Can you imagine the level of unethical loan activities that must be going on in this “ideal” org to elicit a Facebook posting like this? And can you imagine the trouble Jessica F S Brown has landed herself in by daring to quote L. Ron Hubbard to prove someone(s) in the “ideal org” in Auckland are acting improperly?
And there are people responding on FB — they had better be prepared to hand over some more cash in order to keep the Ethics Officer at bay…
Well, it didnt take long. Since I wrote this post (but before it was published) this FB message was deleted from the group and and replaced with HCO PL 7 Mar 65RC I, SUPPRESSIVE ACTS, SUPPRESSION OF SCIENTOLOGY AND SCIENTOLOGISTS as an announcement! How predictable was that?
And this is who the IRS recognizes as being organized and operated for a religious, tax exempt purpose. What happens in Auckland is a microcosm of what happens everywhere in scientology.
The number of incidences of people engaged in financial rip offs/fraud/illegality is enormous in scientology. If it was a normally regulated business rather than a business hiding behind the cloak of religion, it would have long since been shut down.
This is what happens when getting people’s money becomes the paramount activity of an organization, while delivering nothing in return except promises and “certificates”, pins and bowling trophies.
And why are these ideal orgs so desperate for money? Because they massively increase their overhead with new large buildings without increasing their production. They literally cannot pay their utility bills. They also hire new staff with promises of high wages because “we will expand 10X as soon as we are ideal”. That lie then causes desperation to try to hang onto the those new staff who have been promised a halfway normal paycheck — they soon start making noises about leaving staff in order to be able to live.
To use the terminology of Hubbard, it’s a downward spiral that just keeps getting worse and worse.
Oh, brother! Bells ringing all over the place! “Purpose is senior to policy”…”You’re using policy to stop!” Had both thrown in my face when I pointed out to staff how utterly off policy Ideal M’Org fundraising was!
One time I was reading an LRH reference about how to build an organization – I don’t recall the name of it, sorry – but I was showing it, reading it to “Jane” (not her name) who was HCO ES of our org (in plain English that means a senior executive of the church responsible for among other things, ALL org policy being followed and ALL org ethics matters being carried out standardly. An HCO ES is senior to an Ethics Officer). Anyway, there I was showing this HCO ES what LRH says is the way to build an organization, with buying and renovating an expensive new building being definitely NOT the way to do this, and she replied, “Maybe we don’t have the TIME to follow policy.”
Well, I stared at her, open-mouthed, for a moment, then I shut my mouth and nodded, saying, “Yes, I see.”
The HCO ES, telling me we didn’t have the time to follow LRH! A staff member for 16 years, a very trusted high executive in the org, saying that. Boy, did she rock my world!
(Sorry, you Never Ins – only those who’ve been In can have a concept of how shocking such a statement would be coming from a staff member holding her post. In Scientology, it amounts to sacrilege.)
Even though I didn’t let myself react, it blew my mind, I suppose I was very naive.
Possibly I’m still naive because, frankly, it STILL blows my mind!
Aqua, the “funny” thing is, El Con didn’t use his own policy when managing or running orgs. He was a maniac and constantly angry. Not a “high toned” individual at all.
Yes, I do believe that was your experience of him, Wynski, and it is confirmed shared by a number of others who knew and worked with him before his death. Apparently, his written policy became something for others to follow, and ceased to apply to him, if indeed it ever did.
I can totally relate Aquamarine. The real truth is that lrh wrote policies that contradicted themselves all over the place. When we were all programmed to apply everything he said to the letter, it caused a sort of short circuit blindness to the insanity of it all. Staff, under unbelievable psychological stress and pressure to push up stats (oh yeah, also ‘off policy’!) give way and just do whatever is being shouted at them the loudest. It’s a sickening betrayal of all ‘believers’. We were all played like puppets on strings.
To watch a 70 years old is not to watch a 20 years old. People going down carry more weight on there back than on there shoulders. Bended endure.
“To watch a 70 years old is not to watch a 20 years old. People going down carry more weight on there back than on there shoulders. Bended endure.”
Tub O’Lard lives! It makes your eyes hurt.
I’m still trying to find any logic to the way this cult operates. I get that the “orgs” have to be built and staffed since they can’t sit on the money and maintain religious tax exempt status, but why the huge cost of buying new buildings and pouring millions into them when they have to be feeling a bit of a pinch (I can’t beleive that their membership isn’t dwindling rapidly). I figure the fire sale of real estate will pick up in momentum quickly. I also get that they need a reason to bilk money from members, but the huge empty buildings are showing remaining members how much trouble the church is in. A smarter move would have been to create some other scheme that wasn’t as apparent- having empty mausoleums just blatantly advertises the decline, and no one likes to be associated with the losing side- especially since the church kind of sells “elitism” and “superiority”. What’s the point to the buildings? Is there a point to the buildings? I’m a logical person and it’s driving me slightly bonkers trying to wrap my head around the whole thing. The idea of a real estate empire requires someone paying rents/leases or some form of actually making money off the real estate. Empty buildings create no revenue and eat up a lot of capital just maintaining the exterior and interior. No upside there…
Kat, they aren’t feeling a pinch. The ONLY “they” is DM and he doesn’t care if his minions starve. Hubbard often starved his minions. You need to think MORE depraved before you can understand DM Hubbard.
