From mdallara@kcii.com Sun Apr 5 23:46:45 EDT 1998 Article: 122451 of alt.religion.scientology Path: mistletoe.srv.cs.cmu.edu!honeysuckle.srv.cs.cmu.edu!NNTP.CLUB.CC.CMU.EDU!eecs-usenet-02.mit.edu!netnews.com!dca1-hub1.news.digex.net!digex!newshub.northeast.verio.net!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.bbnplanet.com!pln-w!spln!extra.newsguy.com!newsp.newsguy.com!news3 From: mdallara@kcii.com (Mark Dallara) Newsgroups: alt.religion.scientology,sci.skeptic,comp.org.eff.talk Subject: ATG's COO threatens me with legal action for emailing their Advisory Board Date: Mon, 06 Apr 1998 01:02:12 GMT Organization: http://extra.newsguy.com Lines: 177 Message-ID: <352826fd.31867966@news.newsguy.com> Reply-To: mdallara@kcii.com NNTP-Posting-Host: p-780.newsdawg.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 1.5/32.451 Xref: skinner.boltz.cs.cmu.edu alt.religion.scientology:122451 [Posted to alt.religion.scientology, sci.skeptic, and comp.org.eff.talk] [NOTE: My ISP's dialup server recently ate itself, along with the mail server, so I may not have received mail sent to me on Friday or Saturday...] ...however, I'm back online today, and just received this little gem in my mail box. This is, of course, their reponse to my emailed inquiry to the various academics on ATG's advisory board. [QUOTE] To: mdallara@kcii.com Subject: Your communications From: ATG Date: Thu, 02 Apr 1998 17:39:12 -0800 CC: senkan@seas.ucla.edu, lidstrom@u.washington.edu, bbonavid@microimmun.medsch.ucla.edu, kencur@rmplc.co.uk, vdhir@seas.ucla.edu, bruch@acspect.com, gaw@ucla.edu Date: April 3, 1998 To: Mark Dallara From: Harold Rapp In recent days you have contacted ATG’s Board of Advisors and others via E-mail. You have made assertions and statements, raising issues that are in error and which may seriously damage ATG. We may seek to hold you responsible for any such damage. ATG is a public company, and we have a fiduciary responsibility to our shareholders. Defamatory assertions by you will not be tolerated, and appropriate legal action will be taken as the situation dictates. In your many communications you raise a number of issues to which I would like to respond: 1. You make the statement that ATG is a Scientology company. You write “..And to top the whole thing off, there is evidence of close ties between ATG, its distributors, and the ‘Church’ of $cientology...” Nothing could be further from the truth. ATG is not aligned with Scientology. Ironically, certain individual Scientologists have characterized ATG and its current management as being anti-Scientology. What possible evidence could indicate that ATG is tied to Scientology when the CEO, the COO, the Controller, the General Counsel, the Board of Directors, and the Chief Scientist (among others) are not Scientologists? And what is your agenda that you would put forth such an assertion as though it were fact? If you are a Scientology antagonist, that is your choosing. However, do not make characterizations about us which are absolutely false. For your information, we do not ask people their religious affiliation, nor do we care about it. You may be interested to know that it would be illegal to query anyone on their religious affiliation. 2. You ask why ATG did not refute the Structure Probe investigation. We do not know what Structure Probe tested because we were not involved in their testing . The State of Oregon would not divulge to us the lab or the individuals doing the testing. We did provide overwhelming scientific data supporting the IETM crystal technology in specific refutation of Structure Probe’s claims. This included data from two separate tests performed by a California laboratory approved and certified by the State of Oregon - this independent laboratory refuted Structure Probe’s claims. Frankly, the State of Oregon never totally got the issue right, and continued throughout to confuse our products with those made by others. 3. ATG never agreed to stop marketing The Forceâ in Oregon. However, we have learned a bitter lesson. Legal costs can quickly become exorbitant, especially for small companies. It was our judgment that making a $20K contribution was the easiest way to put this matter to rest. We publicly severed our relationship with TradeNet, disagreed with the claims that they were making, and left no doubt where ATG stood regarding that firm. In our view, Oregon has distorted that to which ATG has agreed, and we are paying a significant price for having settled to reduce legal costs instead of proceeding to a judgment in our favor on the merits of our technology. The fact is that our science is real, and we will defend it in the future in every legal venue. 