PARIS (Reuters) - A French judge has ordered two departments and seven prominent members of the Church of Scientology in France to stand trial on charges of organized fraud, a judicial source said on Monday.

The case is the latest in a series of legal battles that have pitted the French judicial system against the Scientologists, who could be forced to stop their activities in France if found guilty.

The latest suit centers on a complaint made in 1998 by a woman who said she was enrolled into the Church of Scientology by a group of people she met outside a metro station.

In the following months, she said she paid 140,000 francs (21,340 euros) for “purification packs” and books which she said were a fraud. Other complaints then surfaced, prolonging the investigation.

Judge Jean-Christophe Hullin ruled that the Scientologists’ Celebrity Center, bookstore and seven Church leaders should be tried for fraud and “illegally practicing as pharmacists”.
…