Yikes- more depraved is mighty scary!
“Hey! We’re depraved on accounta we’re deprived!”
— Riff, Leader of the Jets, West Side Story.
Deeeeeeeear SP Dave Miscavige
Ya gotta understand
Its just cuz you’re so savage
That we get outta hand
Our kids are Disconnected
With most of us Fair Gamed
Golly, Xenu, naturally you’re blamed!
Gee, David Miscavige
You’re very upset
You can’t keep Leah quiet and you’re all in a sweat
Gee, David Miscavige
What are you to do?
Gee, David Miscavige
F**k you!
Feel free to add verses, anyone.
I feel OT
Oh so OT
I feel OT and witty and bright
And I pity
Any SP
Who isn’t me tonight!
I feel charming
And like harming
Any SP or wog that I meet
And so OT
That I hardly
Can believe I am real
Aqua and Outsider! ?
When you’re a Clam you’re a Clam all the way
From your first Qual Exam to your last dying day.
When you’re a Clam you’re the cultiest thing
You ain’t nothin’ at all, COB is the king!
The Sea Org’s in tears
Miscavige is sec checking –
Forget your careers
Your lives he’ll now be wrecking
With his sec checking.
Here come the Clams yeah and they’re really beat
They’ve been ground in the dirt under COB’s feet
Under Old…Vicious…SP…Davey’s… feet.
I believe the reason for the huge empty buildings that cannot be sustained with local membership is so that the cos can announce square feet of churches and ‘new’ orgs at regging events and their larger annual events. Also, to appear to not be sitting on a mountain of money for IRS purposes. Lots of $$ for some cheers and a nod to the government.
No one announces the two stats LRH ordained be the measure of success; auditors made and WDAH. Of course, if they consider sec checking in well done auditing hours (‘I an not auditing you!’ Ha!) that stat will be inflated.
It doesn’t make sense to anyone outside the bubble.
dungeon master, the Stat LRH set for senior management was total money taken from orgs and securely stashed away. Hubtard didn’t have the senior Management didn’t operate off of WDAHs and Auditors made.
I think the key word is empire – the CofS is doing what despots and totalitarian regimes do when they build monumental edifices, while the people suffer and conditions deteriorate. It’s not being done from a business perspective except to the extent that squeezing money from the members and putting it into real estate allows Miscavige to claim increasing assets (though falsely, because the over-the-top customized buildings would only sell for a fraction of their full cost), which is apparently his “stat.”
Then there’s also the traditional religious element – so much for “science” – like magical thinking, and pure belief. Apparently much of the rank and file have been lead to believe in “expansion” and that the “openings” and big buildings are a sign of actual growth, so they keep up a sort of emperor’s-new-clothes illusion among the faithful and indoctrinated; it’s also possible that some of the old diehards in upper management really believe that Scientology is poised for some massive growth, perhaps when Hubbard returns (which, according to reports, some actually believe in).
I think you have to understand the nonsensical, but predictable, dynamics of tyrannical regimes, as well as those of religiously irrational and dysfunctional groups, to understand Scientology. And irrational empire-building, and denial of decline, are also seen in businesses, such as the tendency to overestimate organizational competence, overreach and overbuild horizontal monopolies by expanding outside the core competence, which then fall apart (like GE); or the extended and complete using up of corporate assets in an attempt to keep a no long viable business alive (such as Sears).
Peacemaker-
I can definitely understand it when placed in that context- the last hurrah of all “great civilizations” was usually an inexhaustible effort to build temples and testaments to their greatness at the expense of the populous. The hubris of such is always lost on the one wallowing in their own ineptitude and erecting monoliths to their supposed greatness.
Luckily, I think it’s about to collapse upon itself in a welter of flying rubble!
Speaking of context, I realized I should mention that failing (and fraudulent) businesses also often resort to financial trickery to inflate assets, such as the example of Enron. That’s what I suspect Miscavige is doing internally with the ideal org “expansion” – claiming his “stat” of total assets is going up, when the reality is, that like a new car, they have a market value substantially less than cost from the first day they’re put into use.
From what I’ve seen, it’s also typical of failing small businesses, particularly well-established and family-run ones, that long-time employees often have very co-dependent and enabling relationships with firm. They will do things like ignore lapses in pay in hopes of keeping the enterprise going – that’s much the same sort of dynamic as goes on in Scientology local orgs, where people rely on moonlighting or spouses to actually make ends meet.
And it’s not only “great civilizations” that go on sprees of monument building, but other otherwise un-noteworthy ones with megalomaniac leaders who have outsized aspirations – such as Ceaușescu’s (nominally Communist) Romania, with his private palaces and grand government buildings; or the Duvaliers of Haiti.
Tax deductibility? Money laundering? Keeping up a front of all the glamour that comes with being a Scientologist? Just guessing here.
There is nothing in this article that links Auckland, NZ to this FB conversation (unnamed and now deleted)
Most contributors are Ex new Zealanders now living in Australia.
To put it in perspective (and we are awaiting the last census data so anticipating even less people are willing to declare their faith) the population of New Zealand is approaching 5 million and the number of practicing Scientologists is less than 300.
Poor Jessica. She may be standing in a bucket of ice water as I type this.
Oh, and hey Miscavige, WHERE’S SHELLEY?!?
