Escaped Scientologists EXPOSE Secret Slave Labor Camp | The Headleys

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And did you want to be in love? And did you want to have kids? Like, were these any type of conversations or feelings you're having early on in the marriage? You can't really have that conversation because in Scientology, if you talk about leaving, that is a suppressive act. If you talk about leaving Scientology, if to another person in Scientology. Even your husband. Yeah. So having kids would be essential to leaving because if you leave, there's a policy in Scientology where if you leave Scientology, Hubbard says, close the door all the way. We leave it a crack open in case they want to come back in. But at the headquarters, there's a policy that he wrote specifically for the people that work at the international headquarters. If you leave from the headquarters, we bolt the door shut and weld it with an atomic branding iron. So that person can never, ever be in Scientology ever again. If you, if you escape from the international headquarters. And kids are a problem with that? You're not allowed to have kids if you're in the Sea Org. Oh. Anyone who gets pregnant is forced to have an abortion, which happened to me twice. It happened to you twice? While we were at the international headquarters. While we were married. Now, what was that like? I mean, that sounds like the worst nightmare of all time. It is absolutely the worst nightmare of all time. The first time I was 19, I hadn't been being paid, so I couldn't afford birth control. And from the moment I realized, oh, I missed my period, I had to go to the medical person and ask for a pregnancy test. So immediately, the cat's out of the bag, so to speak. And I'm told that I'm not even allowed to have a conversation with Mark about it. So you didn't even know? And I mean, I, as I said, I had always wanted kids. And this was absolutely my worst nightmare. During our lawsuit, I made a list of all the women I personally knew who'd had, been forced to have abortions. Some of them were required to have up to six abortions. And that list was 80 women long. It got so bad that the place that they were taking the women was like, hey, there's something weird here because you guys are bringing, the husbands are never there. It was the Riverside Family Planned Parenthood Clinic. You're bringing them here in a minivan. So they're doing two or three women at a time. They had to switch to another place because the place was like this. It was the place that was doing them. It was like, there's something wrong with this. We can't keep doing this. And if a woman even for a second didn't immediately comply, they'd be put on heavy manual labor and interrogated, separated from their husband, restricted to the property, like extreme measures. To convince them to do it. Yeah. And in my case, I was 19. I knew that if. If I tried to fight it, I would lose my family, likely lose my husband, lose everything. And I thought about fighting it. And I just didn't feel that I was even mentally capable of fighting. But I was grilled on what to say, what to do. You know, six foot Australian dude took me to the Planned Parenthood Clinic and waited there. And the distinct memory of that was, literally, you know, so the clinic staff are not Scientologists, obviously. They don't know what's going on. And one of the nurses, I had been grilled to say, or drilled, I should say, drilled to say, I don't want any pain medication. I don't want to talk to a psychologist. Just go through with it. And one of the nurses, looked at me and she said, Honey, where's your husband? And I just, in that moment, just I was just like, Oh, my God, he's at work. You know, just anyhow, in that moment, I was just destroyed, like completely and utterly. And in my mind, I remember also thinking if this ever happens again, fuck these people. I'm, I'm done. I don't care what they put me through. I will not ever go through, through with this again. But fast forward two years. Now, had you shared that this happened? Yeah. I found out after it was already all done and dusted. And when you found out, what was your thought? I was like, you, we can't, you know, it is what it is. We were, if we, we, we had seen there, there had been probably by that time, at least three or four couples that had, that had gotten pregnant. And in, in almost every case, the, the, they were separated and they were both put on to manual labor at separate places. So they wouldn't see each other. They couldn't, couldn't game plan anything because they're not together. And it always ended up with either those people got disappeared. We don't know what happened to them if they kept the kid. And there's a policy. If you leave the Sea Org and just any Sea Org location for, for having, for having a baby, then you're supposed to get, sent to a small failing Scientology organization. So one that can't pay their bills, can't pay their staff is in a shitty strip mall somewhere. So they purposely put you in, in even a worse living situation so that you will have to struggle. It will, you know, I can either stay here and not have a kid, or I can have a kid and also be on the struggle bus in the middle of nowhere where I don't have any family or support system or anything. So it's, it's a Sophie's choice. It's always a Sophie's choice in Scientology. There's no, there's only the, the, the lesser evil and the worst evil. There's never a good way out. It's always going to be shit somewhere or another. Again, how is that not, I don't understand how would accounts like you guys be in public, how that's not prosecuted. Because it's part of their belief system that that's how you do it. And because they have. It's completely illegal now. They, and they have all the best lawyers to protect them and using their. Buses of women. Tax exempt dollars to protect an evil, abusive organization. And, and yeah, so, so back to this two years later, now I've been moved into Religious Technology Center. I was sent to Clearwater, Florida. Mark is now in California. And I was in a meeting. All day with David Miscavige coming in and out with 20 other people. He was railing on and on and on screaming about some, whatever the latest flap of the day was. And I passed out and I was carried out of that conference room into a bathroom. And, and honestly, to this day, I don't know why what happened happened, but somebody brought me a pregnancy test and I did it and it was positive. And now. I got just, just to put it out there. If you pull the goalie and I got Michael Phelps swimmers, they're gonna, that's gonna happen. Okay. They're getting to the finish line. Oh my God. That was the second time. And now, you know, what happens though? Yeah. And that time I, and that time I, that I was, I never found out about that time. You never found out about that? No, not until six months later. The next time I physically saw him, I tried to, I put in a CSW completed staff