Rick Ross (consultant) - Jason Scott Deprogramming

Jason Scott Deprogramming

In 1993, Ross faced charges of unlawful imprisonment in the State of Washington due to the alleged forcible detention of Jason Scott (an eighteen year old member of Life Tabernacle Church, part of United Pentecostal Church International) in 1991. Ross was acquitted at a January 1994 jury trial. Scott later sued Ross, two of his associates, and the Cult Awareness Network (CAN), for his abduction and failed deprogramming (CAN was a co-defendant because a CAN contact person had referred Scott's mother to Ross). Ross said the lawsuit was an attempt by the Church of Scientology to silence his efforts, claiming "This isn't about Jason Scott. This isn't about his civil rights. They recruited him to harass me".

The two men hired by Scott's mother seized him outside her house, the teenager was handcuffed and forced into a van, before being transported to a beach cottage for the deprogramming. Ross and his partners walked him into the house, one of the men leading him on a nylon leash, another holding his handcuffs. Ross and his partners had made the house a virtual prison; the windows were covered with thick nylon straps forming a mesh, to prevent escape. Scott was restrained and told his release depended on the completion of the session. Scott testified that he then endured five days of derogatory comments about himself, his beliefs, his girlfriend and his pastor, and diatribes by Ross about the ways in which Christianity and conservative Protestantism were wrong. He was intimidated, forced to watch videos on cults and told his church was just the same. He said he was watched 24 hours a day. When Scott threatened Ross with criminal prosecution, Ross was said to have threatened Scott that he would handcuff him to the bed frame.

After four days, Scott began to pretend that he had changed his mind, feigning tears and remorse, in the hope that this would in due course give him a chance to escape. The final day of his imprisonment he spent watching films on New Age religions and channeling, even though neither are related to Pentecostalism. Scott's plan ultimately worked; Ross, pleased with the apparent success of the deprogramming session, proposed that they all went out to meet with Scott's family for a celebratory dinner. In the restaurant, Scott was allowed to go the restroom by himself; he ran out and called the police, who arrested Ross and his companions on suspicion of unlawful imprisonment. Initially, the charges were dismissed.

At the civil trial Ross and his co-defendants were found liable for conspiracy to deprive Scott of his civil rights and religious liberties. Scott was awarded nearly $5 million. The judge awarded $875,000 in compensatory damages, and punitive damages in the amount of $1,000,000 against CAN, $2,500,000 against Ross, and $250,000 against each of the other two individual defendants. The case bankrupted the Cult Awareness Network. In addition, the jury held the defendants, excluding CAN, liable for intentional infliction of emotional distress, finding they "intentionally or recklessly acted in a way so outrageous in character and so extreme in degree as to go beyond all possible bounds of decency and to be regarded as atrocious and utterly intolerable in a civilized community."

In 1995 Ross filed for personal bankruptcy because of the damages award against him in the Scott civil trial. Scott then settled with Ross, accepting $5,000 plus 200 hours of Ross's professional services "as an expert consultant and intervention specialist". Berry, Scott's new attorney, said that Scott's decision to use Ross's services was not a vindication of Ross's deprogramming methods and refused to say what services Ross would provide.

As a result of the legal risks involved, Ross stopped advocating coercive deprogramming or involuntary interventions for adults, preferring instead voluntary exit counseling without the use of force or restraint. He states that despite refinement of processes over the years, exit counseling and deprogramming continue to depend on the same principles.