[NOTE: I have deleted the name of the person alleged by Zenon Panoussis to have stolen the NOTs documents from the Parliament office, in the interest of protecting the anonymity of the person in question. -- Modemac] Path: netnews.worldnet.att.net!worldnet.att.net!feed1.news.erols.com!news.idt.net!news.stealth.net!solace!mn6.swip.net!mn5.swip.net!news From: Zenon Panoussis Newsgroups: alt.religion.scientology Subject: Present and future scandals Date: Wed, 11 Dec 1996 06:12:34 +0100 Organization: - Lines: 183 Message-ID: <32AE42C2.2E82@dodo.pp.se> NNTP-Posting-Host: dialup97-1-3.swipnet.se Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit NNTP-Posting-User: s-40153 X-Mailer: Mozilla 2.02 [nl] (Win16; I) CC: Madame Kobrin , The Twit Sorry for this delay with the news. I've been overworked. I'll begin with the scandal. I know that after the parliament NOTs and other such things, most of you hold the Swedish authorities at a pretty high esteem. It's time to make the picture more balanced. The hearing was on Monday. When I arrived at the courthouse, I met [name deleted] at the reception. I immediately told the guard that that was the person that had stolen the NOTs from the court and that he should call the police. A while later I saw [name deleted] at the cafeteria. I called the guard by phone and asked why the guy wasn't being picked up. The guard said that he had spoken with the court president's office and that they said that they couldn't act without conclusive evidence. So, that's a nice new view the court has. They need conclusive evidence in order to call the police. Taste this: without definite evidence and proof against someone, you are not supposed to call the police, even if the police is already looking for that very person because of that very offence. Remember this if you ever wake up and find a stranger in your house. Do you have conclusive evidence that he is stealing, evidence enough to convict him? If not, you may not call the police. A few seconds later my case was called, so I couldn't call the police myself. [name deleted] had the great pleasure of following the hearing among the public and giving in his mind the finger to the Swedish justice. The matter requires someone to be held responsible. I publicize the names of the people involved, and it's up to the (Swedish) readers to demand responsibility. The guard's name is Martin. I can't see that he did anything wrong, but he knows who he spoke to at the president's office. The chief of security is called Ulla Pålsson. The judge at the administrative section that has handled the matter earlier is called Ulrika Beergrehn. Demand the last two heads on a plate. * The hearing went well, but there was no spectacle. The scienos didn't try to occupy the courtroom. They had motioned for closed doors, but their prayers were not heard. They had feared that I would bring up the Xenu story, which I didn't. There was no procedural room for that, but there will be in the main hearing, and Xenu will be extensively discussed. On the other hand I had my Fishman Exhibit B T-shirt on, which did cause some discussion. Of course the CoS could not have been represented by less than three lawyers. The lackey Magnusson, the probably scieno Dahlborn and the errand boy Leander did their best to convey the gravity of the matter to the court. The CoS has now specified its demands. For all my alleged copyright infringments up to now they demand SEK 25.000. That's approximately USD 3.700 or DEM 5.000. They did some cover-up by stating that the demand is symbolical due to the fact that I'm anyway in bankrupcy, but it was a bad cover-up. The real reasons are two: 1. They hoped not to have to specify the factual damage. That's hard to specify, because they would have to either disclose at least some parts of their economy, or set it very low and risk that others use the fact against them. This didn't work and they have to specify anyway. 2. They probably learned their lesson (the CoS learning? that's great progress) from Arnie, who's now claiming that he prevailed, having to pay USD 2.500 instead of 3.300.000. They hope to hit me with the costs instead. This may work in principle if I lose, but not in practice; I'll just go bankrupt again. Another part of the hearing that is worth mentioning is that I entered the European convention on human rights into the case. Article 10 protects the freedom of speech. But you can't use freedom of speech arguments against copyright in general; there have to be serious reasons why. A serious enough reason is that the balance between what a copyright protects and what the free speech protects weighs strongly in favour of free speech in the actual case. Now read carefully scienos, and learn to think *before* you enter litigation. The burden of proof lies on me in this matter. How can I prove that the interest of free speech outweighs the interest of copyright? Only by proving what a criminal organization the CoS is, and that exposing the actual texts set an end to (at least part of) that criminality. So I will. My copyright case has just been converted to a tribunal against you. Witness after witness will have the pleasure of taking you down in public. And involving such matters as copyright on the Internet and the human rights convention, you might see this case making it not only to the supreme court, but also to the European court of human rights. How much did you say your legal costs were so far? I can't hear... A funny part was Magnusson trying to avoid the question just how many scienos have been allowed to read the OTs and NOTs. You see, Swedish law has two different levels of "publication" with regard to copyright. One is publication as in English, an edition being sold. The other is much narrower: it only means that a work has been accessed by others than the immediate circle of family and friends of the copyright owner. As soon as a work has been publicized in this latter way, anyone has the right to make and own copies for personal use, distribute copies to others than "the public" quote etc. So we asked Magnusson, just how many parishioners of the church of scientology that are not members of Hubbard's family have had access to the NOTs. Hard question. If he says "none", all scienos that are paying dear money to "complete the bridge" and "reach spiritual freedom" may get slightly sour. If he says "plenty" there goes his argument of "unpublished". Magnusson deliberated at length. He then said "more than ten". Well, have faith scienos. After 20 years, more than ten out of your alleged numbers of 8 million have already reached the OTs and NOTs. As soon as Magnusson said that, I filed some glossy brochures showing a certain conference centre by the name of "Flag" and smiling people holding dossiers of NOTs. The brochures advertise OT and NOT courses and indicate a rather big attendence ( :) ? ). Magnusson wasn't happy. Those interested will now find the entire hearing at http://www.wineasy.se/weesp/trial.htm . * The bailiff wrote that she will be paying me a visit on the 17th to fetch such material that is covered by the still valid court order of seizure. Imagine what fun it would be if those of you that have nothing better to do begun mailing OTs and NOTs to me. You wouldn't need to mail the bulk of them; one page at a time would be enough. And imagine the additional fun if you chose to put false sender addresses on your envelopes rather than none at all; can you see those scienos chasing shadows around the world? Z --- oracle@everywhere: The ephemeral source of the eternal truth...