'Tom Cruise's Church of hate tried to destroy me'

This week a BBC reporter was shown screaming in fury after being hounded by Scientology fanatics. Here, a Mail writer tells how he, too, was the victim of a vicious cult smear campaign.

Daily Mail, UK/May 19, 2007
By Paul Bracchi

The voice at the end of the line was trembling.

"Is that Mr Bracchi?"

"Yes, it is," I replied.

The caller could not have been more relieved. I was supposed to be dead. Someone had started a rumour that I had been killed in a fire.

The same people who had tried to obtain my exdirectory phone number, handed out pamphlets attacking me, and dispatched an American private detective - an ex-Los Angeles police officer - to Britain to frighten and smear the source who had helped me expose their activities.