WAYC:
please excuse my earlier confusion. By your chosen nickname, I assumed you were taking the standard refrain spouted by scientologists as a result of hubbard’s hyperbolic pronouncements.
Your “Oh, and hey Miscavige, WHERE’S SHELLEY?!?” pretty muck blew that misconception out of the water, so I won’t be reading so much darkness and “sheeple-ness into your future remarks, but read them first as possibly-logical and reasonING.
She may get “a little backlash”? She’ll be lucky to not be declared on the spot. Sans goldenrod, natch.
So, Jessica, you observed something off -policy and wanted to get it corrected so as to keep the group strong and working together in the right way?
You poor dear. You well meaning, sincere, little person, you. I can relate.
Stick to your guns, Jessica.
Don’t let yourself be gaslighted. Don’t let the cult do that to you.
You saw what you saw. You observed what you observed.
In Scientologese, “Hold your position in space”.
In Woggese, “Don’t back down.”
Shakespeare said it beautifully: “To thine own self be true”.
Be true to yourself about what you observed and what you know.
Your integrity IS who you are, Jessica.
With you there, Aqua! And, Jessica, I kind of know where you’re coming from. When I was on staff, I pointed out that our Dianetics book booth at the mall was a bad location. Was the venue changed? No. Was I put in lower conditions because of my opinion? You bet.
Fuck the Church Of Scientology!
And fuck David Miscavige while we’re at it!
(Incidentally, the concluding statement is meant to be taken figuratively)
You’re damn right there, Aqua. There may be hope yet for Jessica Brown. Fingers crossed for her.
Mine too. That this thing she wrote was leaked to Mike was a wonderful thing. That said, knowing that her honest, spontaneous objections to the cult’s off-policy lending policies have now been read by us I suspect the cult will come down very, very heavily on Jessica to cave, to shudder her into silence. I’m rooting for her, strongly. BE STRONG, JESSICA!
The CoS is the epitome of “Truth is stranger than fiction”.
I have had numerous reports that Cincinnati staff members were *FORCED* to take out new credit cards and get limits raised for LOANS for BRIDGE for public.
These staff members cannot pay minimums at all with staffpay
I have to come realize that there is an OMITTED GLOBAL WATCHDOG on Scn crimes in multiple geographies.
Thanks to blogs like this New Zealand shenanigans are revealed but there needs to be a kind of Interpol co-ordinating criminal activity in each country for all law enforcement to access.
Karen
We are hearing that ST LOUIS staff members are going into deep debt too.
Many are humanitarians for the Ideal Org Scam and it’s official that the building is now up for sale
St Louis is suppressing the sale price
The listing company is Hilliker
They have a suppressive clause that states no one is allowed to share the sale price information
Who acts like this?
11 years of bankrupting members for the 60,000 sq ft Ideal Org that was supposed th handle clearing the Midwest
Now they are selling it after fleecing members out of $12-14 Million dollars
It’s an ideal scam
The ecclesiastical Real Estate Ideal Ponzi Scheme
With regards to staff and members –
Let’s all
Check the federal bankruptcy courts
Check the courts and follow the Scientologists
If the Scientologists file bankruptcy or lose homes to foreclosure
after donating money to Scientology
It goes public
Let’s turn them into the IRS
Make their crimes public
It’s time to expose everything!
Wow on the Scene at St Louis
The crimes are being committed by the Scientologists themselves. Crimes against themselves.
Look, for not seeing what’s plainly in front of their faces, they’re either super, super stubborn, OR totally off the reservation dumb.
I’m going with “stubborn”.
Super super super I’ve come this far I have to be right about this I’m not changing my mind about this EVER…STUBBORN.
Because, honestly, NO one is THAT dumb!
Its just not POSSIBLE.
Is it?
Thanks for that report about St. Louis’ “morgue” building – the zombie that they bought and then sunk money into maintaining, and paying taxes on, for over a decade as it sat truly idle, and that the org has now given up on ever occupying.
I’m sure Scientology doesn’t want the members to know how little the derelict building is going to go for at this point, and how much of their money has been lost. But I believe that the eventual sales price will have to be reported to the city and will show up in tax records.
Here’s the listing, “being offered without an asking price” thought also stated as “Price: $1 USD”:
https://www2.colliers.com/en/Properties/redevelopment-opportunity-in-historic-lafayette-square/USA-2345-lafayette-avenye-st-louis-mo-63104/USA1053322
Excellent work Peacemaker. My friend in St Louis sent me the for sale brochure and I too thought there was a sign with Hilliker as the company selling it but that was a photo from when they bought it.
I saw the Suppressive Clause
There was a Suppressive clause stating no one could discuss the information sent to them by this outfit – Colliers
It was a threat too
I’ll find it and post it on another day
Who is Collier?
Is this a Scientology Mafia Real Estate Outfit?
Who suppresses information about selling property unless the are hiding something
Scientology does because Scientology is evil
Glad you appreciate the info about STL’s zombie building – I’m interested in following such things, and so appreciate the tip-off that the building had finally been put on the market, not to mention all the gory detail insiders have provided about what the local membership was subject to in order to try to raise money for the project.
Colliers is a national commercial real estate firm, and I’m not surprised they would accommodate clients’ desires to try to keep details of transactions private. See also what I’m going to comment about next.
