SCIENTOLOGY DOCUMENT LEAKS: Stunning new revelations span the 1960s to 2017

 
Some time ago, we were fortunate to get access to new documents about Scientology released by the FBI to dogged Freedom of Information Act journalist Emma Best and the Muckrock website.

We expect Best’s team is going to make the trove of FBI documents and other Scientology records available as soon as today, and we will add a link to those releases as soon as it is available.

The documents cover a vast amount of territory, from complaints about Scientology in the 1960s to detailed records of the FBI’s 1977 raid on Church of Scientology locations in Los Angeles and DC, as well as the ensuing legal battles that occurred, including Scientology’s use of operatives to try and dig up dirt on one of the judges overseeing the trial of Mary Sue Hubbard, wife of Scientology’s founder.

Some of these documents are familiar, and they certainly describe historical events that are well known, but others are new to us, and we will be digging through them for you in coming days.

Another part of the Muckrock release is so vast, consisting of literally tens of thousands of emails leaked from an Austrian Scientology org, we haven’t had time to go through them, and we’re hoping readers will sift through them and bring us their discoveries.

And there’s more. Not only are there new FBI records describing Scientology’s history of dirty tricks and shabby treatment of its own members, but we are also revealing today that two additional significant document leaks have come into our possession.

One is a trove of documents never before published that come from the notorious Mace-Kingsley Ranch, a hellish sort of reformatory in isolation in rural New Mexico where Scientology parents dumped their problem children to experience harsh Scientology discipline. You may have seen the disturbing episode about the ranch in the second season of Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath. Now, we’re sifting through documents that bring that sorry institution into focus.

And there’s still more. We’ve also received a stunning collection of documents from Scientology’s “Valley Ideal Org,” that are so fresh, some of the reports were written in 2017. They provide some of the freshest intelligence about the miserable snitching culture in Scientology that we’ve had in a long time.

Today, we are going to present a snapshot from each of the releases to give you some sense of them.

Hundreds of the FBI documents provide details leading up to and immediately after the July 8, 1977 raid on Scientology’s Los Angeles headquarters, the Fifield Manor (later known as the Hollywood Celebrity Centre), and a church location in Washington DC. We found numerous documents in that collection to be very interesting, but one that really intrigued us were a couple of pages of hand-drawn illustrations that we hadn’t seen before, attached to a search warrant for a suite at the Taft Building in Hollywood, which was not a Scientology building and not one we realized that had been part of the raid…

 
The raid occurred after Guardian’s Office operative Michael Meisner had turned himself in to FBI agents several weeks before. We asked historian Chris Owen if he thought these drawings were Meisner’s attempts to show the FBI where to find the most sensitive documents sought in the raid.

“They are almost certainly the product of the debriefing of Meisner, formerly the GO’s intelligence chief in Washington DC,” Owen told us. He pointed out that recently we ran a story by Chris where he explained that the GO had been alarmed by a 1976 US Customs seizure of GO documents.

“The GO was understandably alarmed by the seizure. Fearing a federal raid, it responded by relocating its B1 intelligence branch and its most sensitive files from its head office in the former Cedars of Lebanon Hospital — the famous ‘Big Blue’ building in Hollywood — to a nearby secret location, almost certainly the Taft Building at 1680 North Vine Street, where it rented Suite 918. Behind a series of locked and alarmed doors and metal gates it stored its most secret information: the ‘Red Box’ data, kept in a special ‘Red Box Space’….The GO’s elaborate precautions had proved entirely ineffective. All it took, in the end, was for one man to tell the truth.”

Although 11 top Scientology operatives, including Mary Sue Hubbard, went to prison after that raid, Scientology survived and flourished, even after the 1986 death of founder L. Ron Hubbard.

Then, in May 1991, Time magazine dealt Scientology a devastating blow with a cover story calling Scientology “the thriving cult of greed and power,” written by journalist Richard Behar. Scientology’s long, slow membership decline started around that time and the church has never really recovered.

And in the FBI documents, we found something that stunned us. Some four months after the Time magazine story appeared, on September 19, 1991, the FBI noted that it had opened an investigation into “allegations that members of the Church of Scientology (COS) systematically abuse their children.”