work request to call Mark and it was disapproved. I was not allowed to even call him. And, um, They took you to a Planned Parenthood in Clearwater. And you had said the last time that you'd never let this happen again. What, again, you're like a prisoner in an organization. So I'm not judging it. No, I know. What's going through your head? Uh, I mean, again, like how the heck, heck did I end up here by this time? I'm 21. Um, you know, it's my husband. I love him. And I've always wanted children. It just, just, it's soul destroying. You know, it, it just really is. It's like, if I had one superpower, it would be to turn back time on that fucking shit. It's just, uh, you know, the only thing that brings me peace, not that I, I've had to work through lot of on this but during our lawsuit because forced abortion was one of the causes of action it like we know many many people who because of that lawsuit were able to leave and have kids because they couldn't outlaw it anymore they couldn't make the women do it anymore because now they're being accused of making women do this so then they had to stop the craziest thing is we help people with our foundation to get Sea Org members, help them get to safety. Aftermath Foundation. Michael J. Rinder, Aftermath Foundation. And so we've heard over the years, we're always being told, oh, this is happening or that's happening. Well, now they're not making the women do this. The dudes are all getting snipped. So it just doesn't happen in the first place. So it's kind of wild. But that's like. I know. It's like the other side of a shitty coin. It's like, what? Now the dudes are having to go through a procedure? So it doesn't happen in the first place? But yeah. And also to be fair, she was also promoted to Religious Technology Center. So now she's working directly with David Miscavige in Clearwater, a totally different organization than I'm working at. So we are only seeing each other if I happen to be going to Clearwater to put on one of these events or conventions that they have. And I might see her for one night in a year or in six months or in four months or whatever, whenever, if I happen to go and if I happen to see her when I'm there. So you're what? When this happens, 21? The second one? So when you guys do get a chance to talk about it six months later, there's still no discussion of leaving? No. No. Because. We were both really upset and Mark asked me, why didn't you tell me? And I was like, I tried. I tried. It's just not a conducive. It's not a conducive environment for any sort of relationship. Right. Because you can't really trust the person all the time. They might rat you out. They think you might rat them out. Could you talk to anyone about your emotional state? No. And that's what was so. damaging about these beyond, you know, I was never even allowed to grieve that loss because doing so would have been considered a crime. A crime. Yeah. Like, if I wanted a child, which of course I did, then that meant I wanted to leave. And that's, you know, a transgression. That makes me a suppressive person. It's a suppressive act to talk about wanting to leave, even to your husband. So, by that point, I was just so, um, felt just completely stuck with no options. I mean, that really fucks with you. Oh, yeah. One of, if not the most common DMs I get on Instagram are many of you asking me what my favorite books are. Well, today's your lucky day, because if you use the link in my description below to join my newsletter, I'm gonna give you my top ten book recommendations right now. Also, if you'd like to join my clipping community for a chance to make money producing content from the show, you can do so via the Discord link in my description below. And finally, you can join my Patreon for early, uncensored releases of the full episodes via the Patreon link in my description below. As always, please take one second to hit that subscribe button if you haven't already. I really appreciate that. Also, the like button's a big help. And you can join my newsletter via the link in the description below. Yeah. And this is what, we're in mid 90s now? Yeah, 1996. Okay. 96. So you guys don't, you don't leave until 2005. Right. And you're and you've, you've already talked about, like, kind of the build-up and 04 and things like that. But let's because now you guys have dealt with these, you found each other, that's great. But you've dealt with these awful, traumatic kind of things that you have to compartmentalize, which is completely inhumane. Like, goes against human nature to have to do that. You continue serving the organization. You're very high up in it. In fact, you're higher than Mark is. Yeah, he had to call me sir. He had to call you sir. Or Mr. Headley. If I didn't call her sir. In the household, too? No. Not at, not at, not at home. Mr. Headley, let's go to bed. But if we were. Yeah, that's a sentence that's never come out of my mouth. When, when we would be in a meeting and somebody, I would have to say, like, oh, this happened. And they said, well, didn't somebody from religious technology come down here and talk to you? And I go, yeah, Mr. Headley came down here. That feels kind of gay. Yeah. Oh, my God, damn it. What am I doing? What am I doing here? Mr. Headley is trans. Oh, man. So, you guys go through this, though, and then 05. So, in 05, in January of 05, I had a motorcycle. I, and it was. Now you got a bike. Yes. It was legal. I had one, too, by the way. We had the same. We both had Yamaha TW200. So, it's like a dual sport. Big, big tires. You can drive it on the road. You can drive it on the dirt. There you go. Though, in 1999, I broke my leg on a motorcycle. Almost lost my foot because they didn't call 911 because David Miscavige was on the property. I broke my tib-fib, both bones right above my ankle. And they didn't call 911? Nope. And then it could be drugs, obviously. Nope. Not even title. No. So, even, so the accident happened on the property. The security chief came and put a splint on my leg and then they shoved me into the little red Honda and drove me to the hospital. And on arrival in the hospital, I was already in shock. So, they rushed me into the ER. The doctors said, you know, first of all, they were super pissed. Like, why didn't you call 911? Because we're Scientologists. Right. Then, the next thing that came was, who put this splint on? And I'm in shock about almost potentially going to lose my leg. But I couldn't say anything bad about Scientology. So, I just said, I'm in shock. I said, I don't know. It was Kevin Catano, the security chief. The same dude who was getting counseling from Tom Cruise. Didn't know how to rig a splint. Because of what they did, and because my leg was completely broken, like, it was connected by muscle and tissue and that was it. So, because they'd put the wrong splint on it, it took them about four hours of testing to see if I was going to lose my foot. Oh, my God. And then, even the next day, so I had to