The following report is from the March 8th picket..
I was there also, I will add that this report is a
true and accurate report on the extraordinary events of March 8th
and Thank you Ray!
Arnie Lerma
Clearwater Picket Report by Ray Randolf..
As best as I can remember...and according to my notes... (I would
appreciate people correcting any inaccuracies they see... to save me
from potential embarassment).
I was up at 4am on Friday, my plane left at 6:01 and I had to
make the god awful drive to DIA. Fortunately, I'd spent the night in
Lakewood, which was 20 miles closer to DIA than my home.
I had met with Lawrence the day before, and the plan was to
just meet on the plane.
Now, you have to understand, I'm not any kind of a morning person at
all. 4am is ungodly. I like staying up until 1am, going to work at
10am (I'm not doing that anymore, though) and the world may start
turning, at my command, at approx. 11am. It was a long trip.
I was armed with wireless email, I sent updates via the wireless
email. However, it wasn't as effective as I'd hoped. Although I hope
it provided some interesting discussion for the irc folks. :)
The plane arrived in Tampa at around 1:30pm or so and we met Jeff
Jacobson with the "Xenu Productions" sign at the terminal. At that
point, Lawrence split off to go get a rental car for himself while
Jeff Jacobson and I went off to Jeff's car. We drove into Clearwater
and straight to the Fort Harrison.. It was at this point that Jeff
and I discovered that the church was planning a childrens event across
the street from the Fort Harrison. I seem to remember Jeff calling
them "Fart Faces" which is a much nicer term than I would have used.
Here's my first live report from CW:
Clams Build Playground on Picket Site
Fri, 7 Mar 1997 14:29:31 -0600
Hi! just got into clearwater.. First report: the church has built
a temporary playground where we were going to picket. They are
sheilding themselves with children. Scumbags.-Ray
Jeff took me on a brief tour of Clearwater, showing me all the
scieno owned hotels (The Diana? Did that name come from where I
*think* it came from?). Neat stuff. The Howard Johnsons where
we were staying was four miles from the Fort Harrison.
The OSA was really nowhere to be seen at this point. At least not
highly visible, although some folks were seeing them here and there.
You have to understand.. Spotting OSA isn't like spotting some secret
undercover agent. When they're watching you, they WANT you to know
that you're being watched. This falls right in line with L. Ron
Hubbards "noisy investigation" policies.
Everyone was introduced and we all shook hands, got to see the faces
of the people we've been talking to and get to know them in real life.
Every single one of them was a pleasure to be around. Yes, even Steve
Fishman... I rather like the guy. We were one block from some kind of
nudie bar or strip joint or something, and everyone made jokes at
Steve's expense about him sneaking out to go there at night. But Steve
was laughing right along with the rest of us.
We went to the meeting that night to make the signs, meet with the
Detective Miller and Ken Dandar, the attorney for Lisa's family. The
meeting was definitely interesting. The CW police showed up and told
us what could and could not be done. Unfortunately, the scummy church
had decided that the CW police were in Cahoots with us, and that made
the Officer a bit less willing to talk than he might ordinarily have
been. The CW police were extremely professional. They informed us
that as Jeff and I had discovered earlier, they were planning an
"event" across from the fort harrison. They called this an "Anti-drug
awareness program" (think about that) and claimed that there were
going to be 150 of the "drug free marshals" (a CoS front) and
boyscouts. (We never saw a single boyscout. Not one.)
In addition to their "event" across the street from the Fort
Harrison, which was obviously designed to make us *look* like
we were protesting a drug awareness event, they church also decided,
rather spontaneously, that they needed to wash the front of the
building that day. So we had our choice: picket across from the
Fort Harrison and look like we're picketing a childrens drug awareness
program, or picket in front of the Fort Harrison and get hosed down
from their "washing of the building."
Here's the Live bulletin from that timeframe:
Clams trying to block both sides of the street
Fri, 7 Mar 1997 18:13:20 -0600
We are all meeting.. Detective Miller, all the critics
(sorry...too busy for names), etc. The "event" taking place
across from the Ft. Harrison is being compared to Winter
Wonderland and was organized 2 days ago. The church has gone to
the police with "grave concerns" about their safety. geez. The
"event"... is centered around children. They are also going to
wash the building (the fort harrison)...so they are trying to
block both sides of the street. -Ray
The scientologist told the police that if we picketed the courthouse
instead of the Fort Harrison, that they would leave us alone. If we
insisted on picketing them, they would usher in 500 counter
protestors.
