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Patron Meritorious
Translation of a French article posted on September 4, 2013 on the website of the daily newspaper Libération:
Sectes: la condamnation de la scientologie examinée en cassation
Sectes: la condamnation de la scientologie examinée en cassation
Appeal of Scientology's conviction before the Court of Cassation
The supreme Court of Cassation is today reviewing the appeal filed by the Church of Scientology, whose the two main entities in France were convicted of organized fraud in 2012 by the Paris Court of Appeal.
On February 2, 2012, the Court of Appeal upheld fines of 400,000 euros for the Celebrity Centre and of 200,000 euros for SEL, the Scientology bookstore. The Court of Appeal also confirmed or increased the sentences given to five Scientologists in 2009 by the Paris Correctional Court.
Alain Rosenberg, the "de facto leader" of Scientology in Paris, and Sabine Jacquart, a former president of the Celebrity Centre, were handed a two-year suspended sentence and fined 30,000 euros for organized fraud.
The prosecution had accused the defendants of exploiting the vulnerability of former recruits to extract large sums of money from them.
The Celebrity Centre called the decision "totally biased and unfair," saying it was "the result of a kind of phantom trial with multiple irregularities and violations of the Scientologists' human rights."
In the statement he wrote before today's hearing, the prosecuting attorney argued for the dismissal of the appeal, except for a very small part of the procedure.
"Name me one church that does not ask its parishioners for money," said Louis Boré, the attorney representing Scientology before the Court of Cassation, responding to France Presse. The lawyer cited Article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which guarantees freedom of religion.
As one of his colleagues had already stated, Louis Boré also said that, if the appeal is rejected, Scientology would take the matter to the European Court of Human Rights.
Scientology, which is classified as a cult in several French parliamentary reports, was founded in 1954 by American science fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard and is considered a religion in the United States and in some European countries. It claims to have more than 10 million followers worldwide and 45,000 in France.