Scientology leader David Miscavige is “nowhere to be found” as prosecutors attempt to serve the 62-year-old with a federal child trafficking lawsuit that names him as a defendant, according to the Tampa Bay Times.
The outlet reported that process servers have tried to serve papers to Miscavige 27 different times over the past four months in the Clearwater, Fla. area and in Los Angeles, to no avail.
When lawyers showed up to Scientology properties in search of the leader, security guards reportedly said they were clueless. The plaintiffs in the lawsuit have also hired a private investigator to help find Miscavige.
Lawyers have also sent an Instagram message to the church’s official account to ask about Miscavige.
David Miscavige (L), Chairman of the Board of the Religious Technology Centre and leader of the Scientology religion, addressing the crowd during the opening of the Church of Scientology’s new church in the City of London, Sunday 22 October 2006.
(Yui Mok/PA)
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 said the children must be referred to as “cadets” and not kids.
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The Church of Scientology in Los Angeles, California, U.S. on Tuesday, July 7, 2020.
( Bing Guan/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Miscavige’s last known address is the church’s international building in L.A., but similar to other members of Scientology’s extremist wing, the Sea Org, he does not have a recorded address.
Court filings related to the recent lawsuit list his home as a Scientology property in a gated community known as the Hacienda Gardens in Clearwater. The 120-unit apartment complex hosts Scientology staff and was purchased by the organization in 2001.
During a motion earlier this month, one of the plaintiff’s attorneys, Neil Glazer, said, “Miscavige cannot be permitted to continue his gamesmanship,” the Tampa Bay Times reported. He is due in court on Jan. 20, but that meeting is pending unless he is served with the papers.
Glazer also said Miscavige is taking part in an “intentional concealment of his location and evasion of service.”
The Tampa Bay Times report stated lawyers have tried to locate him through two traffic tickets he received in the 1990s, but both of those citations list the Scientology Los Angeles center as his home.
Miscavige’s lawyers told the newspaper he is merely the target of a legal strategy due to his status within Scientology. They added that he does not live in Florida, hence why lawyers can’t serve him.
In this handout photo provided by the Church of Scientology, David Miscavige, Chairman of the Board Religious Technology Center and ecclesiastical leader of the Scientology religion, at the Church’s global media center on Sunset Boulevard Dec. 14, 2016, in Hollywood, California.
(Church of Scientology via Getty Images)
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US Magistrate Judge Julie Sneed served a summons to Miscavige on behalf of the plaintiffs. Ten copies of the summons were sent to various Scientology properties in Florida and California.
All were sent back as undelivered since nobody would sign for them.