go into surgery the next day. Oh, God, this was a, such a nightmare. The medical people were like, tell the doctor that you don't want general anesthetic, general anesthesia. The Scientology medical people. Yes, the Scientology, which they have no medical training. Don't let the title be confusing. They had talked to the doctor, and the doctor said, yes, this surgery can be done with a spinal tap. So, they, the medical staff told me, you have to tell them to not give you general anesthesia. Tell them you want a spinal tap. And, and so, by that point, Sunday morning, they're rolling me down the hallway to this operating room, and the general, the anesthesiologist was this short, like, grandma type lady, and I turned to her, I looked up at her, and I said, can I please get the spinal tap? I can't get general anesthesia. And she laid her hands on me, and she said, honey, you are in no condition to get the spinal tap. You cannot. I will take care of you. And I just let, let go at that point. I was just like. Did they find out about that? Of course. Did you get locked in a room or something because of it? No, but it was something that I was, you know, punished for, and I had to do conditions, and you know, whatever. In Scientology, they have conditions of existence, and conditions above normal are good. Normal, uh. Affluence, power. Power, power change. And then they have conditions below non-existence. And so if you do something. Treason is betrayal after trust. Enemy, liability. Confusion. Confusion. Those are all come with, you have to do amends, and you have to get people to let you back in the group, and you have to do confessions, and admit your sins, and, you know, all this other stuff. Sins. Yeah. So basically, if you get in trouble for anything, the first line of the Scientology justice is you basically get knocked down a bunch of pegs, and you gotta work your ass off to get back into good standing. Gamification again. Yeah, and if you don't do that, then you could get what's called a court of ethics, and a court of ethics usually signs amends and things you have to do to make up the damage, and then if that fails to turn you around, then you get a committee of evidence, and you can be taken off your post, you can be kicked out of the Sea Org, you can be declared a suppressive person. Yeah. So there's always there is always a response if you do something you're not supposed to do. It might not come right now, but it's coming. Yeah. So what made you finally have the moment to where you couldn't even tell your wife what's happening, but you walkie-talkie find out Claire's not coming home, and you go, I'm getting the fuck out of here. Yeah, so they basically I was doing a project for David Miscavige to design and identify every single audiovisual system for every single Scientology organization. So they have maybe in one organization, they might have 15 or 20 different systems for different parts of the organization, DVD playouts, film rooms to teach Scientology, training courses, all these different things. And I had gotten approval on maybe 75% of those. And I needed approval on the last 25%. And I had sent a proposal to David Miscavige, and he hadn't gotten it yet because the people on the way were holding it or were stalling, they didn't want to look at it. They didn't want to get in trouble if they approved it or unapproved it. And so he wrote down and said, haven't gotten this proposal from Mark. If he's not working on that, what is he working on? And that's sort of like an invitation for the police people at the Scientology police to dig in and figure out what he's got going and then serve him up on a platter. And so they basically figured out that I was selling. I was selling old 16 millimeter projectors that were gonna be thrown away. I was selling them on eBay for insane prices. You were. I was. Which he had approval to do. Yeah, I got approval. He'd gotten approval to do that. I did a whole proposal to be able to sell these old. They were gonna throw them away. They were like, what are we gonna do with 216 million? You're making more in one sale than you make in like fucking 10 years at Scientology. Oh, I sold so many, the projectors were, the projectors were really high end projectors. Yeah. At the time in 1980. Yeah. And they were still in the box, never opened, hundreds of them. And there was this whole culture around playing old 16 millimeter films and, but people had to repair these old projectors to make them work. I had brand new ones in the box, never been opened. And I was selling the, they might've bought them for a few hundred bucks in the eighties. I was selling them for two, three, $4,000 on eBay. And I sold. For rich. I sold so many. But if in Scientology and the CRG. In the CRG, you're not allowed to have a credit card for the organization. So I had a Wells Fargo debit card that I, my Wells Fargo account would have $50 in it. Then I'd overdraft it. And then I'd have negative 45 and then I'd save up some money and I'd fill it back up so that I wouldn't overdraft. And then when I set this up, I said, Hey, I need a credit card from you guys to be able to set up the account. And they said, no, no, we're not giving you any org credit card. Use your own debit card or whatever. So I was like, okay, so I had like 30K in my account, in my PayPal account from selling all this gear. And when they were digging through my office doing this investigation, they found a receipt for a lens that I had sold for like 150, 300 bucks or whatever. And they were like, Oh, we got the smoking gun. Where did this money go? I was like, it went into my PayPal account. They're like, you have an account that has organization money in it. And I was like, yeah, I got approval. I have a whole proposal. It's all signed off by everybody for me to be able to fund these new design and projects with the oldest old junk that we're throwing away. Anyway, they were like, it's done. You're going to the RPF. It's done, which is their effective prison. Yeah. And I'll never see her. Cause they don't, they, they disbanded the rehabilitation project for us at the international headquarters. So you would have to go to Clearwater, Australia or Los Angeles to do the rehabilitation. And he didn't mention, but the money that he had made, he had given to the organization. It's not like he had it sitting in his account, but they found that there were fees associated with it that he hadn't included in his proposal. My proposal. I didn't say I'm going to sell something for 300 bucks. There's going to be an eBay fee and there's going to be a PayPal fee. So they're like, Oh, you basically embezzled that money. Not went to the fees. And I'm thinking started at the time that this was happening. It started as, Oh, you embezzled $250 of fees that you didn't disclose. And we didn't approve that. And he hadn't picked up his pay. So he went to go pick up his pay and he was like, okay, here's the money. Yeah. Here's 250 bucks. Here