Shortly before Marty Rathbun was removed from his position within the Church, he flippantly wrote down abuses he had committed against some female staff who had worked under him.

Both Rathbun and these women have something to say.

The staff members’ names are intentionally omitted out of respect.

WHAT HE HAD TO SAY

“I abused and degraded [her]. On about 25 occasions I severely ripped into [her]. I called her a “f——-g c–t” and a “suppressive bitch,” and a “black…infested criminal.”

Marty Rathbun

“I abused, denigrated [her]. I have tortured her with a schedule that puts her going home after I leave and arriving before I get up. I blame her for things that she didn’t do — including my own f–k ups — sign of an SP continually wrong targets.”

Marty Rathbun

“I abused [her] and lessened her confidence and drove her frantic… I called [her] such names as “bitch”, “f–king criminal”, called her acts “suppressive”, told her [she] was “1.1” and will go to calculating lengths to f–k me over.”

Marty Rathbun

“I abused and invalidated [her] to the point of harming [her] confidence. I did invalidative upbraidings on [her] on 5 occasions. On those occasions I went beyond simply pointing out what was wrong with her actions and invalidated her personally with insults to her intelligence, and questioning her intentions.”

Marty Rathbun

WHAT THEY HAD TO SAY

“I once worked as Marty Rathbun’s secretary. One thing that always concerned me is his condescending and snide way of handling those junior to him and making them feel small and useless like he frequently did to me.

“In order to intimidate staff around him, he used violence and physical threats. During conferences he would go into violent outbreaks and rages. In one particular instance when he did not like the answer he received, he got pissed off and went into a rage, ripped the phone out of the wall and threw it across the conference room table so it hit the shelf and only barely missed the staff member. In other instances he threw an uncapped highlighter at a staff member, leaving marks on the wall and again only barely missing the person. At the same time he was threatening them in a loud voice with breaking their legs and uttering expletives. He was belittling and ridiculing of the staff members that attended these product conferences.

“In another instance, when he disagreed with me concerning how a particular project should be handled, he got very outraged, lost his temper and threw a legal-sized ring binder across the room at me in a rage. Such behavior is not ‘normal,’ and this is not how Scientologists resolve their differences.

“The atmosphere Rathbun created…was one of insecurity and fear which was 180 degrees opposed to what Scientology stands for. He openly bragged about his use of physical violence and in one instance said that the only thing he had left to get anything done … was physical violence.”

“I have never observed Mr. Miscavige to be violent or have violent uncontrolled rages or outbursts in the 25 years I have known him. I have never seen or witnessed Mr. Miscage cause anyone any physical harm. I have had the opportunity to work around him and was able to observe and experience how he treats and handles staff and others.

“When working for Rathbun, I felt he had unexpressed animosity to Mr. Miscavige. He always seemed to try to cut the communication lines of staff to Chairman of the Board RTC. Mr. Miscavige got more respect and being liked by the staff than Rathbun ever did and Rathbun resented it. In fact, most staff despised Rathbun; he definitely despised them.” (Female Staff Member)

“I worked with Marty Rathbun in both a junior or administrative support capacity for three years. During this time, I observed many instances where he not only didn’t exhibit care or compassion for staff (and myself) but, instead, showed a disregard for them.

“Another instance I recall, occurred where Marty intimidated a junior female staff member, [name]. In this instance, Marty was questioning [her] on a submission he was reviewing—one she had authorized prior to it going to him. At one point, during his questioning, he reacted to what [she] was answering by throwing the submission onto the desk right beside where she was standing with enough force for the submission to come apart and just barely missing contact with [her]. From my recollection, prior to doing this he also had made a motion as if he were stopping himself from coming after her physically.

“In another instance, Marty Rathbun ordered [name] and me to investigate an area of the Church for departures from policy. While the area I was over was not one that generally did such investigations, I had already found a few examples of such violations in this area, at Rathbun’s request. In the course of this investigation, I had several meetings with Marty where he was verbally abusive to both [name] and me because he did not consider the data we were providing was adequate. In a few of these meetings, Marty made motions as if he was having to hold himself back from physically attacking us and, in one instance, he threw a highlighter toward us with such force that the highlighter, missing us and hitting the wall, broke, getting ink on the walls and furniture. I left these meetings with Marty Rathbun feeling confused and incompetent as opposed to understanding what I had done wrong and how to correctly approach the investigation to produce the product expected.

