From one of our Swedish Special Correspondents. He took a trip to the hinterlands of Stockholm on Saturday afternoon to check out the 47X expansion in his area of the world.
I will try to tell you my observations of Scientology’s unprecedented expansion in my corner of the World.
When I studied medicine in the early 80s you could always see Scientologists selling Dianetics or that Protection-against-radiation-book at Stockholm Central Station. The Church of Scientology had an Org in Central Stockholm. Than they dissappeared, I don’t know when but it was many years ago I think.
This summer my family heard a rumour that the Church of Scientology had re-established itself in an office- and industrial area called Kungens Kurva, South of Stockholm.
It was confirmed with a Google search so this last weekend I went to see the Org, and I had expected at least a display window with books and stuff, but not…
The only visible trace was this sign “Freedom house” outside the building (you will see a little later the “connection” to dianetics and scientology)
This is the locked entrance door.
Here is the sign nect to the door and the intercomm buzzer to be let into the lobby and the elevators.
That was it.
Not so impressive. I tried to reach the correct floor by entering the shop part of the building but the elevator and the stairs were locked, and I didn’t want to call the telephone number to ask.
Clearly, the massive international expansion is not happening in the capital of a major European nation.
And certainly not anywhere in the US.
Nor in Canada. Mexico. UK. Germany. France. Spain. South Africa. etc etc etc
Must all be happening in those areas where there are NO orgs and missions.
So I wonder what it is that is expanding?
Faustian Deal
Reported in The Times of Joburg.
A couple of notes about this story.
Ernest and Gaye Corbett were for many, many years, leading lights in the South African scientology community. They gave enormous amounts of money to the church and they and their family members were major supporters of all church programs. The Joburg 18 fiasco set the wheels in motion for this lawsuit.
Alex Faust, the former (now disgraced) “CO CMO Africa” had ruled the roost in Joburg as the “most senior officer” in the Continent. He had been “untouchable.” He would have been smart not to involve himself in regging — but these days it is a requirement of every post in scientology. He ended up in a jam, and went crying (literally) to the Corbett’s to help him out to “cover” the money he had already reported “uplines”. Of course, they didn’t think he would lie to them about returning the money….
It will be interesting to see how this plays out.
The article is reprinted below.
Ex-Scientology couple to sue over ‘Faustian deal’
The Church of Scientology South Africa has been hit with a R5.8-million lawsuit by two former members, who allegedly coughed up millions for the church over the past 40 years.
Wealthy Johannesburg couple Gaye, 66 and Ernest Corbett, 70, are behind one of the country’s top residential and commercial property development companies, Century Property Developments, whose portfolio includes the luxurious Waterfall Estate in Gauteng and the five-star Tintswalo Safari Lodge bordering the Kruger National Park.
The couple, who live in Midrand, has taken their former church to the high court in Johannesburg demanding it repay R 5 850 000 they claim they loaned it seven years ago. They also want interest, which will bring the figure closer to R 16-million. The amount, they say, was to allow the church to buy a former Durban hotel for its activities.
In court papers, the Corbetts claim that church director Alex Faust negotiated the oral loan agreement in October 2007, promising that the church would repay the amount by the end of the following month.
November passed without a cent being paid back, but the Corbetts had agreed not to sue the church as long as they were members.
But, by the end of October 2013, the couple left the church, opening the door for them to sue. In May, they issued summons demanding the capital amount, together with interest at the rate of 15.5% per annum, dating back to December 2007.
In September, the church, registered as a non-profit company, defended the lawsuit, denying it owed the Corbetts a cent.
The matter is set to return to court next year.
In the church’s replying papers, Faust denied being party to any loan agreement. Rather, he said, the Corbetts, or one of the entities in which they have an interest, lent approximately R5-million to church member Peter Cooke.
“It was Cooke and not the [church], who was party to an agreement of loan and who undertook at that time, an obligation to repay the plaintiffs,” Faust said.
And, while Faust admits the money was paid into the account of the attorneys dealing with the transfer of the Durban property, he denies this meant the loan was for the church.
