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References: <20020903072001.30984.qmail@nym.alias.net> <0aa3a86084cdb58a3b5251d78bd92d8b@dizum.com> Newsgroups: alt.religion.scientology,comp.org.eff.talk,misc.legal Subject: (amicus, source docs) Minton -- Affidavit Message-ID: Date: Fri, 6 Sep 2002 02:00:04 +0200 (CEST) Mail-To-News-Contact: abuse@dizum.com Organization: mail2news@dizum.com Lines: 711 Path: news2.lightlink.com!news.lightlink.com!gail.ripco.com!fu-berlin.de!newsfeed01.sul.t-online.de!t-online.de!newspeer1-gui.server.ntli.net!ntli.net!peernews.cix.co.uk!news.itconsult.net!news.dizum.com!sewer-output!mail2news-x3!mail2news-x2!mail2news Xref: news2.lightlink.com alt.religion.scientology:1551275 comp.org.eff.talk:105669 misc.legal:433699 >From courtwatch@hotmail.com Thu May 02 12:21:47 2002 Path: sn-us!sn-xit-03!supernews.com!nntp.cs.ubc.ca!logbridge.uoregon.edu !pln-w!spln!dex!extra.newsguy.com!newsp.newsguy.com!enews3 From: Court_Watch Newsgroups: alt.religion.scientology Subject: ROBERT S. MINTON -- SECOND AFFIDAVIT -- APRIL 24, 2002 Date: Thu, 02 May 2002 12:21:47 -0400 Organization: http://extra.newsguy.com Lines: 693 Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: p-088.newsdawg.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 1.91/32.564 Xref: sn-us alt.religion.scientology:1064585 IN THE CIRCUIT COURT FOR THE SIXTH JUDICIAL CIRCUIT IN AND FOR PINELLAS COUNTY, STATE OF FLORIDA CIVIL DIVISION Case No. 00-5682-CI-11, Division 11 ESTATE OF LISA MCPHERSON, by and through the personal Representative, DELL LIEBREICH Plaintiff, vs. CHURCH OF SCIENTOLOGY FLAG SERVICE ORGANIZATION, JANIS JOHNSON, ALAIN KARTUZINSKI and DAVID HOUGHTON, D.D.S., Defendants. ____________________________________ AND RELATED COUNTERCLAIM. ____________________________________/ SECOND AFFIDAVIT OF ROBERT S. MINTON STATE OF FLORIDA ) ) ss. COUNTY OF PINELLAS ) Robert S. Minton, being duly sworn, deposes and says: 1. I am over 18 years old, have personal knowledge of the facts set forth herein, and am otherwise competent to testify in this matter. 2. On March 9, 1997, I met attorney Ken Dandar for the first time when I participated in a picket in Clearwater, Florida against the Church of Scientology. The picket focused on the death of Lisa McPherson. Mr. Dandar was introduced to me by Mr. Lawrence Wollersheim at the Howard Johnson's Motel on U.S. 19 in Clearwater. Mr. Dandar had an extensive discussion with Mr. Wollersheim at that meeting in my presence to learn about the pursuit of other Scientology corporations and church leaders as a litigation tactic to "go after" Scientology. 3. I had previously loaned Mr. Wollersheim $700,000 and have since loaned his attorney, Dan Leipold, $500,000 to assist in their litigation against Scientology. My money was used in part to pay the witnesses in that litigation to provide affidavits to support Messrs. Wollersheim and Leipold's theories. The same witnesses have been used by Mr. Dandar in this litigation. 4. Until October 1997 my financial involvement against Scientology was limited to the Wollersheim litigation. At that time, I decided that the Lisa McPherson wrongful death case would be a far more effective centerpiece for me and I contacted Mr. Dandar in October 1997 and offered to loan the Estate $100,000 to defray costs and expenses so this case could become a vehicle to attack Scientology on a broad scale. 5. That $100,000 and all subsequent amounts, up to a total of $2,050,000, I loaned to the Estate was specifically for covering the expenses of litigating the wrongful death case. It was not a personal loan to Mr. Dandar, and was not to be spent for other purposes or other cases. The agreement I had with the Estate was that if the case was won or favorably settled, I would get my money back from the Estate (with no interest) once the Estate's expenses were covered. 6. Following receipt of my $100,000, Mr. Dandar sent me a letter telling me that I would have no participation in the control of the litigation. This self-serving statement quickly became untrue, as Mr. Dandar immediately began consulting me about the conduct of the litigation, briefing me on confidential information from the case, sending me copies of deposition and hearing transcripts, and calling me for advice. His statements concerning case control became increasingly untrue throughout my involvement in the case when Mr. Dandar would do things in the litigation designed to satisfy my wishes and thus get more money from me. 7. Two days after I sent Mr. Dandar the first $100,000 check, I made postings to the internet making my views clear - I wanted Scientology charged with murder. Mr. Dandar then filed his First Amended Complaint in the wrongful death case, expanding the case and claiming that Scientology intentionally caused the death of Lisa McPherson. 