Perjury, Clearwater's Pollution

     

               “ Fool me Twice ” Shame on the Justice System

When the Tampa-based federal judge presiding over the wrongful-death lawsuit—Stephen Merryday for the United States District Court for the Middle District of Florida—ruled in favor of the defendants’ motion for summary judgment, he noted the following: “Assuming that Kyle’s father [Tom Brennan] and the others [Gerald and Denise Miscavige Gentile] are liars, Scientology’s
responsibility is possible, but this theoretical and remote possibility is unsupported by evidence or any reasonable and direct inference from the evidence. If the witnesses are ignored in gross as liars, the fact finder is left to guess. Attenuated and compound inferences and speculation uniformly fail to create a genuine issue of material fact sufficient to avoid summary judgment.”

Obviously, we strongly disagree.

Not only did the defendants in the case lie, but the Clearwater, Florida, detective investigating Kyle’s suspicious death—Stephen Bohling—lied in his police report. Both of these assertions are easily verified with testimony and documentation.

Did these individuals commit perjury (a felony in the State of Florida)? According to The Law Dictionary, available online: In criminal law, perjury is “The willful assertion as to a matter of fact, opinion, belief, or knowledge, made by a witness in a judicial proceeding as part of his evidence, either upon oath or in any form allowed by law to be substituted for an oath, whether such evidence is given in open court, or in an affidavit, or otherwise, such assertion being known to such witness to be false, and being intended by him to mislead the court, jury, or person holding the proceeding.


(See The Law Dictionary [at http://thelawdictionary.org/perjury/#ixzz2qURWg1aC%5D, featuring Black’s Law Dictionary.)

Obviously, if a witness deliberately chooses to lie, twisting the testimony in one way or the other, the false testimony may bring about a very skewed outcome in a case.

It’s been shown that Detective Stephen Bohling deliberately lied in his Clearwater Police Report (the CWPR). This has been supported by documents and testimony. His investigation is replete with conflicts of interest and mishandled standard investigative procedures. By twisting statements made by others—in other words, assigning the lies to others such as Marti Scholl of the Hillsborough County Medical Examiner’s Office, or FDLE Agent Barbara Mendez, or Kyle’s psychiatrist Stephen McNamara—he may have believed that he could wheedle his way out of perjury charges. Perhaps he thought he could turn the entire situation into a “he said, she said” scenario.
Unfortunately, all of this illegal behavior had a direct impact on the outcome of the wrongful-death lawsuit.

Here’s how:

On May 29, 2009, Lee Fugate—the attorney representing Gerald and Denise Miscavige Gentile—attached Bohling’s CWPR to his “Motion to Dismiss Complaint.”

On June 11, 2009, Attorney Kennan Dandar—the attorney representing the Estate of Kyle Brennan—filed a motion to strike the report.

On June 24, 2009, Judge Stephen Merryday granted the Estate of Kyle Brennan the motion to strike the police report.

Did this stop the defendants from using the content of the police report? Absolutely not!


Excerpt from the deposition of detective Stephen Bohling

 

Murky Goings-on in Clearwater, Florida

                          

When a child dies unexpectedly and violently the impact on the family is one of complete devastation. Anguish and despair become your close companions. It’s a heartbreak like no other.

After losing my son Kyle, I felt—along with my overwhelming grief—a powerful urgency to make sense of the senseless, to understand what had happened and how the tragedy in Clearwater, Florida, had unfolded. That urgency—that need—has not subsided. There are numerous questions that still need to be answered.

In the weeks and months after Kyle’s passing, something completely unexpected made the pain immeasurably worse—the incomprehensible treatment I received at the hands of Detective Stephen Bohling of the Clearwater Police Department (the CWPD). Losing a twenty-year-old son is horrific enough. Bohling’s unconscionable handling of the investigation into Kyle’s death, however—his deceitful behavior and his immoral actions—not only sullied Kyle’s image but also devastated Kyle’s family and ultimately obstructed justice in the wrongful-death lawsuit that ensued.