I double checked on the STL building, and the seeming error of date noted in the exchange with Peabody, also shows up in the full printed prospectus:
https://listingsprod.blob.core.windows.net/ourlistings-usa/ba9fe169-802c-4f8a-9900-3a150efb289e/95eb4726-2be3-4177-b4de-138b9fd44e44
However, listing services like LoopNet indicate that this is indeed a new 2019 listing:
Listing ID: 14862467 Date Created: 1/14/2019 Last Updated: 2/20/2019
https://www.loopnet.com/Listing/2345-Lafayette-Ave-Saint-Louis-MO/14862467/
I’m also virtually certain I’ve checked on the address once if not twice in the last year and haven’t turned up information about it being put on the market before, so I think it’s got to be newly on the market. The description of the property in the printed prospectus also is poorly written with errors – perhaps having come from Scientology itself, come to think of it – which again suggests to me that the listing agents aren’t actually much involved in marketing the property, presumably because they don’t expect much to come of it.
I checked, and Hilliker was the agency listing the property when Scientology bought it in 2007:
http://www.xenu-directory.net/news/library-item.php?iid=3945
It’s possible that Scientology previously tried selling the building through Hilliker, thinking that the firm that sold it last time would be a good go-to, and that it was done so quietly that there is no sign of it to be found. The similar never-occupied and never-to-be occupied zombie building in Boston has also been through 2 attempts (at least) to sell it, and my guess is that Scientology is a difficult client to work with, including having unreasonable expectations about recovering cost from a white elephant property they probably first overpaid for, and then mis-managed and neglected.
The really sad thing to me, is that given a sale at a loss, Scientology will have squandered money that they coerced from locals at such terrible costs as members ending up losing their own homes and going bankrupt.
Property Experts Joseph Hill & Carrie Herrmann have listed for auction a 4 story, 60,000 square foot building with a reserve of $1 USD. They claim the building sits on a lot size of 1.2 square feet. 60,000 square feet/4 = 15,000 square feet on each floor. The minimum lot size would have to be 15,000 square feet. The pictures of the building are awful. I have no clue how these two experts came up with this listing.
It looks as if the writing of that was delegated to a subordinate, who made multiple other mistakes including “Bids are due by 3:00 PM on February 14, 2018” – I assume they just got the year wrong, because I’ve been keeping an eye on this and the listing only just showed up in searches. That all indicates to me that the “experts” don’t consider the possible sale of this property much of an opportunity worth investing much of their time in, or likely to provide a good commission.
The “church” with all its criminality and insanity is just a reflection of Hubbard’s mind and soul.
What??? Hubbard actually had a soul? That’s hard to believe.
Well, he did before he sold it OSD ;
Hey! I thought we weren’t going to bring that up!
Lol! I think that if he had one he is languishing in an uncomfortably hot place right now…
The personality of the CoS is that of a psychopath or sociopath. Because that’s what Hubbard was. (Or BPD at the very least.) And SOB is definitely a sociopath. The organization as a whole reflects those same traits.
The poor parishioners are caught in that in the same way that the family of a psychopath/sociopath/BPD sufferer are.
What a great comment! Says it all perfectly and succinctly.
Maybe the cherch realizes that the older people are becoming scared of death and dying. Maybe some of those fear for their next lifetime and think doing more scn will insure them of a good death and a wonderful next lifetime. So scn asks for $ using those buttons . And if scn steals. The $ those people are dying soon and won’t go after it. What assholes.
So if any of you have two nickels left to rub together and still have family in the cult you may want to set up a trust and then name the family members to be excluded from your estate. Otherwise, our friendly folks out there saving the planet for us will want what is left of what you worked for. And guess where it will end up. The family members still in will be hounded by the zealots to file a claim against your estate and will pursue it until it is coughed up like an old hairball.
Such is life in a cult.
Very good advice, Newcomer, but inmho it is far more likely that ex-culties with any substantial funds or assets will use these as incentives and enticements for family members who’ve disconnected from them to return. Give them a soft nest, a soft landing, etc. Come back, it will be so easy, I’ll help you, I love you. Its a natural impulse for a hopeless person desperate to get their loved one back. But I agree with you 100% that none of this will work at all and that the opposite must be done. Cut them off without a penny and spell it all out to them in no uncertain terms, effectively telling them, “You want nothing to do with me? Ok, no problem. Sayonara, Have a good life”. Reverse vector, etc. A really good idea, actually. Tremendously hard for most people suffering the pain of disconnection to do, but spot on as a strategy, I think!
Newcomer, if you are alive your brothers, sisters or whatever cannot file a claim to your assets. Where did you get that bizarre legal idea?
Wynski, the reference as I understand it is to estates. But, come to think of it, Scientology being as depraved as can be imagined, I’ve also read read about instances of members financially exploiting family with diminished capacity, or under legal guardianship – and not just the elderly, but in a few sad cases, younger people who befell some unfortunate and debilitating accident or medical condition.
Anyone with close family in Scientology indeed should consider ensuring that those people are specifically prohibited from having any financial or decision-making role, or receive any assets without very strict restrictions on their use.
And when families and assets are involved, and given our wide-open legal system, anything is possible. I have seen people file claims against living relatives’ assets (and may have even run across at least one example in Scientology), often based on the premise that a distribution was not made properly from someone’s estate, or from a jointly-held business (which often involves farms); while such claims may not have much merit or chance of success, they often result in a payoff to settle the matter rather than have it drag out unpleasantly.
