Fair Game: Timeline of Scientology's Harassment of Robert S. Minton and Colleagues

1996

January 27, 1996: Mr. Minton wrote a letter to New Hampshire Senators Robert Smith and Judd Gregg. It was a heartfelt plea to his senators to do something about the abuse of the legal system that Scientology was perpetrating on its critics. The homes of two critics had just been raided after Scientology had obtained writs of seizure under false pretenses. Mr. Minton had learned of the abuse on the Internet.

1997

September 16, 1997: Mr. Minton received a telephone call from Elliott Abelson, one of Scientology's attorneys, inquiring about his health after the Clearwater protest he had attended in March. Mr. Minton had visited the emergency room at Massachusetts General Hospital after his return to Boston. Clearly, Mr. Abelson wanted Mr. Minton to know that he knew about the visit, thereby letting Mr. Minton know, for the first time, that he was under surveillance by Scientology. Mr. Abelson made subtle threats at retaliation if Mr. Minton did not stop helping Scientology's critics.

October 10, 1997: Mr. Minton received a call from a relative in Nashville, Tennessee, informing him that a woman named Mary Frances Newey was in town doing a "background check" on him. The contact number Mary Frances left was the telephone number for the Scientology organization in Boston.

October 14, 1997: Mr. Minton received a call himself from Mary Frances Newey. She threatened that Scientology was prepared to attack him in a number of areas if he didn't stop lending his support to critics of Scientology. She told him he would be attacked in the following areas: family, children, ex-wife, ex-business partners, state and federal taxes.

October 15, 1997: Mr. Minton's 10- and 12-year-old daughters were followed on October 15th and 17th as they walked from their house to a neighbor's house for carpool.

October 1997: Mr. Minton contacted two former Scientologists, Vaughn and Stacy Young, after Vaughn Young posted a message on the Internet detailing harassment they had been subjected to by Scientology. In the post he described how their cat sanctuary was about to be shut down as a result of this harassment. Through anonymous telephone calls, Scientology operatives had nearly succeeded in having the Youngs evicted from their house and their rescued cats confiscated and killed. Mr. Minton's eleventh-hour intervention allowed the animals to be saved. Scientology had mounted its harassment campaign against the Youngs in an attempt to stop a 60 Minutes expose about Scientology in which Stacy was interviewed, and to keep Vaughn from testifying in Germany about Scientology's long-term pattern of illegal conduct. Mr. Minton's intervention made it possible for the 60 Minutes interview to air on December 27, 1997, and for the German testimony to go forward.

November 18, 1997: Mr. Minton received a threatening letter from Scientology attorney Elliot Abelson, in which Mr. Abelson accused Mr. Minton of "fostering a climate of hatred in Clearwater which endangers our staff and parishioners who work and live there." He also accused Mr. Minton of financing individuals who were committing "hate crimes," and of "going out of your way to foment their irrational hatred." Mr. Abelson went on to state that "Association with lawbreakers such as these, combined with the monetary demands that inevitably accompany their involvement in litigation or similar fertile areas for attempts of extortion, make your actions of interest to the prosecutors to whom such conduct has been referred." He further advised Mr. Minton: "My client holds you, your associates and backers, financial or otherwise, personally responsible for any and all damages it has suffered or will continue to suffer as a result of your tortuous officious intermeddling in Church litigation. The Church will not tolerate such conduct." He ended the letter by demanding that Mr. Minton "immediately withdraw all financial support for such matters" and warned him that "you and those you are financing have crossed the threshold of legality." In the letter, Abelson accused Mr. Minton of funding the Lisa McPherson wrongful death case. Although he had not done so until then, Mr. Minton thought this was a good idea and soon thereafter contacted Ken Dandar, attorney for Lisa McPherson's estate, to offer financial assistance.

November 18, 1997: Mr. Minton's elderly mother in Nashville, Tennessee, received a telephone call from a man who identified himself as "Dan Wallace" of "East Coast Newspapers" in Boston. (Subsequent investigation revealed that no such organization existed.) The man said he was doing a story on her son Bob Minton, focusing on how he had accumulated so much wealth in his international banking business. The man asked her if she knew someone named "Mr. Stokes." This was the name of an attorney with the Boston law firm of Bingham, Dana and Gould who had established a company for Mr. Minton in the 1980s. Bingham, Dana and Gould had also represented the Boston Globe when it published a series of articles about Michael Flynn, an attorney who, in the late 1970s and early '80s, had successfully litigated against Scientology on behalf of a number of former high-level Scientologists who all claimed to have been defrauded and abused. Scientologists had broken into the Boston Globe offices to try to stop the publication of these articles, and this had been reported as part of the series. Because Stokes was the president of the German-American Chamber of Commerce in Boston, Scientology was convinced, albeit erroneously, that he was in some way involved with Mr. Minton's current activities with regard to Scientology. The Scientology leadership was sure that the German government was in charge of the "global conspiracy" to destroy Scientology, and equally sure that Mr. Minton was under orders from Germany to go after Scientology. The man claiming to be "Dan Wallace" asked Mr. Minton's mother if she knew of Mr. Minton's "link to Germany," alluding to Stokes' German connection. Mr. Minton's mother told the man that he needed to be asking her son about all of these things. She asked for his telephone number, but he gave her a false number that did not even have a Boston area code.

December 5, 1997: Mr. Minton was in Clearwater participating in the annual peaceful protest in memory of Lisa McPherson, a Scientologist who died an unnecessary and gruesome death after being incarcerated in Scientology's Fort Harrison Hotel in Clearwater for nearly three weeks. While he was in Clearwater, Scientologists picketed Mr. Minton's Beacon Hill home in Boston for the first time, during his daughter's birthday party. Fliers handed out by the Scientologists had a photograph of Mr. Minton and stated: "The face of religious bigotry: Your neighbor, Robert Minton is not all that he seems. This week he is leading a KKK-style rally against peaceful members of a religion. When he's not stirring up hatred in the streets, Minton is poisoning the Internet by filling it full of religious bigotry and intolerance." (NY TIMES 12-21-97.) This was the first of many fliers the Scientologists would distribute in an effort to characterize Mr. Minton as a religious bigot and hate monger to his friends and neighbors. The campaign to discredit him had begun.

December 9, 1997: The Boston Globe printed an article entitled "Gifts of cash fuel battle of principle," by Diego Ribadeneira. The article stated, "Church officials acknowledged that they have conducted their own investigation into Minton's funding practices. Kurt Weiland, then head of Scientology's Los Angeles-based Office of Special Affairs International (OSA Int), was quoted saying, "This is an extremely shady character because he covertly engages in a campaign to harm our religion. It's immoral and quite frankly perverse." Frank Ofman, a member of Scientology's Boston branch of OSA, was quoted in the article explaining that Scientologists distributed the leaflets to "highlight Minton's bias."

December 9, 1997: The Naples, Florida, Daily News published an article by Leslie Miller entitled "Retired banker, Scientologists take aim at each other." The article stated, "Church members say the millionaire is using 'KKK-style' tactics to discredit the church," and "Members of the Church of Scientology have paid for private investigators to dig into Minton's private life and threatened to sue him in six states. They call it chasing a rat out of his hole." Kendrick Moxon, a long-term Guardian's Office and OSA operative named as an un-indicted co-conspirator in the 1980 criminal case against Scientology, was sent to law school in the mid-1980s at Scientology's expense. Now an attorney charged with carrying out much of the legal harassment against Scientology critics, Moxon was quoted saying, "Who is behind this guy? The man is going to be sued because he has committed torts all over the country and I want to know why is he trying to destroy religion and create chaos." OSA head Kurt Weiland falsely accused Minton of "covertly funding, and in this way, manipulating litigation."

December 15, 1997: Mr. Minton's wife Therese found a dead cat on the doorstep of the Mintons' New Hampshire farmhouse. This was clearly placed there by OSA, a reference to Mr. Minton's assistance to the Youngs' cat sanctuary in Seattle.

December 15, 1997: From this date, Mr. Minton's home in Boston was picketed two or three times per week until the end of February 1998. On the days when he was not picketed, Mr. Minton's Boston neighborhood was leafleted with fliers characterizing him as a religious bigot and hate monger.

December 19, 1997: Mr. Minton appeared on a show about Scientology on "Greater Boston with Emily Rooney" on WGBH. He talked about his experience in a mental institution at age sixteen. Later the Scientologists took the video of the show to his mother and used it as a way to spend three hours interviewing her about Mr. Minton. They also took the video to his father.

December 21, 1997: The New York Times published an article titled "Boston man wages costly fight with Scientology," written by Douglas Frantz. Scientology spokesman Mike Rinder was quoted saying, "Sometimes it requires aggressive litigation and investigation to uncover the depths of the nefarious plots that have been attempted to destroy Scientology. The people that we know of whom Minton has funded have expressed their intentions to destroy the Church of Scientology, not merely to criticize. If he wants to fund it, fine. He will have to live with the bigotry he foments and be accountable for the harm he enables to occur [sic]." The article stated, "In a letter to Minton last month, a church lawyer demanded that he stop financing opponents of Scientology and warned that his actions had 'crossed the threshold of legality.'" Mr. Minton's former business associate, Robert Smith, spoke favorably about Mr. Minton, saying: "He's a man of principle and a very tenacious person." Later Mr. Smith would be forced to sever all communications with Mr. Minton to avoid becoming a target of Scientology's relentless harassment himself. Over the next two years, Scientology would systematically target all of Mr. Minton's former friends. The purpose was to isolate him so that there would be no one to whom he could turn for help.

December 23, 1997: The St. Petersburg Times published an article entitled "Scientology-sponsored suit against opponent," written by Lucy Morgan and Thomas Tobin. The article stated, "Scientology has blasted Robert S. Minton Jr. for donating more than $1.25 million to its critics, calling his actions 'nefarious' and underhanded. The church contends he is illegally interfering with lawsuits involving Scientology." It went on to say that attorneys and top officials for Scientology say '… Minton's motives are 'sordid'…" Describing the people Mr. Minton had helped, Scientology spokesman Mike Rinder said, "These people are a pack of criminals." Mr. Rinder also accused Mr. Minton of trying to extort $80 billion from Scientology by his involvement with the Lisa McPherson lawsuit.

December 1997: A private investigator working for Scientology tracked down Mr. Minton's former secretary, Dorothy Cronin, and asked her if she knew of any affairs Mr. Minton had had that might have produced a "love child."

December 1997: Scientology private investigators contacted Mr. Minton's first wife Fran and his son, Rob, from that marriage. Mr. Minton and his son had been estranged for several years, and the Scientology operatives exacerbated this estrangement by characterizing his father's financial assistance of Scientology critics as a slap in the face to his son. This was extremely upsetting to Mr. Minton and served to further estrange father and son.

December 1997: Mr. Minton joined the Board of Directors of FACTNet, a corporation founded by former Scientologists Lawrence Wollersheim and Robert Penney. The main activity of the Colorado-based organization was providing information about Scientology on the Internet via its website, http://www.factnet.org

When Mr. Minton joined the board, Scientology had already targeted FACTNet for destruction. Falsely claiming that FACTNet was a threat to Scientology's income, attorneys for Scientology had convinced a Denver judge to grant a writ of seizure. Armed with the writ, Scientology operatives had raided the FACTNet offices and seized all of the computers. Scientology had then filed suit against FACTNet for copyright violations, allegations that would later prove to be unfounded after a costly legal battle that ultimately resulted in settlement. Because it was clear that Scientology had targeted FACTNet for destruction through costly legal harassment, Mr. Minton agreed to help fund FACTNet's defense. When Scientology learned that Mr. Minton had joined the board, Mr. Minton received a series of telephone calls in which he was threatened about "what would happen" to him if he joined this "hate group." Mr. Minton refused to resign, however, and the campaign against him intensified.