8. In early December 1997 I first discussed with Mr. Dandar the possibility that it would be a good idea if the Estate of Lisa McPherson would agree to donate a substantial part of any proceeds from this case to an anti-cult group as I believed this would mute Scientology's criticisms of the Estate and Mr. Dandar and it was a way for me to recover the funds I had invested in the litigation. Mr. Dandar told me on or about December 5, 1997, that he had discussed this matter with the family of Lisa McPherson and they agreed to donate the "bulk" of any proceeds received, after covering expenses and Mr. Dandar's contingency fee, to an anti-cult group. I later testified about this agreement in a deposition in Boston, Massachusetts on January 13, 1998 in the presence of Mr. Dandar. At that time, Mr. Dandar told me that the anti-cult group that would receive the money was FACTNet, an anti-Scientology group started by Mr. Wollersheim. I was President and on the Board of FACTNet at that time. 9. Shortly before this deposition, I had met Mr. Dandar at lunch time at a Starbucks on Cambridge Street in Boston, across from Mass General. Mr. Dandar was there taking a deposition in a disrelated case. Mr. Dandar was asking about further funding for the wrongful death case. He also wanted to know whether I had any offshore funds that could facilitate the litigation. He told me that with every dollar that I provided to support the litigation, Scientology would spend $20. 10. Dell Liebreich and her two sisters, Lee Skelton and Ann Carlson confirmed in depositions in May 1999 that they had agreed to donate the bulk of any money to a cult awareness group. Further, Ms. Liebreich and Ms. Carlson confirmed that they wanted a cult awareness group named for Lisa McPherson to receive the "bulk" of the proceeds from the case. 11. As a result of this agreement to pay the proceeds of a judgment to an entity I controlled, and because the case had now been turned into a broad attack on Scientology, I continued to provide money to fund the case, a total of $400,000 through 1998 alone. This money was used in part to pay witnesses to be used in the wrongful death litigation. All of these witnesses were ex-Scientologists who had left Scientology years before Lisa McPherson died, and had no personal knowledge of any facts surrounding her death. 12. In June 1998 I was featured in a forty-minute segment on Dateline entitled "The Crusader." The program focused on my activities concerning Scientology. Throughout the filming of the Dateline program, Mr. Dandar indicated his excitement at the possibility of more sensational anti-Scientology coverage on national television, especially if I could get Dateline to focus on the wrongful death case. Mr. Dandar told me he was anxious to have any media against Scientology especially if it would have some impact on the jury pool in Florida. 13. Mr. Dandar encouraged me to get as much negative media about Scientology as possible and I gave media interviews whenever I could. I attended and organized regular picketing of Scientology facilities - which Mr. Dandar and others in the trial team also attended on occasion. 14. I also funded production of a movie about Scientology ("The Profit"). I invested $2.5 million to have two anti-Scientology critics produce the movie. Along with me, Jesse Prince, Stacy Brooks and other LMT staff, Mr. Dandar also had an acting role in the movie. Mr. Dandar played an FBI agent. Mr. Dandar felt the movie would help generate a negative view of Scientology with potential jurors in the area. The only place in the United States the movie was ever screened was in Clearwater and Tampa. The movie was of such poor quality that distribution became impossible. 15. In August 1999, Ms. Brooks and I met with Mr. Dandar in Philadelphia so that Mr. Dandar could brief us on the status of the wrongful death case. I complained to Mr. Dandar that he was not adequately pressing the Scientology aspects of the case and urged him to make more use of Ms. Brooks and Mr. Prince as Scientology "experts." 16. Ms. Brooks and I told Mr. Dandar that we really wanted him to focus the case on Scientology and its leadership as I was funding a case about the "death of a Scientologist on the Introspection Rundown," not just a "simple wrongful death case." It is my belief that because I was funding the case, and in order to ensure that I would continue to do so, Mr. Dandar was willing to shift the emphasis of the case from a simple wrongful death suit to a case against the beliefs and practices of Scientology. At the end of this meeting, Mr. Dandar said this would cost more and I then handed Mr. Dandar a check for $250,000, bringing the total I had loaned to the Estate at that time to $750,000. 