Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath

- Clearwater, Florida, is, like, the Mecca of Scientology.

That is where Scientologists go

to receive the upper-most coveted levels of Scientology.

It is also the place where Scientology

is almost achieving its goal of buying a town,

make it a Scientology city,

then use that as an example for the rest of the world.

- I am the writer of the textbooks of Scientology.

The aim and goal is to put man in a mental condition

uh, where he can solve his own problems.

- Without any Scientology organization,

things are not going to change on this planet.

- After years of slowly questioning Scientology...

- Leah Remini and her very public break with Scientology.

- Scientology, what they do. Trying to destroy people,

trying to destroy their families when they leave,

they create a lot of people

who are willing to fight against them.

- Scientology takes tax-free dollars,

and ruins people's lives.

- This is not the life I want to live.

I wanted to end my life.

Some people, it takes a year.

Some people, it takes ten years

of just peeling that onion of how you were manipulated

and made to think.

- This season, we really needed to focus on

the reason why Scientology is able

to do the things that they do

is because they have tax-exempt status.

- The people who have bravely come on

and told their stories

have not told those stories in vain.

They are having an impact.

- We're presenting our case to the world.

To the FBI, to the IRS.

- The most important thing that has to be done

is the persistent telling of the truth,

and that's what you're doing.

You have to continue to fight.

You have to continue to fight for what's right.

- I mean, it's not hard for you to live here?

- Not at all. - Doesn't bring back any...

Well, I guess you have memories here

that are now replaced... - Well, that's true.

For yourself.

It makes me uncomfortable, because here we are,

driving by, so now they know we're filming here, you know?

- Right. - And now, they're going to be

doing their bullshit with us here.

Like, oh, my God, I'm getting emotional.

I don't know why.

- Leah. - Huh?

- I feel so bad when you get so upset.

I do. I don't like it.

- I was, I would say, raised kind of normally.

It was me and my mom and my sister, Nicole,

and we were born and raised in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn.

And then, my mom and dad got divorced.

And Dennis came into our lives, and he was funny,

and we were happy to have him.

And then, my mother and Dennis got into Scientology.

We were told that we were going to go off

to a very special mission to clear the planet

in Clearwater, Florida.

My stepfather was going to stay behind

and sell everything that we had

because we weren't allowed to bring anything.

We were leaving everything to go and fulfill this mission.

We go to Florida

thinking we're going to an amazing place.

The Mecca of Scientology.

And we arrived to a run-down motel

infested with roaches, infested with rats.

We were separated from our mom,

who was, at the time, eight months pregnant,

and we were living in a dorm with, like, eight other girls.

My stepfather never came.

He never came.

Oh,.

But I just kind of pushed that aside.

But my mom was alone, we were alone,

and we didn't have anybody but the Sea Org now.

The Sea Org was our family, and our father, and our mother.

And my little sister was born there.

My little sister, Shannon.

Why I'm so emotional about Clearwater.

It, in a way, destroyed...

a lot of this family that we had.

I just look at all these families, Mike,

you know, on the beach.

Laughing and having a good time,

and people having dinner or lunch with their families.

And, you know, there's people at Flag right now

like, working very hard and very...

"We got to get this done!" You know?

And having the mentality that the planet...

- Is depending on them. - You know is dep... right.

- And they're accomplishing absolutely nothing.

- Right. They're giving up their lives.

They're giving up their family members

because they've been completely brainwashed

and lied to about what they're doing.

- Yes, exactly. - You know?

And then, you know, here we are.

It's, like, this area makes me

want to throw up now, you know what I mean?

I remember walking these streets.

I was wearing a lanyard,

and walking down the streets of Clearwater,

and people are screaming out of their car windows.

"Cult! Cult member!"

And I'm like, "what?" I'm not a cult member.

I'm sacrificing my life for this."

So it... it was just

a weird moment, you know what I mean?

Because I'm, like, "I'm here to save you."

And now, I'm kind of on the other side of that

going "I'm here to save you."

- Like everybody else around here,

I don't like being in Downtown Clearwater much.

- Right. - Just because the whole place

is creepy. It's empty.

It's... it feels like people are watching you.

That's kind of creepy.

- You know, this reminds me of you

standing out here trying to talk to your son.

Yeah.

I was alerted by Joe Childs from the "Tampa Bay Times"

that he had been told by Scientology

that I was a terrible parent

because I had not tried to help my son

who had contracted cancer.

I had no idea.

The next day, I went to the Fort Harrison

to try and see my son.

My son had cancer.

Of course I'm going to go and try and see him

and see if he's okay,

and find out what's happening, and...

It was... it was a futile effort.

I feel like I'm in this movie

where the villain is always winning.

- Well, the villain isn't going to win forever.

- Well, I'd like to see something happen.

- Promise you. - In our lifetime, Mike.

- I don't think this story of Scientology in Clearwater

has ever been actually told. - Yeah, I don't think it has.

- Like, there's been bits and pieces,

and certainly, the "Tampa Bay Times" has covered it,

but that's for people in Pinellas County.

- Right. - Outside, the whole world

doesn't know.

- It's a story worth telling, for sure.

Yeah.

- In the early 70's, L. Ron Hubbard

was running the Scientology world

from a ship called "The Apollo."

I was on board "The Apollo"

with L. Ron Hubbard from 1973 until 1975.

The ship had been thrown out of various countries.

He tried to bring "The Apollo" to the United States in 1974,

and he discovered that the FBI, IRS,

DEA, and various other government agencies

were waiting on the dock.

For the next year or so, we sailed around

in ports in the Caribbean.

Hubbard at one point had a heart attack in Curacao.

The treatment wasn't the, like,

advanced medical treatment available.

And he decided, "Okay, the time has come

to move the operations to the United States."

He sent a whole bunch of people out

up and down the Eastern Seaboard of the US

to find a location to move to.

There were various requirements.

It had to have an international airport.

It had to be in a relatively warm climate.

It had to be a facility that was big enough

to accommodate all the people, but was cheap.

Ultimately, he settled on Clearwater, Florida,

and the Fort Harrison hotel,

and the adjacent Clearwater Bank building,

both of which were going bankrupt.

I was one of the first people

that arrived in the Fort Harrison.

When Hubbard moved the headquarters of Scientology

to Clearwater, it logically followed

that the plan would be to take over Clearwater

and turn it into a Scientology city.

This... Clearwater was supposed to become

and is supposed to become the Salt Lake City of Scientology,

or the Mecca of Scien...

In fact, they even called it the Mecca of Scientology.

Scientology moved in here in 1975,

and at the outset, came here under false pretenses.

When we arrived in Clearwater, we actually lied.

Tried to pretend to everybody in the community

that this was some other Christian organization

called the United Churches of Florida.