1998

January 3, 1998: An OSA operative called Mr. Minton's father for the purpose of further alienating him from his son. He played a recording of a segment of Mr. Minton's appearance on the television program "Public Eye," in which Mr. Minton had discussed the abuse to which he and his mother had been subjected when he was growing up.

January 6, 1998: Mr. Minton's Beacon Hill neighborhood was leafleted with a flier that featured a large photo of Mr. Minton and the title, "Hatred Hidden Behind Free Speech." The following is the text of the flier: "The face of religious bigotry: Your neighbor, Robert Minton of 39 West Cedar Street, is not all that he seems. He is leading a KKK-style attack against peaceful members of a religion. When he is not stirring up hatred in the streets, Minton is poisoning the Internet by filling it full of religious bigotry and intolerance. Minton's hatred puts families at risk." At the bottom of the flier was a copyright notice by the Church of Scientology of Boston. This was one of many fliers designed to characterize Mr. Minton's outspoken criticism of Scientology's fraud and abuse of its adherents as "religious bigotry and intolerance."

January 7, 1998: Long-time Scientology private investigator Eugene Ingram began contacting Mr. Minton's former business associates in New York and Boston, saying he was investigating Mr. Minton for "conspiracy to commit extortion." Calls to these people continued for months and resulted in many of Mr. Minton's associates severing their ties with him.

January 8, 1998: Scientology private investigator David Lee, who had previously been in Seattle heading up an intense harassment campaign against the Youngs, visited and interviewed Mr. Minton's mother, father, two brothers, an aunt and his uncle in Nashville, Tennessee, over the course of a week.

January 8, 1998: Boston area Scientologists distributed a new leaflet in Mr. Minton's Beacon Hill neighborhood with a photo of Mr. Minton attached. The title of the flier was "Neighbor Pays to Create Hatred Against Religious Group." The flier accused Mr. Minton of paying "over $1.25 million to individuals who are engaged in a campaign to create hatred against members of the Church of Scientology," and went on to explain that "the Church … sponsors many successful tutoring, drug rehabilitation and criminal reform projects and is active in the community to better the lives of all citizens …" The flier ended with a plea to Mr. Minton's neighbors to "join us in condemning the bigots for hire scheme of Mr. Minton." At the bottom of the flier was the following statement: "This is written as a public service of STAND (Scientologists Taking Action for Non-Discrimination)."

January 23, 1998: Scientology private investigators and OSA operatives launched a campaign to harass and intimidate Mr. Minton's friends and former business associates not only in the United States but also in England, Turkey, Brazil, Nigeria, Switzerland, South Africa and Hong Kong. This campaign would continue over the next three years and would result in further isolating Mr. Minton from his friends and associates.

January 26, 1998: Scientologists handed out fliers in Mr. Minton's neighborhood in Boston and around his country home in Sandown, New Hampshire, claiming, among other things, that Mr. Minton "has a history of psychiatric problems." The fliers were again signed by STAND (Scientologists Taking Action for Non-Discrimination). The flier distributed to Mr. Minton's neighbors in New Hampshire stated: "Robert Minton, of 137 Fremont Road, Sandown, NH has given $1.25 million to complete strangers to destroy a religion while his mother lives on social security. He even put a lien on her house and charged her 10% interest as the price of the loan. Why is he so mean and cheap to his own family while showering riches on religious bigots to fund their hate campaigns?" It went on to say: "Like many hate mongers, he has a history of psychiatric problems. But a troubled past is no excuse for leading KKK-style rallies and spreading poison on the internet about a peaceful religion known for its helpful literacy and drug rehabilitation programs. What's your game, Robert Minton?" At the bottom of the flier, again, was the following: "This is written as a public service of STAND (Scientologists Taking Action for Non-Discrimination)."

January 27, 1998: Mr. Minton met with the United Nations Human Rights and Religious Freedom Chief about Scientology's abuse of its adherents and intimidation of critics. He spoke to the U.N. official about Scientology's strategy to throw a smokescreen over its illegal activities in France and Germany by accusing the governments of those countries of religious discrimination. Scientology found out about the meeting and launched a campaign to discredit Mr. Minton with the United Nations. However, Mr. Minton's meeting was successful in educating the U.N. official about Scientology's criminal activities. In the U.N.'s June 1998 report on Religious Freedom, Scientology's attempts to portray their troubles in Germany as religious persecution were described as hysteria.

January - April 1998: For a period of four months, Scientology private investigators repeatedly visited Mr. Minton's former banking associates in England, showing a detailed "psychiatric evaluation" of Mr. Minton that concluded he was likely to burst into a Scientology organization and "kill twenty-five Scientologists."

February 9, 1998: A Scientology operative dressed as a minister distributed fliers on Beacon Hill attacking Mr. Minton as a religious bigot. Others held up a banner calling Mr. Minton a religious bigot.

February 25, 1998: Mr. Minton was featured in The Daily Free Press, an independent newspaper at Boston University. The article was entitled "Activist speaks against Church of Scientology."

February 1998: A new flier was handed out in Mr. Minton's neighborhood in Boston. It featured a photograph of Mr. Minton and several others peacefully protesting Scientology in Clearwater, Florida. Under the photo was the caption: "Mr. Minton associating with an accused child molester." The text of the flier was clearly intended to upset Mr. Minton's family and turn his neighbors against him. Under the heading "Facts about Robert Minton" were the following libelous statements: " Mr. Minton vacations in luxury while charging his mother (who lives on social security) interest on a loan when he has millions of dollars at his disposal; Mr. Minton exploited the people of third world countries, manipulating their debt to make millions for himself and the rulers in power; Mr. Minton refuses to help his own son with a loan to purchase a house, yet forked over $1.5 million to fund the members of a known hate group in a campaign to create intolerance and hatred; Mr. Minton acts like a bully to anyone he can manipulate with his money. His second wife left him rather than put up with his brutal beatings; Mr. Minton buys people with his money and is financially supporting a ring which includes wife beaters, child molesters and a pornography editor." By now Scientology was publishing outrageous lies about Mr. Minton, apparently in an attempt to goad him into filing suit against them. However, several experienced attorneys advised Mr. Minton not to sue as Scientology would use the litigation to further harass him and exhaust his financial resources, ultimately forcing him to cease his outspoken criticism of them.

February 1998: While Mr. Minton was vacationing with his family on the French Caribbean island of St. Bart's, Scientology operatives flew to the island and passed out fliers in the town and on the beach where Mr. Minton and his family were relaxing. The flier contained a number of scurrilous charges, including a claim that Mr. Minton associated with "accused child molesters."

February 1998: Scientology operatives followed Mr. Minton throughout Clearwater, Florida, while he was with a film crew shooting a documentary about his activism against Scientology for SAT-1 German TV.

February 1998: Mr. Minton drove to Connecticut to assist Stacy Brooks, who was helping Leslie White, a young woman who had been driven to the brink of a nervous breakdown by her experience in Scientology. A Scientology operative tried to change the woman's mind about leaving Scientology, telling her that both Stacy Brooks and Robert Minton had been sent from another planet to destroy Scientology. As ludicrous as this statement was, it soon became clear that Scientologists were being seriously indoctrinated to believe it. Word came back from several sources that Scientologists now believed that they were "off-planet people" sent to Earth to eradicate Scientology.

March 14, 1998: While Mr. Minton was in Los Angeles for a peaceful protest of Scientology headquarters, Boston Scientologists distributed libelous fliers about him throughout Beacon Hill. It was the largest number of fliers they had ever handed out about him.

March 16, 1998: Scientology private investigator David Lee visited Mr. Minton's father-in-law in England to "ask some questions" about his son-in-law.

March 16, 1998: A Scientology private investigator spoke by telephone to a friend of Mr. Minton's family in England, explaining that Mr. Minton was being investigated because of his "psychological profile."

April 19, 1998: Mr. Minton delivered a speech to the Cult Information Service (CIS) Conference in Newark, New Jersey, in which he detailed the harassment he had been subjected to by Scientology in their efforts to silence him and frighten him away. The title of the speech was "Battling Scientology's attack on free speech."

April 19, 1998: 12 million Germans watched the SAT-1 documentary about Mr. Minton's commitment to stopping Scientology's criminal activities.

May 3, 1998: Scientology private investigator David Lee, operating in Toronto under the pseudonym Ron Christopher, contacted a number of Mr. Minton's former business associates. He claimed to be working for a non-existent company called "Financial Researchers," conducting a fraud investigation of Mr. Minton. He offered to pay one of Mr. Minton's former employees USD $35,000 if he would sign a false statement that Mr. Minton had committed criminal fraud. This was the third such offer; the first two were made by another Scientology private investigator, Peter Franks, in England. Franks was apparently working with Lee on Lee's assignment to destroy Mr. Minton.

May 1998: A family asked Stacy Brooks to fly to New Orleans to talk to their daughter about her experiences in Scientology. After hearing about Stacy's experiences, the young woman decided to leave Scientology. She informed her superior in New York that she did not intend to return. That night, New Orleans police surrounded the family's house, responding to an anonymous report that a young woman had been kidnapped. The young woman explained to the police that she had made her own decision to leave Scientology, but that Scientology did not want her to leave. The young woman was very happy to return to her family and her old life. Stacy then flew to Washington, D.C., for an interview about Scientology with a Swedish television director. When she arrived in D.C., long-time OSA operative Sylvia Stannard was at the gate to meet her. She accused Stacy of kidnapping and "forcibly deprogramming" the young woman in New Orleans. Stannard told Stacy, "I'm not going to let you kidnap anyone in my town." Stacy asked Stannard how she knew what flight she was arriving on, but Stannard refused to answer.

Mr. Minton arrived in D.C. the next day, and for the next several days Mr. Minton and Stacy were followed wherever they went in Washington. One night while they were having dinner in a restaurant with another friend, OSA operative Matt Braschi suddenly appeared at their table with a camera, taking photos of the three of them and being extremely offensive. One afternoon while Stacy was having lunch with the Swedish television crew, several OSA operatives surrounded their table and became so loud and threatening that Stacy had to have the hotel security personnel escort the Scientologists out of the building.

May 1998 - December 1999: Beginning with Ms. Brooks' arrival in D.C. in May 1998, Scientology began meeting both Mr. Minton and Ms. Brooks at the airport wherever they traveled. Sometimes the Scientologists would appear with picket signs, such as in the Columbus, Ohio, airport and the Denver, Colorado, airport, meeting Mr. Minton and Ms. Brooks at their gates and following them through the airport with picket signs. This continued until the end of 1999, when Mr. Minton and Ms. Brooks began to call the airport security to alert them of their arrival, so that security personnel could keep the Scientologists away from them. Although the harassment has stopped, Scientology still keeps them under surveillance and knows when and where they are traveling at all times.

May - July 1998: Mr. Minton had a series of three meetings, totaling 15 hours, with two of the top leaders of Scientology. He hoped to enter into a dialogue about ending Scientology's criminal conduct, including fraud, practicing medicine without a license, child abuse, and human rights violations. He met with Mike Rinder, the head of OSA International, and Marty Rathbun, head of the Religious Technology Center (RTC) and second in command of Scientology under its dictator, David Miscavige. Unfortunately, the Scientologists had no interest in discussing their criminal conduct. Their interest was solely to convince Mr. Minton to stop providing funds to Scientology critics. They told Mr. Minton point blank that if he would quit giving financial support to critics, Scientology would stop harassing and intimidating Mr. Minton and his friends and family. At the end of the third meeting, Mr. Minton made it clear that he would not stop his financial support until Scientology ceased destroying people's lives through fraud and criminal abuse. In response, the Scientologists intensified their campaign against him.

June 16, 1998: Dateline NBC aired a 35-minute segment on Mr. Minton and his work to expose Scientology's abuse and deception called "The Crusader." Scientology tried to stop the show by presenting Dateline executives with information intended to discredit Mr. Minton, but they were unsuccessful.

July 9, 1998: The Boston Globe published a large article titled "The Improbable Crusade of Robert Minton," which included information about the harassment he was being subjected to.