we're good. And they're like, Nope, it's a financial irregularity. According to L Ron Hubbard's words, anyone who commits a financial irregularity, quote unquote, can, what is it? Join the walking dead. And the walking dead hadn't even come out of this. Wow. He's ahead of his time. This is in 1960s he wrote this. So how, did like the security guards say you're coming with us now? Is that how it goes? Yeah. So basically I got interrogated. So, and that was, you know, the first time I got interrogated. And that was the night that he radioed me asking me if he, the next morning he was going to be sent to the rehabilitation project force in LA and I would never, and I would never see him again. And meanwhile, I hadn't been home. So I had no idea any of this was happening. I actually went. I was in the hole by then. Yeah. She was in this place called the hole. I had been kicked out of religious technology center for refusing to divorce Mark. Anyway. So I, I basically am like, I'm out. They make me pack up all my shit in my office, pack up all your stuff. You're never coming back here again, whatever. They're give all my files. They've ripped all my files. They took my PayPal card. They took my bank card. They took everything. So I didn't have access to the money anymore. And, and I was basically like, so I went and found I woke up L Ron Hubbard's granddaughter. Who lived on the property. And her name was Roanne. Her name still is Roanne. I knocked on Roanne's door and I said, Hey, Roanne, I got a whole bunch of nonsense I'm dealing with. Can you spot me like two, 300 bucks for a week or two? Cause I gotta sort this all out. And she's like, sure. She writes me a check. And then I went to the treasury department. She just gave you the money? Yeah. Yeah. She's got, she had money. She had some, she had some head. No, she had some Hubbard money in there. She was our friend. She still is my good friend. She's escaped since then and she's good for her. But there's another, she comes up, she comes up a little, a few days later in this story. But, um, when I got the money from her, but I had to cash it. So it wasn't really good any use to me. I guess I could have endorsed it, but either way I went to the accounts department. I said, Hey, I haven't picked up my pay in forever. Can I get my pay? And I had a whole bunch of back weeks of pay. And also my sister had some back weeks of pay. So I went to her office, went through her purse, took all her cash. So by the time the morning of them, by the time the morning comes along, I've got like three, 400 bucks in my pocket and this check. So I go on my, I have a motorcycle. I was not allowed. I had been restricted to the property for a really long time. So I wasn't even allowed to go to our, where we lived together. I had to sleep under my desk at the property. Under your desk. Yeah. For months. Cause I wasn't allowed to go home cause I was- Like a cot down there? No, just like fucking- The floor? Got a shoe maybe or something you can make a pillow out of. Um, maybe a roll of paper towels that hasn't been unwrapped. That's comfortable. Yeah. Um, anyway, I have horrible back problems now. It might be because I slept under my desk maybe four or 700 times. But, um, so I get the- Uh, my bike has been sitting in the garage at this house that we live right next to the property. We live right outside the gates of the property in a house with like 10 other RTC people that work with her and the motorcycle was sitting in the garage and nobody knew that's where the motorcycle was. It just been sitting in there because if you're at the property and you're, they think you're going to escape, they lock up your bike. Like they chain it up so you can't get out, but they didn't know my bike was at the house and they said, you can go home. But you're, you're going to get interrogated tomorrow and then you're going to go to the RPF. So I was like, okay, fine. So before I leave, because I had set up this whole base network, I went into David Miscavige's personal server and downloaded hundreds and hundreds of pictures of him and Tom Cruise doing all kinds of bromance-y shit all over the place. And I put it on a fucking drive and I'm like, this is a fucking little insurance package I'm putting together here. So they don't fuck with me. Anyway, this is what I'm doing. I'm like, okay. And because I had access to the whole entire base network, no one would ever think that somebody could do that. So I get those, I put those on a thumb drive, grab all the cash together. I walk home. And as I'm walking home, I actually ended up walking with another RTC person. And so when I walk out the gate, sometimes if you go to go out the gate, they'll be like, you can't go home, go come back here. They won't. I'm not going to buzz you out, but because she was with me, I let her just be like five feet ahead of me when the gate got opened. And as soon as they opened it for her, I just jammed through there, walked. And then I walked the rest of the way down the road with her to her house. And then I went to my house and then that's when I call Claire, Hey, are you coming home? It's like two, three o'clock in the morning now. No, I don't know. We'll see. Da da da da da da. So I get all my stuff together. I put it in a super old 1982 suitcase that I had. I put it on the strap, it bungee corded to the back of the bike. That's in the garage. And then I'm waiting for her. And I fall asleep. And so now I wake up in the morning. It's like about nine o'clock. So they've already had it. I've already had the morning muster at eight 30 and I wasn't there. And I just passed out. So I just overslept. I didn't even, I just overslept anyway. And then there's a bang on the door and it's security and they're like, Hey, what the fuck? And I was like, Oh, I was told I needed to be sessionable. I had to sleep enough to come in and be able to be put on the meter. You're supposed to sleep enough to be able to do that. And because I'd gone to bed at three, I was like, Hey, I got, I was going to come in at lunch. They're like, fuck that you're coming in right now. We don't give a shit about your sleep get your ass to the property and so i'm like okay fine so then i close the door i get my shit together and i go to the bike i open up the garage and i just jam out of there well the security suv is parked next to our house on the road so as soon as i'm jamming out of there they're like oh we got a runner and so they're following me within 10 seconds of my escape they're like oh we're on him and as we're driving down the road i'm trying to get to hemet are you terrified i'm completely losing my mind because i as soon as i jam out of there i look at my rearview mirror i'm like oh you gotta fucking be kidding me they're already on me i'm not even getting a head start anyway they they as we're driving into san jacinto the road narrows and there's like some farms and there's some dirt roads next to it and there's fences where these farms are