Where in the world is Scientology leader David Miscavige?

Last summer, a powerful national legal team filed three lawsuits against the Church of Scientology and its leader David Miscavige on behalf of seven people who say they were victimized by the church. One of them alleges she was held against her will for years at a secretive Scientology compound, five others say they were subjected to a harassment campaign after four women came forward to accuse Scientologist actor Danny Masterson of rape, and the seventh victim says she was molested as a child while working for Scientology in Florida and Venezuela.

They are varied and serious allegations, and they’ve received a lot of press attention. So far, Scientology has struck back by asking for sanctions over the way the lawsuits were served, and the church is trying to force five of the plaintiffs, who were former Scientologists themselves, into “religious arbitration” to put their lawsuits on ice. Hearings on those matters are rapidly approaching, and we expect the media attention to be intense.

But in each of the three lawsuits, there’s also a particular problem that seems kind of astounding in this day and age: None of the three lawsuits has been served properly to defendant David Miscavige, despite repeated attempts to find him and serve him at either a residence or one of his offices.

In a recent court document, the legal team admitted that at this point, months after they filed the lawsuits, they have no idea what David Miscavige’s home address is.

Where is David Miscavige’s home?

Talking to some former top Scientology executives, it turns out that question isn’t so easy to answer. We’re going to run through the list of places where Miscavige has, and might still, rest his head at night, and then we’ll reveal the exact place where Miscavige is going to be on an upcoming date.

Process servers, take note.

At one time, it wasn’t so hard to find David Miscavige. Mike Rinder, Tom DeVocht, and Paul Burkhart, all former high-ranking Sea Org executives, confirmed our impression that in the 1990s and up to about 2010, you would normally find Miscavige residing at one of three places: The Upper Villa at Int Base, the El Cadiz apartments in Hollywood, and the Hacienda Gardens complex in Clearwater, Florida.

We got an excellent view of the Upper Villa at Int Base (also known as Gold Base, 19625 Gilman Springs Rd) when we got to premiere some amazing 4K video footage shot with a drone in 2016 and obtained this shot:

 
Three buildings on the north side of Gilman Springs Road were known as the “Villas,” and the one on the right in this image was known as the “Upper Villa,” and “C.O.B. Berthing,” for “Chairman of the Board” Miscavige. The base, purchased by Scientology in 1978, was Miscavige’s primary home for many years, but Valerie Haney and other eyewitnesses tell us that five or six years ago, Miscavige stopped going to the base entirely.

“After JB blew in 2010 and the location became better known, it was not so good for Miscavige,” Rinder tells us, referring to the escape of John Brousseau, a Sea Org worker who was at one time Miscavige’s brother in law. Also, in 2011 New Yorker writer Lawrence Wright revealed that the FBI had come close to raiding Int Base in a 2009/2010 human trafficking investigation. Since then, Miscavige has not only abandoned Int Base personally, but he’s put much less emphasis on it in general, moving the most important video work, for example, to a new compound on Sunset Boulevard, Scientology Media Productions.

When he wasn’t at Int Base, Miscavige was often in Hollywood itself where the church owns so many properties, and one of his places to stay the night there was in an apartment in the El Cadiz complex, which sits right behind Scientology’s Author Services Inc. building on Hollywood Boulevard.

The El Cadiz complex (1721 N. Sycamore Ave) was purchased by Scientology in 2004, and Miscavige was said to have a private way into the complex from ASI without having to go out on the street. But Rinder has written that he has doubts that Miscavige is using the apartment there anymore.

Tom DeVocht vividly remembers putting together Miscavige’s third hideout, a set of four apartments that were joined together to make one massive, super-deluxe living space at the Hacienda Gardens complex in Clearwater (551 N. Saturn Ave).

We’ve been outside the complex, and we can tell you it’s pretty fugly, looking like a typical mid-rent American apartment complex. It’s mainly used by Sea Org workers who are shuttled in buses to their jobs at the Flag Land Base. But in the mid-1990s, DeVocht was told that the Miscaviges wanted to spend more time in Clearwatear (this was before Shelly Miscavige vanished in 2005), and DeVocht was tasked with tearing down walls to create the super-apartment.

