00001 {10:29:14am} 01 IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 02 FOR THE WESTERN DISTRICT OF OKLAHOMA 03 04 MICHAEL FOUNDATION, INC., 04 05 Plaintiff, 05 06 vs. CASE NO. CV-00-0885-W 06 07 URANTIA FOUNDATION, et al., 07 08 Defendants. 08 09 09 10 10 11 11 12 REPORTER'S TRANSCRIPT OF PROCEEDINGS 12 HAD TUESDAY, JUNE 12, 2001 13 BEFORE THE HONORABLE LEE R. WEST, SENIOR JUDGE PRESIDING 13 14 JURY TRIAL - VOLUME I OF VII 15 16 17 18 19 A P P E A R A N C E S 20 FOR THE PLAINTIFF: MR. ROSS A. PLOURDE 20 MR. MURRAY E. ABOWITZ 21 Attorneys at Law 21 Oklahoma City, Oklahoma 22 22 FOR THE DEFENDANTS: MR. STEVEN G. HILL 23 MR. PETER SCHOENTHALER 23 MR. ERIC MAURER 24 Attorneys at Law 24 Atlanta, Georgia 25 25 00002 {10:29:14am} 01 INDEX OF VOLUME I 02 --------------------------------------------------------------- 03 PEREMPTORY CHALLENGES ................................... 50 04 PLAINTIFF'S OPENING STATEMENT ........................... 68 05 DEFENDANTS' OPENING STATEMENT ........................... 77 05 06 PLAINTIFF'S WITNESSES: 06 07 KENNETH RICHARD KEELER 07 08 DIRECT (By Mr. Abowitz) ....................... 93 08 09 ********** 10 00003 {10:29:14am} 01 PROCEEDINGS: 02 --------------------------------------------------------------- 03 (THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HAD IN THE JUDGE'S 04 CHAMBERS, OUT OF THE PRESENCE AND HEARING OF THE JURY:) 05 THE COURT: Okay, gentlemen. Let's hear a 06 discussion, first, of the settlement and compromise. You 07 submitted a brief. Let's rehash that and see what you -- 08 you've cited some authority here. Let me hear from y'all 09 again. No, it's your motion, isn't it, on the settlement and 10 compromise? 11 MR. HILL: It is, Judge. 12 THE COURT: Why don't you restate your position in 13 that regard. 14 MR. HILL: Our position is that bad faith in the 15 cybersquatting claim is an element of the offense and for them 16 to bring in settlement negotiations evidence as a way of 17 negativing our claim of bad faith, which is one of the elements 18 of our prima facie case, is inappropriate. And where it is 19 coming in for that purpose, the residual exceptions for things 20 like proving a contention of undue delay are meaningless. They 21 say in the brief that they filed that the reason why it's 22 probative is because it shows that Mr. McMullan didn't act in 23 bad faith, or, in the alternative, it keeps the damages down. 24 THE COURT: Okay. Now, you filed a brief citing some 25 additional authority. Tell me what you contend this authority 00004 {10:29:17am} 01 supports. 02 MR. PLOURDE: Well, Judge, if I could just fine tune 03 what he said a little bit. Obviously, if it wasn't probative 04 to something, it wouldn't be admissible. I think what 408 goes 05 to is eliminating the kind of evidence that shows that a party 06 has some conscious awareness of their liability or some 07 conscious awareness that their claim is no good as opposed to 08 going directly to an element of the claim and defeating an 09 element of the claim. 10 The authority that we submitted, Judge, is in the bad 11 faith insurance adjustment area. We submitted a case that 12 states that where settlement negotiations showing or tending to 13 show that the insurance company failed to make a good-faith 14 offer -- in other words, the insured was entitled to submit 15 evidence that the insurance company failed to make a good-faith 16 offer in establishing the claim, it's the inverse of what we're 17 trying to do here. We're trying to use it to negate -- 18 THE COURT: That's the only authority you could 19 find? You couldn't find authority for the converse of the 20 situation? 21 MR. PLOURDE: I didn't find any cases either way on 22 the converse. 23 But the case that was cited that says -- 24 THE COURT: Urico (sp) or whatever the name of that 25 case is? 00005 {10:29:21am} 01 MR. PLOURDE: Yes. That case doesn't say what they 02 said it says. What it says is that -- or it basically says 03 that while it may be admissible to offer -- you know, to prove 04 no bad faith, what the party there is offering it for is to 05 show -- I'm getting this screwed up, Judge -- is there, the 06 claim was -- 07 THE COURT: I don't need any help in getting screwed 08 up. 09 MR. PLOURDE: Listen, I'm doing this from memory. 10 There, the claim was you didn't step in and defend us, and 11 the insurance company offered or tried to offer evidence of 12 their settlement offer and the Court said, "That doesn't go to 13 whether or not you were in bad faith for failing to step in and 14 defend. That's just your monetary settlement offer. It 15 doesn't address the issue so it's not relevant to that issue." 16 That's what that case held. It didn't say if the issue had 17 been bad faith failure to -- 18 THE COURT: All right. Now, here's what I'm going to 19 do on this because I'm a little bit -- I'm still a little bit 20 confused. 21 MR. PLOURDE: Well, I contributed to it. 22 THE COURT: I'm not going to grant the motion in 23 limine but I'm also not making a final ruling on this 24 admissibility. That will come when you offer it or when you 25 attempt to offer it. Don't make any statements about it in 00006 {10:29:24am} 01 any -- you know, that evidence in any of the opening statements 02 or anything of that nature. Then, when you get ready to 03 present that, let me then have an opportunity at side bar, 04 again, approach at side bar and say, "Judge, we want to present 05 it at this time and this is why in the context of the trial 06 itself we think it ought to be admissible." Because in this 07 context here, I'm just not really able to understand the 08 rational or reason for it. 09 MR. HILL: We did find a better case last night, 10 Judge, but Eric is not in here and I don't know the citation. 11 THE COURT: Well, you'll have -- pick it out and give 12 it to them when they make this renewed effort to get it in. 13 Okay. Now then, we have two or three others here. 14 Motion regarding presentation of trial deposition taken in 15 previous unrelated actions. And you're seeking to prevent 16 that. Let me hear your arguments in support of the motion in 17 limine in that regard. 18 MR. PLOURDE: Judge, what it comes down to, and I 19 think both sides have identified the issue, is whether the 20 party who defended the deposition the last time had the same 21 motive to cross-examine the witness as we do. That's really 22 what it comes down to. 23 I went back -- as we said yesterday, their motive -- their 24 case was this was offered by spiritual beings and The Urantia 25 Foundation didn't have anything to do with it. Our case is 00007 {10:29:30am} 01 this was offered by the patient. And I went back and read that 02 deposition again last night and Joe Lewis, who represented 03 Kristen Maaherra in that case, who was cross-examining, didn't 04 ask a single word, didn't ask a single question about the 05 patient. What he asked was stuff like, "Isn't it true that 06 this was authored by spiritual beings?" So we're going to let 07 a deposition in that has all the stuff that they want her to 08 say coming from questions that were asked by the lawyer that 09 was supposedly in our same position, and it just isn't fair. I 10 mean, we didn't have the ability to be there and ask the kinds 11 of questions that we would want to ask to establish that, in 12 fact, it was the patient that -- 13 THE COURT: Well, is that different tactics in that 14 case versus your case? But if the motivation is -- 15 MR. ABOWITZ: It's a different issue. 16 THE COURT: Huh? 17 MR. ABOWITZ: It's an entirely different issue. 18 MR. PLOURDE: Tactics? You know, Judge, I mean, 19 there's a fine line, I guess, between tactics and what you're 20 presenting for your case, but we are arguing for a different 21 result than -- 22 THE COURT: Well, he lost, didn't he? 23 MR. PLOURDE: Yeah, which is one good reason -- 24 THE COURT: And you want a different result. 25 Let me hear from y'all. 00008 {10:29:33am} 01 MR. SCHOENTHALER: I have two points, and Steve might 02 have something to add. 03 The issue is: Who is the author? He asked her who the 04 author was and she said it was spiritual beings. That's what 05 she believes and that is her personal knowledge. I don't have 06 the transcript in front of me. The fact is that she answered 07 the question that is at issue here. The rule specifically says 08 it's not the same motive, it's not identical motive. It says 09 similar motive. I submit to the Court that trying to 10 invalidate a copyright based on who the author is is a similar 11 motive. 