Crossposted to es.alt.religion.cienciologia This one was tough for me to write (I don't speak Spanish).

I appeal to all readers, especially Spaniards, to email or post corrections and additions.

Much of the material comes from Reuters, and is likely correct.

More comes from babelfish translations of articles in El Mundo and El Pais, and I sure hope I haven't made any major howlers.

A fraction comes from an anonymous posting to a.r.s -- I have been able to coroborrate most of the major points, and finally decided to include it.

Spain:

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1982 [ anonymous source, some details uncorroborated ] Under the direction of Kurt Weiland, Scientology's Office of Special Affairs stages a faked arrest of Per Gardstrom, (once Scientology's Commanding Officer for Iberia), as he arrives in the Madrid airport from Copenhagen.

Weiland escorts Gardstrom back to Copenhagen on a subsequent flight, successfully preventing Gardstrom from responding to inquiries from the Spanish authorities about Scientology's international currency transfers.

Gardstrom's friends are taken in by the ruse, and inquire with the police about the "arrest". The Spanish authorities determine that no actual arrest has occurred, and open an investigation into the apparent kidnapping.
December, 1983 "Captain" Bill Robinson elected Chairman of the Operating Thetan Central Committee Worldwide at the OTC Congress in Marbella, Spain.

1984?

"Captain" Bill Robinson, Pedro "Petrus" Lerma, and 17 other Scientology dissidents announce "Operation Phoenix", and found the "Iglesia Universal de Ciencolgica" schism in Madrid Spain.

Robinson is declared a "Supressive Person" by the US-based Scientology organization.

later in 1984?

Pedro Lerma is jailed on trumped-up charges, and released pending trial. Litigation drags on for six years, at the end of which he is exonerated; meanwhile, representatives of the US-based Scientology organization repeatedly libel him in the media. The judge in this case is D. Jose Maria Vazquez Honrubia.

[what were the charges?]
November 1988 Pursuant to the investigation started by the Gardstron kidnapping, Spanish police raid a Scientology conference and nineteen Scientology offices in seven cities, resulting eventually in thirty-seven arrests.

Scientology President Heber Jentzsch, an American, was one of seventy Scientologists initially held on suspicion of coercion, fraud, tax evasion, forging of public documents, and embezzlement.

Jentzsch was soon released (as were fifty-nine others, including all non-Spaniards). Eleven Scientologists, deemed "undesireable aliens", were ordered to leave the country.

"The real god of this organization is money," said Madrid examining magistrate D. Jose Maria Vazquez Honrubia, before referring the case to the jurisdiction of the Audencia Nacionale, which deals with more important cases.

More than one hundred individuals presented formal accusations against Scientology and its executives for one or another kind of fraud. A majority allege theft or larceny. Dozens filed accusations of having been threatened, of having been coerced, of having been falsely arrested or falsely accused of crimes.

Others allege slander. Accused include the Dianetics Associations, Narconon, the Church of Scientology International, Druganon, SOCO, the Sea Organization, and Flag Services Organization.
Late Fall 1988 In the fall of 1988, [Juan/John] Caban, one of the plaintiffs in the Scientology case, was attacked by three alleged "ex-scientologists" outside his place of work. One of the attackers was Montserrat Aguilera, OSA operative and former president of the Civil Dianetics Association in Spain, and a defendant in the main case; the other was Alberto Suarez.

They were eventually charged with attempted homicide, and were originally scheduled for trial early in January of 1996.

[what became of this case?]
1989 - 1999 In a pattern familiar from court cases in Canada, the U.S., Great Britain, Greece, and Germany, Scientology places intense pressure on the plaintiffs to settle, through both legal and extra-legal means. Eventually, all but one of them do so.

Meanwhile, Scientology's lawyers deluge the Spanish courts with motions.
20 Jan 1989 Cristina Chains, instruction judge number 5 of Madrid, rejects a Scientology motion for recusal of Vazquez Honrubia.

Lawyers representing Jentzsch and the civil association Dianetica had petitioned for his removal on the grounds of his "open enmity"

towards the activities of the sect.

Scientology's lawyers immediately appealed on procedural grounds.
17 Feb 1989 A North American Scientologist was arrested for hiring private detectives to pry into the affairs of - Pilar Salarrullana, deputy of the Grupo Mixto and chair of the parliamentary investigation on sects;

- the journalist Jose Rodriguez;

- judge Jose Maria Vazquez Honrubia.

Information compiled by these detectives was found in a court-ordered search of the files of the Morga detective agency of Barcelona, and included details of bank accounts, addresses, automobile registration, photos of family members, mortgages, and legal records.