Like I said, NOT possible just because you are related to a person. Estate law is different and NOT what was referenced.
Jessica is probably getting whatever bank accounts and credit limits cleaned out for sec-checking, while she scrubs toilets. All for quoting LRH. Oops.
I hope that by quoting LRH to show that they shouldn’t be allowing this plundering of money via loans from other Scns, and then having the org slap her hands for quoting LRH, then replacing that posting with one on Suppressives, I hope this will serve as a wakeup call for Jessica so that she realizes something is not right when you are punished for just trying to follow policy. Maybe this will make her look and eventually leave Scn. I made the mistake when in, of writing KR’s on Flag staff members and quoting the LRH they violated. I got into ethics trouble over that.
Janedoe2 , it doesn’t work that way. Hubtard policy isn’t sane as a whole. For every policy that lady posted I can find one that can be used to tell someone to take the loan or what ever.
She will be charged under a Hubtard policy that makes it sin to “use Hubtard POLICY to stop, something good. In this case a person buying Hubtard auditing.
Another one is ,”The hell with the rules, get the show on the road.” Another Hubtard policy order. There are thousands.
Purpose is senior to policy.
Yes, another “gem” nomnom. Thus, it is impossible to be “standard” using El Con policy.
Back in the late 70s and early 80s I was posted in Finance at a Class V org.
This kind of criminality surfaced every now and then.
I used to police it and stamp it out just as soon as I found it was happening again.
Back then it was possible to take this kind of action without fear of retribution. In fact it would be the offenders that took the heat if they did not mend their ways, but back then we did not have the Ideal Org program and basic expenses were much easier to cover.
Thank you once again, DM!
City by city, as each “ideal org” is created, whatever Scientology field existed is torn apart. The lies and financial crimes overwhelms their small little community and further guarantees the new, huge, beautiful buildings remain EMPTY. This is a Miscavige created real estate/money making scheme which is in total violation of Hubbard policy. If a Scientologist tries to bring up policy in an effort to bring about logic or curtail financial crimes, they are silenced by whatever means it takes. PERIOD.
wow. Jessica is simply trying to get policy in. So, it’s taken down. then policies on suppressive acts posted instead? Interesting subtext there ay? Methinks Jessica is currently writing them up etc. Sheesh
Well… looks like someone is ‘half smart.’ Following Hubbard’s policy, no matter how it is interpreted will lead from one minefield into another. The “good intentions” found in Scientology are simply bait.
Sup, I Yawn!
Here is a recent story of unethical but very standard policies Scientology Registrars are doing to long time members.
This was posted on Tony Ortega’s Bunker.
A few weeks ago we got a tip from one of our longtime sources, and learned that nearly the same thing has happened again. But this time, the 82-year-old victim wasn’t new to Scientology.
She had been in it for more than fifty years.
The subject of this story wants very badly to tell her story on the record, but she is concerned about how her family will be affected, and so for now she asked that we not identify her. However, she was very cooperative, sent us documentation, and said she is still hoping to identify herself later on.
Her story is deeply disturbing.
She’s a delightful woman from the Midwest who fell into Scientology in the late 1960s and even joined the Sea Org in 1974, working for a time under Yvonne Jentzsch at the original Celebrity Centre in Los Angeles. But eventually she left the SO and returned home.
She was still passionately devoted to L. Ron Hubbard and the “tech,” and believed that it had the potential to perform miracles — she was convinced that she had lived into her 80s with no health issues because of her involvement in Scientology.
Her one real problem was that she was very hard of hearing. So she was interested when two “missionaires” visited her last March, telling her that she should go to Los Angeles for Scientology auditing that would improve her hearing.
Even with her faith in the tech, she regrets being taken in by the pitch. “I should know better,” she says. But she decided to go.
“They asked me for $3,500 for an intensive in LA to get my hearing back. And $300 for six days in the hotel there, at $50 a day — which turned out being $75 a day.” When she balked at the overall cost, one of the missionaires offered to pay for her flight. (An “intensive” is a block of 12.5 hours of auditing, Scientology’s brand of counseling.)
In Los Angeles, she did the auditing at the Advanced Org, AOLA, and she says she enjoyed it. “I thought I was doing better. I was having wins. I was excited,” she says. (Later, when she returned home, she had herself tested and was disappointed to learn that she had lost another four percent of her hearing.)
On her second day, however, she was asked to meet with some of Scientology’s very persistent fundraisers, known as “registrars.”
“They put me in a room for five hours. ‘You want to go up the Bridge,’ they said. I said I can’t afford it. ‘If we can find you a way, will you do it? We’ll get you a line of credit,’ they said. So, OK, we’ll get a line of credit.”
One of the people pestering her, a man named Morgan, was using a laptop computer the entire time, she says. She found out later that Morgan was applying for credit on her behalf, using all of her private information they had on file. “They said I was the one on the computer. Then they had me sign a paper — ah, I was so stupid I signed whatever they gave me.”
They escorted her from AOLA to a local bank to complete the transaction. “They had all of my information. My Social Security Number, my mother’s maiden name. So the bank said it was a proper transaction.”