17. In the fall of 1999 I flew into the Tampa airport and was picked up by Ms. Brooks and taken to Mr. Dandar's new office on Kennedy Boulevard in Tampa for a meeting concerning whether Mr. Dandar should add David Miscavige as a defendant in the wrongful death case. Attending that meeting in Mr. Dandar's new conference room were Ms. Brooks, Mr. Prince, Dr. Garko, Mr. Dandar and myself. The focus of the discussion was not what the facts were concerning Mr. Miscavige, but how to pressure him. 18. Mr. Dandar was enthusiastic about this prospect even though there was no evidence to support it, as he felt it would force Scientology to the settlement table and would increase the amount of any settlement that Scientology would agree to. He also stated this would generate sensational publicity for the case. During the meeting, Dr. Garko specifically pointed out that there was not a single shred of evidence to support adding Mr. Miscavige and was opposed to adding him as a defendant. 19. The whole theory of adding Mr. Miscavige was based on an affidavit of Jesse Prince dated August 20, 1999, which I have reviewed and which has been filed in this case, speculating about events in December 1995, three years after Mr. Prince had left Scientology staff. This was the pattern used in this and other Scientology cases I have seen - an attorney comes up with a strategy and gets one of the paid "Scientology experts" to come up with a theory and write an affidavit that could be used to support a court filing based purely on speculation and written with allegations by innuendo. 20. At the end of the meeting, Mr. Dandar accompanied Ms. Brooks, Mr. Prince and myself down the elevator. Just before the elevator arrived at the first floor, Mr. Dandar said to us that we could never discuss this meeting. We all agreed. 21. Subsequently, shortly before I was scheduled to be deposed in the breach of contract case on October 11-12, 2001, Mr. Dandar asked me, "Do you remember the meeting that never happened?" I answered, "No," and he laughed and said, "You're good! Just remember that answer." 22. During that deposition in October 2001, Mr. Dandar, on cross-examination, asked me questions to elicit false testimony to support his position that I had no control over the litigation: "Do you know of anyone who was involved in the decision-making process to add David Miscavige or any other Scientologist or Scientology corporation to the wrongful death case?" I said that I supposed Michael Garko, Dell Liebreich and Mr. Dandar had discussed it. Mr. Dandar then asked me if anyone outside of the litigation team was involved in the decision-making process, and I answered, "I don't know." These answers were not truthful because Mr. Dandar did not want me to reveal anything that would indicate that I had any control over the litigation. He knew my answers were false. Not only did Mr. Dandar elicit false testimony but he also had coached me to do so. 23. During the summer and fall of 1999 steps were taken to organize an entity to be called the Lisa McPherson Foundation for the purpose of being the beneficiary of the bulk of the proceeds of the wrongful death litigation at some point in the future. This organization was created with the full knowledge and support of the family of Lisa McPherson, the Estate through its personal representative, and Ken Dandar, the attorney for the Estate. In fact, creating this organization had been suggested by Dell Liebreich, as she testified in her deposition in May 1999. 24. In October 1999, Mr. Dandar incorporated the organization under the name Lisa McPherson Trust (LMT). I was the President and sole shareholder. Mr. Dandar organized the LMT as a for-profit entity but he told me that we would reincorporate it as a non-profit when it was time to distribute funds from the wrongful death case. At a dinner on November 30, 1999, Ms. Liebreich and Mr. Dandar reaffirmed to me their commitment to donate the bulk of the proceeds of the case to the LMT when they visited Clearwater in December 1999 to picket Scientology and to attend an LMT Board meeting. Subsequent to this reaffirmation of the Estate's commitment, I made statements on a radio show in Boston and in an Internet posting dated February 2, 2000, that the Estate had "promised to give the vast majority of any settlement or award from trial to the Lisa McPherson Trust." 25. Mr. Dandar put Ms. Liebreich on the Board of Directors of the LMT, and it was Mr. Dandar who got Ms. Liebreich's agreement to use the Lisa McPherson name. Mr. Dandar thought it would be good for the "image" of the case to have her on the LMT Board. Ms. Liebreich indicated her full support of the activities of the LMT. Mr. Dandar was very happy about my setting up the LMT, as it was going to get "Scientology onto the front page of the newspaper" and help create a favorable jury pool for his case. I purchased a building in downtown Clearwater for the LMT for $325,000 in November 1999. When we first opened the LMT for business on January 6, 2000, Ms. Liebriech was the first person we called. She congratulated us and gave us her full support. This phone call was recorded on videotape. 