you -they basically just get next to me they're like dude you got to come back they're yelling out the window you got to come back you got to come back can't do this it's not gonna end well and i'm like fuck you i'm out i'm going i don't give a shit and they basically just ran me off the road with the suv i crashed my suitcases out fucking bikes fucked up and when that happened somebody driving by called 9-1-1 and they said hey there's a whole bunch of guys fighting on the side of the road with some guy on a motorcycle that they just crashed and there's a copy of the police report from that in his book yeah and they have a scanner a police scanner in the security suv so they that person calls the police dispatcher says hey incident on this road with this suv with a bunch of guys and this motorcycle with one guy and and they're meanwhile they're in the middle they took the key out of my bike so i couldn't even try to get it going again and i'm like give me my fucking key and they're like no mark you got to come back you got to come back call goes out on the scanner they hear that they throw me the fucking key and they whip it back to the property whoa and so then i'm like i don't know what happened i just know that they gave me the key back and then they just took off at like crazy and i'm like okay the clutch is broken off the clutch uh lever's broken off so i have to bump start it and the carburetor is completely flooded from it flipping upside down and crashing i get it going but it only goes like five miles an hour i'm literally just idling on the road with cars behind me and then i see this cop come and flip it and then pull me over and he comes up and i'm like oh my god i'm so fucked this is like the worst thing that could happen because now i'm burned i'm dead because now the police are getting involved that's like the ultimate sin to get the police involved with the scientology matter so i'm like oh my god please please please i don't want to i just want to get out of here and the cop says where are you trying to get to and i said i'm just going into town and he goes we had a report of an incident that happened a little bit back on the road with an suv and a vehicle that matches your description and i'm like oh no i'm just trying to see my dad and they wanted they were asking me some stuff they wanted to find out some stuff before i got there and i'm like oh no i'm just trying to see my dad and then he goes back to the car and he runs my id and it's got the property address on my driver's license and so he's like oh this is they the police know people escape from there all the time and they get hunted down like animals so they know about that they know they're clued in of what's going on yeah well they get sometimes when we when i was on the night shift i'd see the cops hanging out with the main booth security guards the guards would buy donuts for the cops and they'd hang out and have a little donut party donuts and pizza will get you a lot in scientology um in this story they're the good guys yeah anyway so the cop runs my id he comes back and he goes dude where are you trying to get to i'll help you get there i just need to know where you're trying to go and i said i'm trying to get to u-haul in san jacinto so i can put my bike in the back of a truck and drive off and be gone and he goes okay good i'm gonna call another car and we'll escort you to the u-haul wow so we see i'm just waiting there we're talking the other car comes as soon as we start driving again i still can only go five miles an hour because the fucking car was just destroyed and i don't and i can't shift without going more faster so i'm like first or second gear i'm just like and they're literally just following me and while that's happening somebody from the property the public relations director from the property and the legal director from the property are following the cops and the comp and back pulls oh the comp and back pulls over one of them and says what the hell oh no when we were stopped when the cop was trying to figure out what was going on the the pr director pulls up next to us on the road and she goes what's the matter with mark and the cop's like you know this gentleman and she's like yeah and he goes that's when he figured it out he goes oh because he knew her because she's they have police they have events with the police in town all the time to safe point the scientologist from the town so he's like this bitch is messing with he's like oh this they're trying to get him yeah and so then we get the other cop anyway then the legal director she has to pull away because he's like no no you're you're fine go drive along you're interfering with my investigation right now move along so then while we're driving i can see the cops because we're going so slow and they're right before and after me i can see them talking or motioning to each other and now i i look back and the other person from golden era the legal director he's following so they pull him over and this is all in this police report yeah and so then they pull him over then the cop joins back in to follow me and the guys in front we get to the u hall and i'm like thanks guys i they're like are you fucking kidding me in the two miles that we are with us escorting you and i'm like okay and they're like you know we're not leaving until you're in the fucking truck driving away so they hang out with me at u hall i call my dad he's now in kansas city by this time he says i'll get you a plane ticket i'm like what about my bike he's like fuck your bike just dump that somewhere and i'm like well that's like the only thing i own is when was the last time you had talked to your dad probably a year or two before that maybe here and there i would call him his dad had a 1-800 number that he set up just for mark and his sister to be able to call to be able to call if they ever needed anything and we he whenever he would see us he's like you remember the 800 number right and i was like yeah yeah yeah yeah okay i was this is out of like a fucked up movie yeah every way anyway so then we get to the u hall i get the bike roll the bike in the back of the u hall strap it up i get in the u hall i'm going to drive to la i'm going to drive to la my dad's wife's friend lives there i'm going to dump the bike at her apartment building i'm going to get on a plane and i'm going to fly back to kansas city it's january and it's one of the biggest snowstorms they've had in that area is is happening that in kansas city in kansas city and denver anyway so then um i go to wells fargo i get the u hall first stop wells fargo got to cash this uh roanne hubbard check okay get that and then um i go to the i stay with the lady how did i do that i stay i go to the lady dump off the bike and then i go return the u hall she picks me up from the u hall place and then takes me to lax my dad buys me a ticket but um there's no flights landing in kansas city so my flight is canceled now scientology