“We rushed and built those things for them so they could stay there. It was nice, really nice. The latest stereo equipement and TVs. He had a special shower put in that was like a waterfall — it was really over the top. He stayed there for quite some time,” Tom says.

 
Does Miscavige still use that apartment? We don’t know. We don’t know if process servers would have any luck trying to find him at what were his three main previous locations. But Burkhart, DeVocht, and Rinder all point out that Miscavige has many other places to spend the night, and it’s almost impossible to know which one he’s using at any one time.

Up on the 11th floor of the Hollywood Guaranty Building (HGB, 6331 Hollywood Blvd), top executives would meet to plot out Scientology’s most sensitive programs. Rinder and others say there’s an apartment up there, and DeVocht remembers working in the building and Miscavige staying there for extended periods of time.

“The 11th floor of the HGB is the RTC offices and a Hubbard living space — a bedroom, bathroom, and sitting area. Most people have no idea it even exists,” Rinder says. “Miscavige doesn’t have a bedroom there, though there is a daybed in the auditing room that people have been known to take naps on in order to get sessionable for their sec checks.”

“There is also an apartment in the ‘Big Blue’ Cedars Complex,” Burkhart points out, referring to the Pacific Area Command building not far from the HGB that was formerly the Cedars of Lebanon hospital before Scientology purchased it in 1977 (4751 Fountain Ave). “But I can’t imagine he would be at either the HGB or Cedars. There’s too much exposure at those places,” he adds.

 
“He has ‘apartments’ all over the place,” Rinder says, pointing out that plans indicate that on the seventh floor of the new Flag Building (also known as the Super Power Building) in Clearwater there are offices for Miscavige with a bathroom and other areas the church leader could use to sleep there. “He has spaces on the Freewinds and in the Manor at Saint Hill. He has an apartment in Denmark. He even has a suite of offices on the top floor of the Madrid Org,” Rinder adds.

The Freewinds is Scientology’s private cruise ship that plies the Caribbean. Saint Hill Manor is the Scientology UK headquarters in East Grinstead, England, and Scientology has an “advanced org” in Copenhagen and an Ideal Org in Madrid as well as more than 60 other cities around the world.

“As to where he actually lives — he could have five other apartments in LA by now. Or he could still be at El Cadiz. I don’t know, I haven’t watched it,” Rinder says.

The only way to know for sure where Miscavige is going to be, he says, is the regularly scheduled special events that Scientology puts on at certain times of the year.

And that’s how we know exactly where David Miscavige is going to be on February 12.

This week, news leaked that the new Austin “Ideal Org” (2200 Guadalupe St) would have its grand opening on that day, and Miscavige will be there to make a short speech and pull the rope to cut a giant ribbon.

Like in other cities, Scientology is opening a gleaming new “church” there not because there’s any local demand for it, but mostly as a public relations effort to convince its major donors that Scientology is still a going concern. As part of the illusion, Miscavige must show up and say a few words about how Scientology will benefit Austin.

Scientology does what it can to secure the environment from outsiders, and this time they’ve asked for a permit to shut down two full blocks of Guadalupe Street, a major thoroughfare in the UT neighborhood.

It won’t be easy to serve Miscavige. But at least on that one day, for a short time in the afternoon, we know where he’ll be.

DeVocht tells us Miscavige is always very consumed with the thought of being found. “He assumed he’d be assassinated. He’s frightened about it and he’s thinking about it every day,” he says. And the people around him were expected to act as human shields.

“We’d get briefed, we’d be told that they were attempting to serve him,” Tom says. “And I was told, ‘you’ll probably go to jail for it, but if you see someone walking at Dave, just attack the guy.’ Miscavige is on the run and always has been. I would think it would be pretty impossible to serve him.”