July 18, 1998: Former Scientologist Jesse Prince contacted Mr. Minton via email at his FACTNet address after hearing about the Dateline show. Stacy Brooks, also a board member of FACTNet, saw the email and contacted Mr. Prince immediately. She and Mr. Prince had known each other in Scientology for many years but had not had any contact since they had left nearly a decade earlier. Mr. Prince met her in Columbus, Ohio, and they discussed the work she and Mr. Minton were doing to bring an end to Scientology's criminal activities. Mr. Prince had been a high-level executive in Scientology and had extensive information about Scientology's criminal conduct. He offered to assist them in their work.

July 19, 1998: The next day, Mike Rinder called Mr. Minton in New Hampshire and asked him if Jesse Prince was on Mr. Minton's payroll. Coming as it did immediately after Mr. Prince's initial meeting with Ms. Brooks, Mr. Rinder's telephone call was clearly intended to let Mr. Minton know Scientology had them under surveillance.

July 24, 1998: Jesse Prince received a letter from Scientology attorney Elliot Abelson threatening legal action against him if he provided any "information respecting alleged events that came to your attention in your capacity as an employee of a Church of Scientology" to "attorneys who are in litigation against the Church of Scientology entities."

July 25, 1998: Several Scientologists trespassed on Mr. Minton's property in New Hampshire as he and Ms. Brooks were swimming in the pool. The Scientologists loudly hurled profanities down the hill at Ms. Brooks and were extremely threatening. Mr. Minton ordered them off his property. They got in their car and left, but then almost immediately drove back onto his property, got out and began to approach him again. Mr. Minton fired two shots over their heads with his shotgun to let them know he was serious about ordering them off his property. This did cause the Scientologists to leave immediately. Scientology would later falsely claim that Mr. Minton aimed the gun at them and attempted to shoot them, citing this as "proof" of Mr. Minton's "violent nature." However, although the Scientologists attempted to have Mr. Minton arrested for this incident, the police determined that he had done nothing wrong in firing the shotgun as a warning to the trespassers.

July 26, 1998: While Mr. Minton's wife Therese was vacationing in England with the Mintons' two daughters, a letter from Mike Rinder was hand-delivered to her. The letter attempted to elicit her help in convincing Mr. Minton to stop his work to end Scientology's criminal activities. Rinder wrote, "I am certain you are unaware of the real activities and nature of the people Mr. Minton is involved with, and I do not believe you would want your family engaged in these matters if you knew the character of these people or their agenda with respect to the 'Minton money.' He went on to say, "While Mr. Minton claims that [Scientology] has sought to upset his family, in truth it is his activities that are the source of the turmoil that now surrounds his life and yours. It comes about as a result of his relationship with a group of morally bankrupt individuals who are taking money from him while they are engaged in unethical and even criminal activities." Attempting to get Therese to persuade Mr. Minton to meet with the Scientologists, Rinder concluded by saying, "Courts have found several of this group of low-lifes [sic] guilty of violating [Scientology's] rights and yet Mr. Minton gives them money to continue. A couple of them are wife abusers and child molesters. None are fit to be in the presence of you or your children, yet Mr. Minton is playing Santa Claus to them with your money. Mr. Minton's irresponsible, if not outright malicious acts, are damaging my church [sic] and individual Scientologists are well as you and your children. I believe a face-to-face meeting between us would be helpful. This is a serious matter. What is occurring is causing a great deal of damage. If you were aware of all the facts, I am sure you would not support what is happening. You can contact me at 213-960-3500 or 213-960-3508 (fax). I look forward to hearing from you." This letter was upsetting to Mrs. Minton and had the effect of alienating her from Mr. Minton.

July 28, 1998: An article appeared in the local New Hampshire newspaper, the Union Leader Correspondent, entitled "Sandown Police: Shots Fired in Spat with Protesters." This article focused on the July 25 trespassing incident at Mr. Minton's house. Scientology operatives Gerard Renna and Kevin Hall were both quoted. Renna said he was "tired of Minton going on Dateline and spreading lies," that he was "fed up" with it. Hall lied about the trespassing incident, claiming that Scientology protesters "knocked on Minton's door to tell him they were protesting, Minton told them to leave; they did, and he then allegedly fired the shots into the air."

July 30, 1998: Scientology began distributing fliers about Mr. Minton three to four times a week during public meetings at the town hall in Sandown, New Hampshire. This continued for several weeks.

July 30, 1998: Fliers were distributed at a local supermarket in Sandown.

July 1998: Scientology continued to monitor the travel of the Minton family and photograph Mr. Minton's wife and children in England during their summer vacation.

July 30, 1998: Mike Rinder sent Therese Minton a second letter discussing the shotgun incident and asking to have a face-to-face meeting.

July 31, 1998: Mr. Minton was interviewed for an article in the Rockingham, New Hampshire News entitled "Local man helps many leave Scientology; Church says he distorts the Truth" by Lara Bricker. Referring to Boston Scientology spokesman Kevin Hall, the article said "he wants to know why the Sandown summer resident is on a crusade to reform the church and why he is 'spreading lies'" and "trying to destroy the church."

July 1998: Mr. Minton was on a radio show on Boston's WRKO. Before the show Scientologists entered the station's offices to protest their exclusion from the broadcast. The producer later said the Scientologists' behavior was extremely inappropriate, aggressively demanding to be put on the air.

August 1998: The Scientologists informed Mr. Minton that they knew his wife and children had flown from England to Spain in early August 1998. This was clearly done to let him know that they were being followed.

August 1998: Five Scientologists picketed the home of Jesse Prince's father in Memphis, Tennessee. They held picket signs that said, "Tell your son to leave my church alone." Mr. Prince's father also received a number of telephone calls from Scientology private investigators telling him his son was a criminal.

August 3, 1998: The St. Petersburg Times, which is the paper that is distributed in Clearwater, ran an article entitled "Millionaire's bizarre feud with Scientology escalates" which reported on the trespassing incident in New Hampshire. It was later learned that OSA had fed the newspaper a false version of what had happened; this seemed to account for the biased headline.

August 8, 1998: The St. Petersburg Times ran a more in-depth article about the trespassing case entitled "Millionaire not charged in Scientology case." The article said "Police in Sandown, N.H., have concluded that millionaire Robert S. Minton was not firing at four Scientologists at who picketed his house July 25, and will not file charges against him." Mr. Minton would later learn that Scientologists had pressured the Massachusetts state attorney's office to prosecute Mr. Minton for the incident, but they were not successful. The article quoted the Sandown police chief confirmed that no charges would be filed. "We've gone through everything and from where the Scientologist were when the shots were fired, Minton was firing in the opposite direction, " Police Chief Scott Currier said Friday. "He was not shooting at them." The article went on to say "Police also confirmed that Minton was using bird shot that would not have penetrated the vehicle the Scientologists were in, Currier said. Minton said he fired warning shots after the Scientologists trespassed at his 200-acre estate and yelled obscenities at a guest in his pool." It concluded: "Minton says he has spent more then $2-million to help finance opposition to Scientology, providing shelter and money for some former members. He also is helping finance lawsuits, including one filed on behalf of Lisa McPherson, a Scientologist who died in Clearwater under mysterious circumstances."

August 14, 1998: The Rockingham, New Hampshire News published a letter to the editor from Boston Scientology OSA operative Frank Ofman in which he accused Mr. Minton of being mentally unstable. Ofman twisted the facts not only of the trespassing incident but also of Mr. Minton's personal history to paint a picture of Mr. Minton as irrational and dangerous, in an obvious effort to discredit him. He wrote: "Robert Minton of Sandown apparently shot at peaceful Church of Scientology parishioners without rational reasons - he claims he has been emotionally damaged by his brutal involuntarily incarceration into a psychiatric institution at the age of 16. What led to Minton's involuntary commitment is not commonly known, but the residual hostility within him is very evident… Minton stated on several occasions the irreparable damage psychiatry has had on his youth and his overall depression in life. Perhaps this is a similar story to that of the recent Capitol Hill gunman, Russell Eugene Weston Jr., who also had a long history of emotional problems before his frenzied shooting. Who can tell what really set Minton off to fire a shotgun at peaceful Church parishioners who were merely asserting their freedom of speech? Did he just take on the colors of the psychiatric enemies he was trying to fight? It was fortunate that the skilled police officers of Sandown arrived early enough on the scene to handcuff Mr. Minton and protect him against himself and others…." It was later learned that the newspaper published the letter only after intense pressure from Scientology, including threats to sue over its previous news report on Mr. Minton.

August 24, 1998: Scientologists picketed the Turan Corporation in Boston. Robert Smith, the head of Turan, was Mr. Minton's former business associate and had been quoted in the New York Times in December 1997 saying, "He's a man of principle and a very tenacious person."

Now he became a target himself for his support of Mr. Minton. Scientologists passed out fliers headlined "Turan Corp. Connection to the Religious Bigotry of Robert S. Minton," in which they sought to smear Smith by linking him to Mr. Minton. The flier stated: "Robert Minton, a man with links to Turan Corporation's Robert Smith, has blatantly lied to the American public and media about our church, its members, its goals and actions. We refuse to allow our religion to be smeared and maligned any longer. Minton has held himself out on national television and to the press to be an upstanding citizen, but he is using his many millions of dollars to force his bigoted views onto our church and its parishioners to 'reform it'… He promotes an agenda of bigotry."

In one of the first indications that Scientology was investigating Mr. Minton's work in Nigeria, the flier stated: "Minton and Smith did business in Nigeria. Minton made a lot of his money, he says, by helping the country's dictatorial leadership to successfully default on multi-million dollar loans. Everyone with the inside knowledge benefited but as events and statistics show, the people suffered. While millions were siphoned off in 'commissions,' and lenders had to write off huge losses, the leaders of the country completely ignored the human suffering and misery of its citizens. Is this how a man of principal acts?" The flier was signed: "By the Free Speech & Religious Freedom Committee of the Parishioners of the Church of Scientology of Boston."

August 26, 1998: Therese Minton received her third letter from Rinder, saying he wanted to speak with her about Mr. Minton. Still hoping to convince her to meet with him, he wrote, "I imagine that by this time you have probably become aware that some of the things I said in my earlier letters have now proven true. As a matter of fact, I can show you a great deal of information supporting the statements in those letters. I believe there is much more information that you do not have concerning the activities of Mr. Minton and the people he has gotten hooked up with. Clearly, Mr. Minton's involvement with Stacy Young and others has not had a positive effect on your family. While I am sure you have been told various lies about me and the Church of Scientology, you have no downside in hearing what information I have to offer. I would like the opportunity to speak with you face to face. You can call (213 960 3500) or fax me (213 960 3508)."

August 30, 1998: Scientology picketed and passed out fliers in front of Mr. Minton's home on Beacon Hill in Boston. Scientologists carried picket signs clearly intended for Therese and the children to see. Mr. Minton and Therese had separated, and he had been seeing Stacy Brooks. Some of the signs described Ms. Brooks as a vamp destroying the Minton family by breaking up their marriage, and another sign implored Mr. Minton not to destroy the lives of his children. The fliers were passed out to friends, neighbors, and parents of the Minton children's classmates.

August 31, 1998: Scientologists again picketed Mr. Minton's home in Boston, and passed out fliers referring to Mr. Minton and Ms. Brooks as adulterers. The Scientologists also picketed Mr. Minton's home in New Hampshire, where his daughters were staying with him. They held up signs that were obviously intended to upset Mr. Minton's daughters.

September 2, 1998: Eight Scientologists greeted Mr. Minton and Jesse Prince at their gate as they arrived at the Boston airport. The Scientologists created such a disturbance at baggage claim that four state troopers were required to restore order. After both sides were questioned the troopers told the Scientologists that had they known that they were demonstrating in the airport they would have been arrested, since FAA regulations prohibit such unlawful assembly at the airport.