 
Just days after that document was written, in October 1991, Scientology leader David Miscavige and his top henchman, Marty Rathbun, walked into the IRS headquarters in Washington DC without an appointment, asking to see the IRS Commissioner. They were told to come back a week later, and when they did, Rathbun told us, President George H.W. Bush’s IRS Commissioner, Fred Goldberg, signaled that he was tired of Scientology’s long war with the agency. Goldberg then ordered a study that would grant Scientology its coveted tax exempt status two years later.

A month after Miscavige’s IRS visit, and despite interviews with former church members who said children of Sea Org members abused their kids in the “form of total neglect of the children’s physical needs and exposure to sexually explicit materials,” on November 8, 1991 the FBI noted that it was placing its investigation into “involuntary servitude and slavery” in “Pending Inactive” status “until the Department of Justice and FBIHQ make a determination as to the viability of further investigation.”

 
The case status was then changed to “closed” on April 30, 1992 (which just happened to be David Miscavige’s 32nd birthday, a coincidence, we’re sure).

In other words, in the wake of the Time magazine story the FBI seemed to be zeroing in on a subject — Scientology’s misuse of children — that is the focus of new major lawsuits filed this year, some 28 years later.

It’s crushing to think of how much abuse might have been averted if the FBI had not abandoned its 1991 investigation so quickly.

Turning now to our trove of documents that come from the Mace Kingsley Ranch, we’ve chosen a document that seems to capture the petty austerity of the place, as described so well by Tara Dawn and Nathan Rich in the Leah Remini episode.

April 11, 2000

To All Staff
Beth Green

Announcement
Re: The Sugar Rule

It has come to my attention that the sugar rule is not being enforced.

This weekend when Lance went on a store run for the guys, which only Pascal & Peter got food and soda, they came back with huge bags, enough to last them a week.

Andrew had Snickers which he was passing out to Christi and Carmel. And last night the girls were eating Lucky Charms.

I asked them and they said none of the kids on the program follow this rule.

I know this because I have seen it and they don’t follow the rule.

Also the juice that these kids drink has tons of sugar in it. That doesn’t make any sense to me. They might as well just be drinking soda.

So as an end note, all of us need to enforce the sugar rule or just take the rule away all together, which is not a good idea.

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THANKS

Beth Green

 
Think things have changed in the almost 20 years since then? We have for you now one of the documents included in the leak from the Valley org, a snitching document that really captures the way Scientologists are encouraged to drop a dime on another member who so much as utters something that has “a slight bit of criticalness” of the organization…

24 Sept 17

Sam was captain of AOLA back in the 1970’s. That’s where I first met him.

We’d run across each other at orgs a few times after.

Several months ago he got in touch and wanted me to help him with the design of a website. It was during that time I asked him if he ever had thoughts of getting back into the Sea Org. He said no — he had sort of an embarrassing little chuckle. I got the idea that something was amiss, but didn’t feel it was my place to pursue it.

Just a few weeks ago while telling him how hard it is to keep up with a 25 hour SRD schedule and the trouble Robin has being sessionable he commented that the hours was not the WHY. And that Robin’s sessionability is. Fix that and that will handle. It’s not the hours, it’s her sessionability that should be worked on. That is true enough…but the way he said it — I detected a slight bit of criticalness. It was like making the org wrong for tackling a wrong WHY, they should know better. This attitude was subtle but noticeable.

I have since hesitated to bring up anything org-wise or Scientology-wise. I did not want to bring up anything that would bring on any critical attitude from him.

 
Study Scientology for very long and what do you find? Decades of documents that reveal its dirty tricks, Orwellian spying on its own members, and its mistreatment of workers and their children. Now, we have even more examples to show you in coming days. And more questions for why law enforcement does nothing, year after year.

 
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Sands Hall memoir ‘Flunk, Start’ comes out in paperback

If you haven’t read Sands Hall’s excellent memoir yet, this is your chance to pick it up in paperback starting tomorrow — and with a new title!

