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Steven Fishman
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==Fraud scheme== The origins of Fishman's dispute with the Church of Scientology lay in a [[fraud]] scheme he conducted from 1983 to 1988. Fishman joined dozens of [[class action]] lawsuits by presenting stock purchase confirmations he had stolen from his employer and forged. In this manner, he made approximately one million dollars, as much as 30 percent of which he spent on Scientology materials and services.<ref name="behar">{{cite magazine|first=Richard|last=Behar|title=The Thriving Cult of Greed and Power|magazine=Time|date=1991-05-06|url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,972865,00.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070220082505/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,972865,00.html|url-status=dead|archive-date=February 20, 2007|accessdate=2008-05-18}}</ref> Fishman was arrested in July 1988 and charged with several counts of fraud. The [[FBI]] also investigated the possibility of church involvement in the scheme.<ref name="dondero">Dondero, Robert L. [http://www.whyaretheydead.net/krasel/aff_rd.html Declaration of Assistant US Attorney Robert L. Dondero] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080517051016/http://www.whyaretheydead.net/krasel/aff_rd.html |date=2008-05-17 }}. ''US v. Fishman''. N. D. Calif. CR-88-0616. Retrieved on 2008-05-18.</ref> Fishman's attorney, Marc Nurik, had planned to use an [[insanity defense]], offering [[false memory syndrome]] theorist [[Richard Ofshe]] and psychologist [[Margaret Singer]] as [[expert witness]]es.<ref name="richardson">{{cite book|first=Dick|last=Anthony|editor=Richardson, James|title=Regulating Religion|publisher=University of Nevada|location=Reno|year=2004}}</ref> Fishman sat for a seven-part videotaped interview with Ofshe and Nurik. In the interview, he discussed in detail various aspects of Scientology doctrine, his own Scientology involvement, and the church's response to his arrest. Fishman claimed that church staff had ordered him to murder his [[psychologist]], Uwe Geertz, who had knowledge of his Scientology involvement, and then to commit [[suicide]].<ref name="behar"/> At the same time, according to Fishman, he participated in a conspiracy with church staff to deflect accusations of church involvement, by submitting fake documents and [[making false statements]] to his defense team.<ref name="myhistory">{{cite web|first=Steven|last=Fishman|title=My History With the Cult|date=1996-09-18|url=http://www.xs4all.nl/~fishman/history.html|accessdate=2008-05-17}}</ref> For these acts he was further charged with [[obstruction of justice]]. The court ultimately blocked Nurik's defense strategy by rejecting both expert witnesses, based on the testimony of opposing expert [[Dick Anthony]].<ref name="richardson"/> Fishman pleaded guilty to one count of [[mail fraud]] and one count of obstruction, and the court sentenced him on July 20, 1990, to five years imprisonment in the [[Butner Federal Correctional Institution]]. Fishman later claimed that the church hired Scientologist inmate Luis Martinez to kill him in prison.<ref name="pietersma">{{cite journal|first=Jeroen|last=Pietersma|title=Never Defend, Always Attack| journal=N@T|date=December 1995|url=http://www.xs4all.nl/~felipe/cos/translate.html|accessdate=2008-05-18}}</ref> He was [[parole]]d in mid-1993. According to Anthony, who had opposed Ofshe and Singer, Fishman's criminal case was one of several in which they had attempted to introduce their ideas of [[coercive persuasion]] by religious groups. The court's admissibility ruling came as a setback to American critics of [[cult]]s. Ofshe and Singer sued Anthony unsuccessfully, claiming that he mischaracterized the basis of their theories in this and other cases.<ref name="richardson"/>
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