Leah Remini slaps Church of Scientology with harassment, defamation lawsuit – National | 24CA News
Actor Leah Remini is suing the Church of Scientology and its chief David Miscavige for harassment, stalking, defamation and myriad different alleged unlawful actions.
Remini, a former Scientologist and vocal critic of the group, has accused the church of utilizing “mob-style operations and attacks” to harass her and different ex-members.
Miscavige is known as particularly within the lawsuit, which was filed Wednesday within the California Superior Court. The Religious Technology Center, which Remini mentioned polices and enforces punishments doled out by the church, can be named within the submitting.
In a press launch, Remini mentioned she initiated the lawsuit to make the church stop its alleged “harassment, defamation, and other unlawful conduct against anyone who Scientology has labeled as an ‘enemy.’”
The Church of Scientology and Miscavige haven’t commented publicly on the lawsuit.
Remini, 53, joined the Church of Scientology as a toddler in 1979. She left over three many years later in 2013.
The Emmy-winning King of Queens actor is now in search of compensatory and punitive damages for the hurt she claims the Church of Scientology inflicted on her and her profession.
“For 17 years, Scientology and David Miscavige have subjected me to what I believe to be psychological torture, defamation, surveillance, harassment, and intimidation, significantly impacting my life and career,” Remini mentioned within the press launch. “I believe I am not the first person targeted by Scientology and its operations, but I intend to be the last.”
She went on to argue the church tried to “totally restrain and muzzle,” “obliterate” and “ruin” her by means of co-ordinated campaigns of harassment, defamation and abuse. She claimed her household, associates, business companions, and associates had been additionally focused by the church for interacting together with her.
Remini alleged she misplaced a number of business contracts due to meddling and exterior threats from the church.
She additionally claimed the church employed a non-public investigator to stalk her. Remini mentioned on a number of events individuals had been directed by the Church of Scientology to try to interrupt into her dwelling or surveil her.
Remini mentioned she needs to make use of her constitutional rights as an American to “speak the truth and report the facts about Scientology.”
In a separate social media assertion, Remini mentioned the alleged harassment she skilled from the church just isn’t solitary. She mentioned she has been “one of thousands of targets of Scientology over the past seven decades.”
“People who share what they’ve experienced in Scientology, and those who tell their stories and advocate for them, should be free to do so without fearing retaliation from a cult with tax exemption and billions in assets,” Remini wrote on Twitter.
Mike Rinder, a former senior govt of the Church of Scientology, voiced his assist for Remini and her lawsuit shortly after it was introduced on Tuesday.
“The Warrior Princess has struck another blow for all victims of scientology,” he wrote. “This takes courage as all they know to do is retaliate with more hate and harassment. One thing I know — they won’t succeed in silencing @LeahRemini.”
Rinder left the church in 2007 and has since been outspoken concerning the alleged bodily and psychological abuse inflicted upon church members by the hands of Miscavige.
Since leaving the Church of Scientology, Remini has persistently criticized the spiritual group and Miscavige for severe abuses of energy.
In 2016, she launched the documentary sequence Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath, which she produced and co-created. The sequence gained three Emmy awards.
In November 2022, Remini testified in court docket to assert the Church of Scientology falsely planted rape allegations in opposition to movie director Paul Haggis, who left the church in 2009. Haggis was ordered to pay US$10 million to a girl who mentioned he sexually assaulted her almost a decade in the past.
Remini was additionally current in court docket through the April re-trial of That ’70s Show actor Danny Masterson, who’s a Scientologist. She claimed Masterson’s attorneys tried to have her thrown out of the courtroom over incorrect assumptions she can be referred to as as a witness to the trial. She mentioned the church and Miscavige had been making an attempt to “waste the court’s time with embarrassing, petty attempts to get someone who is supporting survivors of sexual violence thrown out.”
During Masterson’s trial, it was revealed two attorneys previously representing the actor leaked delicate trial data to the Church of Scientology concerning the girls who accused Masterson of rape. Masterson was discovered responsible of two counts of rape.
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