Claire Headley and the boys: Are these kids so threatening, they deserve to be stalked by Scientology’s private eyes?
Now, we have evidence that a massive campaign of Scientology “Fair Game” has begun — aimed not at Remini and her family, but at longtime critics who have in the past couple of weeks seen a huge increase in harassment.
Karen de la Carriere was pranked by someone who called the Los Angeles City Health Department on her. Marc and Claire Headley are being stalked by private investigators again, but this time it was so brazen, their children were targeted with surveillance while out playing. Mike Rinder, meanwhile, has undergone a sleazy new round of online targeting and in-real-life snooping. And we know of several others who are also suddenly being watched and harassed.
What’s going on? We’ve asked Scientology spokeswoman Karin Pouw for a comment, wondering if she’ll respond to our question: Is church leader David Miscavige responding to Remini’s bombshell defection by targeting easier prey?
Karen, in front of some of her rescued birds.
Karen is well known to our longtime readers. Formerly married to the president of the Church of Scientology International, Heber Jentzsch, she was a Class XII auditor trained personally by L. Ron Hubbard in the 1970s. In 2010, she was expelled from the church (“declared a suppressive person”) when she dared to complain publicly that her ex-husband, Heber, had spent years as a kind of non-person at Scientology’s bizarre office-prison for fallen executives, “The Hole.” She says her son Alex, a church member, was then forced to “disconnect” from her, and when he died last summer, she was prevented from seeing his body or from attending his memorial.
Karen lives in the Los Angeles neighborhood of Los Feliz, and we can personally vouch that she has a lovely home that in part serves as a studio for her fine-art business. She also rescues birds, and as you enter her front patio, you see dozens of birds living in clean conditions. Inside her home, she also has several exotic birds who are treated as well or better than house guests (as we can attest).
In recent weeks, however, Scientology private investigators have begun a classic “noisy investigation,” going door to door in her neighborhood to ask if people had noticed anything illegal or “immoral” going on at Karen’s house. This is textbook Scientology shenanigans, intended to disrupt the neighborhood. Then, a little more than a week ago, inspectors from the Los Angeles County Public Health Department showed up, saying they were acting on a tip that her house was infested with rat droppings and refuse piled so high that Karen could hardly walk around.
Karen says it was immediately obvious who was behind the prank. With the help of her attorney, Ray Jeffrey, she put together a letter that was delivered to the city attorney, county public health department, and the county district attorney. Here’s the wording…
Dear Counsel,
We need your help. We find ourselves in a bizarre and unfair predicament because we are considered as “enemies” by the Church of Scientology, which has targeted us with a campaign of harassment. This would be of no official concern to you, except for the fact that Scientology is misusing our local government agenies as unwitting participants in the harassment. We are sure that you would not approve of such activity.
We are former Scientologists who have spoken out about what we consider to be abuses within Scientology. More importantly, however, we are solid, law-abiding, tax-paying citizens of Los Angeles. We have a successful fine-art dealership and we live in a lovely home in a respected neighborhood.
By any objective measure, we should be of no concern to our local authorities. We obey the law and want to be left in peace. To our distress, the Scientologists are wasting the time and resources of local law enforcement personnel with completely false reports of illegal activity at our home. We receive unexpected, unnerving visits from inspectors, who find absolutely nothing wrong and that their time has been wasted. We want to stress that these officials have behaved politely and sympathetically in their dealings with us, and we do not blame them for being misused by the Scientologists.
As strange as it sounds, Scientology operatives have gone door-to-door in our neighborhood, asking our neighbors if they are aware of any illegal or immoral activity going on at our home. This ploy has failed because our neighbors know that we are good people, and that these inquiries are so sleazy. Having failed to dig up any “dirt” on us, the Scientologists have begun making completely false reports to our local agencies such as:
— A false report to the Los Angeles City Clerk’s office, accusing us of operating an illegal “boarding house.” We live in a nice, single-family home. We do not have boarders or operate a boarding house. This would be no different than if you were accused of such a thing.
— A false report to the Los Angeles County Public Health Department, claiming that our home is infested with vermin and filled with animal droppings — rats scurrying around our house, and pet birds depositing their waste everywhere! Aside from being false, this allegation is embarrassing and insulting.
— A false report to the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, Los Angeles, alleging mistreatment of our valuable exotic birds. As the uniformed officer saw, our birds are cherished pets kept in excellent conditions.
As citizens, and as the innocent victims of these malicious reports, we are outraged at the Scientologists’ misuse of our local government. Of course, you will ask how we know that these reports came from Scientology operatives. The easiest proof is to compare the false report with the following “attack website” sponsored by the Church of Scientology:
http://karendelacarriere.com/karen-de-la-carriere-maids-day-off.html
Sadly, these are all classic Scientology harassment tactics that waste taxpayer dollars and the time of City and County employees.
We are most anxious to put an end to his harassment and we are fully prepared to cooperate with our offices and participate in any way in the investigation of this matter.