At some point, she says, one of the other registrars asked for her smartphone, saying that he wanted to put the Scientology TV app on it. “I thought I was getting a letter of credit. But what it turned out to be was three credit cards. I only later realized that what he actually did with my phone was activate the three cards.”
At the time, she was just glad the “regging” session was over. She assumed that a letter of credit was something she could draw on later, and wasn’t an issue at the time. She went on with her auditing.
As the week came to a close, she was looking forward to going home. But as her return date neared, she realized that they had other ideas. “They didn’t want to lose the stat. There were very few people there. They didn’t want anyone to leave.”
They wanted her to draw on her credit to buy many more intensives of auditing. She was told that what she really needed was another 23 intensives, or 287 hours in total of counseling.
She just wanted to go home. By 1:30 pm on her final day, she had completed a routing form except for one final signature, showing that she had completed what she came to do. “For hours and hours, they worked on me, trying to get me to stay.”
She sat in the Advanced Org, and sat. At 11:30 pm, she decided that she was going to walk out.
“I said I was going home. They all surrounded me, walking me down the front of the building. They wanted me to go to Ethics. But I went to the hotel, and they followed me. A little later, at 12:30, they called me in my room, saying that I had to come by in the morning at 8:30.”
She then learned to her surprise that her flight reservation the next day was still intact. (She assumed they would have changed it to keep her there.) At about 4:30 am, she put on as many sets of clothes as she thought she could get away with, and made her way to the lobby. She knew that she had to leave her luggage behind.
“The only way I could leave was to pretend I was going for a walk. I walked down the block, and I found some men who looked sketchy. I went into a Motel 6 or something and asked the guy behind the counter to call Uber for me.” Within minutes her ride picked her up and went to the airport. “I was shaking like crazy.”
She got home without incident. But then, she finally discovered that it wasn’t a letter of credit she had obtained, but three credit cards — and a balance of $59,500.
“I had no idea until I got home. Two of the cards arrived in the mail, the third one never arrived. I took the two down to our local church,” she says. She complained, but she was told that she had approved the transaction. “I never said yes. I don’t have that kind of money,” she insisted.
Meanwhile, she went to her bank, reporting the transaction to the fraud department.
“The bank decided it wasn’t fraud,” she says. “I went to everyone I could think of. I appealed the decision. They said it would go to the executive office, the highest it could go. In November, they said they would call me the next day. I never heard from them again.”
She also sent letters to local law enforcement, and even to the attorney general of her state. Again, she got nowhere.
But in the meantime, one thing she was sure of: She was no longer a member of the Church of Scientology.
“My kids are happy that I’m out. They’ve been very supportive.” At one point, when she told them she was trying to get her money back from Scientology and would probably be the subject of harassment, she said she planned to leave town so they wouldn’t be targeted as well. But they immediately drove over and told her not to leave.
“I was afraid of them. I’m not as afraid now. But I was still a Scientologist — until I got home and found out what they had done. It gradually dawned on me what they did. I’d been brainwashed. I’m still working on it.”
A couple of weeks after our initial conversation, we checked back with her and she told us that she was very pleased: She had just spoken to another law enforcement agency that seemed very interested in what she had been through, and asked for copies of her documentation.
Whoa! What an incredible story! But, hey, THAT’S Scientology. Step right up and lose your mind…and all your money.
Glad your back!
Thanks, Deanoftruth! I’m glad I can reconnect now.
Nice to see you back OSD – I was quite concerned at your silence and hoped you were OK? 🙂
Thanks for your kind words, KiwiGal. I couldn’t log in for quite awhile. A URL was blocking me.
OSD – so happy to see you back. I missed you a lot
Yes
Scientology – Lose your mind
Lose your family
Lose all of your MEST
Go into debt then file Bankruptcy
It’s all so spiritual – eh?
So fucking Theta
Hi Idle. Yep, I’m back. Great to hook back up with you!
That’s so sad- taking advantage of people in that way is shameful- I hope she gets her money back but she probably shouldn’t hold her breath. I thought there were laws in place to protect senior citizens from situations like this- I’m disappointed in our government for not protecting people (especially the elderly and the vulnerable) better.
She was in the SEA ORG and STILL trusted those criminals? Well, Darwin at work. She is an idiot.
Scientology’s lawless loan practices began with the “successful” missions of the 1970s, from what I can tell – that’s what turns out to be the case digging into the real history of the supposed “good old days” (just a bit before my time), as I’ve noted previously, and think is worth mentioning again here.
Commercial consumer credit was relatively new back then, and credit cards were rare, so the first scam was over bank loans, with staff such as reges arranging for members to claim assets like cars that they didn’t have, and providing false verification of jobs and income to loan officers. Then some of the missions got the idea to take advantage of another new option in the financial system, and set up their own credit unions – then they were loan officers, which reminds me of what Hubbard said about his aspiration for the day when “the orgs say what’s legal or not.” That’s the sort of illegal behavior that got Bent Corydon’s large Riverside mission, sometimes held out as a shining example, raided by the authorities in 1979 for loan fraud.
On a related note, I just ran across an interesting account of Hubbard being driven past the Riverside mission – and coveting having it for himself. That’s a reminder that is was the old man’s insatiable and even irrational greed, as much as anything, that drove what was later done to the missions (and several, like Mimi Rogers’ father Phil Spickler’s, were essentially confiscated as early as about 1975-6).
I really don’t know how Auckland survives?