We decided that there was no solution to this, that we could only play
it by ear once we got there.
Here's the live bulletin:
Co$ plans 500-strong counter protest
Fri, 7 Mar 1997 18:45:45 -0600
Ok on web page. Rod keller has pics we will try to get up. Latest
is that scn has said that if we picket at the courthouse, they
won't bother us. If we try to picket the ft. harrison...they will
have 500 counter-protesters. They will be washing the ft
harrison... 150 children across the street. We wonder if the
children will like Xenu. -Ray
Then Ken Dandar, the attorney for Lisa McPhersons Family showed
up. He updated us on the Lisa story. Told us he was
committed to bringing justice. He passed on a "thank you" from
the family of Lisa McPherson. The only real new information
that came out of this meeting was the information that Lisa
McPherson had a scientologist boyfriend who continued to
spend her money after her death, and that the medical officer at
FLAG who had taken care of Lisa has now gone missing.
The Live Updates on this:
Attorney for Lisa's family speaks to picketers
Fri, 7 Mar 1997 18:58:26 -0600
Ken Dandar is speaking to us. He is the attorney for Lisa's
family. Telling us the story in his words... not much new to his
version. Says Lisa had been dead for 6 hours before dropping her
body off. Lisa's family thanks us for bringing this out. They
thank netizens for the info. He understands that this case is
going to turn into a crusade for him. "David vs. Goliath," he
says..but he will not back down.-Ray
Medical Director at Flag goes missing
Fri, 7 Mar 1997 19:06:02 -0600
Ken Dander tells us that Janice Johnson, Medical director at
FLAG, has gone missing. Lisa M. had a boyfriend Kurt Payne (or
Paine)..he was on Lisa's checking account and writing checks on
her account after her death. -Ray
We went back to planning for the picket and making our signs. More
discussion was had about their plans to halt our picketing. Again, it
was decided that there was no solution. We did, however, decide to
send a group of pre-picketers early in the morning. The idea behind
this was to make the scns think we were starting the picket, get them
completely mobilized, and then split. Lawrence, Fishman and
Touretsky (I think) were involved in this, and according to what I
heard later, it was extremely successful.
Everyone retired for the evening. I was pretty tired and sore myself.
I slept great right up until around 4-4:30am... Then the screaming in
the parking lot woke me up. I got up to see what the noise was
outside. I was rooming with Wollersheim, who woke up with me moving
around in the room. Outside, laying face down in the parking lot,
with his pants down to his knees...a man was screaming for us to come
out of our rooms so that he could kick our asses. Wollersheim, being
somewhat used to being op'd just said, "yeah..call the front desk, I'm
going back to bed." I called the front desk and the man was
arrested. The next morning, he returned to pick up a backpack he'd
stored in the bushes the night before. When he saw me on the balcony
watching him, he wished me good luck in picketing and he left via
Taxi.
A incident reminiscent of Miss Bloodybutt...
Sat, 8 Mar 1997 06:50:20 -0600
Good morning from cw! the wireless email was choking a bit last
night..so we will do the best we can. check a.b.s. for pictures.
In an incident that reminded me of Ms. Bloodybutt, a man was
lying in the parking lot of our hotel this morning at 5am...with
his pants pulled half down, screaming at us to come out of our
rooms. I called security and went back to sleep.. Trying to find
out what happened this morning..more soon. all notes have been
recvd, and mesgs relayed. -Ray
I asked the front desk for more details several times...but they
couldn't provide me with anything.
Everyone left for the picket... I was the last to leave.
The picket was the freakiest thing I think I've ever experienced. I
went armed with an AR8000 Radio Scanner, preprogrammed with the
frequencies that the CoS is licensed with the FCC to use. I took an
OptoElectronics Scout with me to pick up other frequencies they may be
using as well. (It seems as if the folks in the CoS are not being
entirely legit with their FCC licensing! A conversation with the FCC
will shed light on this). I also had a wireless email system that was
used to provide updates to Marina Chong who set up a temporary website
with my updates from the line.
To explain a little bit about the technology.. The Scout hooks to the
AR8000 (which is really just a scanner)... Then when a radio frequency
activates nearby, the scout detects this and programs the scanner to
receive that frequency. Well, it only took them half the day to
figure out what I was up to. But I snagged every frequency they used
there that day. Which was significant.
