Stacy Brooks

Stacy Brooks (born April 8, 1952) is a former senior executive of the Church of Scientology International (CSI) and the Sea Organization based in the United States. For over 20 years, Brooks was also a member of the Church, working in its upper level management in Los Angeles for almost fifteen years.^[1] After leaving in 1989 Brooks joined the Lisa McPherson Trust, served as an expert witness in many high-profile Scientology lawsuits, and has made many television appearances criticizing Scientology, on programs including Dateline, 20/20 and 60 Minutes.^[2]

In regards to the legitimacy of Stacy and her husband Vaughn as "experts" about Scientology, Vicki Aznaran, an ex-high-ranking member of the Sea Organization inner circle and herself a litigant against the Church stated in an affidavit dated 19 May 1994:

From 1981 onward I knew both Vaughn and Stacy Young, whom I met and had contact with as a result of my work as a staff member in the Church of Scientology. I am familiar with their positions in the Church.

In my staff capacities in the early 1980s, and later in my executive positions in the Religious Technology Center, I was directly or closely involved in meetings with senior staff members of various Church corporations. These senior staff made significant or major decisions which affected the future of the Church. I know that neither Vaughn nor Stacy Young were included in such senior decision-making processes. They were never senior or key Church executives.. They were not consulted regarding, nor were they privy to, the meetings where major issues were discussed and decisions made.

I am informed that the Youngs have made claims to specialized knowledge about the corporate status and structure of the Church. Such claims are false. Neither of the Youngs were in a position to have detailed knowledge of the corporate and fiscal structures and operations of any Church of Scientology. In fact, Vaughn Young worked in the area of Public Relations for the entire time that I was acquainted with him. Stacy was primarily a writer in the Church public relations department. ...

That Vaughn and Stacy Young are experts is not true. They are being called experts not due to expertise in Scientology but in order to collect insurance money for their testimony. When Graham Berry [the lawyer on the case] retained me for $2,500 to write declarations, he made it clear to me he would get me classified as an "expert" so the insurance company would pay.

What this creates, and what the Youngs are part of, is a stable of people who, for pay, write declarations. The Fishman case is a good example. Neither the Youngs nor I have ever met Steve Fishman.^[3][4]

In an Affidavit of 29 April 2002, Brooks admitted wrongdoing on her part for the court cases she and her husband were involved in including the Fishman and Lisa McPherson cases:

My ex-husband Vaughn Young and I left Scientology in 1989. We had no contact with anyone concerning Scientology until some time in early 1993, when we were contacted by two attorneys, Dan Leipold and Graham Berry, who hired us as witnesses in their respective litigation against Scientology. We were paid by these attorneys through 1997 to provide testimony and advice on litigation tactics. This was my primary source of income. First and foremost, the attorneys wanted to know what they could do to put pressure on Scientology, either to get a case dropped or to get a large settlement. The overall strategy that I developed was to target David Miscavige because he was the head of Scientology, so that he could be named as a defendant or have the litigation focused on him personally as a way to harass him. I advanced this strategy although I had no knowledge or evidence of any involvement of Mr. Miscavige in the cases. This pattern of anti-Scientology litigation that I authored is now in use in this wrongful death case and has been used in a number of other cases, some of which are still ongoing today.

When I was hired by these attorneys, I had had no previous experience in the legal field. The attorneys referred to me as an "expert witness" and said that as an expert, I was permitted to testify about my opinions. As I understood it, my job was to come up with theories of what might have happened in order to back up what the attorney was trying to accomplish. I wrote affidavits and declarations based on these theories, in which I speculated about how the attorneys' assertions could be true. I used supposition and careful wording to make allegations that would fit the particular assertion so as to create an impression without actually lying. This is what I was paid to do. At various times I have been called a "witness," an "expert," an "expert witness," an "expert consultant" or a "consultant," whichever description best forwarded the needs of the litigation. The common denominator throughout has been that I was being paid to provide anti-Scientology testimony and strategy to these attorneys.

For example, one of the first Scientology cases I worked on concerned a man named Steve Fishman who was being sued for libel by Scientology after he was quoted in a Time magazine article saying that Scientology had ordered him to commit murder and suicide. I helped put together information for the attorney (Graham Berry) to use in his pleadings that included an allegation that Mr. Miscavige was implicated in the death of his mother-in-law. There was no evidence linking him to her death, which Mr. Berry knew, but he wanted to malign Mr. Miscavige at every opportunity as part of the overall strategy, so it was written to create that impression without ever actually saying it.^[5]

References

External links

• Media Vault of Dateline and 20/20 shows
• Stacy Brooks on IMDb