Paul Haggis-Some Thoughts

I do not know Mr. Haggis. I’ve never met him or spoken to him. Frankly, before Scientology and the Aftermath I’d never even heard of him before.

I’m not a big movie watcher. I prefer a cuddly blanket, a good book (preferably about magic and dragons) and a cup of tea.

More importantly, one does not know what goes on behind closed doors.

Women need to feel safe, supported and protected in coming forward when they’ve been sexually assaulted, raped or victims of domestic violence.

Sexual predators don’t have a certain look, a certain financial status or particular demographic. One cannot tell by looking at someone whether they are capable of such evil.

Anyone coming forward seeking justice after being attacked should be given the benefit of the doubt.

Believed until the facts prove otherwise.

At the same time, no one should ever be accused of such heinous, despicable crimes unless they are guilty. People like Taryn Teutsch, who consistently accuses her father of domestic violence when he is provably innocent should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

Which brings us to Paul Haggis.

Haggis left Scientology in 2009. Since then he has been accused of rape and sexual misconduct here in the United States. More recently, he finds himself under house arrest in Italy, facing yet another such charge.

While we cannot know for certain what occurred in Brindisi, Italy over that three day period, it would be irresponsible to ignore the special circumstances surrounding Mr. Haggis’ particular case.

Scientology’s shadow looms large over Haggis’ life.

Anyone who was able to watch Scientology Black Ops thanks to Tony Ortega, already has serious doubts as to what occurred in Hollywood close to the time Paul Haggis left COS.

Tony Ortega has transcripts from the 10 part series produced by Australia 7 News and journalist Bryan Seymour, although he was ordered to take the videos down.

Episode 2 Witness X includes the following;

“Seymour: We can reveal that before any of these appalling #MeToo-style allegations emerged, Scientology was busy executing its plan to destroy the career and reputation of Paul Haggis by unearthing embarrassing personal information. They looked far and wide. [Image of the SAG-AFTRA building.] It is the biggest and most powerful entertainment union in the world, the Screen Actors Guild. Today, SAG-AFTRA has 160,000 members, among them some of Scientology’s celebrities and creatives. Every member has a file, a unique record of their experience in the industry. But its value depends on the confidentiality and the security of the information it contains. Any attack on that confidence is an attack not just on an individual, but on the establishment trusted with protecting those in front of and behind the camera of the shows and productions loved by billions around the world. Soon after the first accusation against Paul Haggis surfaced in 2018, a person we’ll call Witness X wrote this letter to his ex-wife Deborah, who still works closely with him.

Witness X: Around the time of Paul Haggis’s departure from Scientology I received a call from Scientology senior executive and spokesperson Tommy Davis. I was still in the church. Tom knew that I had worked at Screen Actors Guild years before. He told me he needed me to go to Paul’s SAG production files and find any claims or complaints regarding him being aggressive, screaming or violent behavior — namely with women. He asked I provided him with copies. The idea was so outrageous to me, I told him flat out no. I would never do that. Those files are highly confidential.”

Scientology’s written policy is to destroy their enemy “by any means necessary”.

Hubbard instructed his followers: “This is the correct procedure: Spot who is attacking us. Start investigating them promptly for felonies or worse using our own professionals, not outside agencies. Double curve our reply by saying we welcome an investigation of them. Start feeding lurid, blood sex crime actual evidence on the attackers to the press. Don’t ever tamely submit to an investigation of us. Make it rough, rough on attackers all the way.”
-L. Ron Hubbard, Hubbard Communications Office Policy Letter, 25 February 1966

Also; “If attacked on some vulnerable point by anyone or anything or any organization, always find or manufacture enough threat against them to cause them to sue for peace.”
-L. Ron Hubbard, Hubbard Communications Office Policy Letter, 15 August 1960, Dept. of Govt. Affairs

Thus Scientology has a documented history of looking to these demented policies when dealing with their detractors.

Case in point; Operation China Shop- Scientology’s target; the Clearwater Sun Newspaper.

In 1975 the Sun had been critical of Scientology who therefore decided to take the paper over. To do this the plan was to dead agent and damage the reputations of the editors and journalists.

The Guardian’s Office further targeted its advertisers and employees to discredit them. In the case of the advertisers, to convince them to stop buying space in the paper. If this sounds familiar, it should. It is exactly the same tactic employed by Scientology against Leah Remini, Disney and A&E Networks when the multi award winning docuseries Scientology and the Aftermath aired.