12 MR. HILL: I would just add one thing, Judge, and 13 that is that I don't think we're going to introduce the 14 portions of the Carlson deposition that refer to who the author 15 is. 16 THE COURT: That's one reason I asked y'all 17 yesterday, to designate and cross-designate, to see if there 18 was still any -- 19 MR. HILL: Yeah, we have. I've got to get copies 20 made and then I'll be giving it off to them. What we're 21 interested in is more of the general, I guess, process 22 involving the Forum and the questions and background and how 23 the manuscripts arrived and how she viewed them and things of 24 that nature. I submit that in this case there is an incentive 25 on the part of all parties to develop that kind of information 00009 {10:29:35am} 01 and that kind of testimony the same way there was in the 02 preceding case. You know, maybe at the end of the day people 03 draw different conclusions from the background when they get to 04 the foreground of the process, but I don't think Helen Carlson 05 was a contact commissioner to even observe the subject, but her 06 testimony is nevertheless valuable because she does know things 07 about the way the questions were asked and the way that papers 08 came, and those are obviously issues in this case the same way 09 they were in the Maaherra case. 10 THE COURT: All right. Now, I'm going to deny the 11 motion in limine at this time and under these circumstances, 12 without prejudice to their right to object to them, again, when 13 they're offered and after -- because I think some of the -- at 14 least the objections might be narrowed somewhat after the 15 designation and cross-designation and so forth. All right? So 16 it's denied as of now. 17 MR. ABOWITZ: Judge, may we have an admonition the 18 same as you gave us -- 19 THE COURT: Yeah. Don't get into the details of that 20 testimony in opening statements or anything at least until the 21 Court has had an opportunity to pass on ruling -- I mean on the 22 admissibility. 23 MR. HILL: I don't have the confidence to get into 24 the detail. 25 THE COURT: Well, I caution you in that regard 00010 {10:29:39am} 01 because the Court -- I think it's bad tactics any time to 02 detail evidence that you're going to offer and then at the 03 close of the case the other side says, "Look, he was going to 04 do that and it wasn't admitted by the Court or it's improper." 05 So, I would caution you -- you can generalize but I would 06 caution you against detailing evidence for that reason if 07 nothing else. 08 All right. Now then, I've denied that one. 09 Elizabeth Engstrom. You want to renew your objection to 10 her testimony? 11 MR. PLOURDE: Judge, listen, I was at the office 12 until 10 o'clock last night looking for some case that had 13 anything to do with it. 14 THE COURT: Couldn't come up with anything -- 15 MR. PLOURDE: Couldn't come up with anything. 16 THE COURT: -- that would help you or me, either 17 one? 18 MR. PLOURDE: I wish I could. I think the general 19 standards apply. 20 THE COURT: Well, there's my gatekeeping role. When 21 she puts on her qualifications and so forth, then I will have 22 to rule on whether or not she's allowed to express opinions and 23 so forth, but I'm denying the motion in limine in advance. 24 MR. ABOWITZ: Judge, in that regard, is that the kind 25 of thing where we will be able to challenge her qualifications 00011 {10:29:43am} 01 before she gets into her opinion? 02 THE COURT: Well, yes, you can object at that time 03 and if I feel or I need to have a, quote, Daubert hearing, or 04 Khumo hearing, or whatever kind of hearing, I'll probably get 05 the jury out and let you all argue the matter at that time, if 06 I don't -- if I'm not concerned about it. If I'm going to 07 admit her testimony, I'm not too worried about it, I'll go 08 ahead and let it go without a hearing. You can request a 09 hearing and the reasons for it prior to the time she expresses 10 opinion at the time they put her on and are attempting to 11 qualify her and so forth. All right? 12 MR. ABOWITZ: Thank you. 13 THE COURT: It's denied. The motion in limine is 14 denied. 15 All right. Scott Wharton, same ruling? Anybody have 16 anything new on Scott Wharton? 17 MR. PLOURDE: No, Your Honor. I thought you 18 indicated that you were going to deny that yesterday. 19 THE COURT: I have denied it, I assume. Did you find 20 anything new on it? 21 MR. PLOURDE: Yeah, I thought what you just said was 22 that -- 23 THE COURT: We'll rule on that when he gets into 24 conclusions of law. 25 MR. PLOURDE: All right. 00012 {10:29:47am} 01 THE COURT: All right. What about Kathryn Harries 02 and Arden Schilb? Is that still ongoing? 03 MR. PLOURDE: No. 04 MR. HILL: You ruled on it. 05 THE COURT: I denied those already; right? 06 MR. PLOURDE: Yeah. 07 THE COURT: Okay. Have we got all the motions in 08 limine out of the way now? 09 MR. PLOURDE: I think so. 10 MR. HILL: I think so, Judge. 11 THE COURT: All right. Now, I want to talk with 12 you. Do you all have parties here who can settle this case? 13 MR. ABOWITZ: Yes, sir. 14 THE COURT: Is there any possibility we can settle 15 this case? Now, I don't ever let anybody go to a trial, as 16 local counsel will tell you, without some attempts to settle 17 this case. There's several things I want to find out about 18 this case. Do we need to get the parties in here on this? 19 We don't need this on the record though unless you all -- 20 MR. HILL: No, we don't need it on the record, Judge. 21 (A DISCUSSION WAS HAD OFF THE RECORD, AFTER WHICH A RECESS 22 WAS TAKEN, AFTER WHICH THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HAD IN 23 OPEN COURT, WITHIN THE PRESENCE AND HEARING OF THE JURY:) 24 THE COURT: Be seated, please. 25 Good morning, ladies and gentlemen of the jury. My name 00013 {11:03:04am} 01 is Lee West. I will serve as the judge of the law in this 02 case. I need the assistance of eight of you to serve as a 03 fellow judge, as the judge of the facts in this case. 04 Collectively, you'll serve to determine what the facts are in 05 this case. The first thing I want to do is to ask each of you 06 to stand at this time and be sworn with regard to your voir 07 dire examination. 08 (JURY PANEL SWORN) 09 THE COURT: Be seated, please. 10 We're going to seat 14 of you in the jury box. The first 11 juror will be seated at the back row on this end. We'll fill 12 up all seven seats. The eighth juror will be on the front row 13 at this end and we'll fill up all seven seats. 14 I will explain briefly what this lawsuit is about to the 15 best of my ability and ask you some questions designed to 16 determine if there's any reason why you could not serve as fair 17 and impartial jurors in this case. I'll even give -- and I'll 18 call on you to give some information with regard to your 19 background, your education, your work experience, your family, 20 and then I intend to, slightly unusually, give the attorneys an 21 opportunity to ask you some -- is this a prospective juror? 22 THE JURY CLERK: Yes, sir. 23 THE COURT: All right. You'll have to raise your 24 right hand and be sworn, sir. 25 (JUROR SWORN) 00014 {11:05:01am} 01 THE COURT: Be seated, please. 02 I was just explaining to your fellow jurors that we're 03 going to seat some of you in the box, ask you some questions, 04 ask you to give us some information about you to determine 05 whether you're disqualified for any reason from serving as a 06 fair and impartial juror in this case. And after we have 07 qualified 14 of you for cause, there may be some of you excused 08 and replaced by other members of the jury and that's why all of 09 you should listen very carefully to the questions that are 10 asked and answered in order to expedite the proceeding. But 11 after we have qualified 14 for cause, then each side will have 12 the right to excuse three, for a total of six, under what we 13 call the peremptory challenge procedure, leaving eight jurors 14 to serve as judges of the facts in this case. 15 As your name is called, please take your seat in the jury 16 box as I've outlined. The back row, the first juror at this 17 end, and we'll fill up the back row, and the eighth juror will 18 be at the front row on this end. 19 THE COURTROOM DEPUTY: Darrel Mounce. Is that 20 correct? Mounce, Mounce? 21 JUROR MOUNCE: Darrel Mounce? 22 THE COURTROOM DEPUTY: Yes, sir. 23 Darrell Robinson, Linda Odland, Jacquelyn Littlepage, 24 Radis Earl Spencer, Amelia Gault, Elaine Svec, Richard Bales, 25 Kenneth Sterbenz, Mary Riepe -- Mary Jolene Riepe, Kyla Mach, 00015 {11:08:21am} 01 Freddie Wright, William Love, Juanita Hendricks, and Marsha 02 Ray. 03 THE COURT: Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, let me 04 read a brief outline of what this lawsuit is about. This 05 lawsuit involves some complex laws, copyright laws and 06 trademark laws, by and between two foundations, a dispute over 07 the right to publish books or parts of a book called The 08 Urantia Book. Let me read this to you and all of you should 09 listen carefully. 10 The Michael Foundation, who is represented at this table, 11 has brought this case as plaintiff claiming that Urantia 12 Foundation's copyright, and Urantia will be represented at this 13 table, in The Urantia Book is invalid or, in the alternative, 14 that the publication and distribution of the book Jesus - A New 15 Revelation does not infringe the copyright of Urantia Book. 16 Michael Foundation claims that The Urantia Foundation 17 lacked the right to renew the copyright registration in a book 18 when it filed its application for copyright renewal in 1983. 