A young woman who once won and then lost more than $2 million in damages against the Church of Scientology in Portland started a second legal attack Monday on grounds that Scientologists defrauded her during nine months in 1975 and 1976. Julie Christofferson Titchbourne, who began her involvement with the church when she was 17, is asking a Multnomah County Circuit Court jury to return $3,253 she paid for courses and books and to award punitive damages as high as $42 ...

The U.S. government won access Monday to six sealed letters and memos concerning the Church of Scientology and its founder, L. Ron Hubbard, and failed in its attempt to see 11 others. Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Paul G. Breckenridge Jr. had placed the 17 items under seal in June at the end of a civil trial in which he absolved former church archivist Gerald Armstrong of taking documents belonging to the organization. He sealed the items largely because they involved ...

It was just before midnight, May 28, 1984, when the orders were issued. Confidentially. "Mission information: ... recent reports from contacts made with Homer he is likely to go over to the enemy camp. He is thinking of turning against us completely. "Mission purpose: To prevent Homer from going over to the enemy camp and get him moving back onto The Bridge. "Vital Targets: ... Stay in close comm (communication) with MSN OPS (mission operations). Do not implement any decisions without ...

CLEARWATER—Possibly the highest-ranking, most influential Scientologist to defect from the Clearwater-based, international sect has sued Church of Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard for more than $225 million. Citing physical abuse, the intentional infliction of emotional distress, false imprisonment and the violation of his civil rights, Howard D. "Homer" Schomer, the 49-year-old former treasury secretary of the sect's Author Services Inc. branch, is demanding a jury trial and damages of $226,528,200. Schomer's claims, if proved true, offer a dark view of the ...

"Corrupt, sinister and dangerous" were the words used to describe the Church of Scientology in a judgment given by Mr Justice Latey this summer. He also referred to it as "immoral and socially obnoxious". But who controls the Church now? A major Sunday Times Magazine investigation into the activities of the cult in America and Britain has uncovered a disturbing and extraordinary story — the takeover of the organisation by a small band of youthful fanatics following the disappearance of the ...

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A $20 million-plus lawsuit has been filed by two branches of the Church of Scientology accusing a Boston lawyer, his brother, his law partner and a former Scientologist of violating the civil rights of church members. The federal lawsuit claims attorneys Michael Flynn and Thomas Hoffman, Washington, D.C. restaurateur Kevin Flynn and former Scientologist Laurel Sullivan conspired to violate the church members civil rights by a campaign of lies that led to government investigations and adverse publicity. ...

LOS ANGELES, Oct. 23 — The wife of the founder of Scientology, L. Ron Hubbard, has filed a $5 million suit against Mr. Hubbard's son, charging "massive fraud" in his 1982 effort to have his father declared legally dead or mentally incompetent. The suit was filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court Monday by Mr. Hubbard's third wife, Mary Sue Hubbard, the stepmother of Mr. Hubbard's oldest son, Ronald DeWolf. The suit charges that Mr. DeWolf and his Massachussetts attorney, Michael ...

He may be the most highly visible "invisible" man on earth — Mr. Lafayette Ronald Hubbard. Although not seen publicly since 1980, the reclusive founder of the controversial Clearwater-based Church of Scientology is constantly the subject of newspaper stories, court testimony and television [?] around the world. L. Ron Hubbard, a flamboyant millionaire philosopher, adventurer and explorer, mystic and messiah, has become the Howard Hughes of our time. For no one knows — at least no one is saying — where ...

LOS ANGELES — Michael J. Flynn, a Boston lawyer, was piloting a light aircraft toward South Bend, Ind., in October 1979 when its engine quit mysteriously at 8,500 feet. After making an emergency landing, he said he found several quarts of water in the fuel tank. Since then, Mr. Flynn, who has led a legal battle against the Church of Scientology, a group that has long been the subject of Government investigations, says he has been followed by as many as ...

Church of Scientology public affairs director Richard Haworth has accused Clearwater Sun Managing Editor Samuel E. Fenton and staff writer George-Wayne Shelor of attempting to break into the church's Clearwater headquarters earlier this month, after attending a sect press conference. As a result of the alleged break-in attempt and other "bizarre actions" on Shelor's part, Haworth said the reporter is banned from church property and is allowed to communicate with him only in writing. Shelor has written a series of stories ...

The Church of Scientology has begun reimbursement of money to a number of current and former members who claimed refunds were owed them for services not delivered when they took courses in Clearwater, a California attorney said Thursday. California attorney David Jordan, himself a former Scientologist, said about $160,000 has been repaid 14 of his clients in recent months, and another 19 persons with claims totaling about $240,000 should be paid within 30 days. Jordan also represents another 237 current and ...

The 11th District Court of Appeal in Atlanta has issued a temporary injunction against Clearwater's charitable-solicitation ordinance, at the request of the Church of Scientology. The order is expected to put the law on the shelf for at least four months. The ruling came only three weeks after a lower federal court in Tampa refused to issue a restraining order against the ordinance, ruling that the city could begin enforcing at least a portion of it, even as the appeals process ...

U.S. District Court Judge Elizabeth Kovachevich Thursday denied a Church of Scientology request to restrain Clearwater officials from enforcing a charitable solicitations ordinance until after further hearings on the law in a higher court. City officials hailed the decision as added support for their position. But sect attorneys said after the Tampa hearing that they intend to continue their battle to have the ordinance ruled unconstitutional. "The judge also said that if the city should abuse the enforcement of the law, ...

CLEARWATER — The Church of Scientology brought a traveling press conference to the steps of Clearwater City Hall Wednesday, and its targets were old foes. Saying that Clearwater "has a chance to pull itself out of a really nasty mess," the church's international president Heber Jentzsch took shots at the city's charitable solicitation ordinance (a measure aimed at the Church of Scientology) and at Michael Flynn, the Boston lawyer who recommended its passage. Reading from a letter addressed to Mayor Kathy ...

The Church of Scientology brought a transcontinental traveling press conference to the steps of Clearwater City Hall Wednesday to publicly denounce outspoken Scientology critic Michael Flynn. Sect officials claim Flynn, a Boston attorney and longtime adversary of Scientology, orchestrated an elaborate but abortive scheme two years ago to forge a $2 million check drawn on a bank account of sect founder L. Ron Hubbard. The accusations made by the Clearwater-based sect are based on the declaration of a man a Scientology ...

LOS ANGELES — Church of Scientology officials yesterday accused a top church adversary of conspiring with organized crime figures to steal $2 million from Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard two years ago. Church officials contended Boston attorney Michael Flynn also intended to use the theft scheme in a Riverside County probate case to gain control of Hubbard's $200 million estate. That case was later dismissed. Flynn, reached yesterday at his Boston office, called the Scientologists claim adversary had $2 million check ...