And second, the insurance company involved….as we can see from the Narconon Georgia case and World Wide pulling out. (Interesting also to note Narconon Georgia is a California resident for purposes of that filing).

Bank loans require insurance. Insurers look at risk, and loss avoidance.

Unless the funding for the planned expansion is funded by cash…..

Hmmm. Follow the money….

“Despite Plaintiff’s contention, Defendant is not seeking to inject religious views into this case to attack or support Narconon’s credibility on the basis of religion, as contempated and prohibited by Federal Rule of Evidence 610.”

Here is Rule 610: “Evidence of the beliefs or opinions of a witness on matters of religion is not admissible for the purpose of showing that by reason of their nature the witness’ credibility is impaired or enhanced.”

So Toucan is accusing the county of trying to improperly admit evidence of the Narconon/Scientology affiliation as a way to show that Narconon is run by religious nutbags and therefore nothing they say is credible. Under the federal evidence rule, you cannot try to introduce evidence of someone’s religious beliefs to impeach their credibility. The county’s response to that accusation is, nooooo, that is not why we are trying to introduce evidence about the affiliation–we are trying to introduce evidence of the affiliation because it goes to the question of damages being sought by Narconon against the county in this case. Namely, what effect would such an affiliation have on Narconon’s bottom line? Since one of Narconon’s claims against the county is for lost profits due to denial of the zoning permits, Narconon has to show what it’s profits would likely be. And the county is saying–when potential customers hear of the SCN connection, does that tend to result in more business or less?

According to the depo testimony attached, in some cases the affiliation attracts people and in some cases it scares them away. That it is to say, the connection is in fact relevant to the question of demand for Naconon’s services and thus it’s bottom line. I could argue this the other way too, however. If it’s basically a wash–meaning the increase in demand by some people and the decrease in demand by others are relatively equal so as to offset each other–then how relevant is it really?

Either way, there is usually broad latitude to admit relevant evidence. Does the probative value outweigh any potential prejudice to Toucan’s rights? I guess we’ll hear from the judge on that.

Meanwhile, I leave you with this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arnolfini_Portrait

Florida, like many other states, is in the process of revising their rehabilitation facilities laws, rules and regs. They had counted on the rigorous insurance company guidelines to do that for them, I think, reasoning that if the insurance companies did not cover these bogus rehabilitation facilities that the bad ones would go out of business. And most of them did. But Narconon does a relatively low price, compared to legitimate facilities, and has a high Internet presence advertising their facilities and the unwary pay for nothing and rarely, if ever, get refunds when they realize that they have been scammed. Please support all the states in getting reasonable laws, rules and regs for rehabilitation facilities: that is how the fraudulent ones will close.

Lol.. Too bad.. Some of his paintings would have made amazing Freedom magazine covers..

Yah, my sister Buddha agrees with you.. And I’m sure all the many other folks I know named Buddha would agree as well..

On reflection I think the answer is yes.

It’s a pity that Dutch fellow, Hieronymus Bosch isn’t still around. A superb painter of fantastic imagery.

Sadly he dropped his body on 9 August 1516.

So he can’t.

Andrew