19 Now, in response, Urantia Foundation has asserted claims 20 against The Michael Foundation and its chief executive officer, 21 Harry McMullan, III, that publication of Jesus - A New 22 Revelation, infringes the copyright in The Urantia Book. 23 Now, The Urantia Foundation also claims that Michael 24 Foundation and McMullan have violated the anti-cybersquatting 25 consumer protection act by registering, maintaining and using 00016 {11:10:48am} 01 the worldwide web domain names Urantia.org and UrantiaBook.com 02 and TheUrantiaBook.org. 03 The Urantia Foundation further claims The Michael 04 Foundation and McMullan have committed unfair and deceptive 05 trade practices by claiming copyright in Jesus - A New 06 Revelation and using certain worldwide web domain names in a 07 manner that Urantia Foundation asserts is misleading to 08 consumers. 09 Now, the foregoing recitation is given to you simply to 10 define the issues to be tried between the parties and such 11 statements do not constitute proof of any fact in issue in this 12 case. As a matter of fact, as I mentioned before, it will be 13 up to you to determine what the facts are in this case. 14 Now, let me introduce first the attorneys representing the 15 various parties. Mr. Murray Abowitz and Mr. Ross Plourde 16 represent what I'll refer to as The Michael Foundation and 17 Harry McMullan, III. Mr. McMullan, would you please stand. 18 And their interests, I think, if not synonymous, are very much 19 the same; is that correct? 20 MR. ABOWITZ: Yes, Your Honor. 21 THE COURT: All right. You may be seated, please. 22 The Urantia Foundation is represented by Mr. Steven Hill, 23 Mr. Peter Schoenthaler, and Eric Maurer. 24 Would you introduce the representative of The Urantia 25 Foundation, if you will, Mr. Hill. 00017 {11:12:29am} 01 MR. HILL: Yes, Your Honor. This is Tonia Baney, the 02 executive director of The Urantia Foundation. 03 THE COURT: Okay. You may be seated. Thank you. 04 First off, let me ask you: Do any of you know the 05 attorneys or the parties involved in this lawsuit? 06 Do any of you know anything about what purports to be the 07 facts in this lawsuit? 08 Have any of you ever even heard of The Urantia Book? 09 Have any of you ever heard of The Michael Foundation that 10 published a book called Jesus - A New Revelation? Have any of 11 you heard of that book or of The Michael Foundation? 12 I gather that you have not. 13 Now then, have any -- Do any of y'all know anything about 14 copyright law? Have any of you ever been involved in a 15 copyright litigation? 16 Tell me, if you will, and I'm not trying to embarrass you, 17 but tell me what you understand copyright law to be about, in 18 general. 19 JUROR RAY: Just in general, I'm a song writer and 20 I've written some music. 21 THE COURT: In other words, writers and musicians and 22 various can put things down and publish it and have it 23 copyrighted and that copyright provides certain protections 24 against other people doing it. You understand you've exhausted 25 my thorough knowledge about copyright law, at least until this 00018 {11:14:00am} 01 case started. 02 JUROR RAY: That's about all I know. 03 THE COURT: But do you understand that I will be 04 explaining to you, to the best of my ability, what the law is 05 with regard to copyright and trademark at the close of this 06 case, and during the course of this case, and you will be 07 called upon to apply the law that I give you as copyright law 08 and trademark law and apply that to the facts that you 09 determine to exist from the evidence in this case. Do you 10 understand the different roles? 11 JUROR RAY: (JUROR NODS HEAD) 12 THE COURT: Presumably, I will know enough and do 13 know enough about copyright law to explain that to you. I'll 14 attempt to do it in the simplest possible form. It's a 15 complicated area of the law. I think you probably appreciate 16 that. I may even -- I have to guard against 17 oversimplification, but I will give you the law in the form of 18 my instructions with regard to what the law is at the close of 19 this case and you're then to apply that to the facts that you 20 determine to exist. 21 Do any of you have any difficulty accepting those two 22 roles, you as judges of the facts collectively, and the Court 23 as the judge of the law? Anybody have any problem with that? 24 Let me ask again. Have any of you been involved in any 25 way in any copyright disputes, either in litigation or 00019 {11:15:24am} 01 otherwise? Any of you ever have any experience with copyright 02 law or trademark law? 03 All right. Again, at the risk of oversimplification, 04 these -- both of these organizations, Michael Foundation and 05 The Urantia Foundation, have published different books. One is 06 called The Urantia Book. It was first published in 1955, and 07 the evidence is undisputed that they got a copyright back in 08 1955, and then in 1983, I believe it was, they made an attempt 09 to renew that copyright and had some form of renewal approval. 10 The Michael Foundation published a portion of that book. 11 Approximately -- it's called part four, or it's one-fourth or 12 less of that book -- and it's called Jesus As Now Revealed, and 13 this litigation by and between the parties is to whether or not 14 The Urantia Foundation had a valid copyright, whether they 15 renewed that valid copyright, if valid, and whether or not 16 Michael Foundation infringed on that copyright and a trademark 17 in publishing the Jesus As Now Revealed. 18 Do any of you -- can you understand that as a simple 19 explanation of what this lawsuit is about? 20 Now, is there anything in that -- Are there any things in 21 that that any of you feel that you could not be a fair and 22 impartial juror in determining what the facts are in that 23 dispute? Any of you have any feelings about these -- the fact 24 that it's -- that there may be some sort of a religious dispute 25 here, does that cause any of you to have any qualms about your 00020 {11:17:11am} 01 ability to be fair and impartial by and between the parties in 02 this dispute? 03 All right. I gather not. 04 Have any of you ever registered either a patent or a 05 copyright or a trademark? Okay. Again, say, if you will, when 06 and where was that. 07 JUROR RAY: 1986 was the first one, an original song 08 that I wrote. 09 THE COURT: And it was a copyright? 10 JUROR RAY: It was a copyright. 11 THE COURT: What was the publication; do you recall? 12 JUROR RAY: A Picture of God is the title of the 13 song. 14 THE COURT: A Picture of -- 15 JUROR RAY: A Picture of God. 16 THE COURT: Okay. And that was a picture that you 17 got a copyright on? 18 JUROR RAY: No, sir, it's a song and that's the 19 title. 20 THE COURT: I'm sorry. I'm a little hard of 21 hearing. You published a song, A Picture of God, and got a 22 copyright on it? 23 JUROR RAY: I copyrighted a song that I 24 self-published. 25 THE COURT: Okay. Now then, have you ever had any 00021 {11:18:05am} 01 dispute with anyone over your right of that? 02 JUROR RAY: No, sir. 03 THE COURT: Have you ever had reason to claim 04 infringement of your copyright against anyone? 05 JUROR RAY: No, sir. 06 THE COURT: So you've had no disputes? 07 JUROR RAY: (JUROR SHAKES HEAD) 08 THE COURT: Would there be anything in just the 09 simple fact that you registered a copyright that would cause 10 you any doubt about your ability to be fair and impartial in 11 this dispute? 12 JUROR RAY: No, sir. 13 THE COURT: I gather not. All right. 14 Anyone else have a patent, copyright or trademark? 15 I gather not. 16 As such, no one else has been subjected to any claim by 17 anyone else of a violation? 18 Now, let me repeat again: Do any of you have any 19 knowledge or understanding as to the nature or content of, 20 quote, The Urantia Book? That's U-R-A-N-T-I-A Book, The 21 Urantia Book. I think I asked if anyone had ever heard of it. 22 Have any of you ever heard of it? 23 I gather then that you have no knowledge about the nature 24 or content of that book? All right. 25 Now, aside and apart from Ms. Hendricks, (sic) have any of 00022 {11:19:21am} 01 you had any experience in publishing of any kind, publication 02 of anything? 03 I gather not. 04 I believe some evidence may come out that Mr. Harry 05 McMullan, one of the parties to this lawsuit, is part owner or 06 owner of Alliance Steel. Do any of you have any ownership of 07 any stock or any nexus or connection of any kind with an 08 organization known as Alliance Steel? 09 I gather not. 10 Okay. Now, ladies and gentlemen, I want to ask you, if 11 you will, each, and we'll start with Mr. Mounce -- is that the 12 way you pronounce that? 13 JUROR MOUNCE: Mounce. 14 THE COURT: Mr. Mounce, I want to ask you to stand 15 and tell the parties and the Court about yourself briefly, 16 about your background, where you grew up and what your 17 educational background is, tell us a little bit about your 18 family and work experience and, if you will, tell us a little 19 bit what your interests are, your leisure interests. Do you 20 mind doing that? 21 JUROR MOUNCE: No, sir. 22 I was born in Springdale, Arkansas, in 1939. Went to 23 school in sixth grade and moved to California and went to 24 school in California for a short time and ended up in New 25 Mexico, Roswell, New Mexico, and finished my high school 00023 {11:21:35am} 01 there. I started with the fire department after high school 02 and worked there about seven-and-a-half years and then I had 03 moved back into Oklahoma City, transferred -- I just moved down 04 here and went to work for the fire department in Oklahoma City 05 for a short time and had a little bit of problem with my 06 captain at that time, so I resigned there and went to work in 07 El Reno as a machinist. I worked as a machinist there for 08 about three or four years. Rock Island at that time was going 09 under so I went to work -- put in application for the federal 10 reformatory in El Reno and went to work at the federal 11 reformatory in 1971, retired in 1991 with the Department of 12 Justice, and I'm retired now. I live in Mustang. I'm an 13 outdoorsman, fisherman, forest man, as far as outdoors life. 14 THE COURT: What about your family, Mr. Mounce? Do 15 you have a family? 