has their own travel agency that is a c-org member they can look up any flight on any airline and see who's where and what so all they the manifest they can see every they don't know the um they don't see the first name but they can see the last initials of the name of the last name and they know who they're looking for so they can easily go oh m-a-g-a that's our guy so i'm thinking they're going to get me at the airport but the flight gets canceled and a bunch of flights get canceled and also there's no way for me to get from hemet to the lax there's no way for me to do that with the bike because the bike's totally tits up so i don't know if they think i'm going there or if they think i'm at a hotel locally i don't know what they think but i don't they don't find me at lax and then i end up going to like they give me a like across the street to the sheraton or some shit for because of my flight got canceled and i'm stuck in the airport and i literally i had whatever cash i had and i'm like oh i'm gonna eat something i haven't eaten a single thing this whole entire day i go into this sheraton i order a burger and a drink and the woman brings the food the waitress brings the food and she says do you want another refill on your drink i'm like sure in the time that it took her to go refill the thing and come back the burger's gone and she literally looked at me like are you okay sir i'm like yeah i'm fine she goes you literally ate a giant hamburger in eight seconds that's crazy and i was like oh i'm like i'm not i gotta learn i gotta learn how to eat again like i can't just go that's how you guys would eat oh it was literally because we had 15 minute meal breaks for many many years and like i said you got to do all the logistics of getting the food so if you don't eat in five minutes you're anyway so then if you even have dining i stay in a hotel that night i sleep like the best sleep i've ever slept in my life at that by this time in a bed you did yeah it was amazing and then it's like i wake up and i'm like okay it's back on because they can intercept me at any point i would have been sleeping with one eye open and telling me claire is um she wants you to come back oh you're not going to get whatever the story are you worried about repercussions against claire though no no i'm not worried about all with her because i'm trying to get the out of there no but also but also i know it's going to be easier for me to maybe get her out when i'm gone if there's any chance of getting her out i will have more resources now that i'm on the outside than i would have had on the inside so i go i end up with my my dad picks me up from uh kansas city we go home and then i'm like okay i'm here and for two or three weeks i basically slept my dad worked for dell he was a computer technician and he traveled all over the united states just upgrading banks and walmarts and just whole computer systems and he had a side hustle where he fixed people's computers and he had a whole stack of people's computers that he was that he had to fix and i was like can i do this i know how to do computer stuff all day every day i can do this he was like sure anyway i end up stealing all of his clients that he had fixing stuff and i get a pizza restaurant and i'm in two weeks i'm making 50 bucks an hour i'm making more i mean i'm making more in one hour than i made in a whole goddamn week so i'm like what the this is being and i ain't flipped one burger and i'm slaying it he hasn't thought about claire in a week no i and i always tell her i always tell her like i lost her before right before so they changed her phone oh and also the phone that i had was a nextel but it was my personal phone david miscavige gave it to me for christmas a a week earlier he gave me this nextel phone thanks dave and so it was my phone so i kept it and i but i turned it off because i didn't i knew they're going to call me full time so i just took the battery i was doing i took the battery out but then they changed her phone number so i tried to call her phone number and it was not it wasn't in service because they changed swapped out her phone number so i wouldn't be able to get a hold are you worried that they were taking claire to the prison in your place no because she didn't do anything and i we never spoke about it so she's basically she doesn't know what happened and they also told i don't know this at the time but um so she doesn't know so i don't think she's going to get in trouble if anything i've unburdened her because she's in trouble because she's married to me now i'm the out of there she should be golden again um and it sucks and it's shitty but i'm like i'd rather be dead than stay at that place that's where i was at i was basically like if i go to the rehabilitation project force i'm never gonna see her again anyway so that decision's already been a dystopian that's that decision's already been made for me i'm never gonna see her again no matter what we're done so at least i'm gonna leave on my terms and do my life and not be in l.a scrubbing dumpsters for the rest of my time so her sister is not really in scientology that much her oldest her younger sister that's the oldest of the two and she went to college or whatever claire calls her on her new phone says hey can you get a message to mark he's on a project and i need to get a hold of him and i had a hotmail account forever and it was always like a never told scientology i had this account the only reason i even knew you had that hotmail account is because you sent me a text yes from the from the hotmail that was what you were using to sign up for pornhub no match.com anyway um anyway so i tell she tells her sister to message me on this email with her new phone number and i get this and i'm like what the took me two weeks to figure out how to get him a message yeah but then i'm like i figured it out but then i'm like this seems legit meaning like it's not a trap it's not a trap i don't think it's a trap because she's got her sister doing it her sister's not in c org right that's super super um not something you would bring it wouldn't be sanctioned yeah there's no way you would bring a a green person into this crazy espionage session that's not that doesn't just do that so as soon as i get that i'm like okay i'm gonna call her and as soon as i call her she's like oh they're saying they're gonna get you back and that um dave um has got the the police people got in trouble for even even messing with you you're the only person who's getting anything done you did all those other designs it's all going to be work you're going to get all the money you need all the personnel you're going to get everything it was a this whole thing is a giant up and i'm thinking uh i've been sleeping and eating burger and this is all i'm you when you're there and you're constantly working eating trying to sleep not getting any sleep being yelled at you're just in robot mode you sleep for a week and you're