The_Info_Web/20 - ORGANIZATIONS/PRIVATE/Scientology.md

created	updated	title	tags	aliases	description	category	start	location	summary	relations
2025-07-22	2026-10-09	Scientology	Organization Religion Philosophy Scientology Dianetics GuardiansOffice SeaOrganization OperationSnowWhite IRS FBI RemoteViewing SRI Stargate	Scientology Church of Scientology Church of Scientology International Church of Scientology of California Founding Church of Scientology Hubbard Association of Scientologists International HASI Scientologists	Scientology is a body of beliefs and practices created by the American author L. Ron Hubbard; critics and some governments have called it a cult, and the Internal Revenue Service recognized it as a tax-exempt religion in 1993.	Private Organization	1954	Clearwater, Florida	Religion founded by L. Ron Hubbard in 1954 whose Guardian's Office officials were convicted in 1979 of infiltrating federal agencies and whose members included SRI remote viewing figures Hal Puthoff, Ingo Swann and Pat Price.	type with reverse start role fn founded L. Ron Hubbard true 1954 founder; Church of Scientology in Los Angeles dated to 1954 by the Associated Press, Hubbard Association of Scientologists International at Phoenix by 1954 3 type with reverse role fn head_of L. Ron Hubbard true Commodore; Los Angeles Superior Court found in 1984 that he ran the Church through the Sea Organization and the Commodore's Messengers; Heber Jentzsch became president after Hubbard resigned in 1981 9 type with reverse role fn member_of Hal Puthoff true reported a Scientologist by New Scientist (October 17, 1974), Ray Hyman (1977, Operating Thetan class given as III) and John L. Wilhelm (Washington Post, 1977); Schnabel writes that he joined in the 1960s and resigned in the mid-1970s 17 type with reverse role fn member_of Ingo Swann true reported a Scientologist by Time (March 4, 1974) and New Scientist (October 17, 1974); Wilhelm quotes him on 'fourteen Clears' at SRI; Schnabel writes that he joined in the 1960s and resigned later 17 type with reverse end role fn member_of Pat Price true 1975 credited Scientology in a 1977-era profile with 'opening new vistas and abilities of self'; Wilhelm called him a high-level Operating Thetan; died in 1975 18 type with start end role fn subject_of Internal Revenue Service 1967 1993 tax-exemption dispute and more than 2,000 lawsuits, ended by a closing agreement in which the Church paid $12.5 million and was recognized as exempt 6 type with start role fn subject_of Operation Snow White 1977-07-07 FBI searches of Scientology offices in Los Angeles and Washington on July 7, 1977; Guardian's Office officials convicted December 1979 11 type with reverse start end role fn investigated Board of Inquiry into Scientology true 1963-11-27 1965 Victorian board under Kevin Victor Anderson, Q.C. 7 type with reverse start end role fn investigated Foster Enquiry true 1969 1971-12-21 Sir John G. Foster's enquiry, printed by the House of Commons December 21, 1971 4 type with start role fn subject_of Federal Bureau of Investigation 1951-03-01 FBI headquarters file on Hubbard and later Church of Scientology files; Hubbard also served as an FBI source on alleged Communists in his Foundation in 1951 1

Scientology is a body of beliefs and practices invented by the American author L. Ron Hubbard, who published Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health in 1950 through Hermitage House and chartered the Hubbard Dianetic Research Foundation in New Jersey.¹ A letter of June 12, 1954 on the letterhead of the Hubbard Association of Scientologists International, 806 North Third Street, Phoenix, Arizona, told the Phoenix Better Business Bureau that Scientology "is described as a science of knowingness" with the goal of increasing "recognition, memory, and reaction time."² The Associated Press dated the founding of the Church of Scientology in Los Angeles to 1954, and a Marquis Who's Who entry reproduced in the Federal Bureau of Investigation's file lists Hubbard as president of the Founding Church of Scientology, Washington.³ The British Government's Minister of Health, Kenneth Robinson, described it to the House of Commons on July 25, 1968 as "a pseudo-philosophical cult introduced into this country some years ago from the United States," with its world headquarters at East Grinstead.⁴ A Reader's Digest article of May 1980, "Scientology: Anatomy of a Frightening Cult," is preserved in the Central Intelligence Agency's reading room.⁵ The Internal Revenue Service stated in 1997 that the Church "was recognized as tax exempt after establishing that it was an organization operated exclusively for religious and charitable purposes."⁶

