affidavit, which is not notarized, reads in
part:
"There was never any attempt or intent on my part
by the writing of these policies (or any others for that fact), to
authorize illegal or harassment-type acts against anyone."
However,
the inventory the FBI prepared of items it seized from the Church of
Scientology in July, 1977, cites a nine-page document dated Jan. 26,
1976, which, according to the FBI's description, concerns "operations
against enemies 'Sableman, Orsini, and Bob Snyder.'"
Mark
Sableman and Bette Orsini are reporters for the St. Petersburg (Fla.)
Times and Clearwater Sun who, in 1976, wrote a series of investigative
stories on Scientology. Bob Snyder was at the time a talk show host on
radio station WDCL in Dunedin, Fla., near Clearwater, where the Church
of Scientology established a major new "advanced training" facility in
late 1975.
On his radio show, and on the lecture circuit
in the metropolitan Tampa area, Snyder had been severely critical of the
church, depicting Scientology as an "anti-God" influence that had moved
surreptitiously into the community, misleading businessmen, news media,
and local clergy as to its identity.
The Church of
Scientology had established the advanced training center for its Sea
Organization in the locally historic, 272-room Fort Harrison Hotel in
Clearwater — but did not initially disclose its ownership.
The
previous owner, Jack Tar Hotels, Inc., said only that it had sold the
Fort Harrison building for $2.3 million to a company called Southern
Land Development and Leasing Corp., which in turn was to lease the hotel
to a newly formed organization called United Churches of Florida.
Only
after the mayor of Clearwater at the time, Gabriel Cazares, pressed
publicly for more information about United Churches — and asked in
particular why a religious organization would restrict public access to
the old hotel and post Mace-equipped security guards around the clock —
did Scientology church officials in Florida acknowledge that they were
"95% owners" of both Southern Land and United Churches of Florida.
Still
later, the officials said the two groups were "wholly-owned
subsidiaries" of the Church of Scientology. Asked in 1976 to explain why
the church had not disclosed its role in the purchase of the hotel,
national spokesman Arthur J. Maren said that, "Since the idea was to
unite religions for community and social betterment, and not an idea to
propagate Scientology, the less mention of any dominant religion the
better."
(The hotel complex and nearby bank building the
church purchased for $500,000 now operate openly under the banner of
Scientology.)
In an affidavit the FBI prepared last year
in support of a search warrant prior to seizing papers from the Church
of Scientology, the bureau alleged that two church agents broke into an
Internal Revenue Service office in Washington, in March, 1976, and made
IRS credentials in fictitious names.
"These credentials
were initially made," the FBI alleged, "for use in a covert operation
involving one Robert Snyder, a newscaster critical of the church."
Instead
of carrying out that operation, the FBI affidavit alleged, the
credentials were used by two Scientologists to gain entry to the U.S.
Courthouse in Washington, where the Justice Department kept files of
government documents withheld from the Church of Scientology, under
exemptions in the Freedom of Information Act.
The FBI
identified the Scientologists as Michael J. Meisner, the Washington
church's covert operations chief who became a key government informant
in the case, and Gerald Wolfe of Los Angeles, one of the 11 indicted by a
federal grand jury. The FBI said it intercepted Wolfe and Meisner at
the U.S. Courthouse on June 11, 1976.
In February, 1976,
after the church threatened to sue the radio station for Snyder's
caustic remarks about Scientology, the small station fired Snyder, then
rehired him a month later to host a noncontroversial music show.
The
same month church officials obtained a criminal complaint for
trespassing against Snyder, alleging that he had driven at a high rate
of speed into the courtyard of a church facility shouting obscenities.
Snyder
confirmed that he and his wife had driven onto the premises to gather
information about Scientology, but denied the other accusations. A city
judge dismissed the charges ruling that no "willful trespass" had been
proven.
Mark Sableman, a reporter with the Clearwater Sun
who had written stories critical of Scientology, was the target of an
apparent attempt in May, 1976, to discredit him professionally in the
eyes of the Florida Legislature, which Sableman was then covering.
A
rough draft of a fictitious news story under his name was circulated
anonymously among legislators alleging that 19 of them were linked to
the Mafia and gambling interests and were involved in bribery, blackmail
and illegal financial transactions.
The Clearwater Sun
denied at the time that Sableman was working on any such story and added
in a published disclaimer that two documents circulated with the fake
draft, which the newspaper did not describe, were apparently obtained by
burglarizing the reporter's Tallahassee hotel room.
According
to one account, documents seized from the Church of Scientology in
July, 1977, show Scientologists circulated the fictitious news story.
In
February, 1976, shortly after the church had bought the Clearwater
Hotel and the city's mayor, among others, had stirred a local furor over
Scientology's role, the Church sued Cazares for $1 million — alleging
libel, slander and infringement of its members' constitutional right to
freedom of religion.
