Critic: Are you guys a cult? Mike Ferris, Public Relations Spokesperson, Church of Scientology of NZ: Depends on what you mean by a cult. Every religion in its forming stage was considered to be a cult, pretty much. Critic: You guys aren't in your forming stages though, you've been around for fifty years. You claim to be the only major religion that's emerged out of the twentieth century. So, are you a cult? Ferris: Not in the derogatory sense, no, we ...

Months of interviews and thousands of pages of court papers show the effect that influential church members had on a Clearwater company that was a darling of the dot-com boom. It was New Year's Eve 1997 when Digital Lightwave's chief, Bryan Zwan, made his biggest deal: a $9-million contract for his signature product, a 10-pound device that tests telephone lines. At 5:30 p.m., Zwan phoned his production staff and gave them a tall order: Ship the 308 units right away. It ...

IN THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE SIXTH JUDICIAL CIRCUIT IN AND FOR PINELLAS COUNTY, STATE OF FLORIDA GENERAL CIVIL DIVISION Case No. 00-5682-C1 Section 11 ESTATE OF LISA McPHERSON, by and through the Personal Representative, DELL LIEBREICH Plaintiff, vs. CHURCH OF SCIENTOLOGY FLAG SERVICE ORGANIZATION, INC.; JANIS JOHNSON; ALAIN KARTUZINSKI; and DAVID HOUGHTON, Defendants. —– APRIL 2002 AFFIDAVIT OF JESSE PRINCE STATE OF FLORIDA COUNTY OF HILLSBOROUGH BEFORE ME, the undersigned authority, personally appeared JESSE PRINCE, who after being duly sworn ...

READ THE ARTICLE (Thanks to nytimes.com for access to their archives.): Scientology's Puzzling Journey From Tax Rebel to Tax Exempt New York Times March 9, 1997 By Douglas Frantz The Church of Scientology was founded in 1954 by a writer named L. Ron Hubbard. For years Scientology sought to persuade the Internal Revenue Service that it was a religion and deserved the same tax deduction given to traditional religious groups. Scientology took in hundreds of millions of dollars, and for decades ...

EUFAULA — Narconon Arrowhead, the drug rehabilitation and international training center formerly known as Narconon Chilocco Center near Newkirk, has relocated to Lake Eufaula. The center, considered the with a ribbon cutting and barbecue. The relocation was necessary because of expansion. Narconon now has centers in 29 countries. Its mission is "to eradicate the problem of drug and alcohol abuse internationally through effective rehabilitation and education.' Narconon uses an approach developed by author and humanitarian L. Ron Hubbard. The Eufaula center, ...

With the Sandcastle and Osceola expansions, the church now has 565 rooms in and near downtown Clearwater. CLEARWATER — The Church of Scientology boasts more hotel rooms and religious counseling spaces in Clearwater than ever before with the completion this summer of $9-million of construction downtown. The church now has 565 hotel rooms in and near downtown Clearwater. In a typical week, about 1,300 visiting Scientologists from around the world lodge there while receiving spiritual counseling and training. The newest expansions ...

US officer obsessed by the conspiracy theory of President Kennedy's assassination It is appropriate that Fletcher Prouty, who has died of organ failure following stomach surgery at the age of 84, will best be remembered as the model for the mysterious Colonel X, played by Donald Sutherland, in Oliver Stone's film JFK. Prouty, who believed the assassination of President John F Kennedy was a coup d'état perpetrated by elements of the United States military and intelligence communities, was a career military ...

Prosecutors decide to drop a marijuana charge after jurors, concerned about church influence, deadlock. CLEARWATER — When the two-day misdemeanor trial of Scientology critic Jesse Prince ended Thursday, jurors had little doubt he had possessed marijuana as the state charged. What bothered some of them, according to two jurors, was the possibility that Prince had been set up by the Church of Scientology. They heard testimony about how Prince, once a high-ranking church member, was watched, videotaped and trailed for months ...

CLEARWATER, Fla. - Jurors in a misdemeanor marijuana case against a prominent critic of the Church of Scientology were unable to reach a verdict after some on the panel suspected the church had set him up. A hung jury was declared Thursday in the cases against Jesse Prince, who was charged with growing a marijuana plant in his backyard. The jury deliberated for five hours and was split 4-2 in favor of acquittal, jurors said. Pinellas County Judge Michael Andrews declared ...