It was telling from a Post saying” this is Huge”.
Reminds me of the Days of John Rich .Countrywide Bank would love to claw back the $200,000
Granitt
C’mon, Grant! ‘Huge’ is code for nothing.
At least it’s good to see there is one person, maybe even several people in Oz Scn with the courage to think for themselves. I expect we will welcome them here before too long. I imagine the death and arrest at their facility has caused some deep, or at least deeper, thinking about much that goes on.
DM, the troops are getting troublesome, better send OSA.
And who are they going to blame this time for the flaps?
Maybe the Government of Australia for preventing them to expand? Or perhaps the Tax Institutions are the ones responsible for their frauds? Or will it be Jessica Brown’s FB posting?
Either way, their crimes and frauds eventually will catch up with this cult and its leaders, period!
This would be a great Aftermath episode. Nothing pisses people off more than large, greedy, powerful, unethical organizations preying on good people for money and ripping them off. Revolutions have been started from this criminal behavior!
“To use the terminology of Hubbard, it’s a downward spiral that just keeps getting worse and worse.”
And as per Hubbard – Ethics, Justice and the Dynamics HCOPL,. Scientology and it’s followers are a ‘vacuum for trouble’.
The last loan for my friends husbands OT 7 (6k): “I don’t owe you. I owe the credit card company” WTF
By the time that happened, I knew no amount of KRs would do any good. Both husband and wife worked at Narconon Int. While I am X SO just a DB 🙁
One or the other will get sick or hit some bottom and be sorry for their ‘out ethics’ behavior.
In the last 12 years (since moving out of Hollywood), two people have repaid me loans. One was recovering from a heart attack. The other, his wife had just died (Tom Hall who ran a travel agency out of Glendale).
So all I gotta do is continue getting Scientogy out of my system and all kinds of wonderful things happen 🙂
Cece – I’m so glad you were happily surprised to have two people do the right thing and pay you back! As for the other couple who said they didn’t owe you, that’s just disgusting and another example like Mike mentioned about accountability being considered “low-toned.” Seeing how that plays out in real life is very ugly and it’s so sad you were treated that way. But it doesn’t surprise me at all that you were one of those people who was always trying to help others. So while they slave away at NarCONon, you are on the adventure of a lifetime and FREE – I’d say that makes it quite obvious who the true DB’s are in the real world! Hugs!
PS – They didn’t have a contract with the CC company, you did… so yes, they clearly owed YOU!
Cece, I”m curious, did Tom Hall pay you back? I ask cuz I used to know him.
Yes Cindy he did ?
Since I got out many moons ago, I have accumulated a bunch of money. Man o man, every day I feel sooooooo happy that Tiny Boots can’t have a fricken penny, not a shilling of it….. EVER! !
Way to go! Woot woot!
TKS Ann.
And there’s nothing more painful to Miscavige and his Mini-Me’s than knowing that a former cult member is doing very well, thank you, and that this is money the cherch will NEVER have!
Well done, Bog!
Leaving & then racking up loads of money is OUTSTANDING! Way to go, Bog!
Tks OSD.
Good for you! The best revenge is living well!
Kat
The best revenge is getting the tax exemption yanked and shut the cult down
True!! But it’s still great to sit on a pile of money and taunt Miscavige….more fun too, I would imagine.
Scientology registrars, including Field Staff Members shilling for the Co$ are constantly committing credit card fraud and mail fraud. They did this to my wife (Mitch Talevi and David Foster) back in the early 90s.
They originated, facilitated and coached my wife into raising our credit limits by over 25K. Neither of us were actually working at the time. We were just getting by on reserves. Mitch Talevi and David Foster encouraged my wife to lie about our income. I was stupid enough to not object to this scam. Eventually everything went into collection. We got to work and paid it back, but I have never been able to totally forgive myself for being so stupid.
I’ve heard from several people recently who experienced the same criminal behavior.
I would hope that if anyone who is recently out has had a similar experience that they would file a police report on it. Co$ registrars should be prosecuted for credit card fraud every time they commit the crime.
If they are in fact committing Mail Fraud, they’re in Big Trouble! Anyone ever seen “The Firm’? Ironically, it happens to be a TC flick!
Yep. Tag team duo Mitch Talevi and Charmaigne Rogers did the ‘let’s get him in a room and not let him out until he pays routine’ to me on my first trip to Flog back in late 80’s.
At about 3:00AM I was so pissed and tired I told em both …………… “fuck you, ship me home in a box because I’m not payin for you to extort me.” I was definitely labeled as someone ‘not with the program’!
Wish my breaking point would have come when that happened!
You’re the man!
Happy Belated Birthday Cooper ✨?✨?
It’s not belated yet! And celebrations are in order for sure since it was Feb 22nd, 2013 that I got official word that I had f-i-n-a-l-l-y achieved the total freedom I had been promised.
I was declared Persona non Grata and therefore free from
1) regging (being lied to)
2) being lied to
3) being told how able I was (aka being lied to)
4) participating in deforesting the planet via endless mail (aka being lied to)
5) being asked, begged, demanded of for MONEY (aka being lied to)
6) being asked for money by ‘friends needing services, (being lied to)
7) association with a cult (the truth shall set you free)
Happy belated Birthday, Coop!
Well then it is a day for celebrating.✨✨?