26. I gathered the most vocal Scientology critics and most of the anti-Scientology witnesses under the umbrella of the LMT. I paid the witnesses through my funding of the LMT and put other critics on the LMT Board of Advisors. Because I was funding both the case and its witnesses, the wrongful death case and the LMT became virtually interchangeable. 27. I paid for Mr. Prince to move to Clearwater and loaned him $50,000 to buy a home. I arranged for Mr. Prince to work for Mr. Dandar as his expert. He was paid $5,000 per month with the money I gave Mr. Dandar. I had Stacy Brooks set up the LMT and paid her $5,000 a month as the LMT president. Both were being paid by me, one through Mr. Dandar and the other through the LMT. In the spring of 2000, I had Mr. Prince transfer from Dandar & Dandar to the LMT, but his salary of $5,000 remained the same. David Cecere came to Clearwater to be executive director of the LMT at $5,000 per month and later, after his employment at the LMT was terminated, he became a Scientology "expert" for Mr. Dandar in the wrongful death case. Ms. Brooks gave disaffected former Scientologist Teresa Summers a job at the LMT earning $3,500 per month, after Mr. Dandar had put her on the witness list in the wrongful death case. I put Gerry Armstrong on the Advisory Board of the LMT after Mr. Dandar put him on his witness list. I had earlier given Mr. Armstrong $100,000. I later learned he used these funds to forward an attack on Scientology and pursue a lawsuit against David Miscavige and various Scientology entities. Others on the "Advisory Board" of LMT included Ken Dandar, Dan Leipold, Dell Liebreich, Keith Henson, Grady Ward and Arnie Lerma, all of whom I financially supported in their litigation with Scientology. 28. On May 24, 2000, in deposition in the wrongful death case, I reaffirmed the agreement between the Estate and myself regarding the case proceeds going to the LMT. Soon thereafter, Mr. Dandar, accompanied by Dr. Garko, his trial consultant, came to the offices of the LMT and expressed his extreme concern to me about these public statements and answers in depositions concerning the agreement between the Estate, the Lisa McPherson Trust and myself, and stated that we would have to "backtrack big time" on these statements. The reason he gave was that my financial involvement in this case, as well as the Estate's commitment to me concerning the proceeds, were allowing the Church of Scientology the opportunity to characterize the relationship as an inappropriate "business deal" (which is exactly what it was, a "business deal") between the Estate and myself. 29. On December 1, 2000, after a board meeting of the LMT, Ms. Liebreich reconfirmed to me on behalf of the Estate the commitment that they had made to donate the bulk of the proceeds from the wrongful death case to the Lisa McPherson Trust. 30. Later in December 2000, Mr. Dandar phoned me and said he had an affidavit for me to sign concerning a number of points, including the Estate's agreement with me. I asked that he forward the affidavit to me in New Hampshire. Shortly before December 13, 2000, an affidavit was couriered to me from Mr. Dandar that stated in part that "Dell Liebreich has made no promise or commitment to make any donation to the LMT, and is under no obligation to make any such donation." I called Mr. Dandar and told him I was very uncomfortable with this affidavit, because this statement was completely false and contradictory to all previous testimony. The statement also made me uncomfortable because I saw it as an opportunity for the Estate to renege on the agreement and that was in large part why I was funding the case. Mr. Dandar explained to me that it was critical "for the good of the case" to make this agreement appear to "go away" in the eyes of the Court and the Church of Scientology. He also told me that he would get Ms. Liebreich to sign a similar false affidavit for the same purpose and he in fact had her do that on December 20, 2000. Dandar also filed a false affidavit in this case that there was no agreement. He also assured me that the agreement was still real, but that it would henceforth be secret. 31. I am aware that Mr. Dandar subsequently used these three affidavits to make misrepresentations to the Circuit Court and to the Second District Court of Appeals. In September 2001, during my deposition in this case, I was asked about the agreement I had with the Estate, and because I had signed the affidavit of December 13, 2000, I asserted a Fifth Amendment privilege. In another deposition in the Breach of Contract case, in October 2001, I outright denied the existence of such an agreement and "backtracked" as much as possible by saying that I had "misunderstood" various communications from Mr. Dandar. I did this because Mr. Dandar insisted it would "protect" me as Scientology had been closing in with discovery orders that I was seeking to avoid. 