Practices, structure and vessels

The Associated Press described "auditing" as a process "in which a device that the church claims can read mental states is used in a process of purging negative thoughts."⁶ The Board of Inquiry into Scientology and the Foster Enquiry each examined the Hubbard Association of Scientologists International, Hubbard's position as governing director, and the fees charged for processing.⁴⁷ The Foster report describes a "Sea Organization" cruising under the Panamanian flag, and a 1978 Los Angeles Times article in the CIA's clipping file calls the Apollo (Scientology ship), a 3,280-ton vessel, the Church's flagship and "for nearly a decade the personal yacht" of Hubbard; it reports a June 25, 1971 death aboard the ship and United States Department of State correspondence about the inquiry of the woman's father at the Moroccan port of Safi.⁴⁸ The Los Angeles Superior Court wrote in 1984 that Hubbard "runs the Church in all ways through the Sea Organization, his role of Commodore, and the Commodore's Messengers."⁹ The Religious Technology Center, whose director Mark Rathbun commented on the 1993 settlement, and a Flag Operations Liaison Office, Eastern United States, described in its own letterhead as "a branch of the Church of Scientology of New York," appear as Church bodies in the AP report and in a 1974 letter to the Navy's records center.⁶¹⁰

Guardian's Office

The August 15, 1978 indictment in the District of Columbia describes the Guardian's Office as composed in each country of five bureaus, among them the Information Bureau, "assigned the responsibility for the conduct of covert operations including the collection of data and documents of interest to Scientology." It states that Hubbard, as "Commodore," exercised overall supervision; that Mary Sue Hubbard held the titles Controller and Commodore Staff Guardian; that Jane Kember was Guardian World-Wide, reporting directly to both; and that Morris Budlong was Deputy Guardian for Information World-Wide.¹¹ The indictment's first overt act is a November 21, 1973 directive from Kember to Henning Heldt to obtain all Interpol documents "connecting its founder, L. Ron Hubbard, to criminal activity."¹¹

Operation Snow White

The stipulation of evidence signed on October 26, 1979 by the nine defendants places Guardian's Office agents in the Department of Justice (Sharon Thomas, in the Civil Division office handling Freedom of Information Act suits against the CIA, the Drug Enforcement Administration, the United States Customs Service, the Defense Communications Agency, the Army, the Energy Research and Development Administration, the United States Postal Service and Interpol), the Internal Revenue Service, the Coast Guard Intelligence office (Thomas) and the Drug Enforcement Administration (Nancy Douglass), and records the planting of a recording device at an IRS conference on November 1, 1974 and the theft of Interpol files.¹² Michael Meisner and Gerald Bennett Wolfe were caught in the United States Courthouse in Washington on June 11, 1976 with a counterfeit IRS identification card in the name "John M. Foster."¹² On March 2, 1976 Cindy Raymond wrote to Mary Sue Hubbard proposing a "Operation Snow White Subprogram Hunter, Hunter X" whose targets included obtaining desired files in government agencies by "job penetration" and other infiltration.¹² FBI agents searched Scientology offices in Los Angeles and Washington on July 7, 1977.¹²

Mary Sue Hubbard, Henning Heldt, Duke Snider, Gregory Willardson, Richard Weigand, Mitchell Hermann, Cindy Raymond, Gerald Bennett Wolfe and Sharon Thomas were found guilty on the stipulated evidence, each on one count. Judge Charles R. Richey sentenced Mary Sue Hubbard on December 6, 1979 to five years and a $10,000 fine and Heldt, Snider, Willardson and Weigand to four years each; the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit affirmed by per curiam opinion on October 2, 1981.¹³ The government's sentencing memorandum stated that the defendants "fulfilled his duties as expected by the Church of Scientology" and that the Guardian Orders "called for the execution of massive criminal conspiracies and rewarded the participants for their success."¹³ The presentence reports had stated, attributing it to the United States Attorney, that the perpetrators "went beyond what the Church of Scientology expected of them"; the government told the court that this misstated its view.¹³

The CIA reading room holds Washington Post and other press accounts of the charges ("U.S. Charges Scientology Conspiracy," "11 Church Agents Accused of Spying, Bugging and Theft") and of a 1978 organization called American Citizens for Honesty in Government, described by the Austin American-Statesman as a four-month-old creation of the Church inviting government employees to report waste and fraud.¹⁴ On February 17, 1978 the CIA's Office of Legislative Counsel replied to the Office of General Counsel's Freedom of Information Division, in connection with the suit Scientology v. Director, FBI, that its indices and the Review Staff material supplied to the House and Senate contained nothing on the Founding Church of Scientology and its affiliated organizations.¹⁵

