Scientology’s Enemies List: Are You On It?

Another intriguing Scientology document was leaked today by Marty Rathbun, the former high-ranking official who left the church in 2004.

At his blog, Rathbun provided a .pdf of what he says is an internal document of the Office of Special Affairs, Scientology’s covert-operations wing.

In the document, dated January 22, 2010, an OSA executive writes that some new facilities are opening up in Los Angeles and Las Vegas, and she wants to make sure that certain people in the Western U.S. don’t show up to the festivities.

What then follows is a long list of Scientologists who are apparently out of favor, as well as another long list of ex-Scientologists, journalists, and church critics.

In other words, it’s a handy Scientology Enemies List!

The folks on the list, the executive writes, are “disaffected, enemy connected, psychotic, etc.” She instructs church organizations to make sure these folks aren’t being called about the events, or aren’t told about them if they call in.

Your org receptionists then need to be drilled to handle random calls of people calling in asking information about these events — i.e. some unknown person calls in and asks about a Grand Opening in Los Angeles. The receptionist needs to be drilled to get enough data on the person that they are confident the person is a Scientologist BEFORE giving any data out.

What then follows is a long list of names. The first batch is a list of Scientologists who, for whatever reason, have fallen out of favor.

I recognized a few names.

There’s Paul Haggis, the Crash director who famously defected from Scientology and was the recent subject of a New Yorker profile.

Jason Beghe is also on the list — an actor who left and went public with his complaints about the church.

Another former Scientologist who went public with his disaffection is Jeff Hawkins. We reviewed his excellent book about once being the marketing genius behind Scientology’s big 1980s expansion.

Marc and Claire Headley are on the list, but their names are misspelled. Marc authored a thrilling escape narrative about leaving Scientology’s secretive desert base, Blown for Good.

I’m sure our astute readers will recognize many more names from this list of fallen Scientologists. Please add your identifications in the comments!

Even more fun for this Scientology watcher is the next list, “Known non-Scientologists who should not be on the [mailing] lists:”

Whoo boy! Now this is fun stuff.

There’s Graham Berry, an attorney we wrote about quite a few years ago, who the church tried to destroy with its use of “Fair Game.” See my story about Berry and Robert Cipriano.

Mark Bunker makes the list, naturally. “Wise Beard Man” has long been one of the smartest, most dedicated, and most level-headed church critics around. He’s currently putting together a television documentary about Scientology. Read more about it here.

Tory Christman! To this day, the story I enjoyed working on the most about Scientology was about Tory. She’s really something.

Of course Mark Ebner makes the list! He will forever be known as the guy, for Spy magazine, who walked into the Hollywood Celebrity Centre and got pampered because he convinced the staff that he was a German rock ‘n’ roll star.

So many other great names! There’s Jenna Miscavige Hill, niece to Scientology leader David Miscavige. There’s Jeff Jacobsen, an old friend to the Voice who helped us get into investigating this wacky cabal.

As with the Scientologists, we’d love to hear from our commenters about the others on the list. And if you’re on it, send us a message to brag about it!

UPDATE: Thank you to the folks who are e-mailing me to let me know that you were on the Enemies List! It’s like handing out lottery winnings! In other news, we got a little delayed today with some other matters, so our Janet Reitman interview and Grant Cardone update will take a little longer to appear. But they’re on the way! And much more!

@VoiceTonyO

Click here to see all recent Scientology coverage at the Voice

Tony Ortega is the editor-in-chief of The Village Voice. Since 1995, he’s been writing about Scientology at several publications. Among his other stories about L. Ron Hubbard’s organization:

The Larry Wollersheim Saga — Scientology Finally Pays For Its Fraud
The Tory Bezazian (Christman) Story — How the Internet Saved A Scientologist From Herself
The Jason Beghe Defection — A Scientology Celebrity Goes Rogue

The Paul Haggis Ultimatum — The ‘Crash’ Director Tells Scientology to Shove It
The Marc Headley Escape — ‘Tom Cruise Told Me to Talk to a Bottle’
The Jefferson Hawkins Stipulation — Scientology’s former PR genius comes clean
The Daniel Montalvo Double-Cross — Scientology lures a young defector into a trap
A Church Myth Debunked — Scientology and Proposition 8
Daniel Montalvo Strikes Back — Scientology Hit with Stunning Child-Labor Lawsuits
When Scientologists Attack — The Marty Rathbun Intimidation
A Scientologist Excommunicated — The Michael Fairman SP Declaration
The Richard Leiby Operation — Investigating a reporter’s divorce to shut him up
The Hugh Urban Investigation — An academic takes a harsh look at Scientology’s past
Giovanni Ribisi as David Koresh — A precedent for a Scientology-Branch Davidian link
Janet Reitman’s Inside Scientology — A masterful telling of Scientology’s history
The Western Spy Network Revealed? — Marty Rathbun ups the ante on David Miscavige