(Disclaimer: I am very much not a lawyer, just doing the best I can to decipher this stuff...)

In a decision of Nov 11, 2000 (Justitiekanslern case number 3413-00-30), the Swedish Attorney-General Hans Regner dismissed a complaint of "hets mot folkgrupp" (incitament to violence against or discrediting of protected groups, similar to the US concept of "hate crime") from the Church of Scientology of Sweden.

One of AG's areas of responsibility is overseeing that press laws are adhered to. He is the sole prosecutor in cases of press law violations, so that's where you would complain if you believe a newspaper article, book, television broadcast etc. contained illegal statements.

The CoS Sweden, through their lawyer Per Magnusson of Magnusson & Wahlin, had filed a 7-page complaint against a debate article written by a local politician, Margita Bjorklund, which had been printed in Gothenburg newspaper Goteborgs-Tidningen on September 8, 2000.

In the article, Bjorklund discusses what she perceives as shortcomings in school laws, as she had found herself forced to vote for the acceptance of a Scientology-based school in her city, although she was strongly ideologically opposed to it. She says the current regulations would only let her take financial issues into consideration when deciding whether to allow schools to establish themselves in the area.

Quote from beginning of article:

"I hate fascist and nazist organisations and parties. As a liberal, it is my obvious duty to fight all racist, anti-democratic and anti-equality movements. I feel sick when I think about the scientology movement and its adherents. A manipulative cult that profiteers on people looking for a purpose in life. An organisation that celebrates elitism and rests on a foundation of undemocratic values."

Scientology wanted this article prosecuted as a hate crime. Basis of the complaint:

- the CoS is now a registered religious community in Sweden.

(Two former complaints from scientologists to the AG, in 1997 (case number 493-97-31) and 1999 (case number 2791-99-30), had been dismissed. In 1997, AG had made the assessment that "scientologists"

were not a protected group of people as defined by the hate crime law.

That decision was made before the system of registering religious communities was introduced in Sweden in 2000, and thus before the CoS registered themselves as such.)

- the debate article contained discrediting statements about scientology, by comparing it to fascist and nazist organisations, etc, and by accusing the church and its adherents to be elitistic, undemocratic, manipulating and profiteering.

(The CoS lawyer makes a lot of word clearing examples of definitions of these words to prove his point, and draws parallells to a case involving a rabid anti-semit.)

The AG dissmisses this complaint:



- since the article was published by a regular newpaper, the complaint would be against the publisher, rather than the author of the article.

- for a publisher to be punished by law for the contents of a publication, there must be ascertained a level of criminal intent by the author. In this article, AG finds that the principal intent of the author is to debate issues related to her political assignment, not to threaten or discredit any particular group of people.

The AG further reminds that the law against hate crimes is not intended to prevent debate about or criticism of society issues.

Since the AG finds the statements made in the article to be within the limits of what could be allowed in the context of a debate article printed in a regular newspaper, and thus cannot be prosecuted as a hate crime, he sees no need to further inquire into the question of whether or not scientologists are to be regarded as a group of people in the sense of the hate crime law.

Catarina http://xenu.just.nu - Scientologi till vardags

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