Official inquiries, courts and the 1993 tax settlement

The State of Victoria's Board of Inquiry, appointed November 27, 1963 with Kevin Victor Anderson, Q.C. as its sole member, reported in 1965: "Scientology is evil; its techniques evil; its practice a serious threat to the community, medically, morally and socially; and its adherents sadly deluded and often mentally ill." It recorded that Hubbard had "served as an officer in the United States Navy and appears to have been seconded to the Royal Navy for a period."⁷ The Foster enquiry, ordered printed by the House of Commons on December 21, 1971, quotes the Government's July 1968 view that Scientology was "socially harmful," records the Home Office policy excluding Hubbard and Mary Sue Hubbard from the United Kingdom, and states Foster's conclusion that Scientologists' complaints of religious discrimination were "quite unfounded."⁴ The Foster report also discusses the booklet "Brain-washing: A Synthesis of the Russian Textbook on Psychopolitics," remarking that "Its style resembles more that of Mr. Hubbard than that of the Marxist-Leninist phraseology standard in Soviet official literature."⁴ The CIA's STARGATE collection includes a bibliography listing Foster's 1971 report, Hubbard's Dianetics and Dianetics Today, George Malko's Scientology: The Now Religion (1970) and Roy Wallis's The Road to Total Freedom (1976).¹⁶

In Church of Scientology of California v. Gerald Armstrong (Los Angeles Superior Court No. C 420153), Judge Paul Breckenridge's memorandum of intended decision, filed June 22, 1984, held that neither plaintiff had clean hands and that the Church and Mary Sue Hubbard were to take nothing on the tort claims. It found that "the organization over the years with its 'Fair Game' doctrine has harassed and abused those persons not in the Church whom it perceives as enemies," called "the practice of culling supposedly confidential 'P.C. folders or files' to obtain information for purposes of intimidation and/or harassment" "repugnant and outrageous," and quoted a 1970 French police report.⁹

The Internal Revenue Service dispute with the Church, which the Associated Press dated from 1967, ended in a closing agreement of 1993. According to the AP, the Church dropped its more than 2,000 lawsuits and paid $12.5 million, the IRS declared the Church and related entities tax-exempt (including a trust that oversees the cruise ship Freewinds), the Church set up a tax-compliance committee, and the IRS could levy up to $50 million in penalties if officials were enriched; Rathbun said the document was "a peace treaty. The war is over."⁶ The IRS issued a statement on December 31, 1997 after the Wall Street Journal reported the agreement, noting that unauthorized disclosure of a closing agreement would violate Internal Revenue Code Section 6103.⁶

Scientologists at Stanford Research Institute

Several people at Stanford Research Institute in the early remote viewing work, later the Stargate Project, were reported in print as Scientologists. In the CIA STARGATE collection, a psychological report on six subjects in the SRI parapsychology study states that "at least four of the subjects in this study describe to me an interest in scientology and two of them indicate that they have been involved in the Church of Scientology for some time."¹⁷ Time (magazine) magazine of March 4, 1974 called Hal Puthoff a promoter of "the bizarre and controversial cult of Scientology," which Ingo Swann, "another psychic tested by S.R.I., also practices."¹⁷ The New Scientist of October 17, 1974 wrote of Puthoff that he "has gone through encounter groups and other West Coast fads, and is now a Scientologist (as is Ingo Swann)."¹⁷ In The Humanist in 1977 Ray Hyman wrote that Puthoff "has made it to the level of a Class III Operational Thetan in the Church of Scientology" and had previously "obtained funding to study the Backster Effect."¹⁷ A December 5, 1977 letter to the fellows of the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal, in the CIA's STARGATE collection, quotes "Dr. Puthoff is a Scientologist" among its examples of "Personal Defamation" aimed at investigators.¹⁷ The CIA's reading notes on John L. Wilhelm's The Search for Superman list "World of the Thetans" and "scientology: various levels of achievement."¹⁷

John L. Wilhelm wrote in the Washington Post in 1977, under the heading "The Scientology Link," that "one item that continues to trouble those in government who follow the SRI work is the unusually large number of Scientologists involved with the psychic tests there"; that Puthoff "is a high-ranking Scientologist and has written defenses of his organization's methods and beliefs"; that Pat Price, who "died two years ago, also was a high-level 'Operating Thetan'"; that the laboratory assistant to Puthoff and Russell Targ during many of the Uri Geller experiments "was a Scientologist married to a 'minister' of Scientology"; that some of the initial funding came from a ranking Scientologist; that Swann "helped to establish Scientology's 'Celebrity Center' in Los Angeles, the headquarters recently raided by the FBI"; and that Swann at his original testing "revealed that there are 'fourteen Clears [a medium-high level of Scientology achievement], more than I would suspect,' working at SRI."¹⁸ Wilhelm wrote that the involvement of Scientologists "partially accounts for at least two government agencies pulling back from funding further work there."¹⁸

