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a receiver. When the order was written and then signed on March 2 by
the judge and then made available for review, our attorneys were con
vinced that it was unconstitutional and could not be complied with with
out forfeiting our constitutional rights. Our attorneys filed a Notice
of Appeal to the District Court of Appeals on the same day. Once appealed,
the order was automatically stayed, but the judge viewed this as an
obstructionist tactic. He was obviously irked at our having taken right
ful and legal steps to seek remedy.
The new receiver was appointed at the end of a hearing in which the
former receiver, Mr. Weisman, was to be cross-examined by our attorneys
concerning excessive fees, as well as his competence and credibility in
the role of a receiver. Judge Title refused to proceed with an eviden
tiary hearing in which not only Weisman, but also others claiming fees
in the receiver's final accounting were to be called to the stand.
Our attorneys believe that it was the desire of Judge Title, based
on his own remarks in court, to retaliate for our blocking his constitu
tionally invalid court order. It may have infuriated him that we made
a better move than he by our perceiving that due to the nature of the
order it was automatically stayed while on appeal. Mr. Rader believes
Judge Title also wanted to protect his good friend, Mr. Weisman, from
a most embarrassing cross-examination by our attorneys in regards to
the accounting of the receivership. (Judge Title already announced to
the court on January 10th that they were very good friends.)
Our attorneys insisted that the new receivership was unjust and uncalled
for since we had indeed shown good faith regarding "a reasonable examina
tion." However, we were unwilling to surrender First Amendment guaran
tees in the process.
In order to clear the air and remove the cloud over the Church and other
defendants, our lawyers told the court that after the injunctive order
was stayed we had engaged an outstanding accounting firm, Arthur Anderson
and Company, to do a certified audit which would then be made available
to the Attorney General and to the public press.
The Church has always maintained that the audit should not exceed the
scope of the accusations of the lawsuit. But the court gave the Attorney
General unprecedented run of our records -- even non-financial and
privileged private records that had nothing to do with the allegations
of the suit! After seven weeks of auditing with the help of the account
ing firm of Peat, Marwick and Mitchell, and a receiver's total expense
of over a quarter of a million dollars, instead of admitting his error,
the Deputy Attorney General wants to keep digging in our records.
Apparently the presumption is that if they dig deep enough and long
enough they may eventually find something amiss which will vindicate
their extraordinary abuse of power.
So-long Chodos!
After pleading with the court for the $102,000 he says his time is worth
over these past eight weeks, Hillel Chodos, special deputy attorney
general and counsel for the state, is resigning from the case. The judge
denied his request for payment of fees but left the door open for him to
request them again if the Attorney General is successful in prosecuting th