According to the CWPD, Kyle’s death was reported to the department at 12:10 a.m. on Saturday, February 17, 2007. Detective Bohling took over the investigation fifteen hours later. It’s important to note that Bohling never visited the crime scene to garner further evidence, never. Instead he relied on the meager evidence gathered by the responding officer, Jonathan Yuen. Yuen was working the midnight shift when he responded to the 12:10 a.m. 911 call placed by Kyle’s biological father, Tom Brennan. Officer Yuen later admitted that he only spent a maximum of 20 minutes interviewing Brennan—a very short period of time considering the fact that he was collecting information regarding a suspicious death. He later stated that—contrary to proper police procedure—he destroyed the notes he had taken that night.

As can be imagined, the subsequent Clearwater Police Report (or CWPR) written by Detective Bohling is filled with misinformation, half-truths, and outright fabrications. Some of these fabrications are completely fictionalized conversations—conversations that never occurred. And a great number of these lies are miss-paraphrased statements. By misrepresenting statements made by individuals questioned during his shoddy investigation—by assigning fabrications to others—Bohling twisted the truth into a mass of lies that obstructed justice and protected a number of parties who should have been questioned further.

The unscrupulous detective took this illegal behavior to an unprecedented level when he paraphrased me, Kyle’s mother, into saying things about my son that I never said. These deceptions executed at the hands of a police detective—a public defender who’s supposed to be seeking the truth—piled additional grief and suffering onto Kyle’s family. The aftermath is deeply disturbing.
As an example, on page 15 of the Clearwater Police Report (or CWPR), Bohling took liberties when describing the telephone conversation I had had with an FBI agent. (In January of 2007, while Kyle was traveling the country, FBI Special Agent Jeff Atwood called to tell me that Kyle had visited his Des Moines, Iowa, office that day. According to Atwood, Kyle came in to report a crime—a crime that could not be substantiated. Agent Atwood expressed concern for Kyle, saying that he looked good, was well-mannered and well-spoken, and that he could tell Kyle came from a good home. When he saw that my son was traveling with valuable items—expensive electronics, and gold and silver coins—as well as a large sum of cash, Atwood became concerned for his welfare. When Kyle said he was going to stay at a shelter to save money, the detective recommended a hotel because it would be safer. Atwood told me that Kyle seemed to be suffering from mild paranoia, but that it was a good thing in this case as it would keep Kyle away from those who might harm him. Agent Atwood said he got my phone number by asking Kyle who he should call if something happened to him.)
The falsified CWPR information appears in the form of a March 5, 2007, telephone conversation between Bohling and Detective Carl Brown of the Albemarle County (Virginia) Police Department, and an e-mail supposed sent from Brown to Bohling. (Detective Brown was who we first contacted when Kyle left home. He later helped me locate Kyle when Kyle was in Maui, Hawaii.) Here Bohling claimed that I had been advised by Agent Atwood that Kyle said “he was being followed by people who were after him.” According to Bohling, Atwood said that Kyle “appeared as if he had not been eating, was emaciated and appeared to be having delusions.” (These are statements Bohling claimed I made to Officer Brown regarding my discussion with Atwood, and that Brown passed along to Bohling.) Perhaps not surprisingly, Detective Bohling never asked me for information or details pertaining to my conversation with Atwood.

Here’s the truth: I never stated that Agent Atwood told me Kyle entered his office saying that “he was being followed by people who were after him.” Agent Atwood never said Kyle looked as if he had not been eating and appeared to be having delusions. All of this information referring to my conversation with Atwood is false. Why would a police detective falsify information like this?
Bohling’s police report becomes even more twisted when one reads the e-mails attributed to Detective Brown at the bottom of page 15. (And it should be noted here—as was discovered by attorney Ken Dandar during Bohling’s deposition—that the very appearance of these e-mails is extremely suspicious. For, rather than digitally copying these supposed e-mails into his report, Detective Bohling printed them onto paper then physically cut the paper and pasted them into his narrative. Was Bohling as computer illiterate as Tom Brennan, or were these e-mails fabricated out of whole cloth?)