On November 16, 1977 officers of the CIA's Office of Technical Service briefed staff of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence on OTS involvement in ESP research, after the Washington Post article "Psychic Spying?" by John L. Wilhelm of August 7, 1977 (Outlook section), and left a written outline, an IEEE article on the SRI work and "a brief article on Mr. Pat Price." The article on Price describes him as the new president of a West Virginia coal company and quotes him: "He credits Scientology for 'opening new vistas and abilities of self to me and which I now use as a matter of fact.'"¹⁸ An SRI session transcript of October 4, 1973 has Price tracking Targ, Hugh Crane and Ann Price and Puthoff through Menlo Park and saying: "Just took a look at the Scientology Center. They're not there."¹⁹

Jon Atack wrote that Puthoff posted a reply saying his involvement with Scientology was trivial, and that he answered by stating Puthoff was OT III; Tony Ortega's introduction to Atack's comments adds an editorial note, citing Hugh Urban's history of Scientology, that Puthoff "was OT VII by 1971, the highest level then attainable." Ortega also published a paper by Swann, "Scientological Techniques: A Model Paradigm for the Exploration of Consciousness and Psychic Integration," which he said Swann gave in 1973 at the First Conference on Psychotronic Research in Czechoslovakia.²⁰ Jim Schnabel's Remote Viewers (1997) writes that Puthoff and Swann had both joined Scientology in the 1960s; that Puthoff resigned his membership in the mid-1970s and afterward supported a group of anti-Scientologists, and that Swann later resigned as well; that Price "up to his death, had been deeply involved in Scientology" and had been known to Puthoff through a Scientology course in Los Angeles; that one of Puthoff's laboratory assistants was a Scientologist; that the astronaut Edgar Mitchell, whose private foundation had funded some of SRI's work with Uri Geller, "had briefly taken an interest in Scientology"; and that a senior official of Price's West Virginia coal company "had heard about Price on the Scientology grapevine." Schnabel dates the conversion of Hubbard's Dianetics organization into the Church of Scientology to 1953.²¹

Footnotes

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1. FBI, L. Ron Hubbard/Sara Northrup Hollister file 62-HQ-94080, section 1, memorandum on the interview of L. Ron Hubbard of March 1, 1951 (Dianetics published by Hermitage House; Hubbard Dianetic Research Foundation, Elizabeth, New Jersey, with branch offices), archive.org/details/fbi.l.ron.hubbard.sara.northrup.hollister. ↩︎

2. Hubbard Association of Scientologists International, Phoenix, to the Better Business Bureau, Phoenix, June 12, 1954, enclosed in an FBI Phoenix communication in FBI file 62-HQ-94080 (cited at note 1). ↩︎

3. Associated Press, "Scientologists Settled With IRS," December 30, 1997, by Robert Jablon; Who's Who in the South and Southwest (sixth edition) entry for Hubbard as reproduced in FBI file 62-HQ-94080, section 3, archive.org/details/fbi.l.ron.hubbard.sara.northrup.hollister. ↩︎

4. Foster, Sir John G., Enquiry into the Practice and Effects of Scientology (London: Her Majesty's Stationery Office, 1971), ordered by the House of Commons to be printed December 21, 1971, paragraphs 14, 75, 187 and 190 to 193, archive.org/details/FosterReportEnquiryIntoThePracticeAndEffectsOfScientology. ↩︎

5. Methvin, Eugene H., "Scientology: Anatomy of a Frightening Cult," Reader's Digest, May 1980, CIA-RDP90-00806R000201000014-3, archive.org/details/cia-readingroom-document-cia-rdp90-00806r000201000014-3. ↩︎

6. Associated Press, "Scientologists Settled With IRS," December 30, 1997 (reprinted at cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Cowen/essays/ap301297.html); Internal Revenue Service news release IR-97-50, December 31, 1997, irs.gov/pub/irs-news/ir-97-50.txt. ↩︎

7. Anderson, Kevin Victor, Q.C., Report of the Board of Inquiry into Scientology (Melbourne: Government of Victoria, 1965), order of November 27, 1963 and introduction, archive.org/details/AndersonReportReportOfTheBoardOfEnquiryIntoScientology. ↩︎

8. Gillette, Robert, "Scientology flagship shrouded in mystery," Los Angeles Times, 1978, CIA-RDP88-01314R000100040026-3, archive.org/details/cia-readingroom-document-cia-rdp88-01314r000100040026-3. ↩︎

