Volume 0, Issue 32 vom 02. 12. 1995

Alt.religion.scientology Week in Review
Volume 0, Issue 32
02/12/95
by Rod Keller [rkeller@netaxs.com]
copyright 1995

Contents

  1. R2-45
  2. AOL Folder Wars
  3. Lerma/Washington Post Order
  4. Lerma Trial
  5. Gold Base
  6. GO Still Active
  7. Sealed or Not?
  8. Charles Manson
  9. Netcom
  10. Linda Woolard
  11. Credit Card Fraud
  12. Stipulations of Evidence
  13. Free Zone Web Site

Alt.religion.scientology Week in Review summarizes the most significant
postings from the Usenet group Alt.religion.scientology for the preceding
week for the benefit of those who can't follow the group as closely as
they'd like. Out of thousands of postings, I attempt to include news of
significant events, new affidavits, court rulings, new contributors,
whatever. I hope you find it useful. Like many readers of a.r.s, I have a
kill file. So please take into consideration that I may not have seen some
of the most significant postings. 

The articles in A.r.s Week in Review are brief summaries of the articles. 
Many include an excerpt, and all include message IDs for the articles I
cover. This may or may not be useful to you, depending on how long your
site stores articles in the newsgroup before expiring them. 

Free A.r.s Week in Review subscriptions are available, just email me at 
rkeller@voicenet.com
It is archived at:
        http://www.amazing.com/scientology/ars-summary.html
        http://users.aimnet.com/~jdiver/scieno.htm
        http://www.thur.de/religio/publik/arsfaq.html
        http://wpxx02.toxi.uni-wuerzburg.de/~krasel/CoS/ars-summary.html

#####

R2-45

An anonymous story was posted this week concerning the 'joke' of R2-45, the procedure described by Hubbard to shoot an enemy of the HCG in the head with a .45 pistol. "He once told us how he and Otto Roos had been sent on an 'R2-45 mission' by the Commodore, against Chuck Berner and his Abilitism splinter group. They were quite willing to carry it out if necessary, but when they assessed Abilitism as not much of a threat, they suggested to LRH that he downgrade the mission. He agreed. Instead, they recruited LA Org students for a 'third-rate burglary' (my phrase), in which they broke into the Abilitism center, stole the E-meters, and trashed the rest." Message-ID: <49bgia$2ud@camelot.ccs.neu.edu> #####

AOL Folder Wars

The anonymous poster Xenu reported on the state of AOL's folders this week. "After a period of quiescence, the 'Scientology and Copyright' folder on AOL is again under concerted, coordinated attack. It's been deleted repeatedly over the last few days, with no public acknowledgment from AOL of what is going on. RonArtistR in particular has been foaming at the mouth with posts demanding the deletion of the copyright folder. Apparently AOL has chosen the path of least resistance. Free speech is apparently too much trouble to allow." Other folders have also disappeared. Alan Morris reported the deletion of the 'Scientologie' folder, and Woodsie found his post containing the recently released report by Jon Atack deleted. "Apparently AOL finds this material threatening... I posted the first part, in 8 pages to the 'religion & ethics?' bds...only to find it all removed the following morning." Again, from Xenu. "And the censorship wars continue. Newly created folders to discuss Scientology and copyright (suggested by the sysop, Jerry White) are mysteriously deleted almost as soon as they are established, with no explanations. What is happening? "Also, folders for Scientologie and the Free Zone are deleted, with no explanation. Given that these are folders for discussing religious issues, I'm surprised that the Free Zone is somehow treated as the Scientologists dictate, rather than being considered an autonomous religion, analogous to the Protestants and Catholics." Message-ID: <498m9v$d37@newsbf02.news.aol.com> Message-ID: <morrisaDIoBoq.EBu@netcom.com> Message-ID: <49b5h8$fr8_001@ppp7.erie.net> Message-ID: <49itoe$ov1@newsbf02.news.aol.com> #####