16 JUROR MOUNCE: Yes, I do. I have five children. I'm 17 married. My wife works at the state capitol. She is an 18 executive secretary. She is still working. 19 THE COURT: Have you served -- let me ask you a 20 question: Have you served on a jury before? 21 JUROR MOUNCE: No, sir, I was never on as a juror. 22 THE COURT: You were in the jury pool but not on a 23 petit jury? 24 JUROR MOUNCE: I was a witness in some cases in the 25 Department of Justice, federal prison there. 00024 {11:23:24am} 01 THE COURT: Okay. At the federal prison, witness in 02 some cases growing out of your service there? 03 JUROR MOUNCE: That is correct, sir. 04 THE COURT: Anything about that experience in any way 05 that would prevent you from being fair and impartial in this 06 civil suit that you're on? 07 JUROR MOUNCE: Not that I know of; no, sir. 08 THE COURT: Thank you, Mr. Mounce, very kindly. 09 Mr. Robinson, Darrell Robinson. 10 JUROR ROBINSON: My name is Darrell Robinson. I was 11 born in Oklahoma City. Back when my folks moved to California, 12 I guess there's a lot of that, we came back when I was -- 13 THE COURT: Incidentally, they've started to come 14 back since we have electricity, you know. 15 JUROR ROBINSON: I've got an aunt that tried to get 16 me out there. 17 I attended high school in Midwest City, graduated from 18 high school from Midwest City. I went to college a little bit, 19 not much. I have worked for the State of Oklahoma for 30 20 years. I have a wife, Barbara, and a son, Brian. My wife 21 works at Tinker Field where she's a secretary for the KC-135. 22 My son has a slight business in Stillwater where he's also 23 going to college and he's working at Abercrombie & Fitch, if I 24 said that right, out at Quail Springs Mall. 25 Like the gentleman here, I love to fish, love the 00025 {11:24:48am} 01 outdoors. 02 THE COURT: Mr. Robinson, you mentioned that you 03 worked for the State of Oklahoma for 30 years. What capacity? 04 JUROR ROBINSON: I'm sorry. I'm a printer for the 05 Department of Human Services. We print forms and most of the 06 stuff used by DHS. We do a lot of printing. 07 THE COURT: Thank you, Mr. Robinson, very kindly. 08 Linda Carol Odland. How do you pronounce it? 09 JUROR ODLAND: Odland. That's right. I was born and 10 raised in Oklahoma. High school, college. I married my 11 husband, he was in the military 30 years. We traveled around a 12 lot. I have three girls, all married; four grandchildren. 13 I've done real estate and dental assisting. That's about it. 14 THE COURT: Thank you, Ms. Odland. 15 Jacquelyn Littlepage. 16 JUROR LITTLEPAGE: Yes, sir. Born and raised here in 17 Oklahoma City, one of five children. Graduated from high 18 school in 1996. Graduated from the University of Oklahoma last 19 month. I'll be taking a test next week in Houston to be a 20 certified personal trainer, and getting married next Monday. 21 THE COURT: Thank you, Ms. Littlepage. 22 Radis Spencer. Is that the way you pronounce that? 23 JUROR SPENCER: Radis. 24 THE COURT: Radis? 25 JUROR SPENCER: I'm 30. Was born in Oklahoma. I've 00026 {11:26:19am} 01 lived in several states but always seemed to come back here. I 02 have four children, been married eight years. Two years of 03 college. I sell automobiles at Hudiburg. Love to fish, love 04 to hunt, read, computers, spend time with the children. 05 THE COURT: Thank you very kindly. 06 Amelia Gault? 07 JUROR GAULT: I was born in Saguine, Texas and I 08 moved here to go to community college. I went through a couple 09 of years. I have two children and am happily married. On my 10 spare time, I spend with my family. My brother lives here as 11 well. And I work at Hertz. 12 THE COURT: Thank you very kindly, Ms. Gault. 13 Elaine Svec? 14 JUROR SVEC: Yes, sir. 15 THE COURT: Is that how you pronounce that? 16 JUROR SVEC: Yes, sir. I was born in Oklahoma City. 17 I grew up in Midwest City. I currently live in south Oklahoma 18 City. I work at Oklahoma City Community College. I attended 19 college at York College and Harding College and Oklahoma City 20 Community College. I'm the human resources assistant at 21 Oklahoma City Community College right now and I've been married 22 for 27, almost 28 years to my first husband. I have two 23 daughters. They're both in college. 24 THE COURT: Thank you very kindly, Ms. Svec. 25 Juanita Hendricks? Oh, I'm sorry. Did I miss -- 00027 {11:28:02am} 01 THE COURTROOM DEPUTY: We have one that did not show, 02 Judge. 03 THE COURT: What happened here? 04 THE COURTROOM DEPUTY: We have one that did not show 05 up. 06 THE COURT: I want the one in that -- 07 THE COURTROOM DEPUTY: Right. Marsha Ray. 08 THE COURT: Who is that? Write that down here. 09 Oh, okay. I'm with you now. 10 Marsha Ray, if you will. 11 JUROR RAY: I was born in Oklahoma City. We lived in 12 Tulsa about three years and then settled in Del City where I 13 attended school and graduated from Del City High School. I 14 went to college at University of Central Oklahoma and I married 15 my husband during college. We've been married 25 years and 16 have four children. In my spare time, it's church, family, 17 crafts, but I'm a singer in churches and song writer, and 18 that's me. 19 THE COURT: Thank you, Ms. Ray. 20 All right. Now, Ms. Hendricks. 21 JUROR HENDRICKS: I'm -- 22 THE COURT: I apologize for getting you two mixed up 23 but our chart was a little bit -- 24 JUROR HENDRICKS: I'm married. I have four 25 children. I was born in Oklahoma, graduated from Stroud High 00028 {11:29:17am} 01 School. I work out of my home with an accounting service. 02 With four children I don't have a lot of leisure time but I 03 enjoy reading and church and family. 04 THE COURT: Thank you. 05 William Henry Love. 06 JUROR LOVE: I was born in Alexandria, Virginia. 07 I've been here in the State of Oklahoma for five years. I've 08 been married 15 years to my wife. I've been in the military, 09 Army. I work for military justice. I like to fish. Favorite 10 sport is football, which is the Washington Redskins. I'm a 11 religious man, born-again Christian, and I love people. 12 THE COURT: Thank you, Mr. Love. 13 Freddie Wright. 14 JUROR WRIGHT: Yeah, my name is Freddie Wright. 15 First of all, I'd like to say that this lawyer here, I remember 16 that we were in an arbitration case together. I don't know 17 whether -- 18 THE COURT: All right. Now, which -- Mr. Plourde? 19 JUROR WRIGHT: Right. 20 THE COURT: Tell me about it. Were you involved in 21 that litigation, arbitration yourself? 22 JUROR WRIGHT: I was just a witness. 23 THE COURT: Okay. Would there be anything in that 24 experience that would in any way cause you to be biased or 25 prejudiced either for or against Mr. Plourde in this case? 00029 {11:30:36am} 01 JUROR WRIGHT: No. 02 THE COURT: Could you be -- Are you satisfied that 03 you could be completely fair and impartial in litigation in 04 which he was involved? 05 JUROR WRIGHT: Yes. 06 THE COURT: And, if selected, would you serve fairly 07 and impartially? 08 JUROR WRIGHT: Yes, I would. 09 THE COURT: Go ahead. 10 JUROR WRIGHT: All right. My name is Freddie 11 Wright. I grew up in a place called Frederick, Oklahoma. I've 12 lived here in Oklahoma City for the last -- off and on about 35 13 years. I work out at Dayton Tire Company. I've been out there 14 for 24 years. I have a wife. I've been married for 29 years. 15 I have four kids. I have three daughters and one son. My 16 hobbies are bowling and I like football and stuff like that. 17 THE COURT: Thank you, sir. 18 Kyla Kay Mach. Is that how you pronounce it? 19 JUROR MACH: It's Kyla Kay Mach. 20 THE COURT: Okay. 21 JUROR MACH: Born in Oklahoma City. Grew up in 22 Bethany. Graduated from Putnam West High School. Some 23 college. Married to my second husband, it will be 20 years 24 next month. I have a 15-year-old son who participates in a lot 25 of athletic activity, so I spend a lot of my time following him 00030 {11:31:55am} 01 around. 02 THE COURT: Thank you, Ms. Mach. 03 Kenneth Sterbenz. Is that how you pronounce that? 04 JUROR STERBENZ: Yes, sir, that's correct. I was 05 born and raised in Oklahoma. Been here all my life. Graduated 06 from Putnam City High School. A couple of years of college at 07 the University of Central Oklahoma. I'm married. Been married 08 for 34 years to the same person. I have a daughter, 30 years 09 old. District sales manager for a hand tool company out of 10 Chicago for the last 15 years. 11 THE COURT: Thank you, Mr. Sterbenz. 12 Richard Bales; is that correct? 13 JUROR BALES: Yeah. Name is Richard. I'm 21. Enjoy 14 computers. I'm not working. 15 THE COURT: Thank you, Mr. Bales. 16 May I see counsel at the bench, please, and, if you will, 17 bring your boards. 