Jury selection is scheduled to begin tomorrow in U.S. federal court in Washington, D.C., in the Church of Scientology's $40 million lawsuit against WPP Group's J. Walter Thompson and Hill & Knowlton units; Martin Sorrell, WPP's chief executive officer; and Eli Lilly & Co. The trial, which is expected to last six to eight weeks, alleges Eli Lilly pressured Hill & Knowlton, a public-relations firm, into dropping the Los Angeles church organization because Scientologists were critics of the antidepressant drug Prozac, ...

For both sides, the relationship between the Church of Scientology and the nation's largest public relations firm, Hill & Knowlton, had been a good one. But that relationship fell apart in 1991, just two days after a cover story in Time magazine blasted Scientology as a cult of greed. Hill & Knowlton dropped Scientology as a client. Lilly and Scientology have been locked in battle over Scientology's campaign to discredit Prozac, an antidepressant drug made by Lilly. Scientology blames Prozac for ...

MONTESANO, Grays Harbor County — A self-styled "cult deprogrammer" imprisoned a suburban Seattle teen for five days "to attack his religious beliefs," a prosecutor said as the Arizona man's trial got under way. Rick Ross, 41, of Phoenix is charged with unlawful imprisonment in the January 1991 abduction of Jason Scott, now 21, from the Kirkland home of his mother, Kathy Tonkin. Tonkin has said she hired Ross to deprogram her son. Scott, held at an Ocean Shores beach house, escaped ...

The credibility of witnesses and whether a corporation is responsible for illegal actions carried out by its employees were the subjects of summations by attorneys yesterday in the breach-of-trust trial of the Toronto chapter of the Church of Scientology. Lawyers Mel Green and Frank Addario, who are representing five church members charged with breach of trust, both attacked the credibility of crown witnesses. "These (crown) witnesses are unreliable and cannot be believed," Addario told the jury yesterday. "Their testimony is the ...

Defence lawyers have rested their cases in the trial of the Church of Scientology of Toronto and five members on criminal breach of trust charges. Prosecution lawyers also said yesterday they would not call more witnesses. The trial continues without the jury and under publication ban, as lawyers from both sides argue points concerning what they and the judge will say in their summations. The jury returns June 17 to Ontario Court, general division, to begin hearing final addresses by counsel. ...

An organization of Scientologists allegedly responsible for illegal spying and dirty tricks was not a part of the church when those crimes were committed, a top church executive says. "I feel that by their actions they had removed themselves from the church," Michael Rinder of Los Angeles said yesterday. The Guardian's Office violated the teachings of Scientology's founder, L. Ron Hubbard, and thereby became "something different and distinct," Rinder told Mr. Justice James Southey, of Ontario Court, general division. Rinder, 37, ...

A Scientologist sent to investigate the head office of the church branch allegedly responsible for dirty tricks and spying says he was sickened by what he saw. "I was disgusted. I was sickened to my bones," Norman Starkey, 48, of Los Angeles testified yesterday. Starkey was a defence witness at the jury trial of the Toronto branch of the Church of Scientology and five of its members on breach of trust charges. The charges are in connection with agents infiltrating the ...

A top Church of Scientology executive once married to founder L. Ron Hubbard's daughter says he had no idea about an espionage and dirty tricks campaign conducted by the church. At the trial of the Church of Scientology of Toronto and five of its members yesterday, Jonathan Horwich, 47, of Los Angeles testified he was "very upset" and "shocked" when first informed of the church's campaign. The Toronto defendants face criminal breach of trust charges in connection with agents infiltrating the ...

The worldwide head of the Church of Scientology says he and other top officials were "absolutely outraged" when they concluded that fellow members were committing crimes. "We don't do illegal things," David Miscavige, the 32-year-old church leader from Los Angeles, testified yesterday. When a document outlining a dirty tricks and harassment project called "Operation Freakout" was first seen by his associates in 1981, "I was shocked" and thought it was a fake, Miscavige said. He was not head of the church ...

A scientologist who spent two years in a California prison for helping to steal government documents says her church knew nothing about the crimes. Jane Kender, 55, was deputy guardian of the Church of Scientology in Sussex, England, in 1968 when the British government put a ban on Scientologists coming into the country, she told court yesterday. She was testifying at the trial of the Church of Scientology and five of its members charged with criminal breach of trust in connection ...