32. It was my observation and intent that the LMT was not only the vehicle designated to receive the proceeds of the wrongful death case, it was also used to avoid discovery in the case and disguise the fact that witnesses were being paid. The LMT, represented by Mr. Dandar, maintained that it was separate from the wrongful death case in order to avoid discovery and prevent witnesses from being deposed. Mr. Dandar filed many motions on behalf of LMT and me to try to prevent discovery requests from going forward. The truth was that LMT was inextricably linked to this litigation. 33. To frustrate Scientology's discovery efforts, the LMT refused to produce evidence subpoenaed in the case, "lost" evidence and removed evidence from the premises. In one incident, Ms. Brooks informed me that LMT's attorney, John Merrett, who worked closely with Mr. Dandar, advised Ms. Brooks to leave unedited video footage in the hallway and it would "be taken care of." These videos of witness statements had been ordered produced by the Court. In another incident, on my instructions, the hard drives from the LMT computers were removed from the LMT before the Special Master put in place a stay regarding the evidence in the LMT though they too had been compelled by subpoena. ADDITIONAL MONIES 34. Several weeks before my deposition on May 24, 2000, I had several conversations with Mr. Dandar regarding additional funds he said he needed for the trial of the wrongful death case. He asked me for enough money to take him through the trial. He told me an additional $500,000 would be sufficient. He told me he had a way to hide the funds from Scientology and told me I should arrange payments in such a way that the funds could not be traced back to me. He told me he would not put these funds in his client trust account and that he had another account that Scientology could never find. 35. Mr. Dandar also told me he did not want the money to appear to come from me because my financial involvement was making the case too messy and that he wanted to conceal the money from his employees, Dr. Garko and Tom Haverty, to justify cutting back payments to them. He told me I should never disclose these funds were from me. From this point forward, Mr. Dandar told me that he would tell his employees he was funding the litigation from his retirement account. 36. Following these conversations with Mr. Dandar about the $500,000, I caused a check dated May 1, 2000 in that amount to be issued to Mr. Dandar by the Union Bank of Switzerland, payable at Chase Manhattan Bank in New York. I handed this check to Mr. Dandar at the Bombay Bicycle Club in Clearwater, Florida a few days after May 1, 2000. 37. I was later deposed about the amount of money I had provided to fund the wrongful death case. Prior to my deposition Mr. Dandar told me to ignore this check for $500,000 and only concentrate "on the checks you have written." When asked in deposition how much money I had provided, I testified falsely and omitted this $500,000 check. 38. I was also served with a deposition subpoena in the wrongful death case to produce all documents relating to my payments to Mr. Dandar or his law firm. Mr. Dandar told me not to produce this check for $500,000. He said that he had not disclosed this check to the Court and that I should not disclose it either. He told me that I did not have to disclose the check because I did not write it. He said the check came from "Fred." Fred was Mr. Dandar's nickname for me as the source of funds that would not be traced back to me. 39. By August 2001, I was extremely reluctant to advance any further funds to Mr. Dandar for the wrongful death case and advised him accordingly. I no longer believed that Mr. Dandar and Ms. Liebreich planned to honor their commitment to me regarding the proceeds of the case. We had been forced to dissolve the Lisa McPherson Trust because it had become mired in the wrongful death case. 40. I had already loaned approximately $1.8 million to the Estate through its attorney, Mr. Dandar, and he then approached me for more money starting in late December 2001. By February 2002, there was a certain desperation in his pleas for more money. I did not want to provide any further funds and refused to meet with him in January 2002 in Nashville, Tennessee. 