Squirrel Busters, Sex Toys Sent to the Office and Secret Cameras Trained
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Squirrel Busters, sex toys sent to the office and secret cameras trained on their home: Ex-Scientology leader and wife reveal their five-year 'living hell' after crossing the powerful church dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2526525/Squirrel-Busters-sex-toys-sent-office-secret-cameras-trained-home-Ex- Scientology-leader-wife-reveal-five-year-living-hell-crossing-powerful-church.html December 20, 2013 ADVERTISEMENT Squirrel Busters, sex toys sent to work and secret cameras trained on their home: Paranoid ex-Scientology leader and wife claim their lives are a 'living hell' after crossing the powerful church Marty Rathbun - former Scientology Inspector General and friend of leader David Miscavige - claims he has been harassed for five years Wife filed lawsuit against church after she 'found secret camera' watching their every move at Texas home Wife Monique claims church sent sex toys to her work and was 'obsessed by her sexuality' Followed for 199 days by 'Squirrel Busters' team that harassed them Marty recounts helping Tom Cruise through divorce and interrogating John Travolta as the church's 'Mr Fix It' Scientology say couple's claim is a 'get rich-quick' scheme to 'extort' cash Church says alleged incidents have been refuted under oath by more than two dozen witnesses However the Rathbuns say they have numerous witnesses who corroborate their story By Will Payne, North Of San Antonio, Texas Published: 10:04 EDT, 20 December 2013 | Updated: 12:21 EDT, 20 December 2013 e-mail 72 View comments 1/79 For five years Marty Rathbun and his wife’s lives have allegedly been made a ‘living hell’ by The Church of Scientology furious that he stepped down from his lofty position inside the powerful organization and then dared to speak out against it. Their house was besieged by minions, known bizarrely as 'Squirrel Busters', harassing them at every turn. Private investigators were allegedly hired to follow them and monitor their movements, renting neighboring properties and setting up surveillance cameras trained on their home. Now in an exclusive interview with Mail Online, Wife Monique says her family members, ex-husband and work colleagues were targeted, with operatives spreading lies about her relationship and even her sexuality, to try to drive a wedge between Marty and herself. Scroll down for video +15 'Harassed': Monique Rathbun has filed a civil suit against the Church of Scientology claiming she and husband Marty have suffered at their hands from hacking and egg throwing to questioning her sexuality 2/79 +15 Secret cameras: The couple claim that even after they moved to escape harassment they were tracked down and this camera was set up behind their house to watch their every move. The church say the civil suit is nothing but a 'get-rich-quick scheme' concocted by the Rathbuns After around four years of near constant intrusion, they felt they had no choice but to move hundreds of miles to a secluded property in the hill country of Texas. Even at their new home, they claim they were regularly followed when they pulled out of their driveway. Then came a blissful two months when Monique finally felt safe and secure in her own house for the first time in years. It was not to last. In July, Marty - who used to mentor celebrities like Tom Cruise and John Travolta - discovered a camouflaged camera hidden on a tree in woodland behind their supposed sanctuary. Driven almost insane by paranoia, he was convinced their every move was being filmed. 3/79 'If Marty’s not here, I can’t sleep at night. I stay up and sit on the sofa, with a baseball bat' - Monique Rathbun He claims The Scientology movement, headed by Marty’s former friend David Miscavige, had rented the five-acre property bordering their home and hired a former police officer to not only spy on them, but try to befriend them and infiltrate the most personal moments in their lives. It was the final straw for the Rathbuns. Monique launched a $1 million harassment suit against the church and its leader, which is currently playing out in court. The Scientology movement has dismissed the lawsuit as a get-rich-quick scheme concocted by the Rathbuns, but they say nothing could be further from the truth. +15 +15 Squirrel Busters: The couple claim they were followed for 199 days by the above men. Squirrel is a term used for a Scientology member who has left the church and turned against it Former top Scietologist 'harassed