First groups in Ghana and Dominican Republic formed.
A project is launched to discredit California lawyer Charles O'Reilly, who represented Lawrence Wollersheim in his winning case against the church;
according to former Church lawyer Joseph Yanny, plans were made to steal O'Reilly's confidential files from the Betty Ford
Center and other substance-abuse treatement centers. Yanny said the Scientologists figured that such records could be used to
blackmail O'Reilly.
In an article in the business section of the St. Petersburg Times on 1 July 1987, a Largo shredder dealer talks about his business.
"I've sold the Church of Scientology several shredders," said Becklund. "They shred everything. As a matter of fact, when the city of
Clearwater was investigating them they bought shredders from us. They'd bring in 15, 20 4-drawer legal files and they'd shred them. Oh,
yeah. Lots of maintenance."
The Times reports that every year since 1982, Scientology has sought a tax exemption and Pinellas County property appraiser Ron
Schultz has denied it.
"The Church of Scientology ... was the first instance in my office where I found an institution calling itself a church that the courts agreed
was not a not-for-profit institution," Schultz said.
A representative of CoS hand-delivers a letter to the St. Pete Times that threatens to sue the newspaper if it writes a story about the
book L. Ron Hubbard: Messiah or Madman? by Bent Corydon. The letter accuses the paper of intending to "attack and denigrate the
Church through any vehicle you find available."
The letter, signed by Scientology lawyer Timothy Bowles, threatens action against the Times for libel, slander, conspiracy and violation
of civil rights if it should "forward one of [Corydon's] lies." The letter concluded with "we know a lot more about your institution and
motives than you think."
(Brief History of Scientology in Clearwater)
Jesse Prince says Miscavige has a lifestyle that far exceeds his $40,000 annual
salary. One day DM showed Jesse his safe with stacked up gold and silver brick bars, rare coins and jewelry. He owns 4 new cars, and he and
his wife have lavish wardrobes, such as DM having closets full of tailor made suits valued at $2,000 each. They have a $20,000 stereo system and all
handmade furniture valued around $40,000. They take 4 expensive vacations per year, each one taking between 2 and 3 weeks. They have 15 to 20
servants. Jesse estimates DM’s lifestyle is costing about $750,000 a year.
Meantime, Sea Org members are being paid $30.00 a week.
Jesse says that DM has access and control over all Scientology reserves and he could blow and take it all with him. (Criminal
Time Track: Issue III, (39))
Note:
Jesse Prince says during the time that he was in RTC, from 1982 to 1987,
that the Sherman Lenske law firm was paid 7 to 8 million and the Heller firm 4
to 5 million. All they were doing was giving advice to Miscavige. Later in
time Jesse was asked about the theory that the attorneys control Miscavige and
Miscavige controls Scientology. Jesse was asked if he saw anything that the
real control exists with the attorneys and that they have enough on Miscavige
to take Miscavige out.
Jesse said yes, but he thinks that their hands are so dirty and that blood
drips from all of their hands that they protect each other. They all go down
together and so they all survive together. He says he thinks the attorneys
were being paid, not for their work, but because they have a piece of the pie. (Criminal
Time Track: Issue III, (40))
The Times reports that every year since 1982, Scientology has sought a tax
exemption and Pinellas County property appraiser Ron Schultz has denied it. "The
Church of Scientology ... was the first instance in my office where I found an institution
calling itself a church that the courts agreed was not a not-for-profit institution,"
Schultz said. (Brief overview of Scientology's
interaction with Clearwater Florida)
So at the beginning of 1987, we again applied for recognition to the IRS.
There is a full administrative procedure that one goes through and which we
cooperated with in detail. To put this in perspective, usually an
application for religious recognition gets a total review of 2 and 1/2
hours by the IRS, at which point it is granted. But the rules were
different for Scientology: throughout the next year and a half, we were
forced to submit over a million pages of documents. The IRS was still
unable to find anything wrong, or any reason to legitimately deny our
exemption. So they had one final request. Allow them to do what they called
a "limited financial review". This had the purpose of assuring them that
the money in Scientology was all being used for legitimate purposes and
that the records were in order. Apparently having no choice, we agreed.
Their limited review turned into the most extensive examination of any
organization in history. In fact; they spent 6,240 hours reviewing our
records.
This is the equivalent of one person working 40 hours a week, 52 weeks a
year, for three years. At the end of that review, they stated they could
find nothing wrong. Just as we were expecting to receive our letters of
recognition in 1988, probably the most bizarre twist in this tale occurred.
The IRS promptly shut down all communication with us and the next day
issued a denial of tax exemption.
Their reason?
"We had failed to cooperate in making our records available to them!"
... The IRS' communication literally said we refused to turn over any documents
to them. And here we had actually produced over a million pages worth as well as
all of our financial records. We were later to find out through the freedom of
information act that this very letter refusing to recognize us had actually been
drafted 6 months earlier, before they even began their financial review. They
never intended on granting recognition but instead wanted to illegally gather
information from us that they could then use in a new round of assaults.
Just 3 months later all of the top church corporations received full audit
requests from the Internal Revenue Service. These were unlike any ever
issued in history to anyone.
- They requested every single document in our possession.
- They wanted all of our financial records.
- They wanted all of our bank records.
- They wanted all of our canceled checks.
- They wanted every internal church issue.
- They wanted every PC folder.