41. The next request for a meeting by Mr. Dandar happened just prior to his going to the Cayman Islands in January or February 2002. He called me in New Hampshire prior to this trip and asked me to meet him in the Caribbean on the Wednesday of the week that he would be in the Caymans. He also said to me that if I wanted to send him more money, I could wire it from my bank to a Cayman Islands bank for him. I told him on the phone that I would see if I could arrange my schedule to accommodate his request for a meeting. Mr. Dandar told me the name of the hotel I should book in the Caymans. Once he arrived in the Caymans, he called me again and left a message to make sure I was going to be able to meet him there. I did not take his calls, because I was still uneasy about any further discussions with him about more money. 42. Once Mr. Dandar returned from the Cayman Islands, he again contacted me several times. I told him that I had no plans to travel, but if he wanted to come to New Hampshire he was welcome. A date was set for the weekend of February 23, 2002. Within 24 hours of this meeting being arranged, Mr. Dandar called and asked if it was OK for him to "bring Michael Garko." I said that was fine with me. 43. The next day Mr. Dandar called me again and I mentioned to him that money discussions would be more complicated with Dr. Garko around. Mr. Dandar understood perfectly and said we should couch any discussions concerning any new funding of the case in terms of "Fred" or "your friends," or "overseas investors." 44. Ms. Brooks and I picked up Messrs. Dandar and Garko at the Manchester, New Hampshire airport on Saturday and we drove to my home in Sandown. I began our meeting by informing Mr. Dandar that I no longer trusted him, the Estate of Lisa McPherson, or Dell Liebreich, the Estate's personal representative. Ms. Brooks told Mr. Dandar that she was adamantly against my giving Mr. Dandar any further money for the wrongful death case because I was getting deeper and deeper into legal trouble as the case continued. During the course of that weekend, Mr. Dandar and Dr. Garko assured me that "the case has never been stronger," and that all that was needed was enough money to get the case through trial. 45. All discussions concerning money in the presence of Dr. Garko were couched, at Mr. Dandar's insistence, as if the money were not coming from me but from European "friends" of mine. The purpose of this masquerade was intended to keep Dr. Garko in the dark about who was really providing this money. 46. The result of this February 23-24, 2002 meeting was that I told Mr. Dandar I would see what I could do about additional monies to support the case. In Dr. Garko's presence I said that I would see if my "friends overseas" were willing to be of any further assistance. Another issue of principal concern to me was that people that Mr. Dandar and the Estate were apparently close to, such as Patricia Greenway, Deana Holmes, and Shirley Wilson had launched a smear campaign against me beginning in the fall of 2001. I believed that the smear campaign was orchestrated by Mr. Dandar to make me feel guilty about not providing any more funding. I told Mr. Dandar he had to get these people to stop their campaign against me if he wanted to get any more money from me. In fact, when Mr. Dandar returned to Tampa, Patricia Greenway's smear campaign stopped at once. 47. To try to alleviate my concerns about my pending contempt proceedings, Mr. Dandar (with Dr. Garko present) reviewed with me the approximately 86 questions that I had previously pled the Fifth Amendment to and that Judge Schaeffer had ordered me to answer in deposition. Mr. Dandar asked me the questions to work out how I would answer each one. It was clear to me that he did this to help me to lie about the funds that I had given him for the wrongful death case. 48. One question on that list concerned a transfer of funds to the Lisa McPherson Trust. Mr. Dandar asked me how I planned to answer this question. I stated that I would tell Kendrick Moxon when he asked me in deposition that the monies came from an anonymous source who had contacted me by email using the nickname "The Fat Man." Mr. Dandar gave me a very skeptical look and said something to the effect that "Bob, nobody will believe that ridiculous answer." 49. On February 26, 2002, Mr. Dandar sent me a letter that we had discussed during his visit to New Hampshire. This letter was a "suck-up" letter because I wanted something in writing from Mr. Dandar to reassure me that he and the Estate were appreciative of all that I had done to be of assistance to this case. 50. The second item I wanted confirmation on from Mr. Dandar concerned the "secret agreement" between the Estate, Mr. Dandar and me. Shortly after he returned to Tampa, Mr. Dandar called me and said, "You know I cannot put the secret agreement in writing. If anyone ever got hold of it, it would ruin the case." However, he assured me in no uncertain terms that the agreement was still in place and the funds would go to a group that Ms. Brooks and I would set up once we prevailed in the wrongful death case. He further went on to tell me that he wanted to be my attorney for the rest of my life and that together we would "destroy these evil people." 