According to Bohling, these e-mails stated I had met with Detective Brown on a certain date, and that at that meeting I stated to Brown that Kyle had been diagnosed with “depression and periods of delusion and paranoia.” I supposedly also said that I was told by police—after reporting Kyle’s departure from home—that “there would have to be more information regarding Kyle’s condition to enter him into NCIC as endangered.” (“NCIC” is the FBI’s National Crime Information Center, a reporting database that can also be used to help find missing persons.)

Here’s the truth: I never met with Detective Brown during the time period noted in Bohling’s falsified e-mail. The first time I met with the Albemarle County detective to discuss the death of my son was two years after he had passed. Kyle’s psychologist, Dr. Stephen McNamara, never diagnosed him as delusional and paranoid. Detective Bohling—or possibly Hillsborough County, Florida, Medical Investigator Marti Scholl—fabricated this diagnosis. This statement is a lie.

The statement referring to the reason I could not file a missing person’s report immediately after Kyle left home is also a lie. (On the day Kyle left home I called the Albemarle Police Department to file a missing person’s report. I had been worried about Kyle since his return from a tumultuous visit with his father, Scientologist Tom Brennan, in September of that year.)

Here’s the truth, here’s the real reason a missing person’s report could not be filed. Kyle was an adult who left home on his own fruition. According to law you cannot file a missing person’s report unless foul play is suspected or the missing individual is declared—by physician or by a court of law—to be a danger to themselves or to others.

I told the Albemarle County officer that I was worried about Kyle, that he’d lived a sheltered life and had in his possession thousands of dollars in cash, gold, and silver. I did not know where Kyle was so I pleaded with the officer: Could they please help me find him? The officer sympathized but said that because of the law he could not write a report. When I told him that Kyle was taking medication, he told me to look to see if Kyle had taken it with him—he had. When he asked how much he had taken, I stated more than one prescription’s worth.

The laws regarding missing person’s reports, therefore, are what initially prevented me from filing one, not the lack of information. I knew this, Detective Brown knew this, and what’s more important: Brown would have never lied like this to Bohling. Bohling’s statement regarding the NCIC, therefore, is a lie.
Why would Bohling misrepresent the truth in his report? Could it be that the profile of Kyle fictionalized by Detective Bohling—a profile of a troubled young man suffering from delusions and paranoia—better fit the image of someone likely to commit suicide, someone whose tragic death was entirely his own fault?
It is absolutely certain that the truth would not have benefitted the defendants in the wrongful-death lawsuit—Scientologists Tom Brennan, and Gerald and Denise Miscavige Gentile. On February 17, 2009—two years after Kyle’s death—the Clearwater Police Department released the report regarding Bohling’s investigation, one day after the wrongful-death lawsuit was filed and the news had made the front page of the St. Petersburg Times. When the defendants answered the wrongful-death complaint, their lawyer, Lee Fugate, attached Bohling’s police report to their response.

Excerpt from the Deposition of Dr. Stephen McNamara





Clearwater Police Report, Pasted email








Deposition of Detective Bohling





Excerpt from the Clearwater Police Report

 

 

Hide & Seek, From Clearwater to Craigslist

Soon after the wrongful-death lawsuit was filed, numerous attempts were made to serve Tom Brennan. With each attempt—and they numbered at least four—an individual at the Brooklyn, New York, home would lie to the serving sheriff. According to the officer, he was told every time that “no one at the home knew of anyone by the name of Brennan, nor had anyone with that name ever resided there.”

I was the person doing the investigative work on Brennan’s location. (Few people realize that I’d studied criminology. I never dreamed, however, that I’d use what I’d learned in an investigation into the suspicious death of my child.) Every time the papers were returned, my attorney, Ken Dandar, would ask whether I’d made a mistake. I’d recheck, but the result was always the same–Brennan was staying at that Brooklyn address.

