primary hatemonger in Germany is Renate Hartwig, who runs an anti-Scientology group called Robin-Direct in Ulm, Germany. Hartwig, whose favorite public positioning is that of a proper “Hausfrau,” has a criminal record. Hartwig authored a book about Scientology in which she claimed to own a dog that could recognize Scientologists by their smell. In July 1994, an injunction was obtained forbidding the sale of this book owing to libelous statements it contained. The court ordered the book withdrawn from all bookstores.
Allegations in the book about Scientologists were found by the police in Tubingen to be a “pack of lies.” Not so coincidentally, Hartwig had based many of her claims on statements made by the same discredited witness used by Ursula Caberta—Ms. Sautter, a woman serving a prison sentence for fraud, forgery and grand theft.
Hartwig and the publishing house Pattloch, owned by Catholic bishops, were fully aware of the mental condition of Sautter, having been informed of it by the police, yet used her fabricated claims to promote the book in a 2 million DM advertising campaign. As the reporter who revealed this information on SAT 1 TV stated, “Murder as an ad slogan in a Catholic publishing house. The publishing house as well as the author have to accept the reproach that 140,000 copies sold means 140,000 defrauded readers.”
Hartwig’s background is just as distasteful. While running a singles club, she defrauded an estimated 750,000 Deutschmarks from clients of this service. She has allegedly engaged in tax evasion, malicious defamation, fraudulent bankruptcy declaration, industrial espionage and perjury.
Hartwig’s criminality extends even to misappropriating funds intended for the burial of her second husband, who died in 1986. After eight years, she still had not paid for the burial costs or the cost of the gravestone, although, according to the undertaker, she had received money from his life insurance policy which by law had to be spent on his funeral expenses.
Previously, local CDU politicians and the official “sect commissioner” of the state of Baden-Wuerttemberg, Hartmut Hauser, worked closely with Hartwig in efforts to stir up prejudice and hatred against the Church of Scientology. Exposure of Hartwig’s criminal record has caused the CDU party to distance itself from Hartwig, although party officials have yet to denounce her or her actions.
Apparently her teachings have not reflected well on her own offspring. In a fairly recent incident, Hartwig’s son cut off the arms of Jesus from a statue in a Christian church.