4. You continue to refer to ATG's IE crystal as structured water. You are inaccurately characterizing our product. There is another product in the marketplace which is called structured water, but that product is provided by others. We do not know what your ulterior motive is in the campaign you are waging against us. We are aware that there is a substantial “short” position in the trading of our stock, and that those shorts would prefer never to have to cover their positions. The best way for this to happen is for the company to go out of existence. One of the ways the shorts assault companies is to raise erroneous claims and make defamatory accusations against companies like those you are making in the hopes of driving shareholders away. This is illegal. I can assure you that ATG is poised for tremendous success, and we will not go out of business. Let me say again, we will defend our science against individuals like you. We have forwarded your communications to our attorneys for review and recommendations regarding appropriate legal action, including injunctive relief and damages, actual and punitive, in the event you continue to spread defamatory statements regarding ATG. We take our science and our reputation seriously - you should too. [/QUOTE] I'm preparing my reply. ;) In the meantime, here's the text of the mail I sent to the advisory board members. One of them replied that he was resigning from the board, and the other said that he had never heard of Structure Probe. > Dr. {.....} > > As you may be aware, there is a rapidly growing online interest in American > Technologies Group and its products. Specifically, quite a few Internet > users suspect that ATG's products and claims are fraudulent, and that the > whole company is a scam designed to defraud both consumers and investors. > And to top the whole thing off, there is evidence of close ties between ATG, > its distributors, and the "Church" of $cientology. I think that close > scrutiny from various media outlets cannot be far > off. > > Since your name appears on ATG's website as a member of the company's > "Advisory Board", I (along with many other net.activists) would be extremely > interested in hearing your thoughts on the matter. Also, any references you > can provide to supporting materials in REFERREED journals would be greatly > appreciated. > > Please do not simply refer me to Dr. Lo, as his position as R&D Director > makes for too close of a relationship with ATG to accept his claims without > corroboration. As a member of the academic community, you are held to a > high standard of professional integrity, and should be expected to be candid > and forthcoming about matters in your field of expertise. > > I would be particularly interested in hearing your assessment of this > excerpt from an affidavit at the Oregon Department of Justice web site: > > "5. Structure Probe found no support for the claim that the presence of the > SuperGlobe promotes the formation of IE structures, and no support for the > claim that those structures exist in any of the samples. No structures were > observed in the SuperGlobe or in either of the vials supplied by ATG. Having > reviewed the supporting materials, I conclude further that there is no > theoretical basis for believing that the structures described as "IE" do or > could exist, let alone be stable, at room temperatures or anything > approaching room temperatures... > > "...7. Based on my professional background and training and extensive > experience with electron microscopy, it is my opinion that the structures > displayed in photographs of the literature I reviewed in connection with the > Report depict microorganisms. My colleagues and I at Structure Probe, and > other professionals in the field who work extensively with carbon support > films for electron microscopy, customarily refer to such structures as > "bacteria," though they may be another form of microorganism. These > structures may spontaneously appear after exposure of water to ambient > laboratory conditions, and they can be caused to disappear by > ultra­filtration or by the application of ozone and UV radiation as > prescribed in the EPA Method we used. I do not believe these structures > constitute a new form of matter or support for the existence of a new form > of matter as described in the articles by Dr. Shui­Yin Lo and ATG that we > reviewed..." > > The Intel Corporation found out several years ago that when the Internet > community takes an interest in an issue, it is unlikely to die down and > quietly go away. Until the question of ATG and its "Ie technology" is > resolved to everyone's satisfaction, I think that these questions will > continue to be posed to you and to your fellow board members. > > Sincerely, > > -- > Mark Dallara > mdallara@kcii.com > -- Mark Dallara mdallara@kcii.com http://www2.kcii.com/users/dallara/