A tale of intrigue, international espionage and blind dedication has been painted over the past month by a group of senior members with the Church of Scientology of Toronto during the 1970s. All those testifying had been expelled by the church. They were given immunity from prosecution for testifying at the trial of five members and the church on charges of criminal breach of trust. The charges concern "plants" infiltrating the RCMP, OPP, Metro police and the provincial attorney-general's office between ...

A former top Scientologist testified yesterday she was put in a closet with a set of picks and told to unlock the door as part of her spy training. Marion Evoy told court she failed to get out. But the 42-year-old tutor testified to a string of successes with the Scientology spy network, which is alleged to have penetrated three police forces and three levels of government in the mid-1970s. The Church of Scientology of Toronto and five members pleaded not ...

A man who left a Catholic seminary to eventually head the Church of Scientology in Canada said he knew church members were infiltrating police and government offices, and his wife was one of them. Emile Gilbert, 44, who now lives with his former wife and her new husband in Fonthill, Ont., testified he studied 5½ years for the priesthood then left to join the Church of Scientology in September, 1968. There he met his wife, Cathy Wilkins, who was infiltrating the ...

A former top Scientologist testified yesterday his intelligence office had copies of Ontario cabinet documents stored in a secret hideaway code-named "The Garden." Emile Gilbert, former executive director of the Church of Scientology of Toronto, told a jury yesterday "The Garden" contained 40 or 50 filing cabinets of intelligence files on Scientology's targets. "We had all kinds of files," Gilbert said, "some from Premier Bill Davis' cabinet meetings." Gilbert also said the agents had amassed so much material dealing with the ...

The jury in the Scientology trial yesterday heard the church's spy network extended far beyond the four government agencies they're charged with infiltrating. The Church of Scientology of Toronto and five Scientologists are standing trial on five counts of criminal breach of trust in connection with "agents" planted in the RCMP, the OPP, Metro Police and the Ontario attorney general's office during the mid-1970s. But yesterday, during his fifth day on the stand, a former top Scientologist admitted their "target list" ...

Church of Scientology intelligence officers in the 1970s were "complete zealots" prepared to use illegal means to attack critics, a former official has testified. "Within Scientology, we were completely indoctrinated and did believe that everything we did was 100 per cent right. Our minds were completely altered," Bryan Levman told an Ontario Court, general division, jury. Testifying in return for immunity from prosecution, Levman said he thought at the time it was justified in having "plants" infiltrate Metro police and other ...

Church of Scientology "plants" infiltrated Metro police and the Ontario Provincial Police and succeeded in obtaining copies of investigators' files, a trial has been told. A church member also obtained a file from the attorney-general's office by telephoning a central registry, pretending to be a government lawyer and sending a phony secretary to pick it up, witness Bryan Levman testified. "It was considered a big win. Everybody was very happy," Levman testified yesterday. He added that a Scientology plant later obtained ...

Scientology engaged in worldwide break-ins and espionage because its founder believed he was the focus of a global conspiracy, court heard yesterday. At least 12 police forces and government agencies in Canada were targeted for penetration by Scientology spies in the mid-1970s, Bryan Levman, a former top Scientology official, testified. Levman, testifying under immunity, said L. Ron Hubbard, a former science fiction writer who founded the organization, believed mental health professions were behind a conspiracy to destroy Scientology in concert with ...

The Church of Scientology of Toronto and five adherents are on trial on charges they ran a spy network that infiltrated three police forces and the attorney-general's office. A jury yesterday heard Crown attorney James Stewart outline a spy network that saw members of the church spiriting files out of police and government buildings for copying. The five counts of criminal breach of trust faced by Scientology and the five co-accused stem from activities alleged to have occured from 1974 to ...

The Church of Scientology goes on trial here this morning, charged with stealing thousands of documents from government offices and law firms. It is the first time that a church has been put on trial in Canada. The trial is expected to be long and drawn-out. Various motions on legal technicalities must be dealt with first, a process that could take months. The trial is the result of eight years of legal wrangling. It began in 1983, when 110 police officers ...