Besides, even if such a loan had been made, the debt would have prescribed by now, Faust said.
He added that the couple’s claim “lacks a foundation in fact” and they should be hit with a punitive costs order.
The Corbetts, on the advice of their lawyer, refused to comment on the case, but in a letter published in November 2013 on a blog, the Corbetts claim that during their over 40 years as church members, certain of their fellow members, including Faust, were “constantly hammering and begging for money”.
Spokesperson for the church, Gaetane Asselin, refused to comment on the case.
How about this song with COS in mind?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sdn3O6aaMNc
Addition: It must be 3 or 4 years ago already since me and hubby passed by the Stockholm org just to look at it in this current location, so they seem to be in no hurry to get out of there…
Re: Stockholm org. I believe the first org was established in the early 1970’s, right downtown. By the time I ran into them, 1981, the org was still pretty central, on a side street to the main walking street although a bit further up than where the high traffic was.
Then, things kept expanding, and expanding, further and further away from the centre. It’s very annoying when landlords insist on Bona fide religions paying their rent just like anyone else. So the org has existed all this time, they have just finally expanded to a place where wogs can’t find them. It must feel safe and cosy. 🙂
(I notice that one floor above them is Conroute Ltd, now that’s an honest-sounding name.)
Re: Corbett case, who were the attorneys dealing with the transfer of the Durban property? Were they retained agents of the church?
This will be an interesting one to watch, even though South African law is unfamiliar.
More shite on Dave’s plate. Good news. Bad news for the public: mankind is rushing to decay and degradation even faster and more money will be necessary to fight this evil.
To The Corbetts,
If you are reading this, more power to you from your ex Solo Nots D of P.
I had the privilege to complete both of them on OT VII. Very powerful people. Church goes to really wealthy people to get to their pockets and promising them everything and anything (and their mother). This is a very common practice. I know a similar thing happened with the Test Center near Tampa around 2006, that private public had to be involved to raise big sums for the center. After obtaining the loans they deny it.
Definitely not a proud moment for the Church in South Africa.
Ronit and I wishing you the best!!!
I went to London last week, and I observed both the so called “Life Improvement Centre” in Tottenham Court Road, and the main “church” in Queen Victoria Street. Posted my story on Tony’s blog: http://tonyortega.org/2014/10/12/scientology-sunday-funnies-in-valleys-near-and-far-its-time-to-stand-and-deliver/#comment-1632575032
I did not see this great expansion either…
Yes, 47X for disaster.
Re the Corbetts, absolutely, they are great people, honest, hard working individuals and always willing to help. So they have all, and I am sure many others’ support in their endeavor and we wish them the best in their quest to get back what legally belongs to them. Glad the media over there is somehow catching up with the real facts of this ‘religious organization’.
Would Ex-Scientologists get this song ?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5QCxyns1lrg
Niels — some of your song selections make me scratch my head. This one makes me laugh out loud. I happen to really enjoy Lily Allen. I think anyone can understand the point of this song — it’s hardly subtle 🙂
Thanks. This is one of your best ones ever.
Did I understand correctly that the Corbett loan agreement was verbal? Surely that doesn’t help their case? When I used to make loans to various people I tried to get a written agreement, often unless you were prepared to involve the court even this was worthless, but not with such a huge sum of money involved.
Gee, the sun never sets on the church does it?
Always lit up about something unsavoury.
Be nice if Davey took a long walk off a short pier.
scientology in norway Google streetview. not much expansion here. https://www.google.no/maps/@59.9228351,10.7928177,3a,75y,242h,90t/data=!3m4!1e1!3m2!1s2z2S7I7V8BjDtg1sLYzfRQ!2e0!6m1!1e1
Hei Knuser’n,
I drive past there for fun, once in a while, and I have always wondered if they have both floors of this building or just the ground floor. Do you know?
Hilsen,
Johnny from just outside Oslo
Regarding the Corbett affair, it is mentioned that Gaetane Asselin is the new CO OSA AF. Wow OSA must be suffering from attrition of its “executive” material. No way is Gaetane Cont CO material. She is a mediocre PR at most – of course as a PR she is automatically starting from square negative 10 since she is doing PR for the Church.