“Throughout much of the time that I worked either as Marty’s junior or his administrative support, I observed many instances of Marty taking actions which, because of his position, gave the impression his actions were known of, ordered or sanctioned by Mr. Miscavige when in fact they were not.

“One action carried out by Marty, particularly notable to me because of its insidiousness and results. At this time, I observed him systematically taking actions to sever the communication lines between Mr. Miscavige and other staff members. Mr. Miscavige was often not at RTC during this time period and so was not meeting with those staff directly or observing actions being taken. In several instances, following communications those staff members had sent to Mr. Miscavige on matters related to their posts, Marty reprimanded them for something he took offense to in what they had reported.

“I have been in the Sea Organization for 20 years, and was staff in a Church of Scientology for two years before this. The four years I worked directly under Marty Rathbun as his junior or administrative support were like none I have experienced anywhere else in the Sea Organization or Scientology, either before or after. Marty’s ability to fly into violence against staff created an atmosphere of fear and oppression unheard of in any part of the Church I have worked in and certainly not in keeping with any of the Scientology scriptures.

“Mr. Miscavige was never present in any of the above instances and, in fact, was out of state during much of this time period. Because of Marty’s position and the way he carried out much of what I have detailed above, he gave the impression what he was doing was ordered by or known about or condoned by Mr. Miscavige when, in fact, it was not. As a matter of fact, such actions and treatment of staff is diametrically opposed to what I have observed and experienced directly from Mr. Miscavige in the 18 years I have known him.” (Female Staff Member)

“I personally know Rathbun, as I served on the staff of the same Church as he did. Therefore, I was at various times in a position to witness Rathbun abusing subordinates or other Church staff members. He also threatened and intimidated me personally on several occasions.

“One afternoon in the summer of 1998, Rathbun came up next to me while I was in our staff library. He threatened me saying that he wished I was a guy so he could ‘punch my lights out.’ He then pushed hard against the bookcase that was next to me, which was about 8 feet tall and full of books, so that it rattled and shook. I was concerned something might fall on top of me, so moved back. (I was young at the time and I am quite small compared to Rathbun, who is over 6 feet tall.)

“That same year, albeit a bit later in the year than the foregoing incident, Rathbun came into the office in which I worked at the time. He was already angry when he entered the room. He came at me screaming loudly, and I was concerned that he was going to hit me. He stopped a couple of feet short of me, and to further intimidate me, he grabbed a chair and threw it violently across the room, breaking the chair.

“Rathbun again came into that office. He was again screaming at me. This time he took a telephone from the desk and threw it across the office in the direction where [name] and I were seated. The phone smashed against the wall or a desk, but fortunately did not hit either one of us.

“Rathbun tried to give the impression he was “working for Mr. Miscavige” when using these scare tactics detailed above. Because others had no trust in Rathbun as a person on his own, but did in Mr. Miscavige, it was apparent that Rathbun attempted to use the universally held respect earned by Mr. Miscavige to forward his own personal ends.

“It became very clear to me after personally meeting Mr. Miscavige that Rathbun was the author of his own activities to put people in fear and that Mr. Miscavige had nothing to do with and was not aware of Rathbun’s nefarious activities.

“How I observed this is that all of the above facts I laid out (of physical violence and putting people in fear) occurred while Mr. Miscavige was not present at the Int Base, and that Rathbun would never employ these tactics while Mr. Miscavige was on site.

“I only personally saw Rathbun with Mr. Miscavige at Gold about 5 times between 1998 and 2003, and in each case, I observed Rathbun act like a different person. He was calm, toned down, and even nice. Yet when Mr. Miscavige was not around, my personal relationship with Rathbun was one based on fear of his blow-ups and threats.” (Female Staff Member)

 

“The suppressive person (whom we’ve called a Merchant of Fear or Chaos Merchant and which we can now technically call the suppressive person) can’t stand the idea of Scientology. If people became better, the suppressive person would have lost. The suppressive person answers this by attacking covertly or overtly Scientology. This thing is, he thinks, his mortal enemy since it undoes his (or her) "good work" in putting people down where they should be.”—L. Ron Hubbard

HCO PL 5 April1965, HANDLING THE SUPPRESSIVE PERSON THE BASIS OF INSANITY