Lerma/Washington Post Order

(Full text you can find at http://www.thur.de/religio/publik/wash.html On November 29th, Judge Leonie M. Brinkema issued an order in the cases against Arnie Lerma and the Washington Post. It rejects the major arguments made by the cult lawyers. "RTC asserts that maintenance of the secrecy and confidentiality of the documents in question ('AT documents') represents a fundamental and inviolate tenet of the Scientology religion. Withholding these documents from unprepared or uninitiated observers was of primary importance to founder L. Ron Hubbard and is a belief woven throughout his original writings. Thus, for Scientologists publication of these materials threatens 'irreversible alteration of religious beliefs, including compelled annihilation of a core belief -- confidentiality of the [AT documents].' "Were they arguing to a religious council placed within a theocratic government, RTC's arguments might prevail. But this Court is a secular branch of a secular democratic government. Our traditional separation of church from the state, combined with the heterogeneity of religious practices in this country compel us to reject the RTC's arguments. In the same vein, RTC may not employ the machinery of this Court to enforce its religious prescriptions against The Post by enjoining otherwise permissible activity. "A second related argument regards the alleged spiritual harm that will befall Scientologists and non-Scientologists alike from reading the AT documents. The RTC claims that premature exposure of the documents to non-Scientologists (and even to Scientologists who have not reached the requisite OT level) will result in 'devastating, cataclysmic spiritual harm.' According to the church's dogma, founder L. Ron Hubbard taught that disclosure of these documents to anyone who had not progressed through the necessary spiritual prerequisites could cause profound spiritual harm to the person prematurely exposed.' Non-Scientologists will also be harmed because premature exposure will interfere with their 'personal spiritual progress.' "This argument has no merit. We reside in a country which allows individuals and organizations to confront the risk of harm, spiritual or otherwise, in the face of protected speech. The First Amendment represents a conscious and explicit trade-off which the Founding Fathers made between paternalistic protection from 'harmful' thoughts and free access to information. Where statutorily and constitutionally protected speech is concerned, our system permits an individual's fate to be sealed by the individual's choices rather than governmental monitoring. "In addition to spiritual harm, RTC's Emergency Motion reargues their position about economic harm from publications of the AT documents. RTC bases its economic claims upon two types of harm: 1) Competition from rival churches or 'splinter groups' which will draw away future parishioners and potential donations; and 2) The 'potential loss of new parishioners through ridicule, by taking portions of the materials out of context.' "As to the first claim, no reasonable person could find that The Post's brief quotations from the AT documents could provide sufficient material upon which a rival church could establish a competing organization. As The Post has argued, there is no evidence that it intends any more extensive quotations, and indeed they are under court order to confine their use of the documents to that permitted by fair use. Moreover, The Post is clearly not in the business of setting up religions and is not a competitor of Scientology. "Regarding the RTC's concern about potential loss of new parishioners, this is the price paid in a free society which encourages an open marketplace for ideas. Free speech protections and the fair use exemption to the copyright statute exist to permit open and educated debate on matters of public importance. The RTC must accept the fact that frank criticism of Scientology religious tenets may deter some potential parishioners. Harm from legitimate criticism is not actionable under either the First Amendment or copyright laws. "We therefore conclude that this problem of unclean hands on the part of RTC mandates denial of the equitable relief they presently seek against Lerma and DGS. Even without unclean hands, however, the RTC would lose under the Blackwelder test. The RTC is currently undertaking virtually identical litigation in the United States District Court for the District of Colorado involving FACTNet, Lerma's organizational counterpart. Judge John L. Kane, Jr. denied RTC's Motion for Preliminary Injunction, granted the defendants' motion to Vacate the Seizure Order, and ordered immediate return of all materials." Message-Id: <Pine.SOL.3.91.951130204445.27270D-100000@DGS> #####

Lerma Trial

Shelley Thomson provided a summary of the next steps in Arnie Lerma's trial in her Biased Journalism newsletter. "The lawsuit brought by Religious Technology Corporation, an arm of the Church of Scientology, against Arnaldo P. Lerma (critic), Digital Gateway Systems (his service provider), the Washington Post, Richard Leiby and Marc Fisher (reporters) will go to trial on January 29, 1996. David Miscavige, head of the church of scientology, will be deposed in this lawsuit. Last-ditch efforts by the church to quash his deposition have failed." Message-ID: <sthomsonDIKp7x.1Eo@netcom.com> #####

Gold Base

Also from Biased Journalism, a report from Gold Base, the cult's prison camp in Hemet, California. "On Monday, November 13 there was a security flap at the Scientology base at Hemet, which is coincidentally called Gold Base. Concern was raised about a possible high-level defector. Security procedures entailed checking on a quantity of gold bullion which had been stored in a secure vault. When they went to check on it, they found that 7/8 of the gold was missing. There was no paper trail. Security personnel almost had a shootout over this, but discipline prevailed. There was (they decided) probably no connection between the missing gold and the alleged defector. The gold had to have been removed beforehand, possibly one or two months ago. The deer mouse thought it happened on the night shift, and that a high-ranked person in the church gave the order to make no records of the transfer. A *very* high ranked person, the deer mouse said significantly. "Security sent a message to higher management asking for instructions (it went on). Was this to be considered a theft, or an authorized action? If the latter, why were they not informed? They heard back, after a delay, but the response was ambiguous. They were essentially told to hold their position. A colleague of the deer mouse scanned the message and told us, reading between the lines, that the author had no idea what had happened to the gold and did not want to commit himself." Message-ID: <sthomsonDIKp7x.1Eo@netcom.com> #####