Agreed. Though replacing Anne Hogarth is no huge task. Africa has always been treated as the bottom of the totem pole as far as priority for investing resources. Apparently nothing has changed. But it’s more like starting at square negative 100 as the first thing they did when they got there was declare the OLs in the field and they have just kept going with their insane actions since….
Last week I “happened” to almost bump into Gaetane at a local shopping centre in my area (I live right in the middle of the rats nest – halfway between the CLO and the JBG Org). Actually she was standing outside a shop obviously waiting for someone, so I walked up and stood right next to her pretending to be interested in a display of shoes. She saw me and I could literally feel the jolt as she realised who I was. Not being able to stand being in my space she decided to scamper away without waiting for her companion so I purposely followed her. She kept looking behind her as she walked out of the centre, and kept seeing me, walking faster and faster as I followed her. I was enjoying every minute of it……. Finally, I got to my car, nonchalantly got in and drove home – with a big grin. Confront & shatter suppression? These people cant confront or shatter a teacup.
Yes the LATAM Strategy, gone wild, and blended in with the Ideal Org strategy/GATStrats/ IASStrat/etc to concoct a surefire disaster.
It’s remarkable.
BP – sounds like she saw a panther and rabbited. I also like your use of “rats nest” and will have to keep that one filed for future use.
Replying to Black Panther above: Yes in the good old pre-Miscavagian days the flow was always the other way around – Church staff never had any fear of “SPs” or whatever. That was because they had nothing to hide and were delivering usually good services at a fair rate and being mostly decent about it all. So they had nothing to run away from. Now of course the shoe is on the other foot as all of that has been reversed.
The question is: Is Gaetane Asselin’s arse on the line?
you have to be insane to want to deal with all the crap every single day, in and out…a steady diet of lawsuits, protesters, critics. lawyers, thugs and money everyday. he could live unmolested and worry free to play with his cult thing. but no, he has to court problem after problem after problem.
it’s like this guy has nothing better to do than shoot bullets into himself just for fun.
he likes playing russian roulette.
if you keep pulling the trigger davey, sooner or later it goes bang.
well anyway, it don”t really matter to me,
everybody”s got to fight to be free.
Don’t you just admire the RCo$ sense of responsibilty?
They hold themselves accountable for nothing! (Worth the exclamation)
To be accountable for nothing is to be at total cause.
South Africa has a “mixed” legal system, part Dutch civil code, part British common law, and part “traditional” law from African customs. The contract law is covered by the civil code…and does not follow the common law rules about oral contracts with which many of us (US, UK, and most Commonwealth countries) are familiar. Interesting to me is the agreement to forbear suit as long as the couple remained members of the church. It seems that they were on their way out at that point…even contemplating the idea of “not being Scientologists at some future time” per the November 2007 reference- seems dangerously close to counter intention to me.
That’s interesting. So a suit which would be easily dismissed in the US may actually be feasible in SA. If this is indeed the case, DM may be stumbling into this situation because he assumed that SA law is a duplicate of English law, and he couldn’t be bothered to ask competent SA counsel for a true assessment of this case.
In America you could never win interest for a loan for which the interest rate was not specified in writing, and you would have extreme difficulties demanding the principle be paid back at a specific time for the same reason.
We shall see. Clearly they have a lawyer who felt he could file a claim on their behalf, and I doubt he is incompetent. Obviously the law there is different from what we are used to.
But one thing IS clear and I believe is an important element: when a senior official of the church asks someone for something and promises to be responsible for ensuring it is properly handled, the person turning over their money is doing so on the basis that the church represents itself as being ethical beyond reproach, and can be trusted beyond all else (after all, they expect you to tell them your most intimate secrets).
why are they not suing for ALL the money they Gave the IAS gangsters?
Hiatus57, in most cases it is almost impossible to get back donations from a corp. entity like the IAS. The level of required proofs of criminal wrongdoing are VERY high.
I believe that because it is a donation that makes it almost impossible to legally claw back. That’s the “cleverness” of donations, or one of them anyway. So I have read on here anyway.