just it all just goes the fog wears off and you're just like those fucking isn't it weird though like you're out in the real world now and it's just a week and you're like yes i'm eating yes i'm sleeping that's subjective and i'm making tons of tons of money but you're like what the it is weird existential it is it's it's kind of like like you jumped into somebody else's life yes like you jumped out of the truman show jumped out of that and now but now i don't know i don't have any i have work skills and i have people skills but i don't have real world skills i don't like i gotta pay for a phone what the fuck how much is that oh my god that's the cheapest piece of shit in okia they want 80 bucks a month for that damn you know like i'm like okay it's my yearly salary yeah i'm gonna have to save up for two years to get that uh flipper that the razor that's a sweet little number there anyway so you're like what is the iraq war yeah well we knew a little bit but um anyway so then imagine they make them enlist and like you're going to iraq that was 100 no no that was 100 an option that i was thinking of i'll join the military iraq but i was 32 and i don't have a high school diploma you have to have a high school diploma to join the military that's one of the requirements so i was like fuck and i'm really fucking bad with the school stuff i mean i think really at the end of the day algebra is what made me join the c-org because i was like i'm never going to fuck with algebra all the computers and cameras you're fixing i know fuck with algebra i know but i was like i can't i'm not like my i don't have enough bandwidth to be able to work on this i don't have enough bandwidth to be able to work on this i don't have enough bandwidth to be able to work on this i don't have enough bandwidth to be able to work on this i don't have enough bandwidth to be able to work on this and why what am i going to use it for and why what am i going to use it for and why what am i going to use it for um so i was like damn um so i was like damn um so i was like damn anyway i went to my wife my my dad's wife anyway i went to my wife my my dad's wife anyway i went to my wife my my dad's wife said you need to go to this place they said you need to go to this place they said you need to go to this place they they'll give you a test and they'll find they'll give you a test and they'll find they'll give you a test and they'll find out what you could do based on what you out what you could do based on what you out what you could do based on what you know know know like a i don't know a job placement fucking smart for any of the fucking bullshit they're sending people to and i was like well wait a minute i can't get a job if i don't have a ged but i'm too smart to get a job with these guys and most of the people there were like english as a second language and stuff like that it wasn't wasn't a lot of male caucasians in the job placement place when i went in kansas city at least anyway so then she we start talking again and she's like i'm like well you got to get out of there when and sunday morning you get a few hours to to clean your room and do stuff like that i'm like just call a fucking cab to the to that place on sunday morning and that easy well yeah i was gonna say now you have to say what happened yeah so i said well no because i'm restricted to the property i'm not allowed to go home i had to sleep on the floor of my office with a sleeping bag oh they at least gave you a sleeping bag yeah well yeah she was in the executive right no by now i was not in rtc anymore i was busted into the hole still mr headley to me Mr. Headley. And, you know, I had already by this time gone through my own version of hell. I'd lost like 30 pounds. I weighed less than 100 pounds, like 20 pounds less than I weigh now. I was literally like completely emaciated, just really, really messed up. And, of course, the moment he took off, initially they were going to take me out on the highway to bring him back. But then they told me he'd called 911. He'd gone to the dark side. He called the police. That's what they call it in Scientology when you leave. They call it the dark side. You've gone to the dark side. Yeah. Not the clear side. No, just throw a little Star Wars in there. I was fucking doing some Vader fucking shit. Yeah. And I was immediately like, what the heck? My entire world just went up in flames with him gone. And that same night, I was like, I'm out of here. I packed a bag and hid it under my bed the day he escaped. But then they, like two days after, when they didn't get him back immediately, that's when they wouldn't let me go home at all anymore. I had to sleep on the floor of my office. Oh, and also, the thumb drive with all the pictures, left it on the ironing board. Oh, no. Yeah. Left it on the ironing board. All the time. Tom Cruise files. All of it. Snowmobiling in Alaska, scuba diving in Bonaire, Aruba, Curaçao. On the sailboats in England, in the Real Madrid with Beckham, Tom and Beckham in the stadium watching football. All of it on the ironing board. Which to me, I think if they found that. Do you know how much you could have sold that for? But they found it. But I could have gotten in big trouble too. Wow. Well, because. Because those are their property. They weren't naked. Well. No. But they probably would have tried to sue. They probably. Well, yeah, yeah. I didn't like that pause. Well, I was like, well, not in all the pictures. Anyway, they could have. I think they could have jacked me up if I actually did take that. Because the only things I ended up taking were my own things. Yeah. But I always. But I went through all my shit like, what the fuck? And then I was like, oh, I left it on the ironing board. And then somebody arrested 10 years later for taking files. For having a hard drive. They don't mess around with that kind of stuff. But yeah, so I figured out how to get a message to Mark through my sister without telling her anything. And then Mark says, so just call a cab. And I'm like, well, easy for you to say, but I'm locked up. And he said, so what's your plan? So I had, I had already, I knew all the ways people had tried to escape from that place. They'd, they'd, they'd made lists and of all the people who had escaped from the property over a 15, 20 year period. And so she knew every single way any person had ever escaped from the property. So given that I was in really bad physical shape, emotional shape and everything else, I knew I had to come up with a plan that wouldn't involve them intercepting me because physically, they could easily overcome me and had done so with people in the past that I knew of. So the idea that I came up with is I waited until David Miscavige had gone to Clearwater, Florida in January for the Fort Harrison Gala that they did to woo the locals there. How many months later is this? So no, this is three weeks later. Three weeks after I left. Yeah. So I had made an eye doctor appointment, which