In the 1970’s leading members of the Church of Scientology were laboring over what are now the most infamous crimes in the history of the cult. Most notorious and broad out of all these crimes was Operation Snow White. By the mid-1970’s, L. Ron Hubbard had already trained many of his followers to infiltrate the United States government in order to obtain secret documents, gain tax exemption for the CoS, and accuse any nations that opposed Scientology with genocide.
Project Snow White consisted of a large number of sub-projects that generally fell into a few specific categories: clean out all criminal records relating to Scientology, bring the might of the US government to bear against any and all critics of the cult, and obtain special economic privileges for the cult. Ironically, most of these sub-programs did not target US citizens or the US government and Project Ore even stated that its goal was to use the UN as “a vehicle to “have all the files in immigration, police and interpol in all parts of the world corrected”, suggesting that the US was only a temporary platform that would be soon abandoned if the project showed success. Indeed, Hubbard’s followers did not inject themselves solely into the United States government, but rather into the political structure of any country that they had strong foothold in.
In my last article, “Shawn Lonsdale: Suicide or Murder?” most of those who commented expressed an understandable doubt that there could have been any kind of assassination involved in the death of Shawn Lonsdale. If anyone fails to understand why I would accept the idea that a plot could have been formed against the livelihood of Lonsdale, my answer is this: Scientology was designed to carry out conspiracies. The kind of analysis needed to prove this by examining the documents and infrastructure of the CoS is beyond my knowledge and abilities but the nature of the CoS is still plainly evident in the proceedings of Operation Snow White. This was methodical, calculated, successful, and when it was finally found out, it was not because of any misstep on the part of Hubbard’s operatives.
Michael Meisner was a prominent member of the CoS and even appointed Assistant Guardian for Information in the District of Columbia in January of 1974; in June of 1976, Meisner was appointed National Secretary. In 1977, Meisner left the CoS. Previous to leaving the cult, Meisner worked extensively to direct the infiltration of various parts of the government–most notably the IRS–and even helped create a cover story in the event that Gerald Wolfe, a CoS operative, was caught during an attempt to obtain government records. Wolfe was indeed caught and Meisner–who had also been directly involved in the operation–was supposed to give himself up along with Wolfe so that any FBI investigation would be cut off before it could link the crime to the CoS. However, the necessary arrangements to ensure that the case came to a close quickly without any incrimination of the CoS were taking unusually long. Dissatisfied with the way the cover-up was being handled, Meisner threatened to go to Washington D.C. and take matters into his own hands.
On May 1, 1977, after Meisner had been told by various officials to mind his place and to stop making demands of the church, Brian Andrus, Peeter Alvet, Chuck Reese, and two bodyguards confronted Meisner at his Los Angeles apartment. Meisner was told that he was to be moved to another apartment. When he refused to cooperate, Meisner was gagged, handcuffed, and forced out of the building and into a van. He was then moved to another location where he was detained by the CoS for several weeks. Meisner managed to escape his captors, but he maintained his loyalty to the CoS. On June 1, Meisner was convinced to willingly return to imprisonment after being told that L. Ron Hubbard and his wife–who was also a major official within the cult–cared about his concerns.
By mid-June, Meisner had finally become dissenchanted with the CoS and made the decision to leave the cult if he had the chance. Despite his inward resolve, Meisner continued to cooperate with his captors and was soon left un-guarded during the night. On June 20, Meisner left his escaped for a second time and gave himself up to the FBI.
On July 8, based on Meisner’s confession, the FBI conducted raids in Los Angeles and Washington D.C. targetting the CoS. What they found were burglary tools, eavesdropping equipment, and aproximately 90,000 pages of documents. As a direct result, Operation Normandy, Operation Freakout, and many other illegal projects were uncovered. Eleven Scientologists were sent to federal prisons for direct involvement in the conspiracy, including the wife of L. Ron Hubbard. Hubbard himself was currently in hiding as was listed as an “unindicted co-conspirator.”
Operation Snow White was put to an end, but few of most of those who were involved in the project were not convicted. Other attempts at prosecuting criminals within the CoS have been generally fruitless because tthe cult maintains a large staff of well-paid, well-trained lawyers, strange deaths continued to show links to the CoS, and the CoS eventually became exempt from most taxes (more, in fact, than any other religion) under the Clinton administration under the same terms they had sought in Operation Snow White.
At the same time, the documents siezed as a result of Meisner’s confession have provided the basis for many of the more respected criticisms of Scientology. As Anonymous wages its war on the cult, it’s demands that the government disband the corporate structure of Scientology will depend entirely on the results of Operation Snow White, for without the documents siezed as a result, there would be no definitive proof of criminal activity within the cult.
For more information, I recommend the following link, which has supplies complete documentation of the story and evidence of Operation Snow White as told during the trial of those Meisner had identified as conspirators: http://lisatrust.bogie.nl/legal/snowwhite/stipulation/index.html