This story reminds me of a local wealthy Scientologist in East Grinstead – I think his name was Lee Lawrence, who regularly fronted public for money for services – all at the behest of, and organised by, the Regges (David Beale, Craig Matheison etc) . However he was a bit canny and made the repayments subject to interest if late, and the interest charges increased sharply the later the repayments were. Predictably, the public being pressured to pay couldn’t meet the repayments and complained about being ripped off by Lee. I think the practice was temporarily halted after that, and I suppose you could say at least it was for services…Lee himself was declared SP shortly after for not being On Purpose. He ended up being one of Flag’s largest ever refund request. (Not before St Hill Foundation had collected around £40,000 FSM commission as we sent him to Flag. I was personally put on a plane by the then CO Tony Phipps to go collect the money and transfer it back to the UK so he could buy himself a new Keyboard, as the whole amount went to staff wages. The one and only time I got a decent paycheck in the Sea Org. True story).
I wonder how many commendations and certificates of status the Corbetts have as a result of helping the C of S, probably enough to wallpaper a house. All the times the Corbetts went beyond the call of duty to help a church that they believed was intending to ‘salvage’ mankind. But the moment they disagreed with the church’s insane lust for money and draconian methods of treating loyal staff members, they are excommunicated and all good deeds are forgotten – or erased. The church is so very blind and out exchange with its members, it’s staff, and the rest of society (tax free status that should not be) that they have no way back, no road home. I wish the Corbetts every success.
+1
Okay people. I figured out where all the expansion is happening. It is actually Quantum expansion. It is happening at the quantum level of existence.
Quantum was outlawed by der leader
It ‘s warehouse 8 now
The warehouse! THAT is where all the expansion is.
I was visiting Stockholm last summer and spotted a young woman on Drottninggatan giving personality tests. Afterward, I looked up the location of their org, and was surprised to note that it was so far out of the center of town.
Yes, the most ethical group on the planet strikes again.
In fact the only overt ever committed by scientology at any time, anywhere is a big overt of omission.
They have failed miserably to shut people up.
If they could just master the art of effectively shutting people up, everything would be fine.
That ole being there and communicating thing. How does the church shut that down. 🙂
Oops…..me thinks someone ain’t telling the truth.
And I don’t think it’s the Corbetts.
Not being familiar with South African legal system,
I still see a very flimsy retort by the church.
But yes it will fight tooth and nail to make itself right
and the Corbetts wrong.
Funny how the emphasis on what one has done to support
the church (used to hold contributions over one’s head to get
their next “service”) can melt away, turn into lies and make people
with good intentions into terrible SP’s.
Go Corbetts…..kick some COS butt!
Hell ya! It takes guts to take on the church. Anybody that’s been in the church for any length of time knows their story is true. Go Corbetts!
Re Stockholm: Every time I see a story like this and last week’s LA Org story I wonder what it will take for my son to realize that everything I tried to tell him is true and then I wonder if even that will matter.
Anyway, burn baby burn.
Spokesman “gettin’ ass in line”? Really?
Stockholm is just like all the rest….the boom is somewhere else. The scientology equivalent of “free beer tomorrow”.
I agree, wm. And, you’re absolutely right regarding “…the boom is somewhere else.” At every single Idle Morgue, you just gotta know that the staff is thinking, “Ok. We’re not booming. There must be CI all over the place here! Because I know that all the other orgs are being flooded with new public clamoring for services! All that’s needed is for staff and pubic at our org to hand over a lot more money than they have been! That’ll fix everything!”
Yep, good ole 47x expansion.
Yes, was in Athens last Sunday, huge beautiful building, but what a sorry sight! The receptionist warned
me: “not many people today, because it’s Sunday, you know!”
Indeed, on four floors there were about 20 people, including staff, all auditing rooms completely empty, maybe two students in the academy, two on Purif.
They suggested I watch the GAT II film. I said: “I can’t now, but if I come back tomorrow for it, will there be more people?”
“Well, maybe not, you know, Monday… ”
What a sorry, sorry sight!
Marcel Wenger