 
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Source Code

“Space opera used to be a lot of fun, you know. You’d spend two hours getting into your suit, and you get all this equipment and you get it all here and there and you stuff it and fill up your pockets, and then you climb up with this two hundred pounds of stuff, up a ladder that’s about 30 feet tall, to get into some kind of an airport. And you get inside this ship, you see, and then you regulate about 500 switches and you have to repair four or five electronic circuits and you patch some things together with chewing gum and you strap yourself down in a seat and take off. And then you navigate like mad, going three times the speed of light, trying to navigate by stars that are invisible for some days. And then you land someplace for the skin of your teeth, and boy, you really knew you did something. That’s right. You really knew you did something.” — L. Ron Hubbard, November 18, 1953

 
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Overheard in the FreeZone

“We have a society drugged up, low toned, out of comm, and who now hold the fear of easy drone or satellite assassination and surveillance, and today’s peeps are much more interested in MEST tech than theta tech. Sad. I see no advantage to continue to dumb us down further or an advantage for AI running things. Even just using AI for collecting data isn’t advantageous for those of us who obtain full OT — not necessary and counter-intentioned to theta goals.”

 
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Random Howdy

“Scientologists spend decades on staff and in the Sea Org and never come close to reaching Clear. The number one stated goal of Scientology is to ‘clear the planet’ i.e convert everyone to Scientology either by taking their money or making them indentured servants. Staff and S.O are told not to worry about course work, they can do that in their next lifetimes. The bottom line in Scientology is UPSTAT vs DOWNSTAT. Everything else is window dressing.”

 
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Scientology’s celebrities, ‘Ideal Orgs,’ and more!

We’ve been building landing pages about David Miscavige’s favorite playthings, including celebrities and ‘Ideal Orgs,’ and we’re hoping you’ll join in and help us gather as much information as we can about them. Head on over and help us with links and photos and comments.

Scientology’s celebrities, from A to Z! Find your favorite Hubbardite celeb at this index page — or suggest someone to add to the list!

Scientology’s ‘Ideal Orgs,’ from one end of the planet to the other! Help us build up pages about each these worldwide locations!

Scientology’s sneaky front groups, spreading the good news about L. Ron Hubbard while pretending to benefit society!

Scientology Lit: Books reviewed or excerpted in our weekly series. How many have you read?

 
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THE WHOLE TRACK

[ONE year ago] Leah Remini kicks off 3rd season with emotional toll caused by Scientology’s ‘aftermath’
[TWO years ago] Sinar Parman, 1954-2017: Chef to Scientology’s celebs who escaped to dish on L. Ron Hubbard
[THREE years ago] Even the local Scientology mission is hiding a horror show of abuse: Kelly Jordan tells her tale
[FOUR years ago] Lisa McPherson’s last opportunity for standard care ended 20 years ago today
[FIVE years ago] What Adrian Chen got wrong about Anonymous and Scientology
[SIX years ago] EXCLUSIVE: First Interview with the Principal of Will & Jada Smith’s Shuttered Scientology School
[SEVEN years ago] Marty Rathbun: Scientology’s Secret Agreement With Joan Wood to Change Lisa McPherson’s Cause of Death
[EIGHT years ago] L. Ron Hubbard Christens the Apollo 43 Years Ago Today: For The First Time, His “Orders of the Day”

 
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Posted by Tony Ortega on November 18, 2019 at 07:00

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The Best of the Underground Bunker, 1995-2018 Just starting out here? We’ve picked out the most important stories we’ve covered here at the Underground Bunker (2012-2018), The Village Voice (2008-2012), New Times Los Angeles (1999-2002) and the Phoenix New Times (1995-1999)

Other links: BLOGGING DIANETICS: Reading Scientology’s founding text cover to cover | UP THE BRIDGE: Claire Headley and Bruce Hines train us as Scientologists | GETTING OUR ETHICS IN: Jefferson Hawkins explains Scientology’s system of justice | SCIENTOLOGY MYTHBUSTING: Historian Jon Atack discusses key Scientology concepts | Shelly Miscavige, 14 years gone | The Lisa McPherson story told in real time | The Cathriona White stories | The Leah Remini ‘Knowledge Reports’ | Hear audio of a Scientology excommunication | Scientology’s little day care of horrors | Whatever happened to Steve Fishman? | Felony charges for Scientology’s drug rehab scam | Why Scientology digs bomb-proof vaults in the desert | PZ Myers reads L. Ron Hubbard’s “A History of Man” | Scientology’s Master Spies | The mystery of the richest Scientologist and his wayward sons | Scientology’s shocking mistreatment of the mentally ill | The Underground Bunker’s Official Theme Song | The Underground Bunker FAQ

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