1977 Dodge Van, RIP Few cars have gone so far on so little.

Arthur Doyle is the pen name of a new writer and ex-staff member from the Int Base. We were friends for many years and I am proud he has joined our ranks as a fellow whistle blower. His story is true. I was one of those executives often forced to sleep in the rotting trailer he describes. Since David Miscavige refused to look at my submissions, my statistics were "down" and I lost all privileges including being allowed to go home to my own wife and small room at the Kirby Garden Apartments, in Hemet, California where three couples were jammed into a two-bedroom apartment. One night, after finishing work about 3 am I staggered up the hill to try to find a place to sleep in the trailer. Feeling my way in near total darkness, there was only one bunk empty. Exhausted, I lay down for a few minutes trying to blot out the snoring... only to feel something crawling all over me. Ants! The bed was infested with ants that had somehow gotten by the spiders. Typical. I got up, brushed off the ants as best I could, got dressed, and walked a mile back own to my office in the Cine castle where I slept on the floor. As per usual. The trailer was provided by the Golden Era Productions Security Force, which was run by Danny Dunagan a genuine Guns-n'-Ammo-reading-prison-guard-of-a-subhuman if there ever was one. Think "Percy Wetmor" from Stephen King's The Greenmile and you have Danny Dunagan, Security Chief Gold and Miscavige boot licker. Danny liked having cars and bicycles owned by staff towed off on any pretext. Three times he tried to have my 1977 Dodge van towed to the junk yard because it was old. Somehow on $46 a week (and there were months when Gold staff didn't receive any pay at all) I couldn't afford a new car. It hadn't had a repair or even a tune-up since 1989. It was hard enough just making insurance payments, much less having money for repairs. Danny didn't have a problems like that because the Security Force gave him a motorcycle that he could ride around and a black Nissan Pathfinder. That was the same Nissan Pathfinder that Danny used to run Marc Headley off the road (which could have been fatal). Marc crashed in the mud, shaking him up and damaging his small motor bike. In the confusion, Danny came over and took the keys out of Marc's ignition. Marc was only saved when the local police showed up, scaring away Percy Wetmore... I mean, Danny Dunagan. And by the way, Marc has written a book about his experiences on the Int base which should be a real eye-opener. It was edited by Joe Howard and Marty wrote an introduction for it. You can order Marc's book now. When I finally left the base in 2004, my 1977 bag of bolts somehow got me across the country. The only thing preventing it from falling apart was the intention which sprang directly from necessity level. The old Dodge held up just long enough to arrive in Dallas. A short time after that, it finally went to car heaven. -- Thoughtful

Generally speaking, Scientology has a lot to do with trust. By addressing past betrayals people have experienced, people become more able to trust others and more trustworthy themselves. So naturally one would expect to find a high degree of trust at the highest levels of Scientology, especially at Scientology’s International headquarters.

I arrived at the Int base in 1990. I had high expectations and was for the most part pleased with the people at Gold and other organizations there. I met people who were truly stellar and who could and did move mountains.

At first blush the base was a beautiful place nestled in the base of the Mt San Jacinto mountains. It had tennis courts, soccer field, basketball, beach volleyball, running track, a lake, pools - needless to say I was very impressed. Until I realized no one every got to use any of those facilities.

And soon I noticed things that were truly disturbing. Many people wanted to leave and some of these people were crazy! One individual who was being watched 24 hours a day just snapped and chopped off the head of a cat. He talked to himself often and had to have someone with him at all hours of the day and night. He chopped weeds during the day and was “on lines” to leave.

Then there were the evolutions that took place when someone “blew” (escaped). Several times I had to drive out to go look for someone who had left, going to Greyhound stations and other likely places where they might be found. There were people in security who could track people. They would methodically call every hotel in suspected areas where one was thought to have gone and they'd almost always catch the person so they could be hauled back to the base. These “blow” evolutions could involve 20 or more people and would sometimes last days. Once the individual was found senior staff members would go persuade them to come back. If this happened and you went back to the base, you were assigned to live in “OGH” which stood for “Old Gilman House” where security guards watched you day and night. If you still wanted to leave it could take months if not years. People undergoing such treatment were tormented by staff until they changed their minds.

Even in the Kirby and Vista apartments where staff lived in Hemet (9 miles from the Int base), men in Golden Era Productions were each assigned to “guard” staff as they slept. Even these lodgings were far from “nice.” For example, three couples were assigned to every-two bedroom apartment. A temporary wall was put into the living room, making it into another “bed room.” Without money for furniture, staff didn’t have any. Cheap mattress on cardboard-sided “box springs” (with no springs inside) was the typical bed that married couples slept on for ten years or more. After just a few years, these “beds” turned into bowls. Miscavige had millions of dollars, but couldn’t even afford a decent beds for Sea Org staff.

At least one night each month I had to stay up all night to keeping watch. The way this was done was strange. The main idea was to keep staff from slipping away and we were indoctrinated that if someone tried to take off in their car (if they were lucky enough to own one that ran) then you got in the car with them or grab their car keys and radio for help. Those on night watch were often assigned to guard particular people who were under suspicion or who had expressed displeasure with the way they were being treated. Any non-optimum response from someone was enough to trigger the security machine.

And god forbid, if anyone did happen to get away while you were on watch that night, you would be punished for it with a loss of privileges and status.

As it happened, I had to stand watch over many senior executives. For example, one night I had to stay right outside Ronnie Miscavige’s door all night (Ronnie left the Sea Org in 2000). I remember thinking that things were really strange if even Ronnie, David Miscavige's own brother and Marketing Exec Int, could not be trusted.

Things only got worse after that... After too many people slipped away in the night, senior execs were no longer allowed to stay off the base. In other words, they were confined to the base to be under watch by armed guards all the time within the spiked razor-sharp fence, motion sensors and telescope high on the hill overlooking the base manned by a security guard who watched everything 24 hours a day.

The point is that NO ONE was trusted by David Miscavige even all these people who were for all intents and purposes, volunteers paid almost nothing. Executives who often worked till ridiculous hours of the night had to sleep in a trailer that was completely uninsulated. When the trailers were crowded, they had to sleep on cots with the cheapest imaginable blankets. Sometimes ants, mosquitoes and spiders in the trailers made sleeping tough.

In the morning, these executives had to walk almost a mile to take a shower in the garage building. Even though these executives already had a room in a small apartment, a bed with a wife or husband in it, a shower only a few feet away (some creature comforts), they still were punished even further and forced to live in terribly degraded places because of David Miscavige.

No one was trusted!

Written by Arthur Doyle