The Church of Scientology has been convicted of fraud and fined nearly $1 million by a French court. The criminal conviction is an apparent first against the group, which benefits from constitutional protections in the United States but does not enjoy that sanctuary elsewhere in the world.
The French court, after a five-month trial, may have been inclined to ban the church entirely, but a change in the relevant law just before the trial began made that moot. As is, the court fined the secretive church some $900,000 (600,000 euros), and also handed down suspended jail sentences of up to two years and fines ranging as high as $45,000 to four leaders of the group's French branch, according to press reports.
The original charges were filed by two former members who said they felt coerced into spending tens of thousands of dollars on training, vitamins, personality tests and other things the church provides. That's a common complaint by critics of the church, who consider it nothing more than a cultish, moneymaking enterprise aided by some celebrity endorsements.
The church, which is considered a sect in France, immediately said it would appeal.
The criminal conviction appears to be the first against the group, whose adherents include such Hollywood A-list talent as Tom Cruise and John Travolta. Belgium considered filing criminal charges against its branch of Scientology in 2007, but the church's opponents have mainly come from the social rather than legal realm, and its critics are often feverish in their opposition.
Founded by sci-fi writer L. Ron Hubbard in 1953, the church has had a long and bloody history on the net — dating back to Usenet groups. Critics maintain that the organization is a cult that brainwashes its members and sucks them dry financially. The church, which teaches that humans are reincarnated and once lived on other planets, says it is a legitimate religion.
Anti-Scientology activists who bind together under the name Anonymous declared war on the church in January 2008 after the group tried to suppress a video of Cruise that was produced for Scientology members. A member of that group pleaded guilty in U.S. federal court earlier this year to a hacking charge for his role in a distributed denial-of-service attack that shuttered church websites in 2008.
The church itself was banned by Wikipedia in May from making or editing any articles — a punishment for repeated and deceptive editing of articles related to the controversial religion. Wikipedia's decision was served up by the inner circle of a site that prides itself on being open and inclusive.
French Court Fines Scientologists, Allows Operations | Reuters
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