51. Once Mr. Dandar returned to Tampa from New Hampshire he became so concerned about maintaining communication with me regarding getting more money to him that he arranged to have me receive a phone scrambling device for my telephone in New Hampshire as part of the "trial team." 52. On March 2, 2002, I received the Privatel Model 960V RSA Telephone Encryption Device from Rick Spector, of Rick Spector and Associates, who is Mr. Dandar's videographer/private investigator/security consultant. The reference on Mr. Spector's accompanying letter was "McPherson v. Scientology," and the letter stated, in part, "Ken has asked me to forward the enclosed telephone encryption device to you [sic] attention and request that it be used for future conversations between you and other members of the trial team," and "I do expect it to go a long way toward keeping 'their' noses out of our business." This letter confirmed my significant involvement in the case. 53. Mr. Dandar called me several times prior to March 6, 2002, in a frantic state about money and asked me whether I was going to "come through for the case" or not. He said that we needed to talk about this seriously and as privately as possible, and in the absence of two phone encryption devices, he suggested that we both speak on our digital cell phones. 54. Subsequently I caused to be issued a check dated March 7, 2002, in the amount of $250,000 payable to Ken Dandar. Mr. Dandar called me on the 15th of March to tell me my check had not been received at his office. I told him I had sent it to his PO Box. I included the check with other papers so it wouldn't be seen by his staff. I enclosed the check in an essay from Caroline Letkeman. (Caroline Letkeman had written this essay in an LMT essay contest and was paid a few thousand dollars as a prize by the LMT. In response to an inquiry from Mr. Dandar, I had advised him to use Ms. Letkeman as an expert witness.) I told Mr. Dandar that the check was inside that document, at page 23. Mr. Dandar, who was out of town, told me he sent Donna West to pick up the overnight mail pack and then Mr. Dandar called me to confirm it had been received. CONFIDENTIAL AND IMPROPER INFORMATION 55. In Mr. Dandar's self-serving letter to me of October 9, 1997, he stated that I was to have no control over the litigation. In contrast to this statement, I was routinely informed of confidential information concerning the case, consulted as to its progress and sent deposition transcripts and documents. There have been a number of instances in which confidential or improper information has been imparted to me, either directly by Mr. Dandar or through his agents, Ms. Brooks and Mr. Prince, at Mr. Dandar's suggestion. For example, Mr. Dandar advised me about his early mediation discussions in June or July 1998 with the Church of Scientology. I later posted information about those discussions on the Internet, not realizing the information was supposed to be confidential. I learned from Keith Henson that he had obtained copies of autopsy photos from Larry Bedore in the Medical Examiner's office before they were made public. I was also told about the content of depositions, many of which were sealed. Several deposition transcripts were copied and delivered to me at the LMT offices. The most recent deposition that was sent to me in email by Mr. Dandar was that of Teresa Summers. Mr. Dandar said to me on the phone before he sent the transcript, "You didn't get it from me." Subsequently, Mr. Dandar filed a sanctions motion against Mr. Moxon for not asking Ms. Summers whether or not she wanted the deposition confidential. Mr. Dandar gave me a copy of a Knowledge Report by Brenda Hubert and told me not to tell anybody I had gotten it from him. I posted it on the Internet, in early 2000. When I was asked in deposition about this document, I followed Dandar's instructions, and said it arrived anonymously in an envelope postmarked from Florida and that I didn't know whom it had come from. 56. With more pressure being brought to bear on me through discovery orders, I became increasingly concerned that I was getting in more legal trouble. In August 2001, I asked Ms. Brooks to call Ms. Liebreich to set up a meeting with her. After discussion with Ms. Brooks, it was my belief that Mr. Dandar was not informing his client about the trouble I was getting into by advising me to lie in deposition to protect him and the case. I learned that Ms. Liebreich refused to meet with Ms. Brooks after Mr. Dandar advised her not to, and at that point I began to be extremely concerned about my position and the possibility that I could be prosecuted for perjury. I spoke to Ms. Brooks about this and she and I discussed how to distance me and the LMT from the wrongful death case in every possible way. Based on that discussion, Ms. Brooks and I both spoke to Mr. Prince and told him we wanted him to withdraw as an expert witness in the wrongful death case. Because we were paying him, Mr. Prince wrote a letter to Mr. Dandar withdrawing as his expert. Ms. Brooks also formally withdrew as a witness. On August 24, 2001, John Merrett, an attorney representing me and the LMT in Florida, wrote an e-mail on my behalf informing Mr. Dandar that I would provide no further funding for the case and that Mr. Prince would no longer be his expert. 