Courts: Lawsuits allege Reed E. Slatkin bilked friends out of $35 million. SEC is also conducting an investigation. Investors are accusing Reed E. Slatkin, a co-founder of the giant Internet service provider EarthLink Inc., of operating a Ponzi scheme that may have resulted in the loss of least $35 million of their funds. Slatkin—a Santa Barbara socialite and venture capitalist—also is under investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission for his financial activities, which allegedly included a day-trading operation that promised ...

By all appearances, Clearwater lives up to its name. Located just outside of Tampa Bay, the city boasts palm trees, white beaches, sun, surf, and six cruise tour companies with "dolphin sightings guaranteed." Liberally supplied with spacious hotels within driving distance of the Busch Gardens amusement park and the Salvador Dali museum, Clearwater is a tidy burg with street names like Gulf to Bay Boulevard and Sunset Point Road. Clearwater is also home to the most prestigious international instructional center for ...

This documentary was produced to demonstrate what I believed to be a clear bias against the LMT by members of the Clearwater Police Force who were on Scientology's payroll. Scientology snuck into Clearwater, Florida in 1978 under the assumed name of United Churches. Since then they have come to dominate the small town. I lived in Clearwater for two years, working with a group which was helping people defrauded and abused by Scientology. During this time, police officers started to accept ...

(05-01) 04:00 PDT Seattle — They're calling it the "Camp David of the cult wars." Leaders from both factions in the decades-long dispute over danger posed by new religious movements came together over the weekend at a woodsy retreat center on the shores of Puget Sound. There were a few screaming matches, and a bit of the old backbiting and rumormongering, but it was a largely peaceful gathering of defectors, devotees, heartbroken families and assorted cult experts. "We've reached the point ...

If the judge denies the church's request, the focus shifts to a five-week criminal trial scheduled in October. Seventeen months after it was criminally charged in the death of Lisa McPherson, the Church of Scientology will have its first big day in court on Wednesday and a chance, it hopes, for vindication. "The entire basis for the state's prosecution of this case has now collapsed," begins one of the many Scientology legal briefs arguing the case should be dismissed. The prosecution ...

A former member of O.J. Simpson's "dream team" defense says Lisa McPherson's death was accidental. CLEARWATER — As prosecutors consider whether to proceed with criminal charges in the death of Scientologist Lisa McPherson, the Church of Scientology on Monday presented two nationally known pathologists who said they have scientific evidence that the 1995 death was accidental. Drs. Michael M. Baden and Cyril H. Wecht also suggested their work is so conclusive the case should be dropped. Their primary conclusion: McPherson, 36, ...

A few days after the LMT opened, Bob Minton and Grady Ward held a small picket on Watterson Street. Jesse Prince went along to observe. Ten minutes after the picket, we decided to go back outside and discovered that Mike Rinder, the head of the Office of Special Affairs, had called the police.

Robert Minton intends to buy property in downtown Clearwater. Meanwhile, a restraining order against him is extended to Nov. 29. The Church of Scientology came to court Monday hoping its No. 1 enemy, Robert S. Minton, would never again be allowed near church properties in Clearwater. Instead, church officials learned that Minton, a 53-year-old New England millionaire, plans to be much too close for their comfort. Clearwater lawyer Denis de Vlaming told Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Judge Thomas E. Penick Jr. that Minton ...

The promise of a free dinner in an estate-like atmosphere, plus live entertainment, were enough to entice Barbara Moke to spend her Saturday evening behind the gates of Church of Scientology's newest film studio. Moke, a volunteer at the Hemet Police Department, said her office received an invitation to the opening of The Castle, the sprawling film studio operated by Golden Era Productions in Gilman Hot Springs. "This is the perfect place for a party," she said, while partaking of the ...

A school district committee says the program, based on teachings by Scientology's founder, is not in line with district and federal guidelines A Pinellas school district committee has refused to allow students to hear an anti-drug program based on the teachings of Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard. The program is a product of Narconon International, a drug rehabilitation and education organization based in Los Angeles. Despite the reliance on Hubbard's principles, Narconon officials say it is a secular group that is ...

Scientology leaders say they want peace. They say they want to stay out of court. But with both foes at home and foes abroad, that goal may be elusive. The spiritual home of the Church of Scientology is in Clearwater, but for many years now its leaders have had worldwide ambitions. But as disciples have carried L. Ron Hubbard's teachings away from America's shore, the reception has been almost universally chilly at best – and at times openly hostile. At one ...