18 (THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HAD AT THE BENCH, OUT OF 19 HEARING OF THE JURY:) 20 THE COURT: I'm prepared to let you all conduct 21 limited voir dire with regard to these prospective jurors 22 unless you all feel the need not to do so. Would you like to 23 do that? 24 MR. ABOWITZ: I would like to inquire, briefly. 25 THE COURT: Okay. Now, I'm not going to let you go 00031 {11:33:34am} 01 into very great detail and too long a period of time, so keep 02 it pretty short. What order? You first, plaintiffs first, is 03 that agreeable? 04 MR. HILL: (COUNSEL NODS HEAD) 05 THE COURT: I'd say, try to keep it to about 15 06 minutes, if you can. 07 MR. HILL: Judge, do you have any objections -- Do 08 you have any objections to general questions to the entire 09 panel? 10 THE COURT: No. You use it however you wish to do 11 so, unless it gets too personal or something I feel -- 12 MR. HILL: I'm not going to get personal. 13 THE COURT: Okay, gentlemen. I'll explain it to 14 them. 15 (THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HAD IN OPEN COURT AND 16 WITHIN THE PRESENCE AND HEARING OF THE JURY:) 17 THE COURT: Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, 18 prospective jurors, I'm going to deviate slightly from the way 19 we normally do business. Ordinarily, the judge conducts the 20 entire voir dire examination of the prospective jurors but I've 21 agreed to allow counsel, each side, approximately 15 minutes, 22 to interrogate some or all of the jurors with regard to their 23 qualifications to sit and serve as fair and impartial jurors. 24 And, first, counsel, for the plaintiff, Mr. Abowitz. 25 MR. ABOWITZ: Thank you, Your Honor. 00032 {11:34:45am} 01 Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. How are you? We're 02 glad to have you here to serve as jurors in this case. I'm 03 going to ask you a few questions. 04 As the Judge told you earlier, in addition to the elements 05 of the case that he recited to you, he told you that this case 06 has religious overtones. Mr. Love, you indicated to us, that 07 you're a born-again Christian and your religion is important to 08 you. 09 May I ask generally of the jury panel: How many other 10 people have a religion, follow it, and it is very important to 11 you? 12 Let me ask again, and I don't mean to violate any privacy 13 and I don't mean to delve into any of your religious feelings, 14 but since this is an issue in the case I feel somewhat 15 compelled on behalf of our clients to ask these questions. 16 There will be evidence in this case from Mr. McMullan that 17 The Urantia Book is the basis for his religion. That religion 18 obviously is not a mainstream religion. I would ask you, those 19 of you who -- I would ask all of you, whether your religion is 20 important to you or whether it's very important to you or 21 somewhat important or not important, is the fact that we're 22 here today to address issues in a religion, number one, other 23 than yours, is that going to affect your ability to be fair not 24 only to Mr. McMullan but also to the defendants in this case? 25 Everybody, can you, by shaking your head, tell me that you 00033 {11:36:58am} 01 can be fair and impartial notwithstanding that you're going to 02 hear evidence about a religious difference that is not a 03 mainstream religion, is that going to make any difference to 04 anybody on your impartiality? 05 With respect to the religious nature and overtones of this 06 case, there will be discussions about this religion, some of 07 the things that people believe in, that involves communications 08 from celestial beings, spirits. Is there anything about the 09 nature of that statement that I just made that would interfere 10 with your ability to be fair and impartial to both sides in 11 this case? 12 In other words -- and let me ask it again because it's 13 important and neither side would want to find out in the middle 14 of the trial that you say, "Uhm, I told that lawyer it wouldn't 15 make a difference but it may." It's very important that you 16 can -- that you can listen to this evidence and not be swayed 17 by any bias or prejudice associated with something that you may 18 have a different view of. Certainly, you're going to make up 19 your mind in the case, we hope you do, and you will take the 20 evidence and be swayed one way or the other, tip the scales, 21 but I think on behalf of both sides we would ask you not to tip 22 those scales based on any bias or prejudice you had with 23 respect to religious matters about which you differ. 24 Now, having said that, does everybody agree that that's 25 not going to be a problem? 00034 {11:39:19am} 01 There are several of you -- Mr. Spencer, I believe you 02 were one that said you liked to read. What do you read? 03 JUROR SPENCER: A wide range but I like fantasy. 04 MR. ABOWITZ: Fiction, nonfiction? 05 JUROR SPENCER: Mostly fiction. 06 MR. ABOWITZ: You don't, as a matter of course, read 07 religious works? 08 JUROR SPENCER: No, sir. 09 MR. ABOWITZ: Okay. There was somebody else that 10 said that they liked to read and I thought I wrote it down but 11 I'm getting old. Who -- 12 JUROR HENDRICKS: I like to read. 13 MR. ABOWITZ: Yes, ma'am. Ms. Hendricks. 14 JUROR HENDRICKS: Mostly religious material. 15 MR. ABOWITZ: And, again, I don't want to pry here 16 but can you give me a general description with which you're 17 comfortable in describing the kinds of things that you read. 18 JUROR HENDRICKS: Well, I have one in my purse. 19 MR. ABOWITZ: Would you be embarrassed if I asked you 20 what the title of that was? 21 JUROR HENDRICKS: No, not at all. It's Anxious For 22 Nothing. It's by a religious speaker, Joyce Meyers. 23 MR. ABOWITZ: And what is the substance? What's it 24 based on? 25 JUROR HENDRICKS: It's based a lot on scripture and 00035 {11:40:51am} 01 relying on God as a higher power and based on a lot of the King 02 James Version. 03 MR. ABOWITZ: New Testament? 04 JUROR HENDRICKS: Yeah, New Testament and Old. 05 MR. ABOWITZ: Do you read religious works other than 06 those of what I'm going to call the mainstream, something that 07 may fall outside of what we consider -- might consider 08 traditional religious works? 09 JUROR HENDRICKS: I don't normally veer outside of a 10 certain area in which -- certain area or certain writers I'm 11 comfortable with. 12 MR. ABOWITZ: And, again, this is very important and 13 let me reiterate, as the Judge did a couple of times, on your 14 knowledge of the Urantia Book. If you find this to be a little 15 bit outside of the mainstream, you can assure me that it isn't 16 going to make any difference, because it is maybe out of the 17 mainstream as far as you're concerned, that's not going to make 18 any difference? 19 JUROR HENDRICKS: No, I'm having some hesitation over 20 that. I've never heard of The Urantia Book at all, never, or 21 either of the parties involved, but I would say that I would 22 have some hesitancy in that area. 23 MR. ABOWITZ: And I don't mean to probe any further 24 but can you, for the purposes of my clients and the people at 25 this table, express that hesitancy so that we can react to it? 00036 {11:42:19am} 01 JUROR HENDRICKS: I think if we're dealing with 02 copyright issues, I don't know where religion falls into that. 03 You know, I don't understand that religion would have anything 04 to do with the issues involved in a copyright. So I don't 05 feel -- I mean, even though I may not agree with The Urantia 06 Book, I don't think that I could be -- I think if we stick with 07 the issues when you're dealing with just the copyright issues, 08 you know, I may pray about what my decision should be but I 09 don't think that the religious aspect of it, that I would be 10 impartial in that area. 11 MR. ABOWITZ: I'm sorry. I didn't hear you. You 12 said you would be partial? 13 JUROR HENDRICKS: I don't believe that I would be 14 impartial. I would not be impartial as long as we're dealing 15 with issues; we're not dealing with my religion versus someone 16 else's religion. Just the issues. 17 MR. ABOWITZ: All right. And maybe that's the way I 18 should have expressed it. This case should not be in your 19 minds about your religion that is important to you versus 20 whatever anybody else in this courtroom might feel. 21 Is your hesitancy one that you can't understand how 22 religion fits into the copyright; is that what you're trying to 23 express? 24 JUROR HENDRICKS: I'm not sure how much of this 25 religious issue is going to be brought up in dealing with just 00037 {11:43:40am} 01 copyright issues. 02 MR. ABOWITZ: All right. Well, can all of you assure 03 me that you will keep an open mind on where religion fits into 04 this with the copyright until you hear the evidence? You're 05 not going to discount it because you haven't heard it yet; is 06 that an accurate statement? 07 JUROR HENDRICKS: Yes. 08 MR. ABOWITZ: And now you're comfortable? 09 JUROR HENDRICKS: I'm comfortable. 10 MR. ABOWITZ: Great. 11 Anybody else, based on the discussion I've had with 12 Ms. Hendricks, is there anything about that discussion that 13 raised in your mind a question about whether you can be fair 14 and impartial here? 15 Pass the jury. Thank you, Your Honor. 16 THE COURT: Mr. Hill? 17 MR. HILL: Thank you, Your Honor. 