Part of this Operation included a plan to force the paper’s largest advertiser, the Maas Brothers department store, to pull its adverts by claiming that a Sun reporter “is looking into their back-grounds to print something sordid on them.”

Again, if this sounds familiar just consider the virulent claims made by Scientology that Leah Remini and Mike Rinder are complicit to murder and have “Blood on their hands”.

We draw these comparisons in order to show that the dirty policies utilized in Scientology’s early days are still alive, well and in force today.

The infamous attack on Paulette Cooper included Operations Daniel and Dynamite. Part of a years-long GO campaign against Paulette Cooper, author of the 1971 book The Scandal of Scientology. According to a GO “Intell[igence] US Weekly Report” of October 10, 1972, Operation Daniel was “wide-scale exposure of PC’s sex life.” During 1972, Cooper had faced an increasing campaign of harassment from Scientology; her name and phone number was posted on street walls so that she would receive obscene phone calls, and she was anonymously subscribed to pornographic mailing lists. She also received anonymous death threats and her neighbors received letters claiming that she had a venereal disease.”

Operation Italian Fog- Scientology was determined to destroy Clearwater Mayor Gabe Cazares because he discovered they were behind the fictitious organization infiltrating the city. Part of the plan was to “get real documentation into the files of Mexican license bureau or bureaux stating that the mayor got married in Mexico to some Mexican gal 25 years ago who is not his wife, so puts the mayor in a position of bigamy. This can be accomplished either by a bribe or a covert action. Once the docs are planted it is cleverly exposed that the mayor is promiscuous and a bigamist.”-Letter dated March 23, 1976 by Guardian Office member Bruce Raymond

A second Operation, Keeler, targeting Cazares was to “…write a letter saying something to the following effect: ‘Gabe Cazares was involved in a scandal when he was in Wash DC with some floozy and also in a hit-and-run accident. The girl is going to turn herself into the police. We could have another Washington sex scandal on our hands unless we do something about it quickly.’”

In 1976 Deputy Attorney General (CA) Lawrence Tapper was targeted because he was investigating fraud by COS. Operation Snapper included “Recruiting a very tough woman that is obviously pregnant and that is a good actress… she does a practice run on the AG’s office to ascertain the best place in [Evelle] Younger’s office [the former attorney general] to do the action. Pregnant woman simply walks into the AG’s office in Sacramento and says in so many words: ‘I told Larry I wouldn’t do this but he gave me no choise [sic]. I don’t care about his career anymore! I mean look at me! I’ll go to the press even if it does ruin my family’s reputation. I won’t have an abortion!'” After creating a scene and crying, the woman was to leave, saying, “Oh, never mind, nobody will help me anyway.’”

(These and other Scientology attacks can be seen here.)

From these examples it can be seen the depths Scientology was willing to go, using vile accusations of a sexual nature, in order to discredit and destroy their victims.

Paul Haggis made an eerily prophetic statement early on.

Combined with the questions raised in Black Ops, there is overwhelming reasonable doubt as to the accusations leveled against Haggis.

Knowing that he is facing charges here in the States, why would he commit a further attack in such a public setting? Why take such an enormous and foolish risk?

Paul Haggis awaits his day in court and the chance to clear his name. Until that time, in this particular case, it would be wise to not rush to judgment. Scientology has a long, sordid history of using sex as a tool for fair game. Their various operations show that fabricating criminal scenarios in order to destroy someone is just another day at the Org for Office of Special Affairs.

Scientology is responsible for the largest infiltration of U.S. Government offices in the history of this country.

They stole Paulette Cooper’s stationary and attempted to frame her for bomb threats.

COS has illustrated their willingness to attempt to plant false documents, hire actors and spread false stories of vicious sexual misconduct in order to bring their enemies down.

Given all this there exists the very real potential that Paul Haggis is not the sexually demented monster he’s being portrayed as in the press.

Rather, could it be that Mr Haggis’ life is being shown through the lens of Scientology’s creation? Fiction every bit as dramatic as any film the beleaguered Producer could have come up with?

In the end the truth will out.

The black hatted bad guy will be vanquished and the hero will go on to live happily ever after.

Until then, don’t be distracted by red herrings. Focus instead on the clues swirling through the storyline that point to other possibilities.

Innocent until proven guilty must rule here. Lives are on the line; the women who have made the accusations, Haggis, his family…

Intertwined throughout is Scientology, their policies of fair game and their history proving their capabilities.

Be cautious here before rushing to judgment.

Like Hollywood, Scientology is not all that it appears and truth is truly stranger than fiction.