This week a BBC reporter was shown screaming in fury after being hounded by Scientology fanatics. Here, a Mail writer tells how he, too, was the victim of a vicious cult smear campaign. The voice at the end of the line was trembling. "Is that Mr Bracchi?" "Yes, it is," I replied. The caller could not have been more relieved. I was supposed to be dead. Someone had started a rumour that I had been killed in a fire. The same ...

JOHN Travolta is a halfwit. A statement of the obvious, perhaps, given his adherence to a cult which believes we're all infected with the souls of aliens who were banished to earth 75 million years ago by an evil galactic warlord called Xenu. But if anyone doubted it, the former disco-strutter confirmed his asininity by publicly urging the BBC not to screen John Sweeney's Panorama film about Scientology last night. Not to be outdone, Travolta's fellow- cultists gleefully posted on YouTube ...

A senior policeman has appeared in a video praising the highly-controversial Church of Scientology, the Daily Mail can reveal. Chief Superintendent Ken Stewart, a divisional commander with the City of London police, agreed to be filmed outside Bishopsgate police station for the Scientology film, which is shown to members of the organisation. Although Mr Stewart insisted he was not a Scientologist, the news is the latest evidence of the extent to which the group has managed to forge links with the ...

Scientology has started a new propaganda offensive in Europe, opening new offices in capitals across the continent. German authorities are responding by increasing their efforts to monitor the controversial organization. At first sight, the building in Berlin's Charlottenburg neighborhood looks like a run-of-the-mill office complex: a functional, seven-story construction covered with glass windows. The young receptionist is dressed in black and wears a futuristic-looking headset. But for Scientologists, the building is a chapel, a place for studying their own doctrine and, ...

The controversial Scientology sect was accused of trying to inflitrate British politics last night after it emerged that they paid thousands of pounds to both the Labour and Tory parties. Members of Labour's ruling executive committee, on which Tony Blair sits, approved the payment from a charity which is closely linked to the Church of Scientology, which boasts Hollywood stars Tom Cruise and John Travolta among its members. Labour allowed the charity, the Association for Better Living and Education (ABLE), to ...

The Labour Party received thousands of pounds from an offshoot of Scientology, it has been revealed. The decision to accept money from a charity linked to the controversial cult was taken at the highest level by members of the National Executive Committee. • 'Senior Blair aides to be interviewed as potential suspects in cash-for-honours probe' • Sign up for our daily interactive homepage email They allowed the charity, the Association for Better Living and Education (ABLE), to take a stall at ...

Gabe Cazares spoke out, whether it was as Clearwater mayor, to promote civil rights or to fight Scientology. CLEARWATER — Former Clearwater Mayor Gabe Cazares, a civil rights advocate, champion of the disadvantaged and archenemy of the Church of Scientology, died Friday (Sept. 29, 2006). He was 86. As a politician, Mr. Cazares led the local Democratic Party and won public office at a time when few Hispanics even lived in Pinellas County. As a community activist, he worked to help ...

Scientologists are taking advantage of Germany's education problems for their own ends: They are luring weak students by providing after-school tutoring. Education authorities in Germany are on alert. The ad on a supermarket notice board in the city of Essen was aimed at all the parents in the neighborhood. Right nearby there was an "alternative school" where learning was still fun. "Sounds just right", thought one dad, who is now reluctant to give his name out of sheer fear. He took ...

A councillor in East Sussex has asked for Scientologists in his town to be stopped from working for the council. Councillor Michael Murphy has had his proposal seconded by councillor Paul Scott, but other members of Crowborough Town Council have raised objections. He suggests the council "refrains from using the voluntary services of the Scientologists until a full investigation has been carried out". A Scientology centre in nearby Saint Hill has invited Mr Murphy for a visit. His motion was supposed ...

The controversial church, whose founder called shrinks "terrorists" and which labels mental illness a fraud, is closer than you think to implanting its extreme beliefs in the nation's laws and schools. It may be easy to dismiss Tom Cruise's recent outbursts against psychiatry as the ravings of an egomaniacal celebrity. Comedians have certainly had a field day with Cruise, a fervent disciple of the Church of Scientology, ever since he scolded Brooke Shields for taking prescribed medication to treat her postpartum ...