 
——————–

Bonus items from our tipsters

A reader in Quebec snapped this photo of Scientology shooting a promo. Looks chilly. We hope we get to see the finished product!

 
Stacy Francis, hitting the big time.

 
——————–

Source Code

“Man is continually representing to you that he owns a body, and he doesn’t. He steals one. And Freud was looking for guilt. Do you want to find some guilt? Let’s look that one in the eye for a moment. The very thing he owns with he stole and he knows he stole. And somebody comes along and grabs him and throws him into the clink or something for having run off with a couple of teaspoons from the local manor or something, and he goes into a complete fit. Why does he go into a fit? He thinks he’s going to be tried for his basic crime in this life which is the theft of one Homo Sapiens, which is kidnapping.” — L. Ron Hubbard, January 23, 1953

 
——————–

Overheard in the FreeZone

“Ultimately the truth is that each of us is here by our own choices, perhaps naively without understanding the consequences, yet it is our own choices and compromises that have ultimately led us through the entire cycle of creation to where we are now. Whilst someone else is responsible for the problem and the solution. The person is basically at total effect. This is a lie, and a trap, a prison of disbelief the person has chosen to adopt as a way of protest. The responsibility is elsewhere with someone else. This is false. A neat trap.”

 
——————–

Random Howdy

“Typical Space Ozzie & Harriet ‘Remember the good ole days before all the perversion and permissiveness that lead to the downward spiral?’ reactionary bullshit. Except for the Space Opera, Scientologists have the same mindset as your average teabagger, fundie christian, conspiracy nut, gun lovin’ closet Nazi wingnut. I suggest we round them all up and send them to the FEMA camp called Branson MO.”

 
——————–

Start making your plans…

 
Head over to the convention website and meet us in St. Louis!

 
——————–

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?

 
——————–

THE WHOLE TRACK

[ONE year ago] Never forget: Scientology calls exes liars, but spells out its own abuses in documents
[TWO years ago] Scientology celeb Kerri Kasem marches for religious freedom in Hungary
[THREE years ago] Scientology wastes no time making a move on the new president, but where does Trump stand?
[FOUR years ago] Whale watching, 2016 edition: Who’s keeping Scientology afloat?
[FIVE years ago] VIDEO LEAK: Another segment from Marty Rathbun’s deposition — his ‘Liability Formula’
[SIX years ago] Ray Jeffrey on Scientology in the courtroom: ‘Constantly getting tripped up on the facts’
[SEVEN years ago] SCIENTOLOGY SUED FOR FRAUD OVER REFUND SCHEME, MORE PLAINTIFFS TO COME
[EIGHT years ago] Scientology Network TV Ads: More Precious Reactions!

 
——————–

——————–

Posted by Tony Ortega on January 23, 2020 at 07:00

E-mail tips to tonyo94 AT gmail DOT com or follow us on Twitter. We also post updates at our Facebook author page. After every new story we send out an alert to our e-mail list and our FB page.

Our new book with Paulette Cooper, Battlefield Scientology: Exposing L. Ron Hubbard’s dangerous ‘religion’ is now on sale at Amazon in paperback and Kindle formats. Our book about Paulette, The Unbreakable Miss Lovely: How the Church of Scientology tried to destroy Paulette Cooper, is on sale at Amazon in paperback, Kindle, and audiobook versions. We’ve posted photographs of Paulette and scenes from her life at a separate location. Reader Sookie put together a complete index. More information can also be found at the book’s dedicated page.

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

Watch our short videos that explain Scientology’s controversies in three minutes or less…

Check your whale level at our dedicated page for status updates, or join us at the Underground Bunker’s Facebook discussion group for more frivolity.

Our non-Scientology stories: Robert Burnham Jr., the man who inscribed the universe | Notorious alt-right inspiration Kevin MacDonald and his theories about Jewish DNA | The selling of the “Phoenix Lights” | Astronomer Harlow Shapley‘s FBI file | Sex, spies, and local TV news | Battling Babe-Hounds: Ross Jeffries v. R. Don Steele