September 1998: Mr. Minton and Stacy were stalked through Chinatown in San Francisco by OSA operatives who videotaped them as they walked. They called the police, but when the officer heard that Scientology was involved he called his superior, who came to the scene and apologized, saying there was nothing he could do because the San Francisco Police Department could not afford a lawsuit from Scientology.

September 5, 1998: A large group of Scientologists picketed Therese Minton and the Mintons' two daughters in front of their house in Boston.

September 6, 1998: Two Scientologists, Maureen O'Keefe and Joe Stover, picketed Mr. Minton's house in New Hampshire. The Sandown police arrived and ordered the Scientologists to leave, telling them they were creating a hazard on the road.

September 7, 1998: Scientologists picketed Mr. Minton's home in New Hampshire again, but it was done in a car, with the picket signs held out of the car windows.

September 8, 1998: Scientologists again picketed the Minton house in Boston. Several friends of the Mintons' daughters were given fliers about Mr. Minton.

September 10, 1998: Scientologists came up to Mr. Minton's house in New Hampshire again to hold picket signs out of the car windows as they drove back and forth past the house.

September 10, 1998: Mr. Minton drove Jesse Prince down to Boston from New Hampshire to take him to the airport. They stopped at the Boston Scientology center to picket, and two Boston Scientologists, Frank Ofman and Kevin Hall, began assaulting Mr. Minton both verbally and physically. Frank Ofman in particular was screaming at Mr. Minton and pushing him repeatedly. Finally Ofman grabbed Mr. Minton's picket sign and broke the stick. Mr. Minton tossed the broken end of the stick at Ofman in disgust and then called the police. But when the police came the Scientologists showed them a video in which Ofman's assault of Mr. Minton was missing and the only thing on the tape was Mr. Minton tossing the broken piece at Ofman. Under pressure from the Scientologists, the police then handcuffed Mr. Minton and arrested him for battery. Scientology immediately posted the arrest photos on the Internet and announced that Mr. Minton was a criminal. However, on December 16, the judge dismissed the charges, directing Mr. Minton to fax a notice to the Boston Scientology center before he picketed for the next three months. Although the charges were dismissed, Scientology continued to portray Mr. Minton as a criminal who had been "arrested for assault."

September 10, 1998: One aspect of Kevin Hall's verbal assault of Mr. Minton in front of the Boston Scientology center was particularly disturbing. At the time, Mr. Minton had had several sessions with a Cambridge psychologist named Terry Real. Dr. Real was counseling both Mr. Minton and his wife Therese, who were separating. Kevin Hall repeated statements that Mr. Minton had made to his therapist and to no one else. The only conclusion that Mr. Minton could draw was that Scientology had put pressure on Dr. Real to reveal confidential information from his sessions. Within days of that incident, Dr. Real called Therese Minton and abruptly informed her that he would no longer see either her or Mr. Minton. He refused to give a reason and hung up quickly. Kevin Hall also verbally assaulted Jesse Prince with information from his auditing sessions in Scientology. Scientology claims that this information is kept confidential; however, when someone leaves Scientology their auditing files are culled for embarrassing and upsetting information so that it can be used to harass the person. Mr. Prince's auditing files were last known to be in Gilman Hot Springs, California.

September 12, 1998: Several Scientologist met Mr. Prince with picket signs at his gate at the Minneapolis airport. As he walked through the airport the Scientologists shouted obscenities at him.

September 12, 1998: Atlanta Scientology OSA operative Diane Stein called Stacy Brooks' mother in Atlanta. She told her that her daughter was part of a "hate group" and that she was involved in illegal activities.

September 15, 1998: A group of Scientologists went to the office of Dr. Abernathy, a psychiatrist Mr. Minton had been seeing at Massachusetts General Hospital. They confronted Dr. Abernathy and demanded to speak to him about Mr. Minton.

September 23, 1998: Four Scientology operatives picketed Mr. Minton and Ms. Brooks in the Columbus, Ohio, airport as they went to their gate. Mr. Minton called airport security and informed them of the FAA regulation against unlawful assembly in an airport, and the picketers were escorted out.

September 23, 1998: When Stacy Brooks arrived at her home in Seattle she was greeted by three Scientologists picketing her home. One of the signs read: "Bob Minton was arrested for assault on September 10 in Boston."

September 28, 1998: Peter Franks, a British private investigator hired by Scientology, spread the word to many of Therese Minton's friends in England and to Mr. Minton's former business partner, Jeff Schmidt, that Therese, the Mintons' two daughters, and Mr. Schmidt were going to be followed in order to bring pressure on Mr. Minton to stop his activities concerning Scientology.

Mr. Schmidt's office had been picketed and leafleted at this point for several weeks, as had his home, while his wife and children were there. Franks threatened to go after Mr. Schmidt's clients, one of which was the Nigerian government. Franks said they would arrange picketing of the Nigerian delegation to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) meeting in Washington, D. C., which was set for October 4-8 the next month. Franks promised that Mr. Schmidt would be caught in a web of an IRS tax investigation of Mr. Minton and in his own problems with the Inland Revenue Service, England's equivalent of the IRS. Franks said that unless Mr. Schmidt did something to help Scientology go after Mr. Minton, he would have serious trouble on his hands, since the seven-year statute of limitations had not yet run out on the activities he and Mr. Minton were engaged in together (their partnership ended in 1993.)

Franks also said that all of Therese's neighbors would be visited in Boston, and the "whole ugly scene" would be laid out for all to hear. The children's schools would be targeted for the same campaign, which would include teachers, administrators and parents, to paint Mr. Minton as a pariah. He let it be known that he expected Therese and Jeff to pressure Mr. Minton into quitting the work he was doing concerning Scientology.

September 28, 1998: Two New Hampshire newspapers contacted Mr. Minton to ask him about a flier that had been distributed to every resident in Sandown over the previous few days. The title of the flier was "The Truth About Robert Minton, Leader of an Anti-Religious Hate Group." The flier characterized Mr. Minton as irrational, unstable and violent, deliberately twisting the facts of the trespassing incident and of the incident that led to Mr. Minton's arrest in Boston, charges that were later dismissed after Mr. Minton's attorney made it clear to the judge that Scientology had set him up for a false arrest.

Clearly intended to isolate Mr. Minton from his neighbors in Sandown by frightening them, the flier stated: "When his hatemongering against our parishioners was give prominence in the Boston media, our church was repeatedly vandalized. We said then that he was a trigger's width from an outburst of psychotic violence. His violence struck recently." The flier then gave an outrageously false and exaggerated account of the incident that had led to Mr. Minton's false arrest in Boston: "Reeking of alcohol, Minton turned up outside a Church of Scientology on 10/9/98 carrying picket signs and started abusing staff and parishioners. When two Scientologists tried to stop him, he thrust his sign into the face of one, knocking off his glasses. He finally smashed a stick over the head of the second, who was taken to the hospital." The flier ended by saying "Mr. Minton has paid to create an atmosphere of intolerance against our religion. His religious bigotry, hatred and violence must stop." It was signed by "Free Speech and Religious Freedom Committee of the Parishioners of the Church of Scientology."

September 29, 1998: Scientology private investigator Peter Franks told Jeff Schmidt that Scientology would take care of all divorce matters between Therese and Mr. Minton.

September 1998: Two of Stacy Brooks' sisters were picketed at their homes, one in Atlanta and one in Duluth, Minnesota. Fliers about her were handed out in both neighborhoods. One flier stated: "Please tell Stacy to tell Mr. Minton that he should stop spending his money to hurt the Church of Scientology." The picketers couldn't get a single person to take one of their fliers other then the copy Stacy's sister took to send to Stacy.

September 1998: A flier was pushed through the mail slot at Stacy Brooks' mother's house in Atlanta. The title was "Robert S. Minton & Stacy Brooks Young -- The truth behind the lies." The flier said, in part: "Robert Minton and Stacy Young have blatantly lied to the American public and media about our Church, its members, its goals and actions. We refuse to allow our religion to be smeared and maligned any longer…. Minton made a lot of his money, he says, by helping Nigeria and other third world country's dictatorial leadership to successfully default on multimillion-dollar loans. Everyone with the inside knowledge benefited but, as events and statistics show, while millions are siphoned off in "commissions" and lenders had to write off huge losses, the leaders of Nigeria completely ignored the human suffering and misery of its citizens. Is this how men of principle act?" This flier was signed "Free Speech & Religious Freedom Committee of the Parishioners of the Church of Scientology of Georgia."

September 1998: Virtually the same flier was distributed in San Francisco, signed "Free Speech & Religious Freedom Committee of the Parishioners of the Church of Scientology of San Francisco."

October 2, 1998: Maureen O'Keefe, then head of OSA in Boston, wrote Therese Minton a letter in an attempt to befriend her and gain her trust so that she would turn against Mr. Minton. In the letter O'Keefe denied that the Minton children had been followed or harassed in any way and described a meeting between Mr. Minton and her that was a complete fabrication, saying, "On August 13, 1998, your husband tried to force his way into the Church of Scientology in Boston. I stopped him. He told me, with more hate than I hope your children ever experience, that he intended to destroy Scientology. At that moment, I decided that I would no longer sit back and listen to his vicious lies about my religion and my friends and I were going to do everything I legally could to stop him from interfering with my Constitutional Right to practice the religion of my choice. I made this very clear to him that day. It is a promise I intend to keep."

October 5, 1998: Peter Franks, Scientology's British private investigator, had a letter hand-delivered to Mr. Minton's former business partner Jeff Schmidt while Mr. Scmidt was attending the International Monetary Fund (IMF) meeting in Washington, D.C. The letter was obviously sent in an attempt to convince Mr. Schmidt to turn against Mr. Minton and work with Franks. Mr. Schmidt did not reply.

October 3, 1998: Jesse Prince and Stacy Brooks were on their way to New Hampshire to help Mr. Minton celebrate his birthday. They were standing in line at their gate at the Seattle, Washington, airport, when two DEA agents pulled them out of the line and began to search their carry-on bags. Another agent with a German shepherd that appeared to be a drug dog stood nearby. One of the agents opened Ms. Brooks' computer case and discovered a draft of an affidavit she had brought with her to review on the airplane. When he saw it, the agent suddenly looked at her and asked, "Are you an attorney?" Ms. Brooks replied that she was a consultant to several attorneys on the subject of Scientology, and that the kind of harassment that she and Mr. Prince were being subjected to by the two DEA agents at that moment was part of a pattern of harassment to which she had been subjected for the past five years. When she said this, the two agents suddenly closed the bags they had been searching, stood up, apologized for having bothered them, and quickly left the terminal.

October 9, 1998: Peter Franks sent a flier to a New Hampshire company in which Mr. Minton and Jeff Schmidt had substantial investments. The title of the flier was "What is Jeffrey Schmidt's connection to the religious bigotry of Robert S. Minton?" It then went on to repeat many of the same lies of previous fliers, except this one was tailor-made to target Mr. Schmidt. It stated, "Robert Minton, a wealthy American with past business ties to Jeffrey Schmidt of Hillsleigh International Ltd., has blatantly lied to the public and media about our Church, the Church of Scientology, its members, its goals and actions…. Minton and Jeffrey Schmidt made a lot of money through Mr. Schmidt's contacts, by helping the dictatorial leadership of Nigeria and other third world countries to successfully default on multimillion pound loans. Those who had the inside knowledge benefited in the debt trading business but, as events and statistics show, while millions of pounds were siphoned off in "commissions" and lenders had to write off huge losses, the leaders of Nigeria ignored the human suffering and misery of its citizens. Is this how men of principle act?" It was signed "Free Speech & Religious Freedom Committee of the Parishioners of the Church of Scientology." The owners were so upset by the flier that they called Jeff Schmidt to tell him he must find a way to buy out Mr. Minton's interest in the company.

