REED SLATKIN: SHOULD JUDGE MORROW RECUSE HERSELF?

MORE SCIENTOLOGY CORRUPTION IN LOS ANGELES.

It has been reported that Scientologist Reed Slatkin will be sentenced by United States District Court Judge Margaret Morrow in the Central District of California on November 18, 2002. Scientology minister Reed Slatkin co-founded Earthlink, Ltd. Slatkin is charged with investor fraud. It is alleged that he operated the largest known 'Ponzi' scheme in history. A 'Ponzi' scheme involves the use of new investor monies to make promised financial returns to earlier investors. The amount of the investment fraud may exceed $600 million .The Slatkin case has been assigned to U.S. District Court Judge Morrow.

Judge Morrow had an excellent personal and professional reputation before being elevated to the Federal Bench by President Clinton. Judge Morrow was nominated to the bench in January 1997, but the Republican controlled Senate delayed confirmation hearings and a Senate vote for nearly two years. Prior to her appointment to the bench she had been very active in the California State Bar.

From 1987 to 1996, Judge Morrow was a senior partner at the Los Angeles law firm of Quinn, Kully & Morrow that merged with the giant Washington D.C. based law firm of Arnold & Porter in 1996. From 1987 through 1996, the law firm of Quinn, Kully & Morrow was one of the Church of Scientology's leading law firms in Los Angeles, CA. Indeed, Judge Morrow's other senior partner John J. ("Jack") Quinn was often lead counsel for the Church of Scientology International and other of its affiliated corporations and enterprises. Jack Quinn is a former President of the Los Angeles County Bar Association and is a California State Bar leader. For conflict of interest purposes, Judge Morrow is considered to have formerly represented the Church of Scientology, which benefited from Reed Slatkin's $600 million Ponzi scheme.

Between 1987 and 1996, the Quinn, Kully & Morrow law firm provided representation and advice to the Church of Scientology in numerous cases which involved: David Mayo/Robin Scott; Bent Corydon; Roxanne Friend; Vicki and Richard Aznaran; Joseph A Yanny, Esq.. ("Yanny I"); CSI v. Fishman & Geertz; Geertz & Fishman v. CSI. Additionally, Jack Quinn attended several meetings with me to try unsuccessfully to convince me to enter into a settlement agreement, and "disengagement", with the Scientology enterprise. For example see:

www.xs4all.nl/~fishman/malpro01.html

cultpreres.users4.50megs.com/pattinsonpostingssl.htm

www.xenu.org/factnet/SCN/FILES/ARMSTR/G2--.TXT

www.caic.org.au/psyther/sci/blackmai.htm?FACTNet

In providing such representation to the Scientology enterprise, the Quinn, Kully & Morrow law firm made appearances with other Scientology counsel such as Earl Cooley, Gerald Feffer, Kendrick Moxon and William T. Drescher.

The Quinn, Kully & Morrow law firm was also involved in the events leading up to RTC. v. Yanny (II). After the conclusion of Yanny I, Scientology decided to deal with the Aznarans .Vicki Aznaran was formerly the second highest ranking officer in the Church of Scientology. Her husband Richard was head of security at the Church of Scientology's heavily armed compound and alleged gulag near Palm Springs in California. Vicki Aznaran had escaped from imprisonment at the Scientology desert gulag. After her husband also exited the cult they filed a law suit against the  Church of Scientology.

 Jack Quinn, Esq., and Bill Drescher, Esq., held a breakfast meeting at venerable Biltmore Hotel in Los Angeles with Yanny and former Aznaran counsel Barry Van Sickle who had been disqualified from representing the Aznaran's because of his then-concurrent representation of former Scientology counsel Joe Yanny. (The California Court of Appeal later reversed the Van Sickle disqualification.) Jack Quinn and Bill Drescher knew Van Sickle was no longer counsel to the Aznarans and that he had been replaced by Ford Greene, Esq. Consequently, applicable ethics rules required Quinn, Kully & Morrow and Bill Drescher to deal with the Aznarans only through Ford Greene.

During this Biltmore Hotel breakfast meeting, Jack Quinn and Bill Drescher told Barry Van Sickle that their client, the Church of Scientology, wanted to settle both the Corydon and Friend cases. Bent Corydon was former scientology minister who later sued the cult for fraud and other wrongdoings. Roxanne Friend was also a former scientologist who sued the Scientology enterprise for various wrongs including fraud and interstate kidnapping. However, Scientology lawyers Quinn and Drescher's settlement authority was limited to approximately one million dollars for both cases and Corydon and Friend were demanding over one million dollars each in settlement. Quinn and Drescher told Van Sickle that the real impediment to settling the Aznaran case was the ridiculous settlement demand of Ford Greene. These attorneys said that Scientology could not deal with Ford Greene. Quinn and Drescher prevailed upon Van Sickle to go directly to his former clients, the Aznarans without the knowledge of their then-counsel Ford Greene. Van Sickle was to tell the Aznarans that the Church of Scientology wanted to settle their differences but could not, and would not, as long as Ford Greene remained the Aznaran's lawyer. Quinn and Drescher also told Van Sickle to inform the Aznarans that if they terminated Ford Greene as their lawyer, then the Church of Scientology would settle the Aznaran v. Scientology case. Acting at the behest of Jack Quinn and Bill Drescher, Van Sickle went behind the back of Ford Greene and conveyed the Scientology attorneys' communication, as well as their offer and request. The Aznarans complied and fired Ford Greene as the Scientology attorneys had demanded. Thus, they were then without any legal representation.

