TORONTO—The church of Scientology of Toronto was commanded Friday to move ahead with its case in Ontario Supreme Court proceedings unprecedented in Canadian history. The sect's reason for being in court—a civil motion questioning the legality of a police search warrant—has been usurped by arguments about religion and parishioner/priest confidentiality. Originally, the sect requested the hearing before Justice John Osler asking that he quash the March 4, 1983, Ontario Provincial Police warrant because, the sect said, the document was based on ...

TORONTO—An Ontario Supreme Court judge is expected to rule today in a hearing brought by the Church of Scientology centering on questions of religious equality and criminal wrongdoing. Judge John Osler said Thursday he will study lawyers' arguments and legal precedent in deciding whether to move forward in the hearing to quash an Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) search warrant resulting in the seizure of 25,000 sect documents. At issue is whether the massive 158-page search warrant and its supporting documents ...

TORONTO—A lawyer representing the Church Scientology likened the 34-year-old sect to the Roman Catholic Church during hearing Wednesday in Ontario Supreme Court. Arguing that the Ontario Provincial Police had no right to seize Scientology files during a raid on the sect's Toronto mission last year, Clayton Ruby told the court that Scientology should be given the same respect and protection afforded established religions. "Should a new church be (treated differently) because its doctrines are not as well-known?" Ruby asked Justice John ...

The Church of Scientology of Toronto will petition the Supreme Court of Ontario Monday asking that a search warrant executed last year be quashed, although the Ontario Provincial Police have already used it to raid the sect's headquarters and seize 14 million documents. Investigators armed with the warrant raided the sect's Toronto headquarters in March 1983 and seized 904 boxes of papers and documents believed to substantiate suspected sect fraud, conspiracy, breaking and entering and theft, according to the warrant and ...

Clearwater police Monday released a transcript of a tape-recorded statement made last month by Daniel Cotrino, a New York Scientologist who be had been held against his will at the sect's 210 S. Fort Harrison Ave. headquarters. The transcript indicates the 30-year-old Cotrino, a Scientologist for 11 years, was frightened and angry at the time he made the statement. It is also clear that Cotrino did make the statements he later accused police of fabricating. The transcript of the tape was ...

CLEARWATER — Calling a police account a lie, Scientologist Daniel Cotrino said at no time did any church members try to physically detain him at the sect's headquarters last week. Cotrino, 30, of Brooklyn, N.Y., told a completely different story from the account police released last week and accused three officers of lying in their report. "We have his statements on tape," said detective Ken Fairchild. "The report was written from those statements." ASKED why he believed police would lie about ...

CLEARWATER — In Pinellas County — with its 7 percent unemployment rate the signs on the four Church of Scientology buildings draw attention. Two say simply, "Now Hiring." Others promise a job with "low pay — great future." One along busy U.S. 19 touts jobs for "kitchen personnel." Two others boast: "We are recruiting." What the signs don't say is that the Church of Scientology isn't looking for employees. It is trying to recruit members. The signs also don't say that ...

The D.C. Police Department is conducting an internal investigation to determine how members of the Church of Scientology, a controversial religious group that has been investigated by law enforcement agencies, were able to set up a course for recruits at the D.C. Police Training Academy, police officials said. The course, taught by church members, was set up without the approval of Chief Maurice T. Turner Jr. and is contrary to the department's procedures regarding outsiders teaching police academy courses, according to ...

Officials of the Church of Scientology have a system to destroy evidence and stall any police search at their headquarters in Toronto, says a statement by Attorney-General Roy McMurtry and Solicitor-General George Taylor. The actions of the 100 Ontario Provincial Police officers who raided the church's headquarters on Yonge Street on March 3 with sledge hammers and fire extinguishers were defended in the statement, which accuses church officials and lawyers of spreading misinformation about the raid. The allegations about a ...

TORONTO — More than 100 police officers swept through the offices of a Church of Scientology building Thursday seizing documents as possible evidence in an investigation of fraud against the federal and Ontario governments. Inspector Phil Caney said the two-year investigation centers on a non-profit tax exemption obtained by Scientology "by alleged misrepresentations." Ontario Provincial Police also are investigating consumer fraud in the marketing of courses and alleged conspiracy to commit indictable offenses "where perceived necessary to protect the interests of ...