October 9, 1998: British private investigator Peter Franks had a fourteen-page package of scurrilous material delivered to the Nigerian Minister of Finance while the minister was attending the IMF conference in Washington D.C. A copy of the package was also delivered to Jeff Schmidt at the conference. The theme of the material was that Mr. Minton, Jeff and their other partner, Selwyn Lewis, had profited from the economic woes of Nigeria. The intent of the material was clearly to discourage the Nigerian government from doing business with Mr. Schmidt. It was also clear that Franks was sending Mr. Schmidt a message about what would happen to him if he continued to support Mr. Minton.

October 12, 1998: Jesse Prince and Stacy Brooks were met by two OSA operatives, Gerard Renna and Maureen O' Keefe, as they arrived at their gate at the Boston airport. The Scientologists said they wanted to engage in some "real communication" to try to "resolve our differences." However, the presence of the two operatives made it clear that Mr. Prince and Ms. Brooks were under surveillance.

October 1998: Fliers were distributed about Mr. Minton calling him the leader of an anti-religious hate group. Titled "The Truth about Robert S. Minton, Leader of an Anti-Religious Hate Group," the flier portrayed Mr. Minton as a man of violence with a history of psychiatric instability. The shotgun incident was now described as "violence" against "Scientologists engaged in a peaceful demonstration." The incident in Boston was described in grossly exaggerated terms to characterize Mr. Minton as dangerous.

The flier ended by saying, "Mr. Minton of Sandown, New Hampshire has paid to create an atmosphere of intolerance against our religion. His religious bigotry, hatred and violence must stop." It was signed by the "Free Speech & Religious Freedom Committee of the Parishioners of the Church of Scientology."

November 3, 1998: Stacy Brooks arrived at her home on Vashon Island after a trip to find six Scientologists waiting for her with picket signs. They blocked her from going down her driveway, screaming obscenities at her and lunging at her car in a threatening way. She remained quiet and did not react, and after several minutes they backed away so that she could get home.

November 8, 1998: As Ms. Brooks drove out of her driveway on Vashon Island to run an errand, she encountered several Scientology picketers waiting for her on the side of the road. One of the picketers ran over to Stacy's van and thrust a flier at the window. The title was "Creating Hatred and Bigotry - Would you give your money to someone who is…" and it then went on to list several unsavory types of people, including "an accused child molester… a former pornography editor … a member of an anti-Semitic group run by the most influential neo-Nazi in the world … a group which has been involved in kidnapping for hire and which went bankrupt following a multimillion dollar verdict for civil rights violations under the anti-KKK laws."

The intent of the fliers was to characterize Scientology critics as criminals and perverts, and to identify Mr. Minton as the kind of person who would support that kind of individual. The flier accused him of launching a "$2 million-plus anti-religious hate campaign against members of the Church of Scientology." It then repeated the "evidence" of Mr. Minton's violent nature, distorting both incidents beyond recognition: "In July 1998, Minton fired a shotgun at several Scientologists who had been protesting on public property against his actions," and "In September, Minton violently struck a Scientologist with a stick outside the Church of Scientology in Boston and was arrested. He is currently facing felony charges for assault and battery with a dangerous weapon over this incident." These statements were flagrant lies. The flier was signed "Free Speech & Religious Freedom Committee of the Church of Scientology of Washington State."

November 14, 1998: Multiple felony charges were filed against the Flag Service Organization of the Church of Scientology in Clearwater. This case was State of Florida v. FSO regarding Lisa McPherson's death at the hands of Scientology. The Scientology leadership considered Mr. Minton responsible for much of the attention that had been brought to Lisa McPherson's death.

November 16, 1998: Boston Scientology operative Gerard Renna met Mr. Minton and Jesse at their gate at the Boston airport as they prepared to leave for England to meet with Jeff Schmidt, Mr. Minton's former partner. Again, the message was: "We know where you are all the time."

November 27, 1998: Mr. Minton received an email newsletter from the "Friends of Religious Liberty." Again the trespassing incident was recounted, but now the story was unrecognizable from the original, with the Scientologists playing the role of innocent victims: "In July 1998, Mr. Minton fired a shotgun at three Scientologists who were on the road in front of his house (in a peaceful demonstration protesting his hate campaign)." The incident in front of the Boston Scientology center was also repeated, and that story was also unrecognizable from the truth. Now Mr. Minton was depicted as a raging monster, with the poor Scientologists the innocent victims of his violence: "The following day, reeking of alcohol, Minton and Prince turned up outside the Church of Scientology in Boston carrying picket signs and started harassing staff and parishioners. When two Scientologists tried to stop him, Minton thrust his sign into the face of one, knocking his glasses off. He finally smashed a stick over the head of the second, who was taken to the hospital. Minton was arrested and arraigned on a charge of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon in Boston and is currently facing trial." There were new lies too; Stacy Brooks was reported to have received "scream therapy" at the "Wellspring deprogramming/brainwashing center in Ohio."

December 3, 1998: Stacy Brooks and Jesse Prince were guests on WFLA talk radio, the public radio station in Clearwater, Florida, during Lisa McPherson Memorial Week. They talked about their own experiences while in Scientology at the highest levels of management, including being incarcerated in Scientology's political prison camp, known as the Rehabilitation Project Force (RPF).

December 14, 1998: Mr. Minton's attorney Stephen Jonas made it clear to Boston Municipal Judge Hershfang that it was Scientology that had been at fault rather than Mr. Minton in the September 10 incident with Frank Ofman involving the broken picket sign. The judge dismissed the charges against Mr. Minton. Under pressure from the Scientologists, however, the court made a provision that Mr. Minton must notify Scientology an hour before picketing in front of the Scientology center in Boston. By 4:45pm that same afternoon, Scientology officials were already in touch with Boston police, falsely alleging that Mr. Minton had picketed the Scientology center unannounced.

December 14, 1998: Mr. Minton appeared on Arts and Entertainment Channel (A&E) Investigative Reports, on a program entitled "Inside Scientology." Mike Rinder from OSA was the spokesman for Scientology.

December 16, 1998: Frank Ofman sent a letter to the Massachusetts district attorney's office with an ex-parte copy to Judge Hershfang. The letter complained that Mr. Minton had already violated the dismissal agreement by dropping off his "agents" to picket the Scientology center in Boston. Since the judge received a copy of this letter, he summoned the district attorney and Mr. Minton's attorney Stephen Jonas to his office, where he learned that Mr. Minton had not violated the dismissal agreement at all. Afterwards the district attorney berated the Scientologists for their "provocative acts." After the hearing, Scientologists picketed Therese Minton at her home on Beacon Hill with signs announcing Mr. Minton's relationship with Stacy Brooks. The picket was timed to coincide with the Minton girls' arrival home from school.

December 17, 1998: The same two Scientology operatives, Frank Ofman and Kevin Hall, videotaped Mr. Minton as he picketed the Scientology center in Boston, both trying to provoke Mr. Minton into saying that he hit Frank Ofman first during the September 10 incident. Both Ofman and Hall said the same thing repeatedly to Mr. Minton. Hall would say, "Come on Bob, why won't you just admit that you hit Frank first?" Mr. Minton would laugh and say, "I can't admit to something that never happened." Then Hall would say, "Come on, Bob, you should apologize to Frank for hitting him and then lying about it." Their attempt to put an "admission" on videotape was unsuccessful, however.

December 20, 1998: Scientologists led by Maureen O'Keefe had a truckload of food delivered to the Sandown Food Pantry. This was done after the Scientologists found out that their fliers about Mr. Minton had turned many of the people in town against Scientology.

December 21, 1998: In a move designed purely for harassment, Kevin Hall and three other Scientologists, including Mary Frances Newey with a video camera, drove up to Mr. Minton's house in New Hampshire and waited until he and Ms. Brooks came out the front door. Then they drove by, yelling, "Merry Christmas, Bob and Stacy!" with Mary Frances videotaping them in the driveway.

December 21, 1998: KFI radio in LA did a live show with Mr. Minton and Ms. Brooks about Scientology.

December 22, 1998: While walking back to the house after some shopping, Therese Minton noticed that there were fliers on cars and doorsteps all over Beacon Hill. Upon arriving at her house with the girls, She found a handful of fliers on her doorstep that were clearly aimed at Therese and the children, their friends, neighbors and acquaintances in Boston. The flier had a photograph of Mr. Minton and Ms. Brooks and was titled "We Call It Adultery." It ended: "Minton has spent over $2 million of his family's wealth creating hatred and bigotry towards members of our religion. Minton's behavior is socially obnoxious and morally impaired." The flier was signed: "Friends of Religious Freedom."

December 23, 1998: Mr. Minton was a guest on the Los Angeles public radio station KFI on "The John and Ken Show." Scientologist John Carmichael was the other guest.

December 24, 1998: At 9:30 p.m. on Christmas Eve, several Boston Scientologists, including Kevin Hall, drove by Mr. Minton's house in New Hampshire shouting "Merry Christmas!" at the top of their lungs. The Scientologists folded some of their fliers into paper airplanes and threw them at Mr. Minton's door.

December 26, 1998: All the residents of Sandown, New Hampshire received an "Open Letter to Sandown Residents" from Maureen O'Keefe of the Boston Scientology center. With a large American flag at the top of the page, the letter purported to be from the "Committee on Constitutional Rights." The letter was full of lies and innuendo about Mr. Minton and was clearly calculated to turn the town of Sandown against him. The letter is a good example of how Scientology accuses a critic of spreading lies and hatred simply because the critic is exposing Scientology's illegal activities and its violations of civil and human rights. Anything critical of Scientology is denounced as lies and hate-mongering. As explained in the introduction, a critic must be identified as a criminal. If he or she does not already have a criminal record, then a criminal record must be created or invented. O'Keefe slipped a veiled threat into the closing of her letter when she said, "Our message to him is quite simple: 'You leave us alone. We'll leave you alone.'" This overt reference to one of Scientology's infamous "Fair Game" policies was clearly intended to warn Mr. Minton to back off. Attached to O'Keefe's open letter was a "fact sheet" consisting of a by-now familiar litany of lies about several critics of Scientology. Also included in the "fact sheet" were repetitions of the same two incidents involving Mr. Minton. Rather than trespassing, the Scientologists had now been on "public property": "In July 1998, Minton fired a shotgun at several Scientologists who had been protesting on public property against his actions," and "In September 1998, Minton violently struck a Scientologist with a stick outside of the Church of Scientology in Boston and was arrested for assault and battery with a dangerous weapon." There was no mention that the charges were dismissed, and no mention that the violence was committed by a Scientologist who broke Mr. Minton's picket sign, not by Mr. Minton. In a typical example of Scientology's deliberate role reversal, O'Keefe ended her letter by saying, "We support religious freedom and tolerance and call for an end to the lies and hate."

December 27, 1998: Mr. Minton was a guest on KFUO Radio, part of the nationwide Christian Radio Jubilee Network in Detroit. Don Matzat, host of Issues, Etc, interviewed him. The title of the program was "Scientology - Religious Mafia?"

December 28, 1998: While Mr. Prince was visiting Ms. Brooks at her home on Vashon Island, Scientologists distributed a flier about Mr. Prince in Ms. Brooks' neighborhood. The flier featured a photograph of Mr. Prince and was titled, "The Face of Religious Bigotry." It accused Mr. Prince of buying drugs and being paid "thousands of dollars" to attack Scientology. Mr. Prince had recently visited Mr. Minton in New Hampshire. After a day of clearing underbrush in Mr. Minton's 200 acres of woods, Mr. Minton and Mr. Prince were on their way back to the house carrying axes when a group of Scientologists drove by Mr. Minton's house with picket signs. This incident had now been transformed in the flier into another example of Mr. Minton's violence. The flier was signed, "From the Free Speech & Religious Freedom Committee Church of Scientology, Seattle."

1999

January 1999: A long-term Scientology spy was uncovered after having been sent in on FACTNet, Mr. Minton, Jesse Prince, and Stacy Brooks.