was at the Walmart in Hemet and normally how that would go. Is the medical staff would drive you to the appointment, drop you off and then come pick, come back two hours later to pick you up. So I thought, okay, that gives me a two hour head start. Well, I had to, so I had an eye doctor appointment for 10:15, January 24th, 2005, which ironically is the, also happens to be the anniversary of L. Ron Hubbard's death, though I didn't realize that at the time. That's some biblical shit. Realize that in retrospect. Just like you starting on March 13th. Yep. Yeah. Ron Hubbard's birthday. You told me that off camera. I own March 13th. There you go. Much better. Much better. We'll rename it. Anyhow, so I had to get approval to go to the eye doctor appointment. The night before I wrote it up and they said, well, you can go, but you have to have a security escort. You can't go like normal. So somebody would be- To get contacts. Would be driving. Yeah. Driving me to the Walmart, coming in with me to the appointment. Coming into the appointment. Yes. What do they say when they come in? They don't say anything. She's my friend. She's my friend. Yeah. They do it all the time. They do. They have people go to their parents' funerals and they got a minder with them. Yeah. It's like, who's this? This is Susie. It's like, how long you guys been working for each other? They're like, we don't. I don't even know her. She's just here to make sure I don't skedaddle. I had this guy, Lee, sitting in that chair last year who escaped North Korea and it's talked about on that podcast, the similarities to Scientology, but it's the same thing. Yeah. Yeah. Crazy. So you go into this appointment with your weird security guard guy. But no, it's a girl. It's a woman. It's a woman. And it's a girl that works for her. It's her junior. Yeah. Oh. But she's twice my size. Oh, that's not fair. He can easily overcome me. Anyhow, we pulled. Oh, and so also that morning, I had the Nextel phone radio thing, so I had gone at six o'clock that morning. I went into a closet and called a local cab company and scheduled a cab for 10:15 at Walmart under the name Barbara Smith. And I had $200. So I specifically was like, how much would it be for a cab from Walmart to the Riverside County bus station? And they said, $90. So I'm like, okay, I'm going to be basically halfway through my funds before that. Before I even make it out of the county. But whatever. I knew that. That's why I had gone through every option and knew that I had to have Mark's help to escape. And I told her, as soon as you get in the cab, turn off your phone. Take the battery out, turn off your phone. When you get to Riverside bus station, there will be a ticket there for you that will take you to Barstow, which is the opposite direction of Kansas City. You're going to go to Barstow. I remember that from Too Fast Too Furious, like, we're going to Barstow? Way the fuck out there. So I said, go to Barstow and in Barstow, we're going to get you a ticket to go to Kansas City. So it'll. If they are kind of trying. If they're catching up to you, we're going to throw them off that you're going the wrong direction to come visit me. But so the security escort has already thrown a wrench in the works because somehow I have to ditch the escort. So as it happened. So it's 10:15. We're pulling into the parking lot. She didn't immediately see a parking space. I'm looking over and at, you know, the entrance exit to. I look over, there's the cab. So I said, hey, just let me out up front. It's 10:15. I'll go into my appointment while you park. And she went for it. So she let me out of the car at the front, I walked in, I walked in and I didn't want to run because I'm completely paranoid that I know that like in my mind, it's like playing out like a movie. Like the PIs are going to be running after me. Have you seen this girl? You know, my hair was down past my butt. Literally. Your hair was that long? Yeah. Yeah. So I knew that. And super red. Yeah. So I, you know, look, I knew it would have stuck in someone's memory. So I just walked as fast as I could, walked out the door, got in the cab and the guy looks at me, he's like, "Barbara Smith?" I'm like, "Yep, that's me. Let's go." So he's driving out of the parking lot. I'm waiting for Mark to call and my radio goes off. It's the security escort and she's like, "Where are you?" I'm like, "Oh, I just went to the bathroom. I'll be right there." I'm like. And the cab driver, he's. She's right there. He's like. Yeah. I'm like. He's looking at me like I've lost my marbles. I'm in the bathroom right now. Whatever. He's like, "You better not be." He's probably seen some crazy shit in Pakistan. Yeah. Yeah. And then two minutes later, Mark calls. And I'm like. He's like, "Okay, good. There's a ticket for you. Turn off your phone." Yeah. Because otherwise. Because they have all the setup there at the property. They can just type in the number and see where it's pinging from. But here's where it gets really crazy. We haven't gotten there yet. So I get to Barstow and he had told me to call him to get the ticket number to go to Kansas City. But from a pay phone. From a pay phone. Do not. Yeah. So I panicked because I couldn't find any pay phone that took coins. They only took calling cards. And I'd never heard of a calling card. We didn't even know what calling cards were. I don't know what that is either. I had no idea what it was and I panicked. So I turned my phone back on and I called him. And the first thing he said was, "Oh my God, why are you calling from the phone?" I'm like, "I'm sorry. I panicked. I. " Anyhow. So this is Barstow. He gives. He's like, "Okay. Well, once we're done talking, do not turn it back on again. They'll track you down." I'm like, "Yeah. Yeah. I know. I know. I know." So I get the ticket. I get on the bus. So 10, 15 a.m. that Monday is when I started my escape. By now, it's like 1 p.m. And the bus I'm getting onto now from Barstow is going to Vegas. And then in Vegas, I have to change buses, which will be around 6.30 p.m. So I get on the bus from Barstow. I'm like, OK, I'm good now. We get to Vegas. It's dark. You know, I'm, again, conscious of my long hair and everything else. I'm like, I'll just wait till everybody else has gotten off the bus and then I'll get off. And I'm looking. I'm like, God, there's a McDonald's right there. I could afford a cheeseburger. Hadn't eaten in days, literally. I was surviving on protein bars. And so I go to get off the bus and I go to open the door of the station. And boom, there's four people there. Thank you, guys, for tuning in. Thank you for checking out this clip. If you haven't already subscribed, please subscribe and hit the like button on this video. It is a huge, huge help. And if you'd like to check out this clip's full podcast episode, that link is in the description below or right here. And finally, you can follow me on Instagram and X by using the links in my description below.