9. Church of Scientology of California v. Gerald Armstrong, No. C 420153 (Los Angeles Super. Ct.), Memorandum of Intended Decision (Breckenridge, J.), filed June 22, 1984, archive.org/details/armstrong.1.documents.by.date; Washington Times, January 29, 1986, CIA-RDP90-00806R000100200068-4 (Jentzsch became president after Hubbard resigned in 1981). ↩︎

10. Letter of the Flag Operations Liaison Office, Eastern United States, A Branch of the Church of Scientology of New York, 49 West 32nd Street, to the National Personnel Records Center, Navy Branch, St. Louis, May 28, 1974, in the Navy personnel records of Lafayette R. Hubbard, archive.org/details/hubbard-lafayette-r-navy-records-from-nara-website-november-10-2020. ↩︎

11. United States v. Mary Sue Hubbard et al., Criminal No. 78-401 (D.D.C.), indictment of August 15, 1978, paragraphs 2 to 6 and overt act 1, archive.org/details/usa.v.msh. ↩︎

12. United States v. Hubbard et al., stipulation of evidence, October 26, 1979, Government Exhibits 54, 55, 60 and 65 and the narrative on Guardian Program Order 302, the Coast Guard Intelligence and Drug Enforcement Administration agents and the "John M. Foster" identification card; United States v. Hubbard, 474 F. Supp. 64 (D.D.C. 1979), archive.org/details/usa.v.msh. ↩︎

13. United States v. Heldt et al., Nos. 79-2442, 79-2447, 79-2448 and 79-2449 (D.C. Cir. October 2, 1981) (per curiam; MacKinnon, Robb and Wald, JJ.), n.5 on sentences; United States Sentencing Memorandum, December 3, 1979, pp. 3 to 6, archive.org/details/usa.v.msh; judgment and commitment orders of December 6 and 7, 1979, archive.org/details/USAV.MarySueHubbardEtAl. ↩︎

14. Robinson, Timothy S., "U.S. Charges Scientology Conspiracy," Washington Post, 1978, CIA-RDP88-01315R000400410029-5; Stanley, Dick, "Scientology group searches for corruption," Austin American-Statesman, 1978, CIA-RDP88-01315R000400410031-2, archive.org/details/cia-readingroom-document-cia-rdp88-01315r000400410031-2. ↩︎

15. Central Intelligence Agency, Office of Legislative Counsel, OLC 78-0684/1, February 17, 1978, "Scientology v. Director, FBI, et al.," referring to OGC Memo 78-0912 of February 14, 1978, CIA-RDP81M00980R000200010030-6. ↩︎

16. "Attachment 1: Representative Bibliography," CIA-RDP96-00787R000100250012-3. ↩︎

17. CIA-RDP96-00787R000200140007-0 (psychological report, SRI parapsychology study); "Boom Times on the Psychic Frontier," Time, March 4, 1974, CIA-RDP96-00787R000100030002-8; Hanlon, Joseph, New Scientist, October 17, 1974, CIA-RDP96-00787R000700110020-3, and the same passage in Nature, October 18, 1974, CIA-RDP96-00787R000200090024-7; Hyman, Ray, "Psychics and Scientists: 'Mind-Reach' and Remote Viewing," The Humanist, May/June 1977, CIA-RDP96-00787R000200080037-4; letter to the fellows of the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal, December 5, 1977, CIA-RDP96-00787R000200080012-1; reading notes on Wilhelm's The Search for Superman, CIA-RDP96-00788R001100040006-1. ↩︎

18. Wilhelm, John L., Washington Post, 1977 (article on the military potential of parapsychology), CIA-RDP96-00788R001700360003-3; Central Intelligence Agency, Office of Technical Service, Memorandum for the Record OTS/BAB 287-77, November 17, 1977, with attached article on Patrick Price, CIA-RDP96-00787R000500170001-0. ↩︎

19. SRI remote viewing session transcript, October 4, 1973 (Hugh Crane, Pat Price, Russell Targ, Hal Puthoff, Ann Price), CIA-RDP96-00787R000200130011-6. ↩︎

20. Ortega, Tony, "Scientology and the Spoonbenders: Jon Atack on a previously unpublished Ingo Swann essay," tonyortega.org, July 8, 2017, tonyortega.org/?p=41121, quoting Atack and Hugh B. Urban. The claimants are named in the text. ↩︎

21. Schnabel, Jim. Remote Viewers: The Secret History of America's Psychic Spies. New York: Dell, 1997, read in the archive.org full-text copy, the chapter on the SRI work and its note 12. ↩︎