January - February 1999: As directors of FACTNet, Mr. Minton and Ms. Brooks were involved in settlement negotiations with high-level Scientologists Marty Rathbun and Mike Rinder for a period of two months. The main purpose of the settlement discussions from the Scientology perspective was to persuade Mr. Minton to sign an agreement to stop funding litigation and cut off money to people fighting Scientology. Once again, the Scientologists said that if Mr. Minton would quit giving financial and litigation support to others, they would leave Mr. Minton and his friends and family alone. In negotiations on this matter, Mr. Minton said he intended to continue to support the McPherson case. The Scientologists said they would not cease their harassment of him unless ALL support was cut, especially the McPherson case. No agreement was reached between Mr. Minton and the Scientologists, although a settlement was concluded in the FACTNet case. True to their word, the Scientologists continued the campaign to destroy Mr. Minton.

February 12, 1999: Mr. Minton delivered a speech entitled "A Warning on the Evils of Scientology" at the Leo J. Ryan Educational Foundation conference in Stamford, Connecticut.

March 1999: Scientology turned its full attention on Jeff Schmidt, Mr. Minton's former business partner, harassing him relentlessly to get him to put pressure on Mr. Minton to stop exposing Scientology's criminal conduct.

March 12, 1999: Several Scientologists picketed the home of Jesse Prince's father in Memphis, Tennessee. Mr. Prince Sr. called the police, who ordered the picketers to leave.

April 1999: A Danish television station asked Jesse Prince to fly to Copenhagen to be interviewed for a documentary about Scientology. Aaron Mason, a member of Scientology's Office of Special Affairs in Los Angeles, sent the station manager a large pack of materials designed to portray Mr. Prince as an immoral and dangerous criminal. Mr. Prince was in Copenhagen for approximately two weeks, and he was followed by Scientology operatives throughout his stay.

July 1999: While Mr. Minton was conducting peaceful protests against Scientology in Clearwater, Scientology operatives let him know by remarks made to him that they knew his wife and children were in Spain. Three times during his family's visit to Spain, a Scientology operative photographed them.

July 1999: Scientology operatives broke into Jeff Schmidt's London office and photocopied extensive files. Mr. Schmidt was later told by a Scientology private investigator that if he could not convince Mr. Minton to end his opposition to Scientology, all of the files would be turned over to the Inland Revenue and the Nigerian media. Mr. Schmidt called Mr. Minton and begged him to stop criticizing Scientology. Mr. Minton tried to convince Mr. Schmidt to go to the authorities and report Scientology's conduct as blackmail, but Mr. Schmidt was frightened of what the Scientologists would do to him and his family, and he refused.

August 1999: A Scientology private investigator from Denver, Colorado, visited the mother of Jesse Prince's daughter and attempted to induce her to sign a derogatory statement about Mr. Prince. The man told her that Mr. Prince had sexually abused her many years before, and that she should press charges against him for it. Only when the woman threatened to call the police did the man agree to leave.

August 18, 1999: An email was sent to Mr. Minton under the pseudonym "Alberto Rafallo." The sender accused Mr. Minton of illegally controlling the litigation that attorneys Dan Leipold and Ken Dandar were conducting, based on the funding that Mr. Minton had provided for lawsuits whose clients these attorneys represented. This was the first indication that Scientology would begin to attack Mr. Minton directly for the funding he was providing to various litigation efforts. (In fact, Mr. Minton has never attempted to exert any control whatsoever over any of the litigation for which he has provided funds. Yet Scientology has characterized his funding of the suits as an effort on his part to capitalize on religious bigotry and hate mongering. None of Scientology's attorneys has ever made it clear how Mr. Minton could possibly be making money from his efforts to end Scientology's criminal conduct. To date, he has spent several million dollars with no expectation of ever getting any of his money back.) "Alberto Raffallo" apparently hoped to frighten Mr. Minton into responding by threatening to post his information to the Internet. Mr. Minton never responded to him, and the information was never posted.

August 26-27, 1999: Mr. Minton and Stacy Brooks had dinner at the Palm Restaurant in Philadelphia with Ken Dandar, the attorney for the Lisa McPherson estate in the wrongful death case brought against Scientology's Clearwater arm. Several Scientologists surrounded the table during dinner in an attempt to harass them, and the next morning six Scientologists picketed outside the hotel where they were staying.

September 1999: The same Scientology private investigator that had followed Jesse Prince in Denver followed him from Boulder, Colorado, to Minneapolis, Minnesota. The man checked into the same hotel where Mr. Prince was staying. Later, surveillance photographs of Mr. Prince and a friend were posted on the Internet. A number of Mr. Prince's former business contacts reported that they had been visited by a Scientology private investigator attempting to discredit Mr. Prince.

September 17, 1999: Therese Minton received an anonymous letter informing her that Mr. Minton had been in Philadelphia with Stacy Brooks. Also included in the envelope was a copy of a post made by former Scientologist Charlotte Kates on ARS. The subject was "An Evening at the Palm," dated 08/27/99. The post was included as evidence that Mr. Minton was in Philadelphia.

October 1999: An old friend of Jesse Prince called him to let him know that a Scientology private investigator had contacted him and offered him $10,000 to act as a go-between so that a settlement between Scientology and Mr. Prince could be reached.

October 15-27, 1999: Ms. Brooks tried to lease office space in downtown Clearwater in preparation for opening the Lisa McPherson Trust, Inc. but was refused by every office building. On October 21, MKV Realty, the company that owns the Sun Trust Building at 601 Cleveland Avenue, became the first to refuse. The owner would not to return telephone calls, and the manager would not say why the lease had been refused. Mr. Minton was prepared to pay the full amount of the first year's lease in advance, but this did not resolve the problem. Because no legitimate reason was forthcoming, Ms. Brooks suspected that Scientology was trying to stop her from leasing any space, but she had no proof. One of the realtors finally admitted to her that he had received information about the principles of the Lisa McPherson Trust, including information that Mr. Minton had been convicted of assault and battery with a deadly weapon stemming from an incident in September 1998 in which he caused serious bodily harm to a Scientologist in Boston. This was patently false and information was sent to the realtor to correct this. However, he still refused to lease to the Lisa Trust. He then admitted that Scientology had contacted him and threatened to put pressure on all of the other tenants to move out if he leased space to the Lisa McPherson Trust.

October 19-20, 1999: Mr. Minton received telephone calls from several people who lived in his Boston neighborhood. They said they had received a letter from Scientology that read as follows: "If you have any dealings with Mr. Minton of 137 Fremont Rd., Sandown, New Hampshire, please be aware of his activities on the internet. This sort of behavior by Mr. Minton has occurred repeatedly and he has acted out some of his expressions in the form of violence at various times. He appears to be incapable of controlling himself; thus you are being alerted."

October 25, 1999: Mr. Minton received telephone calls from five different people in Sandown, New Hampshire, from different parts of town, telling him they had received the same letter that was sent out in Boston the preceding week.

October 26, 1999: The two schools that Mr. Minton's daughters attended in Boston received the same letter that Scientology had mailed out in Boston and Sandown.

October 26, 1999: Mr. Minton received a four-page newsletter from Scientology in his mailbox. It was called "Clear Body Clear Mind" and appeared to be a promotional mailing for a Scientology procedure called the Purification Rundown. This was mailed from the Dianetics Center of Massachusetts.

October 30, 1999: A Halloween flier was put on Mr. Minton's and other mailboxes on Fremont Road in Sandown, New Hampshire. The flier featured a photograph of Mr. Minton and a headline that read: "Trick or Treaters Beware!"

October 31, 1999: Mr. Minton arrived at the Tampa International Airport and was met by two Scientologists, who shouted at him, "Bob, what are you doing in our town? Get out of our town!" He and Ms. Brooks were then followed from the airport to Clearwater, and to their hotel. Richard Howd was one of the Scientologists who followed Mr. Minton and Ms. Brooks from the airport to their hotel. Mr. Minton stopped the car near the entrance to the hotel and got out to confront the Scientologists. While Mr. Minton spoke to the woman who was driving the car, Mr. Howd held a video camera inches from Mr. Minton's face. He continued to do this throughout the conversation, until Mr. Minton got back into his car. That evening Mr. Minton picketed in front of the Fort Harrison Hotel, and again Richard Howd was there, keeping a video camera inches from his face as he walked back and forth picketing. Ms. Brooks was also there, videotaping so that there would be a record of what happened, as the presence of Mr. Howd was a disturbing signal that the harassment against Mr. Minton was escalating. Finally, as Mr. Minton rounded the corner of the building, two Scientologists blocked Ms. Brooks so that she could not follow with her camera. Richard Howd pushed Mr. Minton while he was sure he was not being videotaped. At this point Mr. Minton decided to call the police. He began to cross the street and pulled out his cell phone to call, but Richard Howd followed Mr. Minton across the street, holding the video camera close to Mr. Minton's ear. Mr. Minton turned around and told Howd to get away from him, thrusting his sign at him defensively. The sign grazed Howd's eyebrow. Immediately Howd fell to the ground, moaning as if he were in extreme pain. The police arrived and the Scientologists showed them the videotape of Mr. Minton thrusting his sign at Howd as he crossed the street. Because there was no videotape of Howd's earlier assault on Mr. Minton, the Scientologists were able to convince the police to arrest Mr. Minton. He was handcuffed and taken to the Pinellas County Jail, arrested for battery. Scientology immediately began to send Mr. Minton's mug shot to his friends and neighbors in an effort to identify him as a criminal. (Mr. Minton went to trial in March 2000 and was acquitted after the jury heard evidence that made it clear Mr. Minton had been set up by Scientology. However, Scientology has continued to this day to use this incident to harass Mr. Minton.)

November 1999: Jesse Prince accepted an invitation from the German Secret Service to meet with them in Mannheim so that they could interview him about Scientology. Mr. Prince was there for three days and was followed by Scientology operatives constantly while he was there. One evening, two Scientology operatives attempted to force Mr. Prince into a car with them. Mr. Prince was forced to run into a crowd to escape. Before he left Germany Mr. Prince met with an editor of the German magazine Der Spiegel for an interview about child abuse in Scientology's Sea Organization. On his return to the United States Mr. Prince had a layover in Amsterdam. A Scientology private investigator followed him to an Internet café there and watched him as he sent an email to Mr. Minton. Later, Scientology falsely reported in the Lisa McPherson wrongful death case that Mr. Prince had been seen smoking marijuana in the cafe.

November 1, 1999: Mr. Minton had decided to buy a building in downtown Clearwater for the Lisa McPherson Trust, since Scientology had successfully blocked him from leasing office space in any of the office buildings downtown. The morning after Mr. Minton's arrest, Scott Brauer, the owner of the property at 33 North Fort Harrison Avenue, was giving Mr. Minton and Ms. Brooks a tour of his building when suddenly seven Scientologists burst into the room and began screaming at Mr. Brauer, "Don't do business with this man! He's a criminal! He was arrested last night for assaulting a Scientologist!" Mr. Minton and Ms. Brooks had already told Mr. Brauer what happened the night before. Mr. Brauer ordered the Scientologists out of the building, informing them that they were trespassing. They then began picketing the building and taking photographs of Mr. Brauer's clients as they arrived. Mr. Brauer then called the police, who came in and introduced themselves to Mr. Minton and thanked him for taking a stand against Scientology. When Mr. Minton and Ms. Brooks left the building, the Scientologists followed them to their car in the parking lot across the street and surrounded the car in a menacing manner. They blocked them from leaving the parking lot until the manager of the parking lot called the police.

November 4, 1999: An anonymous flier showing the mug shot from Mr. Minton's Clearwater arrest was sent to over 4,000 Sandown, New Hampshire, residents, Mr. Minton's friends and family in Boston and England, parents of Mr. Minton's daughters' classmates and the schools of Mr. Minton's two daughters. A private detective visited the twelve houses in the small English village where Mr. Minton's father-in-law lived, informing everyone in the village about Mr. Minton's arrest in Clearwater.

November 6, 1999: Mr. Minton was served with a temporary restraining order, enjoining him from coming within 150 yards of the 18 Scientology buildings in Clearwater, and also enjoining him from coming within 150 yards of any individual Scientologist. Because there are so many Scientologists in Clearwater, this effectively barred Mr. Minton from Clearwater.

