At approximately 1430 hours on August 27,2003 theStraights dot
com roving editor Wesley Fager staged a one-man demonstration
against Scientology's east coast headquarters
in occupied Clearwater, Florida. His hastily made banner reads L.
Ron Hubbard is a Liar! from
Virginia though unfortunately you can not
read it in the photos as photo quality is very poor.
Photo 2 shows Wes at the side entrance to the courtyard
at the former Fort Benjamin Harrison Hotel (now Flag Headquarters).
If you look to right of Wesley you see the gates opening into the
tree-filled courtyard. The protest started at the side entrance
in Photo 1 with Wesley, poster still folded, talking to a space
cadet, asking her if he was at the Coast Guard Academy or something
because everyone was wearing naval uniforms. She told him he was
at the Church of Scientology and if he had some time maybe
she could arrange a tour. Wesley said no thanks as he had to catch
a plane.
Wesley then walked to left of the building and turned
right onto the main drag, positioning himself at the main entrance
shown in Photo 3 where his banner was unfurled. The main entrance,
as can be seen, was deserted. Everybody was at the side entrance.
Several photos were taken on the main drag as shown in Photos 3,
4 and 5. Several cars passed and gave Wesley a thumbs up. Then he
walked to the end of the building and turned back onto the side
street, approached the side entrance and held his banner for those
in the courtyard to see. The lambs in the beehive just stared at
Wes and his sign sheepishly, but then in a flash, out of nowhere,
a man appeared and got in Wesley's face screaming at him to get
off their property. Wesley calmly stated that he was an American
citizen exercising his Constitutional right to free speech. At that
the bull baiter started walking down the street, pointing and ordered
Wesley to follow him, to which Wesley responded, "I'm not following
you anywhere." Next the pretorian guard screamed that he was
calling the police. As Wesley was walking away to leave, a Clearwater
police car passed right past him and his sign never even slowing
down.
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Photo 1
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Photo 2
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Photo 3
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Photo 4
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Photo 5
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