At the picket, the scientologists had their OWN signs. Signs read:
"Jeff Jacobson porno king"
"Keith Henson is a child molestor"
"Wollersheim: Peanut butter man" (funny story if you haven't heard it)
"Bigots go home" "Druggies leave Clearwater!" (I guess cuz we were
picketing a drug awareness deal?) "fight crime, not religion." (What
happens when one claims to be the other?)
Our signs:
"Scientology Murdered Lisa McPherson?"
"Killed at FLAG" (with picture of Lisa)
"Clear Today, Gone Tomorrow"
"Lisa's Blood on Scieno Hands"
"L. Ron Hubbards Cult of Greed and Power"
"Demand investigations into Cult criminal activities."
"Lisa wasn't the first."
The number of counter-picketers they said would be there had been
greatly exaggerated at 500. The real number was much closer to 200.
They organized the pickets via radio, if a "hostile picketer" wasn't
having his sign blocked *completely* by the counter-protesters, they
would order the ground units to route more picketers in his/her
direction.
Things started out relatively hostile.. People hitting me with their
signs, and surrounding me very closely so as to block anyone from the
street from seeing my sign. The whole time, they verbally attacked
me. The most frequent questions I was asked during the picket were:
1. Did you know Lisa?
(A. No.. Did you? Two or three actually said Yes... but one of the
people who said yes, couldn't even tell me where she worked. And one
of the other ones told me that I didn't have my facts straight and
that Lisa was really killed in a car accident. She should tell her
church's attorneys this.)
2. Who's paying you to be here?
(A. I paid my own way. In fact, I paid everyones way. I dropped 10
million in change to make this protest happen.)
3. What's your name?
(A. I refuse to answer that question. (at one point, however, a
woman said to me, "you look like a.....Ray... I think I'll call you
Ray." I told her I thought she was attractive.))
I tried to listen to the radio to see how they were controlling the
picketers, I was *moderately* successfuly in doing this. Enough so
that I soon figured out that if I "took a rest" that everyone would be
re-routed to deal with other picketers, I could pick up my sign and
get maybe a good solid minute without being bugged while the OSA goons
routed the picketers to me.
About 2/3 of the way through the picket, I was walking along (I took
more frequent breaks than most other folks, as my rib was really
hurting me.) and I heard on the radio, "We've got a guy with some
radio equipment down here.. looks like maybe a scanner." I looked
around to see a member of the Sea Org standing about 20 yards away
from me reporting my presence and my radio equipment to the
"controllers." I made it clear to him that I could hear every
single word that they said... And they were none too pleased about
this. At first, they attempted radio silence. This lasted almost
three minutes, if that. They *had* to have their radios. So
instead, they gave me my very own shadow so that they could see what I
was doing with the information that I heard. The radios deeply
enturbulated them. There were two other scanners in use during the
protest. Making a mockery of their "controllers" became quite the
fun little game.
I can't forget to mention Xenu. Xenu walked up and down the sidewalk
blasting people with his raygun. It's safe to say that the cult did
*not* like Xenu! They surrounded him with people, so that passing
cars couldn't see him and whenever someone tried to take a picture of
him, they would entirely block Xenu from view with their picket signs.
Xenu WAS seen, however, and was immensely popular. Although
apparently, the lower level scn's were being told that the "Xenu"
stuff wasn't really in OT3...that that was "A lie made up on the
internet." Boy are they in for a shock. When one scientologist
told me that the OT3 we had on the net wasn't OT3, I asked him why
people had been sued for posting it. His reply, "they got sued
because they were lying." Hmmm. Maybe I was talking to Elliot
Ableson and I didn't even notice.
It was rather exciting to be harassed by some of scientology's best.
Joe Neil (who knew who I was and told me so) who is head of OSA INT
East US or some such cryptic nonsense position. Suffice to say, he's
one of their bigger, more naughty spooks. I got the Mike Rinder death
glare for my "scientology murdered Lisa mcpherson?" sign. I did NOT
get to talk to Leisa Goodman, which was truly sad. The highlight of
the whole event for me was getting "handled" by Sylvia Stanard, this
little cow of a woman is about the most vile, cretinous little blob
that I think I've ever had the displeasure of conversing with. She
flatly denied that Xenu was part of OT3 and for the most part, her job
seemed to be to get in our faces and bullbait us.
There really wasn't much more to the protest than that. People
following around and making asses of themselves. The message that
came across to all involved was, "JOIN SCIENTOLOGY, LEARN TO BE AN
ASSHOLE."
