ath: typhoon2.gnilink.net!cyclone1.gnilink.net!washdc3-snf1!washdc3-snh1.gtei.net!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!news.tele.dk!small.news.tele.dk!195.54.122.107!newsfeed1.bredband.com!bredband!newsfeed1.telenordia.se!algonet!news2.tninet.se!not-for-mail
From: catarina@pamnell.com (Catarina Pamnell)
Newsgroups: alt.religion.scientology
Subject: OCMB: As a Narconon staff member, I was a Co$ recruiter
Date: Thu, 18 Oct 2001 06:33:46 GMT
Organization: A.R.S.C.C.(wdne)M.E.O.W.
Lines: 164
Message-ID: <3bce7732.2402012@news1.tninet.se>
NNTP-Posting-Host: sdu155-203.ppp.algonet.se
X-Trace: green.tninet.se 1003386842 12536 195.163.203.155 (18 Oct 2001 06:34:02 GMT)
X-Complaints-To: abuse@algonet.se
NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 18 Oct 2001 06:34:02 +0000 (UTC)
X-Newsreader: Forte Free Agent 1.21/32.243
Xref: cyclone1.gnilink.net alt.religion.scientology:59810

Found on the Operation Clambake message board:
http://discus.xenu.net/discus/messages/10/1628.html?1003372503

Posted by Anonymous
Wednesday, October 17, 2001 - 10:22 pm
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I post this anonymously because of actual threats I have received
from former bosses and die-hard Scientologists at the Narconon
facility I used to work at. Narconon is a scam run by the Co$ to raise
money and manipulate and take advantage of desperate,
easily-victimized drug addicts by subjecting them to basic Scientology
teachings and getting them to join the Co$. Narconon claims to have a
80% success rate. In the 7 months I was involved with one of 2
Narconon facilities in California, over 80 people attended and
graduated from the program. I personally know that 71 of them
relapsed. Many who relapse return to Narconon, where they are put on a
degrading and punishing "ethics cycle" where they are forced to
perform manual labor in order to "make up damage" to the Narconon
facility and rejoin the group. Relapsed addicts who return are not
only put to work, but subject to even more intense efforts to get them
to join the Co$ and be brainwashed by the Narconon "counselors". The
facility, only licensed for a little over 32 patients by the State of
California, had almost 50 because of all the relapsed graduates who
returned. The facility was overcrowded and in violation of fire and
health codes. Pressed for time, the kitchen staff would defrost meat
in the bathtubs while the bathroom was still in use by students. Whole
rooms had nothing in them but beds from wall to wall, cramming
students in. There was minimal staff supervision because staff members
were totally outnumbered. On-site drug use was rampant and students
were constantly getting high in the facility or in the surrounding
neighborhood after escaping unnoticed. The safety and well being of
students was endangered when non-commercially licensed and uninsured
staff members would drive students around in uninsured facility
automobiles for program-sponsored events. To deal with the lack of
space at the actual facility, students were placed in temporarily
rented apartments that were far from staff supervision (2 of these
apartments being several miles away from the actual facility). State
authorities were unaware of these ad-hoc facilities and no license had
been granted for them.

Many Narconon graduates at facilities world-wide go on to work at the
facility. This is often because the upper-level Scientologist
counselors who run the facilities convince them they can't afford to
go out in to the world or they will inevitably return to drug use.
Their only chance at sobriety is to work 6 days a week, 12 hours a day
with minimal contact with family, vacation time, free time or personal
time at Narconon. Narconon, the "couselors" say, saved their life, so
the patient must "repay their debt" by working for Narconon. They are
paid $50 a week to start, and raises come only after they pass through
various courses given at the local Co$ organization. "Counselors" have
no formal training when it comes to first aid, drug abuse treatment,
medicine, counseling. The only so-called formal training they have
comes from the Co$ and the fact that all employees at the Narconon
facility were themselves recent graduates.
Addicts and their families pay over $22,000 to go to Narconon after
being convinced through deception and lies that the program will save
their life or that of their addicted love one. A significant portion
of this $22,000 goes to the Co$ as payment for classes staff members
are required to take. Furthermore, thousands of dollars out of that
$22,000 goes to purchasing books from the Association for Better
Living and Education (ABLE), itself an arm of Scientology and the
"publisher and copyright owner" of the books Narconon uses (books that
are all LRH's teachings).

Narconon "students" (the name used to refer to patients) are subject
to an unproven, quack medical practice of the purification-rundown,
where they sit in a sweltering sauna for hours on end, taking harmful
doses of vitamins, minerals and niacin (a very harmful substance in
the amount Narconon makes its "students" consume).

