Background

My name is Martin Ottmann. I am 36 years old and a German citizen, currently living in France. My address is 54, rue Pierre Brossolette, 92300 Levallois-Perret.

On February 18th, 1989 I became affiliated with the Church of Scientology in Munich, Germany. After being a so-called "public member" for more than one year, I joined in August of 1990 the "Sea Organization," a "fraternity" that runs the "Advanced Organizations" and the upper management organizations of Scientology. I became a full-time member and employee of the "Church of Scientology Flag Service Organization, Inc." (FSO), located in Clearwater, Florida.

In July of 1992 I returned to Germany and started working in a printing company of a Scientologist in Frankfurt. In December of 1992 I reported the then owner and the previous owners of the company (all Scientologists) to the police and the tax authorities, after I had found out that they had been involved in tax fraud and forgery of documents. In the later course of a criminal investigation one of the Scientologists went to jail in 1994. At the time of my reporting these individuals to the police in late 1992, I became disillusioned with the Scientology organization and its teachings.

In 1993 I went back to school and due to the public controversy in Germany surrounding Scientology I became interested in the subject again and began collecting documents about it. On December 27th, 1993 I sent a report to the U. S. Consulate in Frankfurt, informing them about fraudulent representations made by the FSO in connection with the application for visas for foreign Scientology-staffers at U. S. embassies [Exh. No. 1]. I never received a response to it.

After finishing school in the summer of 1994 and having earned a high school degree, I began studying social work at the University of Esslingen in the fall of 1994. I concentrated my studies on the phenomenon of cults and related counseling services. In 1995 I began my first of two traineeships in a counseling and documentation center on cults that was run by the Protestant Church in Stuttgart. Additionally I started giving testimony on behalf of the state government in a tax-litigation case against a Scientology-organization in Stuttgart.

Around that time I also became interested in the on-going Scientology controversy on the Internet. I contacted out-spoken critics of Scientology in the United States and became eventually involved in their activities. In the spring of 1996 I was asked by an ex-Scientologist to give testimony about my personal experiences with Scientology for a civil suit in California ("Steven Fishman & Uwe Geertz vs. Church of Scientology International et al," Superior Court of the State of California, BC 122468). I provided the plaintiffs with a lengthy declaration that, although never filed with the court, was later posted on the Internet [Exh. No. 2].

In the fall of 1996 a German journalist who wanted to produce a television-documentary on Scientology and who needed background information contacted me. I started to do research for her, selecting documents and contacting other ex-Scientologists. During that time I came across the investigation of the Clearwater Police Department into the death of Lisa McPherson, a young Scientologist who had died in late 1995 at the Scientology-headquarters in Clearwater. I contacted the investigating detective and when I later arrived with the journalist in the Florida area to do a research trip, I was also interviewed by the police [Exh. No. 3].

Through the year 1997 I continued to make different aspects of Scientology publicly known, mostly through the Internet discussion-group "alt.religion.scientology" and at the end of that year and in March of 1998 I participated in two demonstrations against Scientology in Clearwater and Los Angeles.

When I reached my degree as social worker in the summer of 1998 and began working in that field, I ceased all activity as a Scientology-critic until I was approached by a group of ex-Scientologists in early 1999 who wanted to create a database of Scientology documents that were to be made publicly available for people who were involved in litigation with the Scientologists.

I joined the group in March 1999 and after sorting out my role in the project I began traveling through various European countries and collecting documents from private and public sources. A few months later when it was clear that the project had come to a dead end, I decided to settle in Paris, France. As I was financially independent at that time I decided to continue collecting and archiving the documents and bring the whole project to its anticipated end, while doing it all alone.

Until today I have read about 500,000 pages of documents on Scientology. For the archive itself I have selected more than 10,000 individual documents from 31 countries. I plan to finish the work on the archive within the next 3 or 4 months.

During the summer of 2001 I decided to use some of the documents to bring the activities of certain Scientology organizations to the attention of American government agencies. After I did some related research on the Internet I came to the conclusion that it would be appropriate to file a citizen complaint with a U. S. Attorney's Office, as the concerning activities would fall under the authority of the U. S. federal government.

In December 2001, when I did my last research trip to the United States, I went to the U. S. Attorney's Office in Los Angeles and informed myself about the proper procedures in filing such a complaint. Shortly after my return to Europe, I began writing this affidavit.