November 20, 1999: A private investigator hired by Scientology contacted the father of Leslie White in New Canaan, Connecticut. Ms. Brooks and Mr. Minton had both stayed with the White family in February 1998 to help Leslie, who had just left Scientology and was close to having a nervous breakdown. The private investigator falsely stated to Leslie's father that he had been hired by Therese Minton and wanted to know what Leslie's father knew about Mr. Minton and Ms. Brooks' relationship. The investigator told Mr. White that Mr. Minton was "bipolar" and needed to be on medication on a daily basis for his "mental imbalance." The private investigator also called Leslie's mother and Leslie herself; unsuccessfully attempting to convince them to talk to him about Mr. Minton and Ms. Brooks.

November 23, 1999: Another anonymous flier was placed in the mailboxes of Mr. Minton's Sandown, New Hampshire, neighborhood. The flier was a copy of a web page Scientology had created on the Internet showing the mug shot from Mr. Minton's October 31 arrest in Clearwater and painting a grossly distorted picture of what had happened.

November 1999: Mr. Minton entered into a contract to buy the office building at 33 North Fort Harrison Avenue. The owner, Scott Brauer, told Mr. Minton that a Scientologist came and sat in the reception room of the building for hours with a signed offer to buy the building for substantially more than Mr. Minton's contract. Mr. Minton was contacted by another property owner in Clearwater who told him that it was impossible to rent office space to tenants in Clearwater because of harassment from Scientology. Every time anyone tried to lease a space, Scientology operatives would intimidate the potential client until they gave up in fear. In this way, this property owner explained, Scientology was forcing the prices of all property in Clearwater down to rock bottom, at which point they would buy it all up themselves. With regard to Mr. Minton in particular, a property owner informed him that a member of the City Commissioner's office made calls to all the property owners in Clearwater warning them not to sell property to Mr. Minton. One property owner said she got 40 calls in one day telling her not to do business with Minton or his co-workers. Mr. Minton and Ms. Brooks were provided with a photocopy of a fax that had been sent naming three people with whom the property owner was not to have any dealings. The three people were Robert Minton, Stacy Brooks and Jesse Prince.

December 3, 1999: Judge Thomas Penick issued a temporary injunction prohibiting Mr. Minton from coming within ten feet of any Scientologist or Scientology property in downtown Clearwater.

December 12, 1999: Dateline ran a follow-up story about Mr. Minton in which Scientology spokesperson Mike Rinder made the following statements: "Bob Minton falls into a category similar to those anti-Semites who are out to make it seem like there is something wrong with being a Jew," and later: "I don't know what motivates this guy, I don't know what. But on the other hand if you ask me do I know what motivated Timothy McVey to go blow up a building, I don't know either."

December 1999: A flier was distributed in the Boulder, Colorado, neighborhood in which Jesse Prince was living. The flier's title was "Jesse Prince: The Face of Religious Bigotry," and it had a photograph of Mr. Prince from a recent arrest. The Boulder police had received an anonymous call that Mr. Prince was driving while intoxicated, and based on this he had been arrested. The text of the flier accused Mr. Prince of being part of an anti-religious hate group and of physically threatening Scientologists. It also stated: "Prince is closely associated with and financially supported by a religious bigot named Robert Minton, who has a long history of mental problems and psychiatric treatment. Together they have threatened individuals with axes and sledgehammers and threw rocks at these people and property. Prince and Minton regularly show up drunk and disorderly in front of church premises just to cause trouble. Minton has discharged a shotgun at our people, an incident under investigation by law enforcement. Prince has recently been arrested for drunk driving in Boulder and Minton faces trial this December for assault and battery when he attacked another individual with a stick and beat him across the face. Next time you see this man Prince (or his sidekick Minton), recognize the face of religious bigotry." It was signed "Free Speech & Religious Freedom Committee of The Parishioners of The Church of Scientology of Colorado."

December 10, 1999: The Tampa Tribune published a favorable piece by columnist Rick Berry about Mr. Minton and the Lisa McPherson Trust entitled "Bob Minton: Will he rouse the gorilla?" In it, Berry congratulated Mr. Minton for standing up to Scientology, the "gorilla" in downtown Clearwater.

2000

January 5, 2000: Mr. Minton signed the closing papers on the property at 33 North Fort Harrison Avenue. The owner, Scott Brauer, told Mr. Minton that over the weekend he had repeatedly received telephone calls from Ben Shaw, the head of Scientology's Office of Special Affairs in Clearwater, trying to convince him to pull out of the deal with Mr. Minton. Mr. Brauer said Shaw offered him twice the money Mr. Minton was paying and also offered to indemnify him against litigation should Mr. Minton sue him for breach of contract. Fortunately, Mr. Brauer was an ethical man and refused Shaw's offers. "I have to look at myself in the mirror every morning," he said.

January 5, 2000: Scott Brauer received a telephone call from Mike Roberto, then Clearwater's City Manager. Roberto told him that he was calling because he had heard about the property deal with Mr. Minton and wondered if Mr. Brauer realized how much trouble it would bring to downtown Clearwater if the deal with Minton went through. Mr. Brauer said that he felt that Roberto was trying to strong-arm him, and he said it seemed to him that Roberto was calling to put pressure on him to back out of the sale. Mr. Brauer told him they didn't need to have the conversation because Mr. Minton already owned the building, as of 3:45 that afternoon.

January 6, 2000: The owners of Ottavio's, an Italian restaurant two doors down the street from 33 North Fort Harrison Avenue, brought wine and bruschetta to the celebration party at the Lisa McPherson Trust after the closing. The next day, Scientologists came to the restaurant and warned them not to do business with Mr. Minton or the Lisa McPherson Trust. The owner refused to be intimidated and told the Scientologists he was "running a business, not a nursery school playground." Soon thereafter, a restaurant patron let the owners know that word had gone out to Scientologists to boycott Ottavio's until they agreed to stop doing business with the LMT.

January 13-16, 2000: Scientologists picketed the Minton house in Boston for three days in a row.

January 16, 2000: In a letter to the editor of the St. Petersburg Times titled, "Scientology has helped family, friends, business," Scientologist Patrick J. Clouden of Largo, Florida, wrote: "I would never ask Minton for help or advice on ethics. That would be like asking Hitler about the Jewish religion."

January 25, 2000: Mark Bunker, the LMT's multi-media coordinator, was arrested in Chicago for criminal trespassing as he stood on a public sidewalk to film two dentists who were requesting their money back from the Scientology organization in downtown Chicago. Mr. Bunker was filming the dentists outside the entrance when two off-duty Chicago police officers hired by Scientology burst out of the building, grabbed his camera from him and handcuffed him. Mr. Bunker was taken to jail, booked, and charged with criminal trespassing despite two eyewitnesses who swore he was standing on the public sidewalk. Mr. Bunker would later be acquitted, but not before Scientology posted his mug shot on the Internet and described him as a criminal.

January 30, 2000: The Atlanta Journal/Constitution published an article by Jean Marbella titled "A Private War: Millionaire spends big bucks in battle against Scientology" (a reprint from a Baltimore Sun article of January 19, 2000). Scientology spokesperson Mike Rinder was quoted as saying the following regarding the LMT: "They're here for only one purpose, to harass Scientology" and "Minton's Lisa McPherson center can only hurt relations between the city and the church."

January 2000: A flier was distributed in Mr. Minton's Boston neighborhood with the headline: "New revelations in secret debt buy back scheme by Boston resident Robert S. Minton." The text of the flier included a quote from an article in a British magazine called "Business Age," as follows: "Between 1987 and 1993, a complex fraud was carried out by a clique of international debt traders in cahoots with corrupt Nigerian officials and was conducted under the pretense of executing the official Nigerian debt conversion program so as to fill their own pockets at the expense of unsuspected debt holders, financial institutions and Nigerian creditors. Documents show that a Mr. Rasheed was the key CBN official who worked directly with Mr. Minton and the Abacha family in both BuyBack schemes now under investigation." The flier had photographs of Nigerian dictator Sani Abacha, Mr. Rasheed, and Mr. Minton. It concluded by saying, "The British Financial Services Authority and the Home Office are now launching their own investigations into the actions of the London banks and financial institutions. And the U.S. Authorities? Minton: Return our money now!" Designed to appear to be from a group of Nigerian freedom fighters, the flier ended by inviting readers to "Visit our website."

January 2000: Jesse Prince, in Clearwater to find a place to live so that he could work for the Lisa McPherson Trust, was followed by a man who was later identified as a Scientology private investigator. The man made lewd gestures at Mr. Prince when Mr. Prince pulled up next to him in his car. The man then got behind Mr. Prince and began to follow him in his car, speeding up and slowing down, in a threatening way. Mr. Prince went to the Largo, Florida, police department and filed a complaint with Officer Des Jardins. Officer Jardins was able to identify the man as a private investigator working for Scientology, although he would not give Mr. Prince the man's name. The man's car was rented from Enterprise, where all of Scientology's private investigators rent their cars.

February 2000: Therese Minton was being sponsored by another Beacon Hill couple for membership in the Longwood Tennis Club. Scientology sent a package of discrediting material not only to the couple who was sponsoring her, but also to each member of the membership committee. As a result, she was turned down for membership.

February 1, 2000: A German documentary filmmaker and his cameraman came to Clearwater to interview German Scientologist Gottfried Helmwein. They asked LMT Producer Mark Bunker to film them arriving at Helmwein's house and knocking on his door. Mr. Bunker, standing on a public sidewalk, was in the process of shooting this footage when a man who would later be identified as Richard Bernard ran out of Helmwein's house and attacked him with a hammer. Mr. Bunker was able to capture the incident on camera. Immediately after the incident, Bernard ran back into the house and Mr. Bunker called the police. Two police officers arrived shortly, and became hostile to Mr. Bunker after he identified himself as an employee of the Lisa McPherson Trust. Both officers refused to view the footage of the hammer assault. One of the officers indicated that he intended to arrest Mr. Bunker for recording the assault without getting the assailant's permission. Neither officer made any attempt to locate the assailant, Bernard. It was only when a police sergeant arrived that the officers agreed not to arrest Mr. Bunker and located Bernard. However, Bernard gave a false name and date of birth and was never asked for any identification by the officer. No charges were ever brought against him for the hammer incident. It was later discovered that at the time of the assault against Mr. Bunker, Bernard was in violation of his probation on a cocaine trafficking charge. He was apprehended and served a year in prison.

February 6, 2000: The St. Petersburg Times published a story titled "How much oddity can one town take?" written by Tom Tobin. Marty Rathbun, a high-level Scientology spokesman, made the following statements regarding Mr. Minton: "I worry about this guy because he is deranged"; "Frankly, I'm afraid for people's lives"; "It seems the more he is ignored, the more that he flies off the handle."

February 20, 2000: An anonymous Scientologist using the name benwog@flash.net wrote the following post on ARS harassing Mark Bunker: "LOL Hey Fat Man. LMT business hours are said to start at 9 oclock AM that is. You have no business showing up 3 hours late for work. Does Minton know you are that late? And if you are really an employee of the LMT, then get yourself an email like vp@lisatrust.net. Mr. Bunker had, in fact, arrived at work that day three hours late. The message was intended to let Mr. Bunker know he was being watched.

February 2000: LMT staff member Jesse Prince met a man in a pool hall where Jesse and his fiance had gone to play pool. He introduced himself as Rinsey Trinidad and invited Mr. Prince to go outside with him to smoke marijuana. What Mr. Prince did not know at the time was that the man, whose real name was Barry Gaston, was a private investigator hired by Scientology to befriend Jesse and set him up on drug-buying charges.

March 18, 2000: Mr. Minton delivered a speech at the Leo J. Ryan's Education Foundation conference in which he gave a brief overview of the history of Scientology in Clearwater from the beginning in 1975 up until the present time.