The Church of Scientology did not respond with any settlement negotiations and/or offer(s). Instead, Scientology lawyers filed a massive motion for summary judgment. The effect of such a successful motion would have been to dismiss the Aznaran's lawsuit against the Church of Scientology with an additional order that the Aznarans pay the Church of Scientology's (prevailing party) court costs. The Scientology motion was so massive that it had obviously been many months in the making and was almost ready to file when Judge Morrow's other senior partner and Bill Drescher met with Barry Van Sickle. Van Sickle was then representing Joseph Yanny and had won the forty-day trial in Yanny I case. The Aznarans had no lawyer and only two weeks to respond to a massive motion that would require a number of lawyers and a huge effort to successfully oppose.

Joe Yanny is a close friend of Vicki and Richard Aznaran. He was outraged when he learned of what had happened. Knowing he would be sued again by Scientology, Yanny appeared in federal court on behalf of the Aznarans. He obtained a continuance of the hearing on the Scientology summary judgment motion. Later, the judge ordered Ford Greene reinstated as counsel for the Aznarans and denied the Scientology motion for summary judgment.

Joe Yanny angrily fired Barry Van Sickle as his lawyer in Scientology matters. He then hired David Parker and me to (successfully) defend the second Scientology v. Yanny case, which was a claim for breach of fiduciary of duty. Scientology had alleged that it was a conflict of interest, and a breach of fiduciary duty, for Scientology's former copyright lawyer Joe Yanny to briefly appear for the Aznaran's after they had fired Ford Greene. During the litigation, the depositions of Jack Quinn and Bill Drescher were taken and the facts as to the Biltmore breakfast meeting confirmed.

There are over 28 judges sitting in the United States Federal District Court in Los Angeles, CA. Cases are supposed to be randomly assigned by a "wheel" system which ensures that each new case goes to the next judge, then the next judge, then the next judge until the wheel goes fully around and starts again. Judges who have even an appearance of a conflict of interest are supposed to recuse themselves.

Indeed, in the RTC v. Scott/ Mayo RICO litigation Judge Mariana R. Pfaelzer had to eventually step down from presiding over the case. Before being appointed a federal judge, Judge Pfaelzer had been a partner at the now defunct Wyman, Bautzer law firm which had been representing the Church of Scientology in the Scott/Mayo case. After her judicial appointment Judge Pfaelzer always and properly recused herself from being the judge in any case involving her former partners. However, one day several of the judge's former law partners paid her a private visit in her chambers at the Federal District Court in Los Angeles. The judge's former partners told her of their representation of the Church of Scientology in the Scientology litigation against Mayo. They asked if she would adhere to her disqualification practice if the new Scientology case were assigned to her courtroom. She apparently agreed not to do so. The Scientology v. Scott/Mayo case was filed and it was assigned to Judge Pfaelzer's courtroom. When the Wyman, Bautzer lawyers appeared for Scientology in Judge Pfaelzer's courtroom, she did not adhere to her practice of recusing herself from all cases involving her former partners at the Wyman, Bautzer law firm.

During the course of the case, Judge Pfaelzer issued a ruling that infuriated the Church of Scientology. Scientology's Office of Special Affairs dispatched Earl Cooley, Esq., Jesse Prince and another to pay a midnight visit to the judge's home. The mission came to the attention of the FBI, which commenced a public corruption investigation. The participants admitted setting out to pay a midnight visit to the judge, but denied having actually spoken to her because they could not find her address. I obtained the FBI report when I represented Joe Yanny in Spurlock (Scientology) v. FBI. Other nocturnal activities of the Scientology enterprise were more successful. Scientology representatives prevailed upon the Chief Clerk of the Federal Court to specially open a filing window at the clerk's office on a Saturday morning so that Scientology could file certain papers in the RTC v. Mayo/Scott litigation.

You will be able to read more about Scientology's abuse and corruption of the legal and political system in the three books I am working on. One book details my own experiences with the Church of Scientology. Another examines the various lawsuits that the Scientology enterprise has been involved with over the past fifty years and the last book picks up where A Piece of Blue Sky by John Atak leaves off. This book commences with the death of L. Ron Hubbard and David Miscavige's takeover of the Scientology enterprise. It also examines David Miscavige's subsequent reign of terror as Chairman of the Religious Technology Center, his role in the Church of Spiritual Technology, his claim to be the legitimate ecclesiastical leader of the Church of Scientology and the expansion and threat of the World Institute of Scientology Enterprises. In part it will be the unauthorized biography of David Miscavige: church leader, tax evader or racketeer?

Graham E. Berry, Esq.

3384 McLaughlin Avenue

Los Angeles, California 90066

USA

Telephone: (310) 745-3771

Fax: (310) 745-3772

Email: grahameb@aol.com

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http://www.lermanet2.com/reference/GrahamBerry/lettertoAndrewCard.htm

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