18 Good morning, just barely. I'm Steve Hill. I represent 19 Urantia Foundation. I want to ask just a couple of followup 20 questions to the panel as a whole. 21 First of all, Ms. Littlepage, you mentioned you were going 22 out of town next -- 23 THE COURT: Mr. Hill, I don't want to restrict you 24 too much but remember that I'm very hard of hearing. 25 MR. HILL: Oh, I'm sorry, Your Honor. I'll back up 00038 {11:44:49am} 01 so that -- There we go. Is that better? 02 THE COURT: That's better. 03 MR. HILL: You mentioned that you are going out of 04 town next week for a test; is that correct? 05 JUROR LITTLEPAGE: Yes, sir. 06 MR. HILL: When does that occur? 07 JUROR LITTLEPAGE: I'll be leaving next Tuesday. 08 MR. HILL: Next Tuesday? 09 JUROR LITTLEPAGE: Yes, sir. 10 MR. HILL: Okay. I assume that you've already made 11 your arrangements? 12 JUROR LITTLEPAGE: Yes, sir. 13 MR. HILL: It would be a tremendous inconvenience for 14 you to -- 15 JUROR LITTLEPAGE: The test is paid for, the flight 16 is paid for. 17 MR. HILL: Okay. Thank you. 18 Mr. Robinson, what type of materials have you printed? 19 JUROR ROBINSON: Forms. 20 MR. HILL: Okay. 21 JUROR ROBINSON: Mainly it's just forms for clients. 22 Occasionally a brochure or handbook. 23 MR. HILL: You haven't been involved in publishing 24 the works of other people, per se? 25 JUROR ROBINSON: We have a legal department that has 00039 {11:45:36am} 01 gone through it long before we get into it. They bring us the 02 plates and we put it on the paper. 03 MR. HILL: Okay. Mr. Spencer, did you say you liked 04 computers? 05 JUROR SPENCER: Yeah. 06 MR. HILL: You use the Internet? 07 JUROR SPENCER: Yes. 08 MR. HILL: How frequently? 09 JUROR SPENCER: At least once a day to check e-mail 10 and the e-trade game. 11 MR. HILL: Is there anybody on the panel that doesn't 12 use the Internet at least once a week? 13 UNIDENTIFIED MALE JUROR: Does not? 14 MR. HILL: That does not use the Internet. 15 UNIDENTIFIED MALE JUROR: I don't even have a 16 computer. 17 MR. HILL: You don't have a computer? 18 UNIDENTIFIED MALE JUROR: No. 19 UNIDENTIFIED MALE JUROR: My wife won't let me on 20 ours. 21 MR. HILL: Okay. I have that problem. You touch the 22 wrong button and it blows up the whole house. Yes. 23 Sir? 24 JUROR MOUNCE: I don't use mine. I get it turned on 25 and I can't get it turned off. 00040 {11:46:29am} 01 MR. HILL: There's going to be an issue regarding 02 worldwide web Internet domain names. Is everybody familiar 03 with what a domain name is? No? Okay. No, Mr. Love? 04 JUROR LOVE: (JUROR SHAKES HEAD) 05 MR. HILL: Anybody else uncertain as to what an 06 Internet domain name is? 07 UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE JUROR: Are we talking URLs? 08 MR. HILL: Yes. 09 UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE JUROR: I understand that. 10 MR. HILL: Is there anybody who has never surfed the 11 Internet? 12 JUROR MOUNCE: I don't know the first thing about a 13 computer. 14 MR. HILL: Okay. Thank you, Mr. Mounce. 15 More generally, many of the events that are going to be at 16 issue in this case occurred well before I was born and I 17 suspect before everybody on the panel was born. As a result, 18 there's going to be some documents in this case that are going 19 to go into evidence but they may not be discussed by any of the 20 witnesses. Is there anybody who thinks that if they're 21 impaneled on the jury, they would be inclined to decide the 22 case based only upon the witness testimony that they hear and 23 would not be willing to also look at any of the documents that 24 counsel for the respective parties point out as being important 25 in closing argument? Everyone agrees that it would be 00041 {11:47:57am} 01 important to look at the documents even if nobody has been able 02 to talk about them because nobody has personal knowledge about 03 them? Okay. Thank you. 04 Is there anyone who believes -- there's been a little bit 05 of discussion about religion and I'm not going to belabor the 06 point -- but is there anyone who believes that if you're 07 following your true-to-heart religious beliefs and those 08 beliefs tell you to do something that is otherwise not in 09 accordance with the law, that that conduct is still justified, 10 just as a general principle? Is there anyone who follows that 11 general principle? 12 JUROR SVEC: I'm sorry. Could you repeat that? I 13 got a little confused. 14 MR. HILL: Sure. Is there anyone who feels like -- 15 I'm just going to give a for-instance. I'm not saying it has 16 anything to do with this case. Is there anyone who feels that 17 if they felt compelled to express their religious freedoms but 18 that expression were to come into conflict with other laws, 19 that it would still be okay to express their religious views in 20 the manner in which they're compelled to even if it came in 21 conflict with the law? 22 JUROR SVEC: I think that if they did that, they 23 would be responsible to the law. They might have to follow 24 their conscience but they're going to have to pay to the law. 25 MR. HILL: Thank you, Ms. Svec. 00042 {11:49:34am} 01 Was there anyone when Ms. Hendricks was discussing the 02 fact that this is a copyright and other legal issues in this 03 case, was there anyone who disagreed and felt that if there are 04 religious overtones in this case, they might actually tend to 05 factor in the religious overtones in addition to the law as the 06 Judge gives it to you in the case? 07 I don't get the benefit of going first in this case. 08 We're the defendant, even though we do have some claims in the 09 case. Is there anyone who thinks that they would not have the 10 ability to wait until you've heard all of the evidence and the 11 closing arguments of counsel in this case before making up your 12 mind as to which side you believe is right or wrong under the 13 law as the Judge gives it to you? Anybody think they can't 14 wait and hear both sides? Thank you. 15 Mr. Love, you were involved in military justice, I thought 16 you said? 17 JUROR LOVE: I worked in court martials, boards. 18 MR. HILL: Did you spend time in court martial 19 proceedings? 20 JUROR LOVE: Yes. 21 MR. HILL: What role did you play in those 22 proceedings? 23 JUROR LOVE: Very little court but mostly in typing 24 specifications and charges and interviewing the clients or the 25 people brought in for the articles, whichever article it was. 00043 {11:51:11am} 01 Went over psychology reports. 02 MR. HILL: Is there anyone on the panel that has 03 never gone through the process of buying a home? That's 04 understandable. 05 Thank you, Judge. I don't think I have anything else. 06 Appreciate your time. 07 THE COURT: Ms. Littlepage mentioned that she was -- 08 you have a trip planned a week from today; is that correct? 09 JUROR LITTLEPAGE: Yes. 10 THE COURT: And you're involved in a commitment in 11 that regard. How long would you anticipate being gone? 12 JUROR LITTLEPAGE: Through that following Sunday. 13 THE COURT: To the following Sunday. 14 JUROR LITTLEPAGE: Yes. 15 THE COURT: We can't ever really tell exactly how 16 long a case is going to take but it may well extend beyond 17 that. We're not certain. It may end this week but it could 18 very well extend over into Monday or Tuesday of next week. 19 Would that create any problems for any -- other than 20 Ms. Littlepage, do any of you have any difficulty with the 21 possibility that this case might require you to be in 22 attendance through a portion of next week? 23 All right. You're Ms. Spencer? 24 JUROR GAULT: Ms. Gault. 25 THE COURT: Pardon? 00044 {11:52:45am} 01 JUROR GAULT: Amelia Gault. 02 THE COURT: Go ahead, Ms. Gault. Tell me what your 03 problem is. 04 JUROR GAULT: My daughter actually has a doctor's 05 appointment today at 1:45. I could reschedule that. She's 06 going to be fitted for a helmet. So if I couldn't do it today, 07 I would have to do it tomorrow or the next day. 08 THE COURT: Okay. Aside and apart from these two 09 ladies, do any of you have any difficulty? 10 May I see counsel at the bench. 11 (THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HAD AT THE BENCH, OUT OF 12 HEARING OF THE JURY:) 13 THE COURT: You waive for cause? 14 MR. ABOWITZ: We have no challenge for cause. 15 THE COURT: Pardon? 16 MR. ABOWITZ: We have no -- 17 THE COURT: No challenge for cause. 18 You waive for cause? 19 MR. HILL: Yes. 20 THE COURT: All right. What do you want to do about 21 these two? 22 MR. ABOWITZ: I think you should let them go. I 23 don't think Ms. Littlepage, that that would be a problem if we 24 got to next Tuesday and she wasn't out of here. 25 THE COURT: What are you suggesting with regard to 00045 {11:53:53am} 01 her? That I excuse her? 02 MR. ABOWITZ: That you excuse the juror. 03 THE COURT: Do you agree? 04 MR. HILL: No objection. 05 THE COURT: And what about -- is it Ms. Gault? 06 MR. ABOWITZ: I didn't understand about the helmet. 07 THE COURT: She has an appointment that she's either 08 going to have to do today, which would require her to be gone 09 this afternoon, or she's going to do it tomorrow or the next 10 day. It had to do with a medical appointment for her daughter. 