- They wanted every student file.
- They wanted full lists of all our parishioners including the exact
amounts they had donated and when.
- They wanted all the social security numbers of all of our parishioners.
But why go on?
In effect, we would have had to build the biggest vacuum cleaner that has
ever existed and attach it to the top of our building and turn it on to
provide them with everything they were asking for. The first action
required per law was for us to respond to these requests. According to the
IRS rules, you are allowed to give your response to their request before
they can force you to produce your documents. Church staff and attorneys
worked around the clock to get these responses to the IRS within the
allowed time period. And by the way, that happened 'to be during the
Christmas season. Nonetheless, we did get them our replies. But when the
IRS responded, we found their answers were dated 4 days before we had even
replied. We asked the IRS how they could do this. They said,
"Per law you have the right to respond. That doesn't mean we have to read
it!"
This started a huge round of battles in the courts. And the odds were
definitely not in our favor. In fact, the IRS had never lost on this issue
in court. But then again, they hadn't faced the Church of Scientology. We
were to soon find out that this was only the first part of their assault.
IRS agents from around the country gathered for a conference in Atlanta
to strategize our total destruction. And the second phase of this assault was to
go after you. That's right. They worked out how they would start auditing the
tax returns of individual Scientologists. They even worked out how they would
deal with you when you received their requests. IRS agents around the country
were ordered not to listen to any of your explanations, but to hit you with
every penalty in the book, and they were to start at least two new audits every
single week. This strategy was activated resulting in thousands upon thousands
of audits on Scientologists across the United States. And they were desperately
trying to get the church to comply with their requests so they could find out
the rest of your names and go after each and every one of you. (David Miscavige's IAS speech, 8 October 1993)
Pat Broeker sends a mission to remove David Miscavige from
post.
Missionaires are Vicki Aznaran, Jesse Prince and Spike
Bush. They go to Gilman Hot Springs to remove DM from post and take
over command of Scientology. The mission failed and that results in LRH’s
closest aide, Pat Broeker, being removed. The power was taken over by
Miscavige who purged the Sea Org of anyone friendly to Broeker.
Jesse Prince is removed from RTC and put under armed guard at Happy
Valley, a few miles West of Gold. After a few months he was put to work at
Gold under watch, until he escapes in 1992.
Miscavige removes Vicki Aznaran from the post of Commanding Officer of RTC.
He appoints himself Chairman of the Board of RTC. Thus, he moves the seat
of power from ASI to RTC because it was more defensible to run Scientology
from a non-profit corporation. (Criminal
Time Track: Issue III, (29))
In an affidavit dated 24 Sept 1999, Miscavige gives his cover story for why
he removed Vicki Aznaran, Jesse Prince and Pat Broeker: (Criminal
Time Track: Issue III, (37))
“Their duties, of course, were to see to the purity of the religion.
….I soon learned this individual (Broeker) was pretending to have
special data concerning Scientology and had begun a project to change the
Scientology Grade Chart. This chart is central to the practice of the
religion. As such, it is sacrosanct.
This, of course, was entirely contrary to the authority vested in RTC.
Alteration of Scripture is what RTC is charged with preventing. The manner
in which this person (Broeker) attempted to gain a position of Source was by
claiming to know things Mr. Hubbard wished to be done, that Mr. Hubbard had
never articulated or written down. Mr. Hubbard wrote a policy letter called
Hidden Data Line, outlawing this practice in the Scientology religion..”
Note:
In 1999 Miscavige makes a change in the Grade Chart. He orders the
Happiness Rundown put on the Grade Chart, instead of off to the side where
LRH had it. Also, as COB RTC, he has allowed over a 1000 LRH issues
(Scripture) to be altered.
Also, RTC hands out verbal data that they have followed LRH handwritten
originals. But they deny any requests from the public or common staff to see
the handwritten originals. This violates the HCOPL Hidden Data Line.
RTC/Miscavige have altered the Grade Chart and Scripture, & violate
Hidden Data Line.
Therefore, these were not the real reasons he removed Aznaran, Prince and
Broeker. The real reason he removed Aznaran, Prince, and Broeker was
politics.
Vicki is ordered to the RPF "Running Program" at Gilman Hot
Springs. This involved running around an orange telephone pole from 7:00 AM to
9:30PM with ½ hour breaks for lunch and dinner. She was kept there by armed
guard, but finally escaped down a riverbed.
Vaughn Young did not know that Pat was planning to oust Miscavige.
But, Miscavige thinks that Vaughn was one of Pat’s infiltrators in ASI. They
went after Vaughn for weeks and broke him. Then they did it several more times
over the next year and a half. (Criminal
Time Track: Issue III, (29))
Richard and Vicki Aznaran leave the SO and return to their home in Dallas,
Texas. DM says this is when he became COB RTC. He leaves the post of ASI and takes
over RTC. (Criminal
Time Track: Issue III, (22, 33))
Church of Scientology Celebrity Centre of Dallas, Texas founded. (CofS)
Norman Starkey, as Trustee of Author’s Family Trust-B, enters into
a License Agreement with RTC, wherein LRH’s estate allows RTC use of the
Advanced Technology. (Criminal
Time Track: Issue III)
IAS Freedom Medals awarded to Scientologists Peter Schless, Andrik Schapers,
Philippe de Henning and Dennis Clarke at the annual convention in Paris, France. (CofS)
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