April 2000: John Fashanu, a retired British soccer player from Nigeria, released an investigative report that contained allegations that Mr. Minton was involved in the theft of billions of dollars from the Nigerian government and that he was involved in a massive money-laundering scheme. Several articles appeared in England and Nigeria in which the media quoted from this so-called Fashanu Report. Although Fashanu claimed it had taken him three years to compile the information, in fact it later came out that Scientology private investigators had provided Fashanu with the completed report. Most of the documents appeared to have come from a break-in of the office of Mr. Minton's former partner, Jeff Schmidt.

May 23, 2000: After a two-day jury trial, Mr. Minton was found not guilty of battery in the criminal misdemeanor case of Howd v. Minton. Mr. Minton's attorney, Denis deVlaming, was able to show the jury that Mr. Minton had been set up for the arrest and that Richard Howd had been following Scientology's "fair game" directives which require that anyone who is critical of Scientology must be labeled a criminal, even if the evidence must be manufactured. A juror was quoted in the paper the next day saying that the reason they had found Mr. Minton not guilty was that "It was a set-up."

June 1, 2000: High-level Scientology spokesperson Marty Rathbun made several statements about Mr. Minton and the Lisa McPherson Trust that were quoted in article in the St. Petersburg Times entitled "Scientology foe sets up office close to church." When asked how he felt about the Lisa McPherson Trust opening its doors so close to Scientology, Rathbun said, "These guys are nobodies. They bring absolutely nothing to this community." He compared the situation to the Ku Klux Klan opening an office on North Greenwood, a Clearwater neighborhood with mostly black residents. "The reason they're here is to harass people," Rathbun said. "They know better than anyone that any existing Scientologist isn't interested in their information." On Tuesday, the church had offered to buy the building out from under Minton, but the seller, CPA Scott Brauer, declined. Rathbun said that some of Minton's followers, including Stacy Brooks, were no longer in Scientology because they could not measure up to Scientology's level of ethics. Rathbun also accused Minton and his staff of being in Clearwater to violently "deprogram" Scientologists.

June 2, 2000: Customs officials detained Jesse Prince and Mark Bunker as they arrived at the Leipzig, Germany, airport. Mr. Prince and Mr. Bunker were there to attend a ceremony at which Mr. Minton was to receive an award (see entry for June 3 below). The customs officials thoroughly searched Mr. Bunker's luggage, even going so far as to open up every blank video cassette that Mr. Bunker had brought to film the ceremony. Mr. Bunker was then allowed to go, but Mr. Prince was detained for much longer while agents minutely searched all of his luggage and his person. As they informed Mr. Prince that he was free to go, one of the agents explained that they had received an anonymous tip that Mr. Prince and possibly Mr. Bunker were carrying illegal drugs. Mr. Minton and Ms. Brooks were at the airport to meet Mr. Prince and Mr. Bunker. Mr. Minton saw a man videotaping Ms. Brooks and him. He approached the man, who admitted that had been hired by Scientology to videotape them. He suggested that Mr. Minton could also obtain a copy of the videotape for the right price.

June 3, 2000: Mr. Minton went to Leipzig, Germany, to receive the Alternative Charlemagne Award from the European-American Citizens Committee for Human Rights and Religious Freedom. The committee honored Mr. Minton with the award in appreciation "of his involvement, led by his courage and sense of civil duty, on behalf of the victims of Scientology; of his efforts towards human rights and freedom of expression in the USA; and as an expression of our support for the American people in putting human rights violations by the totalitarian Scientology to an end." Mr. Minton delivered a moving acceptance speech for this award, and an interpreter delivered it in German for the German audience. Scientology operatives followed Mr. Minton and Ms. Brooks throughout their stay in Leipzig and later when they visited Ursula Caberta in Hamburg. Ms. Caberta was the head of a task force on Scientology that was part of the Hamburg government. The police had to be called after one Scientology private investigator followed Mr. Minton, Ms. Brooks and Ms. Caberta in a harassing manner. During dinner at a restaurant in Hamburg, Hamburg police officers identified the people at a table next to Mr. Minton, Ms. Brooks and Ms. Caberta as Scientology operatives sent to listen in on their conversation.

June 8, 2000: Scientology private investigator Eugene Ingram visited LMT staffer Jeff Jacobsen's former neighbor in Scottsdale, Arizona. Ingram inquired about the sources of Mr. Jacobsen's income and other personal information. Ingram also visited the tenants of a rental house in Scottsdale owned by Mr. Jacobsen.

June 11, 2000: Mr. Minton participated in a debate at Howard University in Washington, D.C., concerning the accusations made against him in the Fashanu Report. The Nigerian Democratic at the Howard University in Washington, D.C. The Nigerian Democratic Movement requested this debate. Minton explained the debt buyback in detail and answered in-depth questions from the public and media regarding his dealings with Nigeria. John Fashanu the supposed author of the report accusing Minton of money laundering did not show up for the debate.

June 14, 2000: Stacy Brooks and another board member of the Lisa McPherson Trust, Duncan Pierce, attended a hearing before the House International Relations Committee in Washington, D.C. The hearing was orchestrated entirely by Scientology. The audience was composed entirely of Scientologists except for the members of the LMT, who were surrounded by OSA operatives during the hearing. The panel of witnesses included several people known to be apologists for Scientology and two Scientologists. The purpose of the hearing was to convince the committee that the U.S. Congress should bring economic sanctions against France, Germany, Belgium and Austria for the position those countries had taken against Scientology. Scientology was portrayed as being victimized by religious discrimination in these countries. No testimony was presented to counter these charges. The Lisa McPherson Trust had contacted Rep. Gilman's office prior to the hearing to offer additional witnesses, but the offer was denied. Out of approximately fifty committee members, only about fifteen attended. The hearing did not result in sanctions against the European countries.

June 18, 2000: Thirty-year Scientologist Tory Bezazian contacted Stacy Brooks at the Lisa McPherson Trust and asked for help in escaping from Scientology. She called from Los Angeles, very distraught about leaving Scientology and afraid that Scientology operatives would harass her once they learned that she had decided to leave. Ms. Brooks invited her to come to Clearwater where the Lisa McPherson Trust would be able to offer her some protection from the Scientologists while she collected her thoughts. Ms. Bezazian agreed to fly to Clearwater. When she arrived at the airport she was met by Janet Weiland, a high-level Scientology operative in the Office of Special Affairs International. Weiland followed Ms. Bezazian through the airport, holding onto her suitcase and refusing to return it. Ms. Bezazian was frightened but spoke to Ms. Brooks via cell phone until she was able to get into her seat on the plane, where Weiland was unable to reach her. Ms. Bezazian was met at the Chicago airport by her husband Harold Bezazian, also a long-time Scientologist, who begged her not to go to Clearwater and not to leave Scientology. Ms. Bezazian told her husband that she wanted to speak to the people at the Lisa McPherson Trust and got on her plane to Tampa.

Ms. Brooks, Mr. Minton and Jesse Prince went to the airport to meet Ms. Bezazian. It was nearly two in the morning, but when they arrived at Ms. Bezazian's gate they found four Scientology operatives there waiting for the plane. One of the Scientologists was Dennis Clarke, a long-time Scientology operative who was also head of Scientology's anti-psychiatry front group, Citizens Commission on Human Rights. Another was Charlie Earls, a long-time member of the intelligence branch of Scientology's Office of Special Affairs. A woman named Cathy True was also there. True was also in the Office of Special Affairs. She was known to Ms. Brooks as the person sent by Scientology to threaten people who no longer want to be in Scientology, particularly those who want money refunded. The fourth Scientologist was a woman named Penny Jones. She had been a friend of Ms. Bezazian's. When Ms. Bezazian came into the terminal Jones immediately pulled her aside and insisted on speaking to her.

Two Tampa police officers were there to ensure that Ms. Bezazian was not forced to go with the Scientologists against her will. Ms. Brooks asked one of the officers to assist Ms. Bezazian, but he informed her that he could do nothing unless Ms. Bezazian stated that she did not want to go with Jones. Jones spent several minutes trying to talk Ms. Bezazian into leaving with her. While this conversation was occurring, Charlie Earls approached the police officers and began to give them false information about Mr. Minton, Ms. Brooks and Mr. Prince, saying they were wanted by the police. The police officer ordered Earls to show him copies of arrest warrants or be quiet. Finally Ms. Bezazian said in a loud voice, "Penny, I want to talk to these people. I want to go with them." The two police officers immediately ordered the Scientologists to back away and moved in close to Ms. Bezazian and Ms. Brooks, flanking them on both sides. They announced loudly, "This is police business! Everyone stay out of the way!" and escorted Ms. Bezazian, Mr. Minton, Mr. Prince and Ms. Brooks out of the airport and to their car.

That night Ms. Bezazian stayed in a room at the Hyatt Westshore, a hotel near the airport. Mr. Minton and Ms. Brooks also stayed at the hotel so that Ms. Bezazian would not be alone. They were up all night, because Ms. Bezazian wanted to talk to them. Early the next morning, Scientologists began knocking on her door, trying to convince her to leave with them. She felt harassed by them and it was necessary to have staff of the Lisa McPherson Trust at the hotel all day the next day to protect her.

June 23, 2000: An English translation of a letter from the Nigerian High Commissioner in London, Prince Bola Ajibola, to a prosecutor in Geneva, Switzerland, General Bernard Bertossa, appeared anonymously on the Internet. In it, Prince Ajibola accused Mr. Minton of money-laundering and fraud against the Nigerian government and asked Bertossa to press criminal charges against Mr. Minton. Clearly, Prince Ajibola's complaint was based on the Fashanu Report.

June 23, 2000: Ursula Caberta, head of the Hamburg government's task force on Scientology, came to Clearwater on vacation to visit her friends, Mr. Minton, Ms. Brooks, and others at the Lisa McPherson Trust. Upon her arrival at Tampa International Airport, approximately forty Scientologists materialized as Ms. Caberta entered the terminal and began shouting at her, "Nazi go home!" The Scientologists surrounded Ms. Caberta and Ms. Brooks, who guided Ms. Caberta through the hostile crowd and protected her until the airport police arrived and forced the Scientologists away. The police then escorted Ms. Caberta, Ms. Brooks and Mr. Minton through the airport and into the adjoining police station. The police stayed with Ms. Caberta and Ms. Brooks while Mr. Minton got the car, and the police then escorted the two women to the car to make sure they would be safe. Ms. Brooks had intended that Ms. Caberta would be a guest at her home during her vacation. However, Tory Bezazian, a thirty-year Scientologist, had just left Scientology and was under the care of the Lisa McPherson Trust to protect her from being harassed by Scientologists. She had been staying at a hotel in Tampa, but there was so much harassment from Scientology at the hotel that it was decided she would safer at the home of Ms. Brooks. As a Scientologist, Ms. Bezazian had been indoctrinated to believe that Ms. Caberta was an evil, dangerous person, so Ms. Bezazian was afraid to be in the same house with her. Therefore, a hotel had been reserved for Ms. Caberta. When she was taken to her hotel to check in, however, it was discovered that someone had canceled her reservation and another hotel had to be found late that night.

June 25, 2000: Ms. Caberta wanted to speak to U.S. media about the situation with Scientology in Germany, because Scientology was harassing her in Germany and trying to get her government superiors to fire her, and she wanted the truth to be known in the U.S. Therefore, the Lisa McPherson Trust invited several local media to their offices and held a reception at which Ms. Caberta discussed the fact that Scientology was viewed as a fraudulent commercial enterprise in Germany, not as a religion, and that many Scientologists had been found to be committing criminal fraud in Germany. During this reception, Scientologists were outside trying to disrupt the gathering, and when Ms. Caberta left later that day, she was served at her hotel with a subpoena to appear for a deposition in the Lisa McPherson wrongful death case, a legal proceeding in which Ms. Caberta had no involvement whatsoever.

June 2000: While Therese Minton was on vacation in England with the children, they were follow