Tony Ortega is a journalist who was formerly the editor of The Village Voice. He's written about Scientology since 1995, and in May 2015 released a book about Scientology's harassment of Paulette Cooper titled 'The Unbreakable Miss Lovely.' He continues to monitor breaking developments in the Scientology world from an undisclosed location in an underground bunker he shares with four cats and one of them wrinkly Shar Pei dogs. Despite his super-secret security protections, you can still reach him pretty easily by sending him a message at tonyo94 AT gmail.com (Drop him a line if you'd like to get an e-mail whenever a new story is posted.) [Header image courtesy John Rickard]
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Belgium will try two Scientology organizations and 10 Scientologists for fraud

Breaking news from our man in Paris, Jonny Jacobsen, who tells us that Belgian prosecutors finally announced their decision in a criminal case that has been a long time coming. Here’s Jonny’s report…

A court in Belgium on Thursday has sent two Scientology organisations and at least 10 Scientologists for trial, the Belga news agency reports.

The []

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Ryan Hamilton jumps on Narconon’s answer in Nevada drug rehab lawsuit

On Tuesday, we posted Narconon’s response to the first of four federal fraud lawsuits filed against the Scientology drug rehab facilities in recent weeks. Now, just days later, Las Vegas attorney Ryan Hamilton has come swinging back, asking the court to accept that Narconon has essentially admitted to the allegations his client made about the []

Jillian Schlesinger: How I got into Scientology, and how I got out

By Tony Ortega

This is happening in Los Angeles, on Fountain Avenue, in an old hospital building painted blue and topped with huge, lit-up letters that read SCIENTOLOGY.

And this is only weeks ago. In 2014. In the center of one of the largest cities in a country that likes to think of itself as one of []

Lawyer Vance Woodward sues Scientology over his time in the church — here’s the complaint

We just talked to our old friend and Underground Bunker correspondent Vance Woodward, who filed a lawsuit against the Church of Scientology Friday.

You remember Vance — after putting out a wild memoir about his time in the church, he helped us blog L. Ron Hubbard’s essential text, Dianetics, and we had a roller coaster of []

New judge announced in Laura DeCrescenzo case, and Narconon lawyers up

The last time we checked on Laura DeCrescenzo’s forced-abortion lawsuit against Scientology, we learned that Judge Ronald Sohigian (who handed Laura such a decisive victory in October) had decided to retire. The case was assigned to Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Rafael A. Ongkeko, but Scientology filed a peremptory challenge, which automatically was granted.

So now, []

Jillian Schlesinger says Scientology now ‘sneakier’ about forcing abortions

At our request, Karen de la Carriere hurried to prepare part two of her interview series with Jillian Schlesinger, a woman who defected from Scientology’s inner “Sea Org” just a few weeks ago. (See yesterday’s remarkable Part One of the series.)

In this segment, Jillian talks about the snitching culture in Scientology, and about how pregnancies []

Three weeks out of Scientology: Fresh information from a ‘blown’ Sea Org member

Karen de la Carriere has an amazing video for us this week. She talked to Jillian Schlesinger, who left Scientology’s inner “Sea Organization” just a few weeks ago after 12 years of dedicated work.

Joining at only 18, Jillian says she was working 19 hour days and taking home only about eight dollars a week — []

Jon Atack: Why I call Scientology a cult and not a church

Jon Atack is the author of A Piece of Blue Sky, one of the very best books on L. Ron Hubbard and Scientology. He has a new edition of the book for sale, and on Saturdays he’s helping us sift through the legends, myths, and contested facts about Scientology that tend to get hashed and []

French land sale falls apart once town learns Scientologists are involved

Sainte-Feyre, France

We’ve got a breaking story from Jonny Jacobsen, our man in Paris…

Councillors in a French town have pulled out of a deal to sell land for development after revelations that investors behind the project were Scientologists.

The announcement came just weeks after they had approved the sale of land in the town of []

Video Vault: L. Ron Hubbard at his campiest, in 1960’s State of Man Congress!

L. Ron Hubbard is at his campiest in a 1960 lecture that is featured in this week’s “quote video” supplied by our secret source. Hubbard was born in Nebraska, grew up in the Pacific Northwest, and spent a lot of time in places like New York and Los Angeles for his writing career. But where []