11 MR. ABOWITZ: I'd ask the Court to excuse her as 12 well. 13 THE COURT: Excuse her as well? 14 MR. HILL: (COUNSEL NODS HEAD) 15 THE COURT: All right. Now then, -- let's excuse 16 them and I'll call a couple more right quick to see and then 17 you'll both have your three peremptory challenges left. All 18 right. 19 (THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HAD IN OPEN COURT AND 20 WITHIN THE PRESENCE AND HEARING OF THE JURY:) 21 THE COURT: Ms. Littlepage and Ms. Gault, the 22 attorneys and the Court have agreed that you will be excused to 23 not interfere with the conflict that you've outlined. You'll 24 be excused. You might go back by the jury assembly room and 25 turn in your badges and explain to them that you've been 00046 {11:54:51am} 01 excused, Ms. Littlepage, because you'll have to be gone next 02 week and that you have an appointment this afternoon that you 03 have. You'll be excused at this time and we'll call two other 04 jurors to take your place. 05 THE COURTROOM DEPUTY: Glenna Rae Guinn. Glenna 06 Guinn? 07 JUROR GUINN: It's Guinn. 08 THE COURTROOM DEPUTY: Nita Annesley? 09 JUROR ANNESLEY: It's Annesley. 10 THE COURT: Okay. Mrs. Guinn and Mrs. Annesley, were 11 you able to hear all of the questions that I asked and that the 12 attorneys asked and all of the answers that were given by the 13 jurors in the jury box to those questions? 14 JUROR ANNESLEY: (JUROR NODS HEAD) 15 JUROR GUINN: (JUROR NODS HEAD) 16 THE COURT: If I asked each of you those same 17 questions, would your answers be in any way substantially 18 different from the answers given by these jurors in here? 19 Anything you want to call to the Court's attention about your 20 ability to serve as a fair and impartial juror in this case? 21 First, Ms. Guinn. 22 JUROR GUINN: No, sir. 23 THE COURT: Do you have any reason to believe you 24 couldn't serve fairly and impartially in this case? 25 JUROR GUINN: No, sir. 00047 {11:56:37am} 01 THE COURT: And Ms. Annesley? 02 JUROR ANNESLEY: Well, I've read the book and I've 03 read quite a few religious books and I think it would be a 04 problem as far as my religious beliefs. 05 THE COURT: Because of your religious beliefs? 06 You'll be excused then, Ms. Annesley. You can return to the 07 jury assembly room and advise the jury clerk. 08 JUROR ANNESLEY: All right. Thank you. 09 THE COURTROOM DEPUTY: Drew Flowers. 10 THE COURT: Mr. Flowers, were you able to hear all of 11 the questions and answers? 12 JUROR FLOWERS: Yes, sir. 13 THE COURT: Would your answers be the same or 14 substantially the same? 15 JUROR FLOWERS: (JUROR NODS HEAD) 16 THE COURT: Do you know of any reason why you could 17 not be a fair and impartial juror in this case? 18 JUROR FLOWERS: No. 19 THE COURT: If selected, would you serve fairly and 20 impartially? 21 JUROR FLOWERS: Yes, sir. 22 THE COURT: All right. I'll call on, first, 23 Ms. Guinn. Please stand and give us a little information about 24 yourself. 25 JUROR GUINN: I was born and raised in Oklahoma 00048 {11:57:44am} 01 City. I'm married and have two children. I'm retired. I 02 graduated high school. My husband is retired. Right now we're 03 taking care of a granddaughter. We like to travel, when 04 possible. And we just kind of take care of family at the 05 present time. 06 THE COURT: Mr. Flowers? 07 JUROR FLOWERS: I was born and raised in Oklahoma 08 City. I graduated in 1997 from West Moore High School. I just 09 graduated in December from Southwestern Oklahoma State 10 University, a bachelor's in health administration. I currently 11 work for OU physicians at the OU Health Science Center. And I 12 start back in the fall. And I'm single. 13 THE COURT: Thank you. 14 Mr. Abowitz, did you wish to ask either of these 15 prospective jurors any additional questions? 16 MR. ABOWITZ: May I address from here, Your Honor? 17 THE COURT: Sure, sure. 18 MR. ABOWITZ: Mr. Flowers, what is your graduate 19 program? 20 JUROR FLOWERS: Health administration. 21 MR. ABOWITZ: Were you able to hear, you and 22 Ms. Guinn, able to hear the questions I posed to the other 23 members of the jury? 24 JUROR FLOWERS: Yes. 25 MR. ABOWITZ: And that would make no difference in 00049 {11:59:00am} 01 your deliberations? 02 JUROR FLOWERS: No. 03 MR. ABOWITZ: Ms. Guinn? 04 JUROR GUINN: No, sir. 05 MR. ABOWITZ: Thank you. 06 THE COURT: Mr. Hill? 07 MR. HILL: Did either of you -- you can just indicate 08 by raising your hand -- did either of you disagree with the 09 statement that Ms. Svec made when she said that if you follow 10 your conscience and there are legal repercussions, there have 11 to be -- you have to live with the repercussions? Did either 12 of you disagree with that statement when you heard it? 13 JUROR GUINN: (JUROR SHAKES HEAD) 14 JUROR FLOWERS: (JUROR SHAKES HEAD) 15 MR. HILL: Nothing else, Your Honor. 16 THE COURT: May I see counsel at the bench, please. 17 Bring your boards with you. 18 (THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HAD AT THE BENCH, OUT OF 19 HEARING OF THE JURY:) 20 THE COURT: Pass for cause? 21 MR. ABOWITZ: Yes, sir. 22 THE COURT: Pass for cause? 23 MR. HILL: Pass. 24 THE COURT: All right. We'll exercise peremptory 25 challenges as follows: The plaintiff will exercise their first 00050 {12:00:14pm} 01 peremptory, then the defendant, so forth. I think the way 02 you'll have to do it is just indicate to me so I can X them 03 off. 04 MR. ABOWITZ: Can you give us about 10 seconds? 05 THE COURT: Sure. 06 (PAUSE) 07 (PLAINTIFF INDICATES JUROR WRIGHT) 08 MR. HILL: Who is that? I'm sorry. 09 THE COURT: This is a little confusing because this 10 lady -- 11 MR. HILL: Yeah. 12 (DEFENDANT INDICATES JUROR LOVE) 13 THE COURT: Your second, counselor. 14 Love was their first. 15 (PLAINTIFF INDICATES JUROR SVEC) 16 THE COURT: Your second, counsel. 17 (DEFENDANT INDICATES JUROR BALES) 18 THE COURT: Your third and last, counselor. 19 Hendricks is seated the second one. Ray is at the end 20 here. 21 (PLAINTIFF INDICATES JUROR RAY) 22 THE COURT: Your third and last, counselor. 23 (DEFENDANT INDICATES JUROR MOUNCE) 24 THE COURT: Got that? 25 MR. ABOWITZ: Yes, sir. 00051 {12:02:51pm} 01 THE COURT: You gentlemen may be seated. 02 (THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HAD IN OPEN COURT AND 03 WITHIN THE PRESENCE AND HEARING OF THE JURY:) 04 THE COURT: The following named jurors together with 05 the remaining members of the jury pool will be excused. You 06 may step down and return to the jury assembly room for further 07 instructions. Darrell Mounce, Richard Bales, Freddie Wright, 08 Elaine Svec, Marsha Ray, and -- let's see -- and William Henry 09 Love. Those six may step down. 10 Thank you for your willingness to serve as jurors in this 11 case, ladies and gentlemen of the jury. 12 I'll ask the remaining members of the jury pool to please 13 stand and be sworn as jurors in this case that you've been 14 selected. 15 (JURORS SWORN) 16 THE COURT: Just move down to this end of the jury 17 box. 18 Ladies and gentlemen, now that you've been -- well, I'll 19 wait until you're seated. Be seated, please. 20 Now that you've been selected as jurors in this case, you 21 will, as I mentioned earlier, be a fellow judge with me in this 22 case. You'll serve collectively to determine what the facts 23 are in this case. You'll listen to the evidence. Any 24 documents that are admitted will be available for your 25 consideration to arrive at a conclusion as to what the facts 00052 {12:04:49pm} 01 are. 02 I will determine and explain to you, as best I can, at the 03 conclusion of the trial what the law is in this case that 04 you're to apply to the facts that you determine to exist, but 05 it will be your job to listen to the witnesses and determine 06 credibility or believability and decide what -- decide the 07 disputes of facts and apply the law. 08 Now, I want to ask you to keep an open mind. Don't make 09 up your mind with regard to what the facts are until you've 10 heard all of the evidence in the case and the Court's 11 instructions with regard to the law and go to the jury 12 deliberation room and begin your deliberation. Don't discuss 13 this case, not even among yourselves, but certainly with no one 14 else until such time as it goes into the jury deliberation with 15 you after you've been sworn and received the Court's 16 instructions. 17 Now then, don't read or examine anything outside the 18 record in this case to help you determine the facts because 19 evidence -- the time-honored system of justice is that evidence 20 comes under oath and subject to cross-examination and that 21 establishes the safeguards that evidence has to be considered 22 properly by you. So, don't read anything in the newspaper, 23 don't draw any conclusions from any television programs or 24 anything. As a matter of fact, if any of them attempt to in 25 any way mention this lawsuit, it's not very likely but it 00053 {12:06:20pm} 01 might, just don't pay any attention to it and don't listen to 02 it, and then make up your mind based upon the evidence you hear 03 here in open court. 04 Now, we'll proceed as follows in this case. We're going 05 to take a recess for lunch. As soon as you get back, we'll 06 start. And I think I'll wait until that time to explain the 07 order of the arguments and the presentation of evidence. Just 08 remember that you'll be excused until 1:15. Be back in the 09 jury assembly room at 1:15. My bailiff will come pick you up 10 at that time and bring you back into the courtroom and we'll 11 try to resume very shortly thereafter. 