One of the accused is Scientologist Humberto Fontana.

Jose Manuel Gomez Bertitez, a lawyer working for Scientology, explained to El PAIS that the Agency Morgan had not compiled dossiers as such, but only some papers with various data, "possibly requested by somebody in the Church", and denied that Jose Luis Chamorro, another of Scientology's lawyers, was implicated in the crimes committed.
2 April 1989 Public prosecutor Carlos Ladron de Guevara, investigating the Church of Scientology, moved before the Court of Instruction number 21 of Madrid for new statements by two high officials of the former pro-Franco regime; the object of these requests is to clarify facts about the establishment of the sect in Spain, in the years 1969 - 1975. The named officials are Luis Rodriguez de Miguel, former Subsecretary of the Department of the Interior in 1973, and Luis Mayans, a director of the Merchant Navy in 1975.

[Unknown to the prosecutor, Rodriguez de Miguel had died 19 April 1982 ] Also requested are whatever records from 1972 are held by the Ministries of Interior, Foreign, Commerce, and Navy, with respect to the vessels Royal Scot Man and Apollo, and to the activities of the "Operation and Transport Corporation Ltd" (OTC), which is considered the embryo of the Church of the Scientology in Spain.

Presiding magistrate Jose Maria Vazquez Honrubia states that he has requested information on Scientology's actions in the years 1969 - 1975 from Interpol and Scotland Yard, as well as from the Moroccan Department of the Interior.
1989 The Spanish Ministry of Health issues a report calling Scientology "totalitarian" and "pure and simple charlatanism."
October 1990 In Sentence No 639 of the 16th Section of the Provincial Audience of Madrid, Pedro Lerma is acquitted of all charges. Evidence presented at the trial implies that Scientology operatives had "framed" him. The sentence describes the goals of Scientology in these (roughly translated) words:

".... which is none other than that of "making money and making more money", and to which end they put into practice graft, extortion, kidnappings and sequester, theft and robbery of documents, falsifications, larceny, false accusations and denouncements, obstruction of justice, defrauding of the public treasury, Social Security and a countless list of unlimited illicit activities from which we should not exclude espionage ......"
Dec 1994 On 12 Dec 1994, Magistrate Judge of the Tribunal of Instruction 21 of Madrid, D. Maria Paz Redondo Gil, handed down a Decree of Commencement of Oral Trial, indicting Jentzsch and twenty Spanish Scientologists on charges of "the felonies of illicit association, threats, coercion, usurpation of functions (called "impersonating an officer"

in the US), false accusation, simulation of a felony, (that is, framing an innocent person for a felony), illegal arrest, crimes against the Tax Administration, crimes against freedom and safety in the workplace, intrusion, crimes against public health, injuries, damages, abuse, slander and inducement to suicide"

The defendants were required to post surety of 160,841,271 pesetas (about 1.1 million dollars);

Weiland and three others escape indictment, apparently as a result of a failure to formally charge them at the outset.

Legal proceedings are scheduled to begin in June 1999, in the Fourth District of the Provincial Court, before judge Pilar Olivan.

Eighteen defendendants are charged with twelve criminal offenses.

The prosecutor has demanded a 30-year prison term for Jentzsch.

May 25, 1999 Scientology's defense lawyer defendants accused the judge of the Fourth chamber of the Madrid court with prejudice.

Trial proceedings are postponed until highest court in Madrid can rule upon this motion.

April 28, 2000 The Section Fourth of the Provincial Hearing of Madrid decided to pospone until 6 June 2000 the Scientology trial that was to begin 3 May. The court has acceded to the request for delay submitted by the defense, with the aim of regularizing situations with Property before beginning the oral hearings. The trial, that was begun by a court of Madrid more than 16 years ago, and which has already been postponed several times, will have almost 150 witnesses.
October 1, 2000 Pleading continued illness on the part of the lead defense lawyer, Cobo Del Rosal, Scientology moves for an additional postponement.

The trial, which was to have begun October 19th, will not begin until November 30th.
November 30, 2000 Another postponement; Cobo del Roso still sick.
April 5, 2001 Scientology's attorneys move for dismissal, citing the long delay between indictment and the commencement of trial.
April 2001 The trial finally gets under way.

Heber Jentzsch does not show up.

The defense immediately moves for dismissal.

The prosecution argues that since Jentzsch is not present, his lawyers cannot argue for dismissal on his behalf.

Proceedings are scheduled to continue on April 17th.

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