Cazares and his wife then
countersued the church, alleging that a "fact sheet" on his background
that Scientologists had circulated had libeled him.
(The
Cazareses later dropped their suit, they said, in order to concentrate
their resources on defending against the church suit, which a federal
judge in Tampa dismissed last month.
A hearing is yet to
be held to determine whether the Church of Scientology should be
compelled to pay the Cazares' legal fees, which his attorney estimates
at between $40,000 and $70,000.)
On March 14 and 15, 1976, Cazares attended a national mayors' conference in Washington, D.C.
Shortly
thereafter, while Cazares was running unsuccessfully for Congress, an
anonymous letter signed only "Sharon T." circulated in Clearwater
alleging that the mayor had been riding in a car in Washington that
struck a pedestrian and that Cazares had failed to report the accident.
Last
April, the Washington Post reported that documents the FBI seized from
the church showed that two Scientologists had staged a fake hit-and-run
accident involving Cazares in Washington's Rock Creek Park.
A woman
Scientology agent, said to have been driving a car in which Cazares was
riding, reportedly "struck" a second Scientologist posing as a
pedestrian, sped away and urged the mayor not to report the "accident."
The
Church of Scientology subsequently subpoenaed the Post reporter and
entered the story into court records as part of a contention that the
government had leaked documents prejudicial to the church.
Cazares,
who is now a stockbroker in the Clearwater area, has acknowledged
renting a car and driving it in Washington on March 14, 1976, but has
said he drove alone. Inquiries to the Washington police by Florida news
media at the time the anonymous letter from "Sharon T" circulated,
disclosed 19 hit-and-run accidents in the metropolitan area on March 14,
none involving a pedestrian. Although he turned the letter over to the
FBI, Cazares declined to discuss the incident further with The Times.
Spokesmen
for the Church of Scientology have denied involvement in any such
episode or in circulating the letter from "Sharon T." One church
spokesman said, "It sounds like the plot of a movie."
In
pleadings filed in the Los Angeles federal court, Asst. U. S. Atty.
Raymond Banoun, the prosecutor in the case of 11 church officials
indicted Aug. 15, said earlier this year that federal grand juries in
Tampa and New York are investigating Scientology, but he would comment
no further.
The New York grand jury, according to a
reliable source, is attempting to determine whether the church or its
officials were involved in framing freelance author Paulette Cooper on
criminal charges lodged against her on May 17, 1973.
Miss
Cooper, who wrote a 1971 book entitled, "The Scandal of Scientology,"
was charged two years later with two counts of mailing bomb threats to a
prominent official of the church in New York and one count of perjury
for denying to a grand jury that she sent the notes.
J.
A. Meisler, then a public-relations official in the New York Church of
Scientology, has said in a signed statement that after he received the
two typewritten bomb threats he gave the FBI a list of persons "who
might bear me a grudge or be critical or opposed to" Scientology. Los
Angeles church spokesmen confirmed that her name was one of those given
to the FBI.
One of the notes bore a single fingerprint of
Miss Cooper, and the wording of both contains clues pointing to her.
One note, for example, refers to "books closing in on me" — Miss Cooper
has written several other books and numerous magazine articles — and
also contains the words, "My tongue is swollen — I hurt — my operation."
Miss
Cooper had a minor tongue anomaly which she says developed as a result
of childhood malnutrition when she lived in an orphanage. Shortly before
the Church of Scientology reported receiving the notes in late 1972,
Miss Cooper also had undergone major surgery for an unrelated problem
and mentioned it in a television interview.
In the months
after she was charged with federal offenses relating to the mailing of
the notes, Miss Cooper has said she spent more than $20,000 for legal
fees and an additional $6,000 for psychiatric treatment of severe mental
depression. On one occasion, she has said, she attempted suicide.
In 1975, two years after her indictment, authorities dismissed the charges against Miss Cooper.
Three
weeks ago, Miss Cooper filed a $20 million damage suit against the
church in New York. In the suit, she said that FBI agents advised her in
October of 1977 of evidence that the Church of Scientology "had caused
her stationery to be stolen, had written the two bomb threat letters on
it, had caused them to be sent to it (the church) and had called in the
FBI and blamed her."
In her civil suit, Paulette Cooper
refers to a manila folder entitled "PC Freakout" that was among
truckloads of documents the FBI seized from the Church of Scientology,
following a search July 8, 1977.
The only available
description of the folder is contained in the FBI's extensive inventory
of materials it seized. The FBI said it contained two documents that
concerned "getting PC incarcerated in a mental institution or jail."
The FBI has informed Miss Cooper that the initials "PC" refer to her.