? Cheers
‘Fuck you’ is often heard in the cult. But your’s was especially good, newcomer! Let’s all be ‘not with the program!’
Way to go Coop! That’s the way to tell them!
It would be interesting if the many of you not only filed police reports, but also contacted the FBI & lodged IRS complaints. Demonstrating an organization-wide pattern of consistent financial crimes (laws have gotten much more strict, at least here in the US since the 2007-09 financial crisis, with regards to those who act as “fiduciaries.”) While one-off cases reported locally here and there may not attract attention, a slew of reports demonstrating consistent behavior may spark something much greater!
The registrars encourage people to declare bankruptcy.
GREAT post.
injustices help wake folks up.
I’d like to weasel my way into the FB group to see what they post, but it’s probably not worth a second look.
Scientology organising loans between individuals was and still is rampant, if you have good credit you can guarantee you will be regularly hit up for loans to others, it is then up to you to battle with them to get repaid. I had to create a spreadsheet to keep track of my loans and repayments, at one point I had 5 different people owing me money, one loan never did get repaid.
There was a point when I realized that quoting LRH in opposition to something being done, did no good any more. It was all about what was best for the church of scientology and david miscavige was “command intention” of what was needed and wanted. One could quote LRH til he was blue in the face, it did not matter; it did no good. I mean look at the Debbie Cook email! After her email, so well written with quoted references from LRH, no one should have disconnected from her and all who read it should have been asking questions of david miscavige and what the hell he was doing. It was disappointing to me to see so many scientologists just toe the line and do what they were told and parrot what they were told was the truth.
It does appear the day of reckoning is at hand for the church of scientology and david miscavige. Just not soon enough for me.
Hubbard and Scientology are ultimately really all about ends-justifies-the-means thinking. Policy just provides guidance for the majority of situations where management doesn’t have other considerations, and lulls the well-intentioned rank and file – membership and lowly staff – into the comforting belief that there’s a system that is ultimately consistent and even just. Hubbard indicates in a number of places that other factors are senior to policy, and himself readily disposed of his own cosmetic policies when it came to supposed “letters to Ron,” fobbing off the reading and even signing of them to others. “Kha Khans” are another clearly written example where Hubbard dictated that those managing to produce well for Scientology “can get away with murder without a blink from Ethics.”
That’s one of the real traps of Scientology, isn’t it, the way it leads people to believe that it is orderly and just, when in fact the real behind-the-scenes operating basis is that higher-ups can just throw all the pretense out the window and do however they see fit?
Exactly. There is and never has been such a thing as “standard tech.”
Wow, Mary Khan,
You took the words right out of my mouth and said them better.
After a number of futile attempts I, too realized that quoting policy to staff and showing how it was being violated was an utter waste of time, just a complete waste of my vocal chords, because they knew, they could read. They had taught ME, after all!
Plainly, they saw. Plainly, they knew, and didn’t care, and would do it anyway.
Observing this about 7 times, I knew something was very wrong. My org was off policy, out-tech, and doomed.
Not even being cognizant of the phrase at the time, not even reading the blogs yet, I went UTR.
I stopped talking to the about anything meaningful. I considered them “the enemy” at that point. I moved among them, did some little Basics courses, wnt to some of the events and donated piddling amounts, to keep up appearances. I stopped arguing with them, trying to make them see. I kept my mouth shut and my eyes and ears wide open. I was going to leave by quietly withdrawing my support.
Started reading the blogs..need I say more?
Questions answered, doubts utterly confirmed, by hundreds of people! And far from it just being MY org, the rot was systemic. It was EVERY org!
It took 2 years of being UTR and then I was out for good.
But my org staff – HIGHLY TRAINED AND AUDITED LONG TERMS STAFF – denying policy, justifying out tech, justifying off policy, GASLIGHTING me about it, trying to convince me that it was I who didn’t understand…wow, I was shocked, in the beginning.
Then I got it. I really got it. “Wake Up Call” – loud and clear.
Awesome response Aqua.
If you want to try to talk to a (probable) Scientologist, you can go to narconon and go into their chat. If done correctly, this can be great fun. BTW, several people have died at Narconon over the years. Their practices are dangerous.
https://www.narconon-suncoast.org/
Look for the chat symbol on the bottom right hand corner.
I’d rather not give their web page the ‘click counts’ from going there. It helps their Google rating, which is not something anyone familiar with narCONon would want.
It just seems impossible to me that at some point this cult isn’t prosecuted as a money making, money laundering, money extorting criminal business. Their fair gaming tactic used on their own members, people who sincerely believe they are doing good works, is bound to turn on them. It’s just sad.
I guess Jessica got the CICS declare (prelim to SP declare)
?
Yup. A big severe reality adjustment
Mary, don’t you just love big, severe reality adjustments! It’s just so much fun!
Dude… is that really you?
I was wondering when you would get around to me! Yep! I’m back! Something called a ‘URL’ was blocking me. So I would just read everyone else’s posts. Then for laughs and giggles, I thought I would give it one more shot. The URL was gone. Allowing me to post.
Welcome back, OSD! So glad it was just a tech thing that kept you from posting and not something far more serious!
Hey Aquamarine!!! What’s up, girlfriend? Yep, I’m still around! You’re still stuck with me.
Happily so, Dude, happily so 🙂 How is LSD (Little Surfer Dude)?