In April of 2009, Dandar received a misdirected e-mail from Carrie Brennan Farrell (one of Tom Brennan’s sisters), who lives in San Diego. Evidently, Farrell believed she was sending information to attorneys representing her brother. Written with the intent to discredit me by claiming that I’d expressed little concern for my son’s well-being, it provided amusement for the law office of Dandar & Dandar. (See Farrell’s e-mail pasted-in below.) Along with her morally repugnant and self-serving musings, Farrell erred in the time-line regarding Kyle’s travels. These two things would make it easy to discredit her as a witness. And in the end she helped throw her brother under the bus. When she implied that she’d spoken to Tom Brennan in person, I suspected that Brennan was now out in San Diego.

Thanks to this correct guess, Brennan was served in July of 2009. Knowing that he’s frequently worked as a handyman, I searched the San Diego-area Craigslist. Sure enough, there he was: “Tom the Handyman.” When Kyle’s older brother called the number listed in the ad, he was able to positively identify the voice of his step-father. All it took was one word: “Hello.” Brennan was finally served with the complaint when a hired private investigator contacted him pretending that a room in his home needed painting.

When Brennan entered the investigator’s home he was immediately shown a photo and asked if he was the individual pictured. Attorney Dandar was later told that when Brennan was served the color drained from his face and he said, “I thought you might find me.” Soon afterwards he returned to live at the Brooklyn address where supposedly he had never resided.

Copy of Original Craigslist Ad

To: emmons1666@yahoo.com; DandarLaw@aol.com
Sent: Mon, Jun 29, 2009 8:52 pm
Subject: Brennan on Craigslist

Found Him! He is living in Oceanside, California. This is a suburb of San Diego. I will try to get an address.

••••••NEED A HELPING HAND? CALL TOM THE HANDYMAN!!•••••
June 27, 2009 … CALL TOM THE HANDYMAN!!••••• … CALL TOM BRENNAN AT (760) 277-5488 FOR FRIENDLY , DEPENDABLE AND ECONOMICAL SERVICE. …
sandiego.craigslist.org/nsd/hss/1243341804.html – Similar pages

•••••••EXPERIENCED HANDYMAN SAVES YOU $$$$$•••••••
June 27, 2009 … •••••••EXPERIENCED HANDYMAN SAVES YOU $$$$$••••••• … CALL TOM BRENNAN AT (760) 277-5488 FOR FRIENDLY, RELIABLE AND ECONOMICAL SERVICE. …
sandiego.craigslist.org/nsd/hss/1243351654.html – Similar pages
[ More results from sandiego.craigslist.org ]

TOM BRENNAN HAS BEEN SERVED!!!
Date: 7/16/2009 3:30:40 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time
Process of service record










Mission Accomplished




Copy of email inadvertently sent to Attorney Kennan Dandar from Carrie Brennan Farrell.

* Note date of the email



* Date on the complaint



Defining Moral Depravity:

Carrie Brennan Farrell makes a gaffe when concocting the time-line in her email to Attorney Dandar. Farrell makes the statement “by this time Kyle had returned to Florida.” During this time Kyle was, in fact, camping on a beach in Hawaii. No one knew where my son was at that time as I had just filed a missing person’s report. Brennan Farrell’s concern ended for Kyle at the conclusion of that singular phonecall.

Affidavit of Victoria Britton

“If you tell the truth you don’t have to remember anything”







Miscellaneous Email



Excerpt from Tom Brennan Deposition





Excerpts from the Deposition of Stephen McNamara,MD.

Attorney Lee Fugate attempting to corner Dr. Stephen McNamara with fabricated information.



Deposition of Stephen McNamara, MD







The deposition of Caryl Brennan Farrell was canceled by attorneys representing the Church of Scientology one day before they were to occur. Her lies would go unchallenged.