Miscavige — who took over as Scientology, after the church’s founder Ron Hubbard died in 1986 — has allegedly avoided process servers 27 times in the span of four months.
The process servers have tried to serve Miscavige in Los Angeles and at Scientology’s headquarters in Clearwater, FL, according to court documents obtained by the Tampa Bay Times.
Former Scientology church members, husband and wife, Gawain and Laura Baxter and Valeska Paris filed the lawsuit after claiming they were forced into labor on Scientology boats as children after signing a one billion-year contract in exchange for little or no money. Paris reportedly left the church in 2009 and Gawain and Laura Baxter left in 2012.
In addition to the trafficking allegations, Paris alleges she was the victim of repeated sexual assaults in her youth and that when her mother left Scientology, the then-17-year-old was locked in an engine room for 48 hours as punishment.
Gawain Baxter said his parents put him in a Sea Org nursery when he was two months old, according to the lawsuit. When he turned six, he was also forced to sign the one billion-year contract and sent to live in a Cadet Org dormitory with around 100 other children.
Children over six years old are considered to be, and are frequently told that they are, adults and that they should act and expect to be treated as adults. The lawsuit noted in background that the children must be referred to as “cadets” and not kids.