GO Still Active

Another anonymous story of former Guardian Office cult members still at their posts was released this week. "My source contends that an ex-GO of the name of Maureen Brigatti is now/was recently in charge of all scientology reserves world-wide.Maureen Brigatti was allegedly the Deputy Guardian Finance for the UK. He claims that the GO was divided into several areas - Information, PR, Finance, and Social Coordination (Narconon etc.). At the top of the pyramid was a Guardian World Wide - Jane Kember - with a number of Deputy Guardians (DG PR was David Gaiman, DG Fiance was Herbie Parkhouse). "As of 1991 Maureen Brigatti was (according to my source) in charge of the Sea Org Reserves and the IAS accounts. Both of these accounts are apparently held in a Kredit Bank in Luxembourg. My source estimates that the money in these reserves is roughly $500,000,000. "My source goes on to explain that the IAS administration is actually in Cyprus. This is apparently because the banking regs are looser than a lot of either places, and banking secrecy. There is also no official scientology activity there either - so they are less likely to be hassled by the local officials. And, as the IAS has never applied for any tax exempt status in the states (according to my source), the IAS doesn't have to make it's books open to anybody. The name of the office in Cyprus is apparently Theta-Management-Liason (TML)." Message-ID: <49baib$1vr@camelot.ccs.neu.edu> #####

Sealed or Not?

Last issue of WiR contained the story of Andrew Milne posting excerpts from a sealed deposition. The excerpt quoted Arnie Lerma as saying that Larry Wollersheim isn't an easy person to deal with. A devastating Dead Agent attack. Andy Milne now claims the portion quoted is not sealed after all. He addresses Arnie: "You are not only a copyright violator but you also don't bother to check your facts before posting. This is a good indicator of the veracity of your other claims. "Only the first day of your deposition was marked confidential. The second day's was not so marked and may be quoted. The excerpt I posted came from the second day." Message-ID: <495ijq$60r@crl14.crl.com> #####

Charles Manson

Evidence of imprisoned murderer Charles Manson's involvement in the cult was posted this week. The evidence is a portion of a letter to Mary Sue Hubbard. It is dated June 22nd, 1970, author unknown. "Report of interview with Raul Morales, Re: Charles Manson. According to Raul: Raul arrived in prison on McNeil Island, Washington in 1962 and became a cell mate of Lafayette Raimer allegedly a trained Scientology auditor (about Level I in Rauls's estimation) and was introduced to Scientology at that time. Raimer was auditing in prison at that time and in one 10 man cell had managed to gather a group of about 7, all in Scientology. Charles Manson entered later and studied, did TR0 etc. along with his cell-mates and received approximately 150 hours of auditing from Raimer. Processes used were CCH's, Help processes (Who have you helped-Who have you not helped) and other Dichotomy processes (Rauls terms, such as What can you confront, what would you rather not confront), Havingness (Such as 'What can you have?' 'Look around and find something you can have. Look around and find something you're not in.' Raimer kept records of his auditing. Manson got super-energetic & flipped out when he'd been audited and would, for a time, talk about nothing but Scientology to the extent that people avoided his company. After a while, however, Manson was screaming to get away from his auditor (in Raul's opinion, he'd been severely over-run or something). He eventually managed to get put in solitary confinement to get away from his auditor. Eventually prison officials got suspicious of the groups strange activities and broke up the group." Message-ID: <199511250407.UAA23777@infinity.c2.org> #####

