Seems to me the judge is wrong. Take Rex's religious activities out of consideration and you take out the motivation for the murder.
Maybe she means his beliefs don't count.
Seems to me the judge is wrong. Take Rex's religious activities out of consideration and you take out the motivation for the murder.
Maybe she means his beliefs don't count.
That's highly inaccurate. The police have gathered alot of evidence in the case (some of it revealed in their arrest affidavit) and then there are always the witness statements.Originally Posted by secretiveoldfag
Laurel Zaspel, for example, was the first employee to greet the victim when he came to Fowler to pick up his severance check. She & other employees have already told police that Fowler gave instructions to send Ciancio to his office when he arrived & that Fowler would handle the matter himself. Then, they heard gunshots coming from Fowler's office.
Police concluded that Ciancio was shot from behind & from the side, which ruled out that Ciancio fought Fowler. He was murdered. Fowler may have made statements to police that were not mentioned in the affidavit which can be used at trial.
Fowler's being tried for murder, not embezzlement of funds. It has zero to do with Scientology. In fact, if the judge were to allow Fowler's "religion" to prejudice the jury, it would be grounds for appeal.
Remember the Menendez case in Beverly Hills where two sons murdered their wealthy parents, then went on a luxury spending spree? They spent $2.5 million on an attorney who baked up a story they were molested by the father and this drove them to kill both parents because they feared being raped again. The older Menendez confided to his psychiatrist the real reason he murdered his parents, then threatened to kill the psych if he told police about it.
Their 1st trial ended in a hung jury. The judge forbade them from usiing the molestation defense in the 2nd trial because there was never any proof of the molestation. They were convicted in the 2nd trial. The older brother later admitted the molestation accusations were invented by their attorney to get jury sympathy.
The judge was right in not allowing Scientology into the trial. The jury will judge the case on the facts & evidence, and not whether Fowler is a bad or evil individual because he's a Scientologist.
No, the argument was apparently over money. What Rex spent the money on is irrelevant. What is relevant is that they had an argument over money which resulted in violence & death. That is the likely thrust of the case.
The church was apparently not in any way a party to the events. The church-related material is just 'human interest' detail. It makes an interesting 'story. It is not relevant to the trial. Rex could've spent the money on hookers or orphanages. It wouldn't change the nature of the prosecution's case.
For the prosecution to go off on some sort of extended tangent introducing the church would be a waste of time as well as a distraction from purpose. It could also easily cost them a conviction; either through confusing the jury with irrelevancies, or by adding irrelevant/prejudicial material which could warrant a mistrial, or through a subsequent defense appeal of prosecutorial misconduct based on the former.
A smart prosecutor would stick to that which is NECESSARY to his case alone and ignore any extraneous details.
Because of the nature of this board (esmb) people tend to lose discernment about matters in which they perceive church involvement, seeing all things 'through the church darkly'. That is not surprising. People who tend to be "ex's" often have antipathies with the result that their emotions tend to color their perceptions. How many ex-wives/husbands say nasty things to others about their ex. Sometimes its warranted, often it isn't.
In this regard people on esmb have a tendency to be myopic about the church. Frankly, the vast majority of the world doesn't give a 'flying f@ck' about the Co$; i.e. don't know, don't care. If it's irrelevant the prosecutor is unlikely to bring it up and the judge is unlikely to allow it. The Co$ connection is substantially irrelevant. KISS.
Mark A. Baker
I don't think it is whether the prosecution will mention it - after all they are merely trying to prove that Rexy killed Ciancio and it does not look like they may have much of challenge.
But what will Rex do? What will his lawyers do? He is charged with 1st degree murder - not that there is much chance he will actually get executed but still. Either he just concedes the point that he planned this.
But - and this is a big BUT - the first thing is the family statements in sentencing. The victim's family have the right to make statements in court. and the judge cannot forbid them from bringing up anything.
Secondly - the civil case against the estate. The conviction is going to open up a whole can of worms for the cofs.
A good point, Mark. In my opinion Graham Berry needs to read your post. Several times. he has, in my view, a tendency to clutter his briefs up with stuff about the CoS that is irrelevant to the case.
From a legal standpoint, a very good post.
But going beyond the law, there are many ways in which CoS could have contributed to this terrible event.
People considering murder suicide are usually unstable and need psychiatric help. After years in scientology, Rex was less likely to seek psychiatric help than others in his position who were not indoctrinated into a false belief about the only profession that may have been able to help him.
If his debt and problems came up in auditing, he could not even discuss them with his wife as that would be talking about his case, which is forbidden (exes, correct me here if I am wrong on this point).
CoS make promises that they can not deliver. It is always the next level will solve everything, pay up, do the level and everything will get better. The pressure is incredible. And the mindset they create is just like that of the gambler – “If I use this money / borrow this / steal this/ and make one more bet, that will be the one that gets me back on my feet. I can repay the money I lost and everything will be alright.” But the gambler does this to themselves, CoS have a very deliberate set of procedures designed to instil this way of thinking in the minds of their victims.
Rex was an OT VII - he was supposed to have control over his life and even others. He was supposed to be able to make things go right. Believing that the great saviour, L. Ron Hubbard and his wonderful tech, could not help him must have been devastating to self efficacy and self worth. Had he only known that the tech was a con, maybe he could have done something positive to help his situation.
There is a very real chance that CoS played a big part in what played out in Rex’s head leading up to and during this tragic event.
(Maybe someone else could tell me, could he even talk about depression or suicidal thoughts if it did not come up in his processing or is that frowned upon?)
Great to see you have no clue as to how we function. Maybe you should go off and join Maundering.
That cause over MEST thing sure didn't work out so well.
I like all the legal arguments, but it is surely evident, even if it is irrelevant to the charge of murder, that Rex's practice of Scientology was responsible for unhinging him and creating financial problems for his business to the point where he could see logical necessity in shooting Ciancio and then killing himself. Are these links in any doubt?
The judge is no doubt right to stay focussed on the final events but since Fowler's beliefs and practices were directly responsible for the murder/attempted suicide I would be surprised if they are not introduced somewhere by someone as material evidence.
With respect to all the learned individuals who have posted above, I'm not sure I see why this would be such a bad thing. Rex's devotion to Scientology is not a trumped-up invention of the defence but an ascertainable fact which appears to have triggered the whole tragedy.
Just saying.
The court and prosecution are smart to just take care of Rex in such a way that brings about a full conviction.
Afterwards ESMB, anonomous, and the media can go to work with the Co$ connections and the philosophical and psychological problems that were afflicting Rex.
It is sad to think of the evil that was in Rex's mind for him to perform the act that he did.
And we all know what brought about that planting of the evil seed. It does not matter who exactly planted it. What matters is that it was planted.
Rd00
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