Inside Scientology - Janet Reitman [117]
She was right: there were multiple caretakers looking after Lisa, including some who didn't speak English, and none of them stayed for very long. One of them, Lesley Woodcraft, the British-born personnel manager at Flag, was pulled onto the watch on November 22 and almost immediately passed the responsibility to her roommate, Alice Vangrondelle, the Flag librarian.
Vangrondelle complained that it wasn't her job but grudgingly got out of bed. She found Lisa talking gibberish, freezing cold, with blotches on her face that looked like those caused by measles. She'd run around the room in a frenzied manner; later, exhausted, she'd collapse on the bed. At one point she rested her head on the librarian's shoulder. "E.T., go home," Lisa cried. "E.T., go home."
When Vangrondelle returned to her room later that day, she wrote a "Knowledge Report" on Woodcraft, whom she felt had improperly posted her to the watch. The report contained a lengthy description of Lisa's mania and noted that Lisa's breath was "foul." This is a sign of a toxic condition called uremia, caused by poor function of the kidneys. She also wrote that Lisa looked feverish.
This report, dated November 22, 1995, is the last one detailing Lisa's condition for several days. There are no logs for November 23–25, a period that was marked by an upsurge of violent behavior, as Lisa's caretakers later testified. Lisa, they said, pulled things off shelves, destroyed furniture, broke lights, threw a ficus plant at one of her watchers, screamed, and banged her head on the wall, floor, and bed. One minder recalled her gouging at her own face with her fingernails. Another stated that she drenched the floor with water, stripped naked, and lashed out with her fists. Security personnel removed everything breakable or dangerous, including the lamps, leaving Lisa in total darkness.
At three in the morning on November 24, Sam Ghiora, a Flag security staffer, was seated on a small bench outside of Lisa's room when he heard the doorknob rattle. Slowly, the door to room 174 opened, and Lisa stood at the threshold, fully dressed.
"Hey," she said calmly, walking a few steps toward him. "You're not CMO."
"You're right," Ghiora said. He was not a member of the Commodore's Messenger Organization but a new Flag security trainee.
"You can't tell me what to do," Lisa said.
"You're right," Ghiora said again. He knew he'd broken protocol by speaking to her, but he was momentarily shocked: How had she just walked out of the room? Where were her minders? Ghiora gently put his hand on Lisa's shoulder and steered her back toward her room. She stopped at the threshold. "I just don't know what's happening," she said.
Ghiora said nothing.
"Could you help me?"
Nothing.
"I need help," she said, and slowly entering her room, shut the door.
On November 29, about a week after she'd taken her turn on the watch, Alice Vangrondelle went to see Judy Goldsberry-Weber in the medical liaison's office. "I want to know how a person would act if they didn't get enough to eat or drink," she said. "What are the symptoms of dehydration?"
Goldsberry-Weber took out some medical books and gave Vangrondelle a list of symptoms, which include dry skin, loss of appetite, flushed complexion, dry mouth, weakness, chills, and in more serious cases, fever, increased heart rate and respiration, confusion, chest pain, and unconsciousness. "Have you ever taken care of anyone like that?" Vangrondelle asked. "How would they behave?"
Goldsberry-Weber told her that it would not be uncommon for a patient in this condition to behave "irrationally" for a short period, but given enough fluids, the condition could be turned around