Information that
Scientology does not want you to read
Books Critical of Scientology Stolen and Destroyed
From diconnectd@aol.com Mon Apr 10 13:34:45 BST 1995
The following is an excerpt from a Public Record Court Document
United States District Court Central District of California
Case # CV 91 6426 HLH (Tx)
Declaration of Graham E. Berry re deposition testimony of Garry
Scarff. April 4 1994
Garry Scarff was an operative for the Church of $cientology's
Office of Special Affairs, (OSA)
Books Critical of Scientology Stolen and Destroyed.
"Q. Mr. Scarff, have you now located the two exhibits that you had tried
to locate with reference to stealing library records?
A. Yes, sir, I did. "
Q. Turning your attention to Exhibit-99, what is that? "
A. This is a letter that I sent to Ginnie Cooper, the Director of
Libraries for Multnomah County, which is the county where Portland,
Oregon rests. And it is concerning an operation in which I was a part of
a -- part of which has been a long time policy within the Church of
Scientology to eradicate not only from what I have spoken to already on
court files but eradicating from library systems throughout the country, any
information that is critical or adverse to the Church of Scientology. "
And specifically within the library systems within the City of Portland,
Oregon, I as well as other individuals within the Church of Scientology
just as a matter of policy were ordered to destroy any and all critical
materials adverse to the Church of Scientology. And this letter is to the
Director of Libraries informing her that all of such books that are on
file at the library which have been listed as "lost" are not lost. They had
been destroyed. And I list six books there. "Specifically one book
refers to -- entitled "A Piece of Blue Sky" by Jon Atack, who is
a former high ranking member of the Church of Scientology who
wrote an expose on Scientology. "And I recall there were
approximately four to five copies of this book in the library all
which were listed as lost. And this letter explains to Ms. Cooper,
basically, that the Church of Scientology destroys materials on a
regular basis which they consider to be adverse, including if she
were to check the library's copy of Time Magazine dated May
6th of l991 they will notice that that article had been cut from the
magazine because the Church of Scientology considered it to be
adverse. "Exhibit-100 is a response to me from this library director
in which she did a full inventory of the books that they had and
claims that several of the books appear to be out of print now and
the library currently has no copies. I refer to one, the book entitled
"Inside Scientology" by Robert Kaufman. She said the library has
no copies. "No. 2, "The Scandal of Scientology" by Paulette
Cooper. She responds the library currently has no copies. "No. 3, "
The Hidden Story of Scientology", by Omar Garrison. She responds
there are two copies in the library and there are no copies at the
central library. And it is out of print. "No. 4, book entitled "L. Ron
Hubbard, Messiah or Mad Man" by Bent Corydon. She responds
there are supposed to be currently 13 copies in the library. However,
seven of these copies are currently listed as lost and there are two
copies on order to replace the two copies lost at the central library.
"No. 5, book entitled "Bare-Faced Messiah: The True Story of L.
Ron Hubbard" by Russell Miller. "She responds there are supposed
to be four copies in the county library, two of the four copies are
listed as lost. And the book is out of print.
"No. 6. "A Piece of Blue Sky", she responds there are supposed to
be three copies in the county library, two of these three are currently
listed as lost. "She refers to the Time magazine article dated May 6th
of 1991 and claims that the article is on microfilm and therefore the
issue can be found in microfilm, but the print copy is missing. "She
also states that she instituted safeguards to protect reordenng these
books based upon the letter that I sent her.
"Q. Now, turning your attention to Exhibit-99, the last paragraph on that
document, that letter states: 'These missing books were in fact stolen
from the library and destroyed in fulfillment of an internal directive by
the church which instructs its members to eradicate all published materials
critical of Scientology and to replace it with pro-Scientology materials.
A. That's correct.
"Q. How do you know that these missing books were in fact stolen
from the library? "
A. Because I was very much a part of the effort to steal the books
from the library and destroy them. "
Q. Was anyone else involved in that effort? "
A. Gwen Mayfield was involved. Angie Mann was involved. I know
that her husband Charles Mann to have been involved. Like I said,
this was an effort that Scientology has long had. I even recall back in
'82 that John Carmichael had talked about removing stuff from the
library and destroying it. And it was Gwen Mayfield who told me how
to remove a book from the library. She showed me that within the
binding of a hardback book there is a long, thin, metal strip which
sets off an alarm when something like that goes through the sensors
in the library and she said all you had to do was take a razor blade,
slice along the bindings of the book, pull out the metal strip, rub it
into a little ball and flick it away. It takes away the security aspect
of this book. It was very easy to get away with it by ripping out the
little metal band.
"Q. Gwen Mayfield is part of the --"
A. Gwen Mayfield is an official of the Church of Scientology and
director of the Office of Special Affairs whose job in part is to do
such activities as I have just described. This would be considered a
covert operation. "This is not the first time this has happened although
not in a library situation. When Julie Christofferson had her trial in
Portland in 1985 one newspaper by the name of Willemette Week
published an expose of the Church of Scientology in which the
newspaper later learned that approximately, I think the number was,
10,000 copies of the newspaper had been stolen from different places
throughout the city because of the desire from the Church or officials
of the church not to have any of the readership within the general public
to have access to these newspapers. "And it is my understanding that
the newspaper later sued the church and the church chose to end
and settle the case.
"Q. How do you know about that activity?
"A. It was common knowledge within the church. It was common
knowledge in the church at the time because I was involved in one
other operation with John Carmichael at that time against Julie
Christofferson and you have to understand that within the OSA and any time
someone succeeds in pulling off a covert operation, people don't sit
around a table and talk seriously about what just happened. It is a
celebrative occasion. It is like somebody needs to pull out the wine
and cheese and we Will all celebrate because everyone was laughing
and John Carmichael thought it was quite comical that people would
try to look for a copy of the Willemette Week and there would be
none found anywhere within the city. "
Q. Were you involved in the removal of those newspapers?
A . Yes.