Netcom

Judge Whyte issued a ruling on November 21st in the case of the cult against Netcom, Internet provider for Tom Klemesrud, and in turn, to Dennis Erlich. Netcom claimed victory, saying in a November 28th press release: "The Court vindicated NETCOM's position, ruling in favor of the Company on two of the three critical points under review. Judge Whyte ruled that NETCOM is not liable for direct copyright infringement or for vicarious liability. On the central issue of direct copyright infringement, the Court held that NETCOM is not liable for direct infringement when an individual uses its system to post copyrighted material onto the Internet without its knowledge. Rejecting the plaintiffs' position in this regard as 'unreasonable,' the Court noted that holding an access provider liable for direct infringement under those circumstances 'would ... result in liability for every single Usenet server in the worldwide link of computers transmitting [the infringing] message to every other computer.'" Cult spokesman Andrew Milne also claimed victory, posting a press release from the RTC. It is becoming increasingly difficult for Andy to find "Big Wins" from recent court decisions. "On November 21, 1995, Judge Ronald Whyte of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California denied Netcom's and Klemesrud's motions for summary judgment in a copyright infringement suit filed by two Church of Scientology organizations, Religious Technology Center and Bridge Publications, Inc. "This later, 32-page ruling is a major blow to Netcom and Klemesrud. They had hoped they could evade liability for their part in Erlich's copyright infringements, however, they now have to face trial on the issue. "It is a decisive victory for the Church of Scientology which has maintained all along that access providers and BBS operators have a responsibility to take action to halt infringements once these are brought to their attention. The court clearly rejected Netcom's claim that it merely provides a passive channel of communication like a common carrier and is thus comparable to a phone company. The judge stated that '... Netcom does more than just 'provide the wire and conduits.' Further, Internet providers are not national monopolies that are bound to carry all the traffic that one wishes to pass through them, as with the usual common carrier.'" Message-ID: <9511290241.03S0R06@support.com> Message-ID: <499b1r$ih9@crl9.crl.com> #####

Linda Woolard

Linda Woolard (aka Miss Bloodybutt) filed for and received a restraining order against Tom Klemesrud on November 21st. It contains language that prevents Tom from posting to the Internet any message about the case. It states in part: "Defendant: Tom Theo Klemesrud, shall not alarm, annoy, or harass plaintiff, an SPECIFICALLY IT IS ORDERED THAT DEFENDANT a. not threaten, strike, or make physical contact with plaintiff and b. not keep plaintiff under surveillance c. not follow plaintiff d. not telephone plaintiff e. not block plaintiff's movements in public places or thoroughfares "Other orders: The defendant shall not have anyone else, specifically Pierre Merkl surveil, follow, telephone, threaten or make physical contact with the plaintiff. The defendant shall not make any Internet postings about the plaintiff or the 1-14-95 incident involving the plaintiff. "Defendant continues to harass plaintiff by willfully posting defaming, demeaning and untrue derogatory comments about the plaintiff on the Internet. He continues to direct Pierre Merkl to surveil, follow, telephone and harass the plaintiff, plaintiff's roommate and members of the plaintiff's family. "Defendant shall not post on the Internet or publicize in any way the plaintiff's name, address, phone number or the name, address & phone numbers of Barry Rohrbach or any members of the plaintiff's family. The defendant shall not post on the Internet or publicize in any way anything about the plaintiff or about Barry Rohrbach or any member of the plaintiff's family." The order also contains Linda's account of the incident, and explains away the "blood" that Linda spread on Tom's bathroom walls. "The Plaintiff had a preexisting medical condition which causes her hemorrhoids to bleed when under stress or when drinking heavily. She started hemorrhaging from her rectum and tried to calm the Defendant. She explained her medical condition to him. She went into the bathroom and removed her denim pants which were soaked with blood. She wrapped herself in a towel. "The Defendant kept threatening her and shoving her around. This caused the Plaintiff to suffer more emotional distress which caused more bleeding from her rectum and caused blood to be spread around the room." Tom Klemesrud responded to the order. "This language is clearly an unconstitutional restrain of 1st Amendment Free Speech rights. "In a declaration, that is not signed, or show what the last page is, Woolard says that on November 27th, 1995 I was stalking her at a bar in Burbank. In fact I was 1,500 miles away in Thompson, Iowa--for this was the day of my Dad's funeral. "She said after seeing me at the bar in Burbank watching her, she 'became terrified and ran into the women's bathroom to get away from him. She immediately began hemorrhaging from her rectum because of the emotional distress she was once again experiencing by being in the vicinity [1,500 miles] of the defendant. When her friends went into the bathroom to see what was wrong they found her bleeding profusely. They phoned for an ambulance. She was transported and treated in the emergency room at Thompson Memorial Medical Center in Burbank. Later at about 6:00 am on May 28th, 1995 she was transferred by ambulance to Olive View - UCLA Medical Center in Sylmar for further treatment. She was released later that afternoon.'" Tom also posted a response to the order, presumably filed with the court. "The temporary restraining order in place acts as a prior restraint of speech on my part: 'defendant shall not make any Internet postings about the plaintiff or the 1/14/95 incident involving the plaintiff' and is a violation of my First Amendment rights. The TRO also potentially acts to block my attorneys in the RTC v. Netcom case from performing legitimate reasonable investigation through licensed investigators to adequately defend me in the unmeritorious lawsuit. It is my opinion that the application for TRO re harassment is a second 'set up' by Ms. Woolard similar to the way I was set up on January 14, 1995. I would request that the Court consider the facts within this declaration and the attached pleadings filed on my behalf and rescind the unconstitutional and over broad orders herein." Message-ID: <49lbci$8j5@utopia.hacktic.nl> Message-ID: <9511301409.0JW9V02@support.com> Message-ID: <9511302037.0SZ6704@support.com> #####