Never in my time at this Narconon facility was there every a licensed
medical professional on staff, apart from a registered nurse who had
gone through the program herself after becoming addicted to
prescription medications she stole from work before coming to
Narconon. This nurse, the facility's only licensed medical
professional, relapsed 3 times during the course of my employment at
the facility. She was far from the only staff member to relapse. Both
students and staff members were constantly getting kicked out or fired
because of drug use, inappropriate sexual conduct between staff
members and students, or being deemed "suppressive" by hardcore Co$
staff members after, say, a staff member missing a day of work,
showing up late, or refusing to embrace forced Co$ teachings.

While at Narconon my job involved public relations for the facility
and recruitment of new "students". I was told by my bosses to lie to
any and all people who called the facility seeking help for themselves
or loved ones.

We would lie about insurance coverage (We would tell people we knew
for a fact that their insurance carrier would cover our program when
in fact, such carrier had never, EVER agreed to cover the Narconon
program because that health insurance company had doctors smart enough
to recognize Narconon as the scam it is). So, innocent people would
pay tens of thousands of dollars, sure that their insurance providor
would reimburse them at a later date. That reimbursement would never
come but by then Narconon and Co$ already had their money. We would
lie about our success rate, basing the statistics of a 70%-80% success
rate on decades old studies done by obscure European research firms.
In actuality, there was no record of the firms conducting such studies
of ever having existed. But, go to the website of any Narconon
facility worldwide and they will taut this 70%-80% success rate. I
would extoll our success rate to callers while at the same time
knowing that well over 90% of students I had seen graduate from the
program had relapsed.
We would constantly hear of graduates relapsing when their families
would call mere days after the students graduation, devastated that
they had already returned to drug use. I personally can recall the
names of 6 students who graduated and became staff members... lasting
less than a week as staff before relapsing. Almost all students who
attempted to return home after graduation relapsed as well.

These unfortunate people are not statistics to me. I can recite the
names of each and every one of these Narconon victims who I saw come
in to the program desperate for help, only to be taken advantage of,
abused, and manipulated.

Narconon tauts this high success rate but the staff knows it is not
true. In typical C0$ fashion, however, they deny the facts and make
themselves believe in the lies that best serve their agenda...
recruitment and fundraising for the Co$ by taking advantage of drug
addicts and their families.

Even the Narconon facilities are constantly sending
students-turned-staff back and forth to one another for because of
relapses. Narconon Southern California had to send their "Ethics
Director" to the Northern Califoria facility after he relapsed.
Narconon Chillocco's Senior Case Supervisor (the upper-level
Scientologist who determines what Scientology courses individual
students will take, in what order, and how) relapsed and came to the
So. Calif. facility to redo her program. Narconon Nor. Calif's Intake
Director (the lead person responsible for bringing in new "students"
relapsed and apparently had a sexual relationship with a juvenile
"student" (Narconon Nor. Calif. is the only Narconon facility licensed
to treat juveniles as well as adults), and was sent to Narconon So.
Calif. to redo his program. These staff members, supposedly among the
most advanced, most accomplished, most experienced, most highly
trained graduates and staff members of Narconon still could not stay
sober! And because of their staunch dedication to the Co$, they were
sent to another facility after their relapse (where they would avoid
embarrassment and so that the students at the facility they used to
work for would be unaware of what had occurred) where they would
quickly go through their re-attempt at the program and get hired at a
different Narconon facility.

Narconon is truly a criminal enterprise. It sickens me to know that I
was responsible for bringing in decent people who sought out my
guidance for help at the most desperate times of their lives to an
evil organization like Narconon - an organization who's sole purpose
was to defraud, manipulate, then brainwash these drug addicts and
their families to the extent that the addict would get suckered in to
accepting the Co$ and LRH's insane teachings. Lives and families are
torn apart at Narconon.
When I left Narconon in an argument with my bosses because of my
gradually becoming more and more aware of what a criminal conspiracy
Narconon was and is, I was threatened by these Scientologist bosses of
mine. For weeks after I left they tracked me down and left threatening
messages on my answering machine. Despite such threats and the evil we
all know Scientology can inflict upon those who it deems its enemies
(especially people like myself who were on the inside of their tactics
and teachings), I had to post this message here and share my
experiences at and knowledge of Narconon in the hopes that it will
keep atleast 1 person from going to this facility were they previously
considering it.