Bare-Faced Messiah (PDF) - Apologetics Index

The only way to find it would be to comb through all the folders in which Ron's auditing sessions
were recorded.
Hubbard gave his approval to this course of action, adding a note to Otto Roos: 'I'm delighted that
somebody is finally going to take responsibility for my auditing.' Roos began calling in the folders
from Saint Hill and from all the Scientology branches in the United States where Hubbard had been
audited. There were hundreds of them, dating back to 1948; Roos calculated they would make a
stack eight feet high. He began working through the folders, discovering, to his disquiet, numerous
'discreditable reads' - moments when the E-meter revealed that Hubbard had something to hide.
Towards the end of March, while Roos was still poring over the folders, a messenger arrived at his
cabin saying that the Commodore wanted to see all the folders. Roos was dumbfounded: it was an
inviolable rule of Scientology that no one, no matter who he was, was allowed to see his own
folder. He told the messenger it was out of the question. A few minutes later, the door burst
openand two hefty members of the crew barged in, picked up the filing cabinets and staggered out
with them.
Two days passed before a messenger told Roos he was wanted by the Commodore. From the
moment the Dutchman entered Hubbard's office, it was apparent the Commodore had made a
dramatic recovery. Hubbard leapt up from his desk with a roar and struck out at Roos with his fist,
following up with a furious kick. He was shouting so wildly that Roos was unable to make out what
he was saying apart from that it was something to do with the 'discreditable reads'. Mary Sue was
sitting in the office with a long face watching what was going on. When Hubbard had calmed down
a little he turned to her and asked her, as his auditor, if he had ever had 'discreditable reads'. Mary
Sue's expression did not alter. 'No sir,' she said, 'you never had such reads.'
Roos could see folders scattered across Hubbard's desk, open at the pages where he had noted
the 'reads' that Mary Sue denied existed. He said nothing. Hubbard paced the room, fretting that
Roos had 'undoubtedly told this all over the ship' and that everyone was talking and laughing about
it. In fact, Roos had informed no one, although it did not prevent him from being put under 'cabin
arrest'.
After he had been dismissed, Mary Sue kept running down to his cabin with different folders, trying
to explain away the 'discreditable reads'. He had been using outdated technology, she said, and
'should have known about it'. Later Diana Hubbard also stopped by, pushed opened Roos's door,
screamed, 'I hate you! I hate you!' and stalked off.[14]
The Apollo was docked in Tangier throughout this drama and Mary Sue was busy supervising the
decoration and furnishing of a split-level modern house, the Villa Laura, on a hillside in the
suburbs of Tangier. The Hubbards planned to move ashore while the ship was put into dry dock for
a re-fit and Mary Sue was looking forward to it.
Hubbard was still dreaming of finding a friendly little country where Scientology would be allowed to
prosper (not to say take over control) and he had begun casting covetous eyes on Morocco, at
whose Atlantic ports he had been calling regularly ever since leaving the Mediterranean. The
Moroccan monarchy was going through a period of crisis and Hubbard felt that King Hassan would
welcome the help that Scientology could offer in identifying potential traitors within his midst and be
suitably grateful thereafter.
Some months previously, the Sea Org had set up a land base in a small huddle of office buildings
on the airport road outside Tangier. The erection of a sign on the road announcing, in English,