We would be most appreciative if you could notify your various City and County departments with law enforcement obligations that complaints received concerning either of us, Karen de la Carriere or Jeffrey Augustine, or our residence at 1935 N. Serrano Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90027, are suspect and may be part of a pattern and practice of harassment fostered by the Church of Scientology. Anything you can do to help us would be appreciated.
Marc and Claire Headley
The Headleys left Scientology in 2005, then sued the church unsuccessfully. Marc described their experiences working at Scientology’s International Base in his 2009 book, Blown for Good. Last October, we showed that Scientology’s private eyes were photographing the Headley home and tried to make the case (on an anonymous smear site) that they were spending lavishly on a new roof. (Actually, hail damage to their roof was covered in their homeowner’s policy.)
Such surveillance quieted down, but then, just recently, it picked up again. Marc and Claire noticed more “drive-bys” in their cul-de-sac as men in cars came by to look at their house.
Then, on July 19, with Marc out of town on a job, Claire and her three boys joined other former church members Cindy Plahuta and Chrissie Weightman and a couple of other moms with their young kids for a trip to Tiny Town.
In Morrison, Colorado, the attraction features a miniature village. And a fun time was had by all. At the end of the little town, there’s a playground with some picnic tables, Claire tells us. The kids frolicked as the moms relaxed. Then, something strange happened, Claire says.
“Chrissie and I were facing the road. And we thought, wow, weird. There was a minivan, driving along at normal speed, but its side door was wide open. And there were these two middle-aged, large people inside, one with a professional-looking camera with a big lens aimed at us, taking pictures,” she says.
She looked around, wondering what the camera was aimed at, but behind them was just playground. The photographer seemed to be focused on them and the kids. “As we looked at them, they shut the door and took off.”
As unusual as the incident was, Claire says it was also depressingly familiar.
“It really pisses me off that they do this when I’m with my kids and Marc is out of town. They’ve done it so many times,” she says. “It’s just utterly pathetic. We’ve been gone eight years, and they will not leave us alone.”
“They always do this when I’m out of town,” Marc says. “There’s no intelligence-gathering going on at Tiny Town. This is obviously an attempt to intimidate. But it’s comedy at this point. They’re spending money and time, and they’re showing how desperate they are right now.”
Mike Rinder and Christie Collbran
Meanwhile, in Florida, Scientology’s former top spokesman has seen a sudden surge in surveillance by private investigators. But Mike Rinder also has been targeted by his own daughter.
At an anonymous smear site, “Who Is Mike Rinder?” a statement recently appeared written as an open letter to Rinder from his daughter, Taryn. Like other former Scientologists, when Rinder defected, his family was ripped apart by the church’s policy of “disconnection.” Taryn chose to remain in the church and cut off all ties with her father.
Now, Taryn has been convinced to write a letter: “As your daughter I naturally would rather not be writing this. But I have no choice given your continued actions against the Church you and my mother raised me in,” it begins. It then feigns concern for Rinder’s new family (he recently married Christie Collbran, who has a son from a previous relationship, and Mike and Christie have a toddler).
The letter is a gut-wrenching mixture of false concern and accusations that Rinder was a bad father. But it lacks any specifics — except for Taryn’s repeated claim that Rinder drove too fast at times, endangering the family.
Seriously, that’s the worst that she alleges. The document is both pathetically weak and devastatingly cruel at the same time.
We asked Rinder about the increased attacks he’s experienced in recent days…
The attempted intimidation tactics have ratcheted up over the last few weeks.
“Anonymous” hate mail (that then shows up on the hate sites the church now admits they provide content for). Private investigators back in force to follow us everywhere. Visits to people who have had the temerity to “associate” with me, making veiled threats that it is not going to be good for them. Serving Christie with a subpoena to produce documents and appear as a witness in the Garcia case.
It’s just the normal knee-jerk that happens when David Miscavige blows a gasket about the “attacks” on him and demands that “something be done to make their life as miserable as you are making mine by failing to handle them.” And as a result, RTC [the Religious Technology Center, Scientology’s controlling entity] and OSA [the Office of Special Affairs, Scientology’s spy wing] swing into action with ill-considered acts that will ultimately blow up in their faces. Miscavige has ridden on celebrity coattails for years. It is driving him insane that it is now celebrity mud that is hitting him in the face every day and he is powerless to stop it.
I think there is another point of note here — how is it that after disconnecting are they “communicating” to me? Only when it seems to serve the purpose of the church to be able to use for a smear. It’s the random application of this stuff that is bizarre. Tom Cruise’s kids are still connected to Nicole Kidman…. But people are being declared for refusal to disconnect from their own children who remain “friends” with people who are friends with “SP’s”…..
We are tracking other examples of retaliation going on around the country. We’ll let you know what else we can about them. And of course, if Karin Pouw gets back to us, we’ll let you know.
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Karen de la Carriere Gives David Miscavige More Reason to Harass Her
Karen de la Carriere, J. Swift, and Angry Gay Pope have really outdone themselves this time as they take us into the world of Scientology nuttiness.
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Posted by Tony Ortega on August 1, 2013 at 07:00
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