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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John Brousseau: Marty Rathbun is putting words in my mouth about the FBI’s Scientology probe

[John Brousseau]

We tried to stay away from Mark “Marty” Rathbun’s sad videos, we really did. We got two whole days away from commenting on his bizarre turnaround, which has him trying to rewrite the historical record in order to smear people he once said glowing things about. But once again, he’s really stepped over a []

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Paul Haggis: Marty Rathbun is using private info I gave him against Lawrence Wright

 In the latest video that Mark “Marty” Rathbun posted to his website as part of his general attack on Lawrence Wright and his 2013 book Going Clear, Rathbun calls Wright’s book a “phony narrative,” and accuses Wright of deceiving readers about the way that director Paul Haggis came to investigate and leave the Church of []

Marty Rathbun’s project becomes clear: Someone’s worried about Scientology & the IRS

 Well, the project is becoming clear. Someone is apparently worried about losing his precious tax []

Marty Rathbun, Victoria Britton has a question for you about Scientology and judges

 We’re traveling again today and we don’t have time for a long story. And we also know that you’re probably sick of reading about Marty Rathbun. But we wanted to give Victoria Britton recognition for raising one of the best questions we’ve seen about Rathbun’s new []

Marty Rathbun tries to rewrite the record on Scientology spying. But we have the dox.

[Gary Morehead’s Bearcat 3000. In the biz, this is known as “dox.”]

We truly did not want to pay any more attention to Marty Rathbun’s lame swipes at Lawrence Wright’s book Going Clear, but in his latest video (“Going Clear, Part 9”) he is making some claims that are staggeringly dishonest. We felt we had to []

Thanks for the slick videos, Marty Rathbun. Here’s a not very slick one for you.

 As we write this, Marty Rathbun has put out three segments of a video that he shot recently with professional help. He says in these videos that he is going to expose the “anti-Scientology cult” that uses Lawrence Wright’s book Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief as its “bible.”

It’s truly fascinating, we’re []

Understanding Marty Rathbun: For the first time, his full deposition of 2014

 On Tuesday, we examined the complete history of Mark “Marty” Rathbun’s website, “Moving On Up a Little Higher,” looking for some clues for what led the former top Church of Scientology official to go from one of church leader David Miscavige’s most vocal and effective critics to give up that role so []

Memories of a Scientology warrior: Marty Rathbun’s curious career as church rebel

 Last week, we caused a bit of an uproar in the Scientology Watching community when we reported evidence that Mark “Marty” Rathbun gave a Church of Scientology attorney in Israel a copy of an email that independent Scientologist Dani Lemberger sent to Rathbun in 2013, and which contained private information about Lemberger’s Scientology auditing. []

As Louis Theroux’s ‘My Scientology Movie’ hits U.S., troubling news of co-star Marty Rathbun

[Marty Rathbun and Louis Theroux in ‘My Scientology Movie’]

On Friday, Louis Theroux’s unconventional documentary My Scientology Movie opens in select U.S. cities after a successful run in the U.K. and Australia. The movie was largely shot in Los Angeles in 2014, and besides featuring Theroux himself it spends much of its time considering the veracity []

Marty Rathbun defends Scientology leader David Miscavige as he trashes tell-all memoir ‘Ruthless’

 Late last night, Marty Rathbun posted at his blog a lengthy broadside criticizing Ron Miscavige’s memoir, Ruthless: Scientology, My Son David Miscavige, and []