In about the last hour of the protest, the adults became tired and
they started recruiting the children from the drug free marshals
events.. We saw a 10 year old picketing with a sign he didn't even
understand and a 15 year old. Pictures are available.
We all left the picket, went to dinner did various funstuffs and then
met back at the courthouse for the Candlelight vigil. It was dark
and the mood had changed considerably. We walked across Fort Harrison
blvd into the gauntlet of cameras from the media. At least one of
which was Inside Edition. The scientologists came across the street
out of the fort harrison and "milled" on the sidewalk. We were
walking through a huge crowd of scientologists. They had apparently
heard about my broken rib and two large men on either side of me
coordinated rather obviously to bump into me, driving my own arms into
my ribs. They were making no secret of what they were doing, either.
It was purposeful, and they *wanted* me to know it. The pain was
excrutiating, but I wasn't about to give them the satisfaction of
complaining about it. If medical problems develop as a result, I'll
sue the CoS. :)
I spent most of the time walking behind Gabe Cezares(sp?), the
ex-mayor of Clearwater who had his share of run-ins with the church.
They yelled at me, called me names, "bumped" me, stepped on my toes,
blew out my candle, and did *everything* that they thought they could
get away with in light of the police presence. However, one thing
was very clear... had the police not been there, we'd have been
seriously hurt. One man who blew out my candle three times was
finally taken aside by a police officer who told him that if he saw
him do it again, he'd be arrested.
Ron Newman and myself were the first to leave the candlelight
vigil. I simply told them, "I'm done, you can go now"
and they pretty much did (well, sort of. They shifted focus to
Ron Newman instead of me). Two OSA agents approached
Ron and I and asked if they could come with us after the picket.
I told them no and asked why they never sent any cute, female
OSA agents to bother us. To which they replied, "you let us
come with you, we'll bring women." The other guy pointed at the
crowd and said, "we'll bring a lot of women. whoever you want."
It's hard to take it seriously... I can't believe their request
to "hang out" with us was serious, much less the offer of
giving us women. Either way, it's still pretty offensive that
they think of their fellow churchgoers that way.
Does this sound like a religion that YOU would want to belong to? Here
was an organization that sells itself as being an advocate of freedom,
and they did everything they could to stomp on ours.
We left that night and the white van followed us out. We went and
watched movies, the news, ate pizza and drank beer. Although I'm sure
they figured we were doing something far more suppressive. It was
satisfying to know that we kept them working long after we'd started
playing.
Several hints were dropped throughout the day that there would be
another picket on sunday. This was just a bluff, but they fell for
it pretty heavily. The scanner indicated that their watchtower people
were back in position watching for "SP's" early sunday morning.
Someone called Lawrence Wollersheim on the phone in our room as I was
walking out the door. Lawrence answered and the individual on the
other end claimed to be me, wanting to know "what the plan was."
Lawrence said that they had my voice down pat. Another individual
called about 20-30 minutes later claiming to be Steve Fishman, wanting
to know "what the plan was". It wasn't Steve. Both imposters were
told that we were picketing the Fort Harrison later that day.
The white van was omnipresent. They'd taken a picture of Arnie Lerma,
turned it into a mask and the driver of the white van was wearing it.
The individuals in the van were the same OSA agents that offered Ron
Newman and I the women the night before. Maybe they just wanted to
be our friends. They did seem lonely.
We kept up the "second picket" charade right up until the last minute,
even when we were climbing into the car to go to the airport, Lawrence
yelled, "do you have the signs? Ok... we'll see ya there!" The
white van followed us, providing exactly what we wanted. They soon
figured out they'd been duped and turned around.. hopefully to find
that their other targets had slipped out the back.
This stuff is all from my perspective... I have tried very hard not to
tell *other peoples* stories here, as we all have our own, and I hope
that the others will take the time to write up their ARSCC KR's.
Lessons learned in a nutshell:
1. These people are dangerous. Even the publics can display
cult-think to a truly frightening extent.
2. Sometimes police *really are* our friends. Sometimes.
3. If you give hundreds of thousands of dollars to certain churches,
they'll teach you to be an asshole.
4. Sea Org chicks... well... nevermind.
5. P.T. Barnum was *way* right.
-Ray
--
M. Ray Randolph -- rayr@ezlink.com -- SP4 w/Clam Cluster
Read about Scientology! FREE SEX! http://www.ezlink.com/~rayr/scieno.htm