DECLARATION OF LYNN R. FARNEY
I, LYNN R. FARNEY, hereby declare and state:
1. I am over 18 years of age and a resident of the State of
California. I am the Secretary of the church of Scientology
International ("Church"), and am overall responsible for litigation
involving the church.
2. On April 4, 1994, the U.S. District Court for the Central
district of California in the case of Church of Scientology
International v. Fishman, CV- 91-6426-HLH, refused to seal the court
record which contained confidential Scientology Scriptures which
are copyrighted trade secrets of the Church. An emergency motion
to seal pending appeal was filed and temporarily granted on April
13, 1995. However on April 20, 1995 the court denied the motion
and unsealed the files.
3. Immediately upon receiving word of the unsealing of the
Fishman case files (the same day) I arranged for paralegals and
Church members to go to the clerk's office of the U.S. District
Court where the files are located, to sign out the files that
contain the confidential Scriptural documents so that no other
public person would be able to have access to these records. The
documents were kept "signed out" in a reviewing room at the
courthouse until the Clerk's closing time, at which time they were
delivered back to the Clerk.
4. Thereafter, every business day since the Fishman files
were unsealed -- continuing until the files were sealed by the
federal District Court on August 15th, 1995 -- two Church members
have arrived at the Court Clerk's office when it has opened at 8:30
a.m. and have signed out the Fishman case files that contain the
the Church's confidential Scriptures. They then either kept possession
of such files in the Court's reviewing room until the Clerk's
office closed at 4:00 PM or turned the files over to two other
Church members at noon who kept the files until 4:00 P.M.
closing time.
5. This procedure was instituted as the most effective means
to ensure the continued confidentiality of the Church's
confidential Scripture and trade secrets contained in the Fishman
case record. Indeed the procedure was extremely effective, as the
clerks log indicated that as of August 15th, 1995, no one other than
Church agents has access to the records.
6. On august 14, 1995, over the protests of the Church
member who had checked out the FISHMAN files that day, one volume
was taken from him by a court clerk and copies were made of
approximately one inch of documents. The church member, David Holt,
got the woman who had requested the copies to sign the log that is
kept by the court of people who are viewing documents or getting
copies. A check of the court log showed that the woman had simply
written that she was from the Washington Post"
7. On the following day. August 15, 1995, I was informed
that a woman who identified herself as Katherine Wexler, a reporter
for the Washington Post, attempted to get the Fishman files to
review. Wexler admitted that she wanted to review the files for a
story she was doing. the two Church members who had checked out
the files, Rory Tate and Reuben Ramos, informed Wexler that the
files contained confidential material that were confidential trade secrets and
were copyrighted by the Church of Scientology and that she should
contact one of the Church's attorneys before she attempted to
review them.
8. The plaintiff in this California case prepared and filed
and emergency motion on August 15, 1995, to seal the docuemnts in
that Court's file pending final determination of the sealilng issues
under submission. later that day, the Court sealed the files.
9. Attached hereto as Exhibit A is a true and correct copy
of the sealing order in Church of Scientology International v.
Steven fishman et al. dated August 15th, 1995.
10. Efforts to get the Post to return the materials were
unsuccessful and on August 19th, 1995 an article appeared
entitled "Church in Cyberspace. Its Sacred Writ Is on the Net,
Its Lawyers Are on the Case." A true and correct copy of this
article is attached hereto as Exhibity B.
I declare under penalty of perjury that the forgoing is true and correct.
Executed this 21st day of August, 1995, at Los Angeles,
California
LYNN R. FARNEY