CLEARWATER —The city of Clearwater has assigned police protection to Michael J. Flynn, the man who is leading the city's charge against the Church of Scientology. The church ridiculed the move as a "publicity stunt." Plainclothes Clearwater police officers are guarding Flynn, a Boston lawyer who is the city's $80,000 consultant for public hearings on church activities that begin Wednesday and are scheduled to continue through May 15. City Manager Tony Shoemaker said he ordered around-the-clock protection as a precaution, and ...

Toronto ON — Four Ontario Cabinet ministers and a former minister have been accused in a lawsuit of a conspiracy "to bring about the demise" of the Church of Scientology of Toronto. The controversial cult claims that the ministers and others, including the Ontario Provincial Police and the Metro Toronto police, have violated its constitutional rights to freedom of religion, speech and assembly. Among actions cited as harassment is the provincial inquiry, headed by Daniel Hill, into the practices of cults, ...

About 100 agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation learned on July 6, 1977, that they would be participating two days later in an operation unprecedented in the United States. The notification, described two years later in a Washington court room, said the agents would be raiding offices of an organization that some governments, in the United States, Canada and elsewhere, officially classified as a religion — the Church of Scientology.

Confidential documents from various Ontario Government offices including an attorney-general's communication about police intelligence operations have been found in U.S. Church of Scientology files. The documents were part of the evidence submitted by federal attorneys in the Washington prosecution of U.S. leaders of the cult on charges of conspiring to steal government documents and obstruct justice by cover-ups and by kidnapping an informer. Of 12 indicted, including two in Britain and the informer, nine have been tried, convicted and sentenced by ...

CLEARWATER — Police are investigating the apparent drowning of a woman who reportedly fell from a sea-wall into Clearwater Bay Friday morning. The name of the woman, believed to be a visitor from out of town, is being withheld by police. The victim was described as a white and in her early 50s, 6-feet 3-inches tall and weighing about 160 pounds. She was clad in a blouse, sweater and skirt when she was found floating 10 feet from the wall behind ...

EDMONTON (CP) — The Church of Scientology lodged a formal complaint Friday with the provincial attorney-general against the RCMP, which it accused of spreading false and misleading information about the church to files of Alberta government agencies. In a letter delivered to the office of Attorney-General Neil Crawford, the church asked for an investigation to stop the RCMP from interfering with the process of government. The letter, signed by Rev. Raymond Rockl, national director of public affairs, said the church "has ...

Riverside Mission is Searched for Evidence of False Loan Scheme Sheriff's deputies seized 17 boxes of documents from the Riverside mission of the Church of Scientology Wednesday in a search for evidence that possibly as many as 100 past and current members fraudulently obtained bank loans and then gave the money to Scientology. More than two dozen Riverside County sheriff's deputies spent six hours searching through the offices of the mission for tax, payroll and other records on 20 named individuals ...

Police confiscated a cache of weapons in a temporary Church of Scientology headquarters in Dunedin after the Scientologists abandoned the base, the Clearwater Sun has learned. All but four of the weapons, found "about 60 days ago" in the King Arthur Courts condominiums off State Road 580 just west of U.S. 19, are being held by Dunedin police. State and federal authorities are investigating. The one weapon sent elsewhere was a short-barreled Mauser, which was turned over to the U.S. Treasury ...

The American Friends' Service Committee, the first, and until recently, the only registered church lobby, has charged that the United States is "in close danger of developing the very police state we as a people fear so much." The warning by the Quaker agency on Capitol Hill was made after it revealed that government agencies have been keeping it under surveillance since 1921. The Quaker committee thus far has collected nearly 1,300 pages on itself from government intelligence agencies under the ...

THE ATTLEBOROS — Several weeks ago a pair of canvassers stood in the area of the Attleboro Common and asked passersby what they thought they could do to help fight crime. They got, says Gerard Velona, exactly the kind of response they expected: "I don't know." Velona, a theology student from Brookline, heads a church of Scientology campaign designed to help reduce crime throughout the state. So far, Velona and his crew have visited about 40 communities. The results have been ...

The Church of Scientology is suing three Metropolitan Police officers over a report on the movement. They say the report has been circulated all over the world by Interpol. Mr David Gaiman, press officer of the sect, who is named in the report, said yesterday that it accused scientologists of numerous offences, including causing grievous bodily harm and drug trafficking. In September the movement issued a High Court writ against Sir Robert Mark, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, alleging libel in the ...