If you’ve ever followed the efforts to expose the Church of Scientology for the abusive cult that it is, you know how the church inserts itself into any legal proceeding regarding one of its celebrity members, even if the case doesn’t directly involve Scientology.
It has come to light that Scientology attorneys got their hands on criminal discovery material in the rape trial of Scientologist and former sitcom star Danny Masterson. Masterson, who starred in “That ’70s Show,” faces accusations of raping three women in the early 2000s.
“Deputy District Attorney Reinhold Mueller told the trial judge on Wednesday that a tranche of criminal discovery material has ended up in the hands of The Church of Scientology, even though it is not a party in the case,” reports the Daily Mail.
Actress and former Scientologist Leah Remini, who has become one of the leading whistleblowers about the church and its abuses, wrote about the case extensively in an Instagram post on Thursday.
“In the rape trial of celebrity Scientologist Danny Masterson yesterday, the Los Angeles District Attorney’s office revealed that Scientology has covertly obtained a significant amount of criminal discovery materials,” Remini wrote. “Scientology has no reason to have criminal discovery materials in its possession. No reason at all. Scientology, which should be a co-defendant in this trial, has repeatedly lied, saying it has no covert involvement in this trial.”
Scientology attorney Vicki Podberesky emailed the district attorney’s office to address what the church perceived as poor treatment of the church at the hands of the DA. (In other words, the prosecution was telling the truth rather than buying Scientology’s spin.) But Podberesky made what Remini refers to as “a colossal error” and “a grave error.”
Podberesky “included a link in her email,” Remini reports. When the DA’s office clicked on that link, they were shocked to see “a massive amount of their criminal discovery.”
Mueller detailed to the judge which files the link contained.
“In the attachments, I don’t want to say all of our discovery, but a large amount of our discovery was attached to these files,” the Daily Mail reports Mueller as saying. “Emails between law enforcement and victims. Text messages. Police reports. Photos. We weren’t able to get through all the attachments, but it’s extremely troubling that all of our redacted discovery we turned over to the defense is now in the hands of Scientology.”
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Remini notes that Podberesky’s link to the discovery files doesn’t just suggest Scientology’s typical pattern of gathering as much information as it can about anything involving prominent Scientologists; it points to something much more nefarious.
“This is the same criminal discovery the DA shared with Danny Masterson’s defense team,” she writes. “This is a huge deal! This confirms that Scientology, which has tax exemption based on its religious status (it’s not a religion), is colluding with Danny Masterson and his defense team.”
Remini also posits that Masterson’s family members, who are deeply entrenched in Scientology, or other Scientologist friends may be behind the leak of the discovery material to the church. “They are all Scientologists who believe they’re above the law. Scientology policy requires Scientologists to turn over these materials.”
She also admits that, while many defense attorneys do good work, there are some, including the lawyers in this case, who are merely doing the bidding of Scientology. At the same time, this dangerous cult is doing everything it can to protect one of its own.
“There is nothing Scientology and Scientologists won’t do to infiltrate government offices, organizations, and institutions,” Remini writes. “There’s nothing Scientology won’t do to obtain the intel it needs to protect itself. It has literally been Scientology policy for seven decades.”
Scientology attorneys have been present nearly every day of the trial, and a spokesperson told the Daily Mail that “the District Attorney has unconscionably centered his prosecution on religion and fabrications about the Church hoping to prejudice the jury and inflame bigotry.”
This is the canard that Scientology pulls out anytime someone dares pull back the curtain, and demonstrates what a dangerous cult Scientology actually is. It’s not “bigotry” to demonstrate that the entire Scientology organization is rallying behind Masterson any more than it is to call out the abuses in the Catholic Church or the Southern Baptist Convention.
The big difference is that, while the scandals in Christian denominations don’t characterize all Christians, this type of behavior has been baked into the cake of Scientology from its origins. All you have to do is read one of the many books or watch one of the many documentaries to know this fact.
In the end, Remini laments the “silence from mainstream media members who breathlessly covered every raised eyebrow and cough in the Johnny Depp/Amber Heard trial.” She’s dead on here, and it’s time for media outlets to step up and call Scientology out for its abuses of power.
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