A book removed from Amazon's site because of alleged legal troubles is now among the top 150 books sold by the online bookstore. The book, a controversial exposé of the Church of Scientology, languished deep in Amazon's list of 4.5 million titles before being dropped in February. A Wired News report on that decision prompted Amazon to reinstate the book late last week. The book jumped to No. 700 before hitting a high of 148 on Tuesday. Author Jon Atack, reached ...

SEATTLE — Responding to e-mail complaints, Amazon.com says it will restore a book critical of the Scientology movement to its online catalog. The book, "A Piece of Blue Sky," by British writer Jon Atack, was banned by a British court following a successful 1995 defamation lawsuit against Atack. Amazon.com pulled the book in February, but said this week that it would reinstate it. "While the decision in February seemed the right thing to do at the time, we thought we could ...

Amazon.com has removed a controversial book from its listings, a book well known for angering the Church of Scientology. A Piece of Blue Sky, by UK writer Jon Atack, is an exposé of the Scientology movement from its creation in 1959 until the death of founder L. Ron Hubbard in 1986. The book disappeared from Amazon's site only recently. On alt.religion.scientology newsgroups, participants are questioning Amazon's decision, angrily pointing out that it is still legal to sell the book in United ...

[...] Maloney doesn't say which religion (perhaps his?) he would like to bring back into the schools, but it likely would not be the Church of Scientology, which boasts among its ranks several well-known purveyors of Maloney's "violence, hatred and sadism" and has used the shootings to promote its own agenda. Calling itself the Citizen Commission on Human Rights International, a Scientology-backed group showed up at the American Psychiatric Association's annual convention in Washington, D.C., on Saturday to blame psychiatrists for ...

The Church of Scientology International has settled a long-standing legal battle to repossess about 2,000 unpublished and copyrighted documents and keep them from being accessed by computer users in the future. Under a settlement reached in a U.S. district court earlier this month, a Colorado-based nonprofit group called FACTNet is permanently enjoined to pay the church $1 million if FACTNet is found guilty of future violations of church copyrights. FACTNet, started by former Scientologist Lawrence Wollersheim, also promised to return all ...

Scientology leaders say they want peace. They say they want to stay out of court. But with both foes at home and foes abroad, that goal may be elusive. The spiritual home of the Church of Scientology is in Clearwater, but for many years now its leaders have had worldwide ambitions. But as disciples have carried L. Ron Hubbard's teachings away from America's shore, the reception has been almost universally chilly at best – and at times openly hostile. At one ...

Scientology leaders say they want peace. They say they want to stay out of court. But with both foes at home and foes abroad, that goal may be elusive. Leaders of the Clearwater-based Church of Scientology say they hope the years of heavy legal expenses are over. That may not be a realistic hope. While the number of cases Scientology is currently pursuing is down in the United States, a survey of the cases still under way shows a persistence and ...

Around the clock, from Norway, the Netherlands, Australia and every corner of the United States, the critics of Scientology discuss the controversial organization and its practices. A court decision in Sweden is quickly posted to the news group, followed quickly by a full translation. Daily transcripts of a trial in Northern California are up before daybreak the next day, and news accounts from all over the world are quickly translated and reproduced. Many of those who post messages to the central ...

NEW PORT RICHEY – Two members of the state physician's board are questioning whether a health-food store with ties to Scientology is practicing medicine illegally by offering a church-sanctioned vitamin regimen. The treatment, called "purification rundown," is one of the first steps Scientologists take upon joining the church. Church members tout the rundown as a purifying routine that enables people to kick drug abuse and "think more clearly and have more energy." Some physicians, and a former Scientologist interviewed by the ...

WASHINGTON, D.C. - The U.S. Supreme Court today left intact a $1.08 million award against the Cult Awareness Network over the 1991 abduction and attempted deprogramming of a young Kirkland man. The justices, without comment, rejected an appeal that challenged the award as illegal and unconstitutional. Lawyers for the now-defunct, Chicago-based network said that holding the nonprofit group legally accountable for the act of one unpaid volunteer was "unprecedented and unsupportable." The appeal said the award threatens other advocacy groups "across ...