by Squirrel Busters' Loaded: 0% Progress: 0% 0:00 Previous Play Skip Mute Current Time 0:00 / 4/79 Duration Time 4:00 Fullscreen Need Text ‘We are prisoners in our own home’, said Monique in an exclusive interview with MailOnline. ‘I am terrified whenever Marty leaves the house that something terrible is going to happen. I have no idea what they are capable of. It has made me anxious and depressed. ‘It has ruined our lives. I have no friends because every time I meet someone I am paranoid they could have been sent by the church to spy on me. If I interview someone at work I immediately think, "Are they employed by the church?" ‘Even if I did make a friend at some point I would have to tell them they were going to be approached by Squirrel Busters or private investigators. ‘After years of harassment at our last home, I finally thought we had moved somewhere safe, which was no easy task. I used to go for a swim in the backyard every evening, it was heaven. 'But the moment we found that camera it was shattered. I can’t even go out in the backyard now. I never know who might be watching. ‘If Marty’s not here, I can’t sleep at night. I stay up and sit on the sofa, with a baseball bat. They have made him out to be such a devil and a demon, who’s to say one of the parishioners won’t take it upon themselves to take us out to win favour in the church. I am physically scared. ‘We have talked about moving again, but we can’t just keep running. They will find us wherever we go. It’s a living hell.’ Marty added: ‘After all the efforts we made to find somewhere they couldn’t get to us, to discover there was a camera trained on our property watching our every move… well, for Monique, it was such an intrusion, it was like rape. 5/79 ‘I can accept a certain level of harassment. I was part of the church for 35 years and to an extent I believe you reap what you sow, but they have targeted Monique for years now and we need to do something about it. ‘A standard tactic is to attack the things their enemy holds dear and everyone knows there is nothing in this world I care about more than her. But they need to realize this is America and you cannot behave in this way with impunity.’ +15 +15 Celebrity members: As the former Inspector General of the church, Mr Rathbun claims he was asked to help prominent members. He says he helped Tom Cruise through his divorce to Nicole Kidman and once 'interrogated' John Travolta with an e- meter Marty joined the Scientology movement – which was started by L Ron Hubbard in 1952 – back in 1978. By the Nineties he reached the position of Inspector General, the second most senior person in the movement, only answerable to David Miscavige. He describes himself as ‘Mr Fix it’, the go-to man whenever there was a major problem. One of his primary duties was managing the crop of A-List stars who adhered to the controversial religion. Being Scientology's 'Mr Fix It': From helping Tom Cruise deal with divorce to interrogating John Travolta Marty explained: ‘Whenever anything was going wrong I was brought in. When Tom Cruise was going through a divorce with Nicole Kidman I had to counsel him for nine months. ‘If any of them was becoming disaffected or disillusioned with Miscavige, I had to deal with them. 6/79 ‘In 2000, John Travolta starred in the movie Battlefield Earth, based on the first half of a novel by the same name, written by Hubbard. 'Miscavige took full responsibility for it at the beginning. He was watching the daily rushes down in Florida and at the time he was saying it was going to be the greatest movie ever made. ‘I was there when we saw the first sneak preview. He loved it. He got John Travolta on the phone and lavished him with praise, saying it was the greatest thing anyone had ever done for Scientology. ‘But it bombed on day one and within a week Miscavige was looking for a way to manage the situation. One day he said to me, "Marty you need to get John’s a** in, this movie has become the laughing stock of the world". ‘John Travolta had taken a salary of $10m, half what he usually took, but Miscavige wondered if the special effects would have been better and it would have been a success if he had taken nothing. 7/79 +15 Flop: Mr Rathbun claims church leader David Miscavige was unhappy with a film called Battlefield Earth, based on the teachings of Scientology, and told Mr Rathbun to 'get John's a** in' ‘So I spent days looking into John’s life to work out what he was doing that was unethical and immoral, that would explain why he would commit such a terrible "crime against the church".