Credit Card Fraud

Tom Klemesrud also posted information on credit card fraud, carried out by the cult as part of its harassment campaign. It is possible that some of the information was collected when his mailbox lock was broken, and mail stolen several months ago. "So far, my Discover card, First Card, Montgomery Ward card, and J.C. Penney cards have been compromised. I personally have a hard time believing all these cards, or statements we in my mail box July 26th. It could be a TRW job. In each case the theft changed the address to some mail drop in Sherman Oaks then re-applied, or reported the cards stolen. In the Ward Card case, I was informed that the theft showed a phony ID of me at a local store. The United States Postal Service says there are really over-worked, and that the Attorney General's guidelines are such that they will not prosecute unless $20,000 is stolen in the fraud." Message-ID: <tomklemDIq5JL.9zF@netcom.com> #####

Stipulations of Evidence

Rogue Agent posted portions of the Stipulations of Evidence from the trial of the Guardian Office 11 in 1978. The case is Criminal No. 78-401. The stipulation describes the portions of the evidence that were agreed to as accurate by both the prosecution a nd the defense. It describes some of the spying techniques that were used against the IRS. "In a clinical setting, Mr. Meisner also learned to conduct covert investigations, surveillances 'suitable guise' investigations, the recruiting and supervising of covert agents, the placing of these agents in organizations that were to he infiltrated, the theft of documents, and other overt and covert intelligence gathering techniques. "A few days before November 1, 1974, Don Alverzo, who held the position or Deputy Information Branch I Director US telephoned Mr. Meisner from Los Angeles, California, to inform him that he was coming to the District of Columbia to place an electronic bugging device in the Chief Counsel's conference room at the Internal Revenue Service where a major meeting concerning Scientology was to be held. On October 30, 1974, Mr. Meisner met Mr. Alverzo at the Guardian's Office located at 2125 S Street, Northwest, in the District of Columbia. Also present at this meeting were the defendants Mitchell Hermann and Bruce Ullman who held the position of Information Branch II Director in the District of Columbia. Alverzo showed Meisner the bugging device which he had brought with him from Los Angeles. One of the items Alverzo had was a multiple electric outlet containing a transmitting device. In the late afternoon of October 30 Mr. Meisner and the defendant Mitchell Hermann entered the main IRS building located at 1111 Constitution Avenue, northwest, for the purpose of locating the conference room of the Chief Counsel's office where the meeting was to be held on November 1, 1974 "The defendant Hermann told Mr. Meisner that he had entered the main IRS building on the morning of November 1, 1974, gone to the conference room, where the meeting was to be held and placed the bugging device in a wall socket in that room. The room was located on the fourth floor of the Internal Revenue Service main building in Washington D.C. and faced the driveway of the Smithsonian Institution Museum of History and Technology on Constitution Avenue Northwest. Thereafter, Hermann left the building and waited in a car in the driveway of the museum with Don Alverzo and Carla Moxon (the Assistant Guardian Communicator (Secretary) in the District of Columbia) and overheard and taped the entire meeting over the FM radio of the car. Following the conclusion of the meeting, the defendant Hermann reentered the IRS building, removed the bugging equipment from the conference room and took various papers, including the agenda for the meeting, which had been left by the participants. He showed these items to Mr. Meisner. Soon afterwards Alverzo returned to Los Angeles. He took with him the bugging device, and the tape recording of the meeting." Message-ID: <49e40j$i1u@camelot.ccs.neu.edu> Message-ID: <49e42q$i23@camelot.ccs.neu.edu> Message-ID: <49e44s$i2d@camelot.ccs.neu.edu> #####

Free Zone Web Site

The Free Zone Association, a group of former cult members who still believe in the teachings of Hubbard, announced a web site this week. They have acquired the rights to Scientologie by Dr. A. Nordenholz, written in 1934, before any of Hubbard's writings. The site is http://www.freezone.org "The Free Zone Association obtained the rights for the book from Dr. Nordenholz's heirs and has republished the book both in English and German. You will find background data in the English and German 'literature' section of the Web pages. "Our general opinion is that Scientology as it is represented by the Church of Scientology has departed far from its original philosophy and technology. But discover this for yourself by reading our pages." Message-ID: <497l1k$a74@news3.cts.com>
Ku