The
FBI inventory of seized documents contains more than a dozen references
in all to "PC" and "Paulette Cooper," including a three-page document
dated May 18, 1972, discussing "intelligence operations against Paulette
Cooper" and a manila folder with "handwritten notes from P. Cooper's
diary."
In addition to alleging that the church framed
her on the criminal charges, Miss Cooper's suit alleges that the Church
also stole her diary; sent false and malicious, but anonymous letters to
acquaintances; made threatening phone calls to her; stole information
about her from the offices of her lawyer and doctor and mailed it to her
and spied on her.
Jonathon Lubell, New York attorney
for the church, declined to comment on the nature of Miss Cooper's suit
other than to state he was confident Scientology would be "vindicated."
Cooper's
1971 book also resulted in a major legal battle with the church, which
filed eight libel suits against her in California, New York and Canada
as well as in Australia and Great Britain, where Miss Cooper says the
book was never distributed.
Tower Publications, Inc.,
publisher of "The Scandal of Scientology," withdrew the book from the
market shortly after the suits were filed against Miss Cooper and the
company. Stating that fighting the suits was not worth the probable cost
in legal fees, Tower paid the church $500 in a 1973 settlement and
wrote a brief apology for "any difficulties caused to the Church of
Scientology as a result of any half-truths or misstatements of fact in
the book ..."
On Dec. 5, 1976, five of the lawsuits were
settled on the eve of a Superior Court trial in Los Angeles pertaining
to one of them. The church paid what Miss Cooper's attorney described as
a "substantial sum" for her legal expenses.
She in turn
signed a statement that said in part that in the five years since
publication of the book she had learned that a number of passages in it
were "erroneous or at the very least misleading" and agreed not to
discuss the book publicly.
In still another suit, which
the church filed against Miss Cooper this year, it accused her of
breaking a clause in the settlement agreement under which she was to
refrain from public discussion of Scientology and her book.
The
church filed the suit after a newspaper story last April described her
conflict with Scientology, although the story said she was traveling in
Europe and could not be reached for comment. Her attorney, in responding
to this suit, said she signed the 1976 agreement "under duress" from
the church and that it was therefore "unlawful and unenforceable."
Jeffrey
Dubron, a church spokesman in Los Angeles, characterized Miss Cooper as
"someone who is out for money and found a sensational way to get it."
"All
I'm saying," Dubron said, "is look at her book, look at this (the
15-page statement she signed concerning disputed passages in the book)
... and then ask us why we sued, and why, when you talk about Paulette
Cooper's credibility, you find we have fairly deaf ears."
Forty miles north of Toronto, in the small community of Sutton, Ontario, a 55-year-old housewife named Nan McLean has been an equally vocal critic of Scientology, and her conflicts with the church have been intense.
Mrs.
McLean joined Scientology in 1969 and for several years worked full
time at one of the church's counseling "franchises" — now called
missions — in Toronto. Before she left in the fall of 1972 she had
brought her husband, two sons, and daughter-in-law into the church.
One
son, John, now 26, dropped out of high school in his senior year to
join Scientology and spent nearly two years aboard the church's
flagship, the 3,280-ton yacht Apollo.
But when the
McLeans became disenchanted with Scientology and sought refunds for some
of the counseling courses they had taken, conflict erupted with the
church — and escalated as the McLeans began publicly criticizing the
church in new articles and on radio and television.
In a
little more than five years, the Church of Scientology has filed nearly
a dozen lawsuits — most of them for libel — against various members of
the family in the United States and Canada, instigated criminal charges
alleging harassing phone calls from the McLeans, and conducted a mock
funeral for the family down the main street of Sutton.
A
judge dismissed the criminal charges after testimony that three of the
calls actually were placed by Scientologists to the McLeans.
On
April 25, 1974, a Canadian court ordered the church "not to carry on
public demonstrations against" Mrs. McLean, distribute literature
describing her as a "lost soul," or otherwise refer to her previous
association with Scientology.
Mrs. McLean in turn was
ordered to cease impugning Scientology on radio and television until a
church suit against her (to reclaim a $1,300 refund it paid her) is
resolved.
Amid these legal battles, two Toronto men were
arrested on April 17, 1974, in what police said was an aborted attempt
to break into an attorney's office. The office was that of Nan McLean's
attorney. The following day a court hearing was scheduled in one of the
suits the Church of Scientology had brought against her.
The two men later pleaded guilty to possession of burglary tools and were sentenced to two years probation.
Although
a police search of their apartment found material on Scientology,
neither man acknowledged affiliation with the church during interviews
with police or with probation officials.
Asst. Crown
Atty. Brian McIntyre, in a letter to Mrs. McLean dated Nov. 3, 1975,
said a police investigation revealed that both men were members of the
Church of Scientology.
There is no evidence the men were acting at the direction of the church.