57. Mr. Dandar responded by filing a motion for severe sanctions against Scientology, falsely stating that his expert Jesse Prince had withdrawn because Mr. Prince was frightened of being harassed by Scientology. Mr. Dandar drafted an affidavit for Mr. Prince to sign regarding the alleged harassment even though he knew Mr. Prince had withdrawn for other reasons. Mr. Dandar filed this false affidavit with the Court and used it as a basis for sanctions against Scientology. 58. I became increasingly concerned with the perjury I had been involved in and the possibility that I could be prosecuted. I authorized my attorneys to contact Scientology's attorneys in early February 2002 to initiate settlement discussions. My initial intent was to extricate myself from this litigation and simply walk away without affecting the course of this litigation. With my attorney, Stephen Jonas, Ms. Brooks and I met with Scientology representatives in New York. We tried to extract concessions from Scientology concerning the two upcoming contempt hearings I faced - one before Judge Schaeffer and one before Judge Baird - as well as a deposition in the breach of contract case that was also scheduled within the next two weeks. Scientology refused any concessions whatsoever. Scientology made it very clear there were pre-conditions to talking settlement, that they suspected I had been less than forthcoming in both the wrongful death case and the breach of contract case, and that any settlement discussions that took place would have to be predicated on my telling the truth in those cases. 59. I called Mr. Dandar on the evening of March 28, 2002, and he said, "Hi, Fred!" I said, "This is not 'Fred,'" in a very stern voice, and said, "This is Bob Minton." I then told him that he needed to arrange a meeting with his client, Ms. Liebreich, so that the four of us (including Ms. Brooks) could discuss the wrongful death case. Mr. Dandar said he would contact Ms. Liebreich and get back to us. The next night I called Mr. Dandar and told him that we wanted to meet to talk about dropping the wrongful death case. I told him that after consultation with my counsel in Boston, I knew I had to be truthful concerning all matters in this case, starting with the deposition scheduled for April 8, 2002, in the breach of contract case. Specifically, I told Mr. Dandar that I would be revealing the existence of the $500,000 check issued to him by Union Bank of Switzerland (UBS) in May 2000 and the March 7, 2002 UBS check for $250,000. Mr. Dandar said that I couldn't possibly disclose that information, that he had not disclosed this to the court and it would land him in serious trouble. Mr. Dandar was quite frantic about this and said I didn't need to reveal the checks as they did not have my name on them, and, as he had said several times previously, "I've told you before to just concentrate on the checks you have written." He said to me that he had suspected from my call the night before that I wanted to talk about dropping the case and, after advising his client of his suspicion, he said Ms. Liebreich did not want to meet with us. He said he had instructed her not to answer the phone so that we couldn't speak with her. I made it very clear to Mr. Dandar that he and I would both be destroyed because of the perjury if he continued this case. He proposed that we meet him in Cleveland on Wednesday or Thursday, because he had a heart checkup there on Tuesday. 60. The next morning I called Mr. Dandar again. I kept insisting that I had to tell the truth. Mr. Dandar repeated that there was no way that the two UBS checks could be revealed. When I kept insisting I had to tell the truth, he said he did not want Ms. Brooks and me to meet him in Cleveland or anywhere else, because, "it would give him a heart attack." 61. In light of this affidavit, I hereby recant any false statement I have made under oath that may contradict my sworn statements in this affidavit. FURTHER AFFIANT SAYETH NAUGHT. ss. Robert S. Minton ____________________________________ ROBERT S. MINTON STATE OF FLORIDA ) ) ss. COUNTY OF PINELLAS ) The foregoing instrument was acknowledged before me to be true and correct to the best of his ability this 24th day of April, 2002, by Robert S. Minton. He is personally known to me and did take an oath. ss. Suzanne Davidson ________________________________________ Notary Public