12 Would everyone please stand and remain standing until the 13 jurors clear the courtroom. You may lead the way out, if you 14 will, Mr. Flowers. 15 (THE JURY WAS EXCUSED FROM THE COURTROOM, AFTER WHICH THE 16 FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HAD IN OPEN COURT:) 17 THE COURT: Court is in recess. Thank you, 18 gentlemen. 19 (THE LUNCHEON RECESS WAS TAKEN) 20 00054 { 1:14:23pm} 01 AFTERNOON SESSION 02 TUESDAY, JUNE 12, 2001 03 --------------------------------------------------------------- 04 (THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HAD IN THE JUDGE'S 05 CHAMBERS AND OUT OF THE PRESENCE AND HEARING OF THE JURY:) 06 THE COURT: Okay. Anil mentioned something that 07 probably should just go in the record somewhere, that the 08 parties have agreed that any documents not objected to, 09 exhibits not objected to, are admitted without objection; is 10 that correct? 11 MR. HILL: That's fine with us. I thought we were 12 going in that direction and this morning -- 13 MR. ABOWITZ: Ross had the conversation with Steve on 14 that. He's right -- he was right behind me. 15 MR. HILL: Ross told me that their exhibits that are 16 unobjected to, they're not willing to tender them into 17 evidence. So, -- 18 THE COURT: Okay. We'll take that up when Ross gets 19 here. 20 I want to clarify one thing before I explain to the jury. 21 We're going to take up the question of who is the author of The 22 Urantia Book as the first submission to the jury before some of 23 the other submissions; right? 24 MR. HILL: (COUNSEL NODS HEAD) 25 THE COURT: I wanted to explain to them. Do you all 00055 { 1:33:50pm} 01 want to -- Are you going to limit your opening arguments, this 02 phase of the opening arguments, to the authorship or do you 03 want to do the whole nine yards and then limit your evidence or 04 somewhat restrict your evidence until all the evidence on 05 authorship is in and then instruct and argue on that? How do 06 you all want me to explain it to the jury about this? 07 MR. HILL: Well, I actually thought that we were -- 08 that what we were going to do was make our openings but not 09 argue the law, of course. Just make our openings and -- 10 THE COURT: Total openings. 11 MR. HILL: Each side produce their side of the case 12 and then we'd send the jury out -- we'd do closing argument on 13 just the authorship and send the jury back and then close -- 14 THE COURT: Okay. Now, you didn't have any idea of 15 having subsequent evidence after the issue of authorship was 16 decided? 17 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Your Honor, a major problem is we 18 have out-of-town witnesses -- 19 THE COURT: Pardon? 20 MR. SCHOENTHALER: A major problem is we have out-of- 21 town witnesses who will be coming in throughout the trial 22 process. 23 THE COURT: Right. 24 MR. SCHOENTHALER: And, frankly, each of them has 25 evidence on numerous items, and if we limit -- 00056 { 1:33:55pm} 01 THE COURT: So you want to put it all on? Okay. 02 MR. HILL: Just put all the evidence in and argue at 03 the end. 04 THE COURT: We'll just put all the evidence on and 05 then argue and instruct on authorship, and then, depending on 06 what their answer to that interrogatory is, then we'll instruct 07 and argue on the rest of it, or will there be additional 08 evidence after that? 09 MR. ABOWITZ: Can we hold it open on the additional 10 evidence? 11 THE COURT: Huh? 12 MR. ABOWITZ: Can we hold it open on the additional 13 evidence? 14 THE COURT: Well, that's what I want -- we can do it 15 now, if you decide you want to, but I think we have to have a 16 rule of understanding how we're going to do it. The way I 17 understand it, you're proposing we just put your case on but 18 submit on one issue only first and then after that's answered, 19 then just continue argument and instruction with regard to the 20 other issue; is that right? 21 MR. HILL: That's how I understood it, yes. 22 THE COURT: So, I don't need to explain that to them 23 at this time? 24 MR. HILL: I don't think so. 25 THE COURT: Okay. 00057 { 1:33:58pm} 01 MR. HILL: But we do want to go ahead and put our 02 stipulation with regard to Urantia Foundation's exhibits on the 03 record and also stipulate to the -- to drop the motion to quash 04 that was filed. 05 THE COURT: All right. Why don't you make that 06 record right now. 07 MR. HILL: Okay. Urantia Foundation is withdrawing 08 its motion to quash the trial subpoena of Richard Keeler, and 09 counsel of the parties have reached a stipulation that Urantia 10 Foundation exhibits 1-A, 1-B, 2, 3-A, 3-B, 4-A, 4-B, 4-C, 4-D, 11 4-E, 5, 8, 16, 21, 23, 28, 30, 31-A through D, 36, 93, 94, 12 99-B, 99-C, 100-B, 100-C, 114-A through C, and 116 are tendered 13 in. 14 MR. PLOURDE: Let me just kind of clarify a little 15 bit. First of all, you've represented to me -- I haven't had a 16 chance to double check -- but you represented those are all the 17 ones we had no objection to in the pretrial order? 18 MR. HILL: This is true. 19 MR. PLOURDE: Based on that, I have no reason to 20 doubt that's correct. Based on that, we don't have any 21 objection to those being offered into evidence. It was a 22 little bit of a trade-off. The offer was that all of our 23 exhibits that weren't objected to would be submitted into 24 evidence except that we have several that they have not 25 objected to that we may not want to offer, and they prefer not 00058 { 1:34:04pm} 01 to have them go into evidence. So the ones that they have 02 objected to -- I think the deal is that the ones that you have 03 not objected to that we offer will be put into evidence. 04 THE COURT: Admitted without objection then; is that 05 correct? 06 MR. HILL: We're putting ours into evidence. We 07 reserve the right in the pretrial order to use certain of their 08 exhibits. We got their exhibits before we had to do our own. 09 I'm interested to hear how the Court is going to take up the 10 matter of their exhibits submitted to which we didn't file any 11 objections provided that -- 12 THE COURT: Well, if you didn't object to them, 13 they'll be admissible if they offer them. Now then, if you 14 offer them, is that what you're asking, what's going to happen? 15 MR. HILL: Yes. 16 THE COURT: If you offer them but you didn't object? 17 Did you make a statement in your pretrial statement that all 18 exhibits offered by the defendant as well? 19 MR. HILL: (COUNSEL NODS HEAD) 20 THE COURT: They'll be admitted then. 21 MR. HILL: Okay. Thank you, Judge. 22 THE COURT: If you listed them -- If you listed 23 them, even though you elect not to offer them, you can't object 24 to them if they offer those as well. By listing them, you 25 don't necessarily -- I mean, that doesn't amount to any kind of 00059 { 1:34:08pm} 01 an objection to them. Any exhibit not objected to will go in. 02 MR. ABOWITZ: We objected to their exhibits as 03 they've listed them and those exhibits -- it would seem to me 04 that those objections are still good. 05 MR. HILL: Well, that's fine, but the exhibits -- I 06 mean, I'm not trying to -- 07 THE COURT: Did you object to them specifically? 08 MR. ABOWITZ: Yes. 09 THE COURT: The ones -- including the ones you had 10 offered? 11 MR. ABOWITZ: Yes. 12 MR. HILL: No, that's not true. 13 MR. ABOWITZ: Yes. 14 MR. PLOURDE: A lot of them, they also listed, and 15 when they listed them, we objected to them. So we have one -- 16 THE COURT: Well, you've got a deal here where you've 17 offered them or listed them? 18 MR. PLOURDE: We listed them. 19 THE COURT: And then you've objected to them when 20 they offered them? 21 MR. PLOURDE: Well, and let me tell you why, Judge. 22 You know, as soon as counsel finishes laughing, let me tell you 23 why. 24 THE COURT: Well, it isn't just counsel laughing. 25 MR. PLOURDE: Okay, Judge. Let me try to overcome 00060 { 1:34:11pm} 01 your skepticism. Judge, documents that they produced or that 02 their people wrote are admissions, that they are admissible 03 against them. If we didn't write them, they're not admissible 04 against us so we get to use them if we want to but they can't 05 offer them themselves because they're out-of-court statements. 06 So, you know, whereas we can rely on an exception to the 07 hearsay rule, they can't. It's those kinds of -- 08 THE COURT: Again, I'm asking: Did you specifically 09 make an objection to any of the exhibits they've listed, 10 including the ones that you had offered? If they incorporated 11 your list of the ones that you've offered, what you should have 12 said, Ross, is, "I object to even those ones we've listed that 13 are included if they're offered on their behalf," and you 14 didn't do that. 15 MR. PLOURDE: Well, Judge, let me tell you, there are 16 a couple in there that they listed the same exact exhibit. 17 They put it in their book and I objected to it. 18 THE COURT: You objected to it from their standpoint? 19 Okay. 20 MR. PLOURDE: That's right. And we also had it and 21 they may or may not have objected to it. But, in any event, 22 you know, we'll just withdraw them. 23 THE COURT: What kind of exhibits? What are we 24 talking about here? 25 MR. PLOURDE: Well, for instance, that History of The 00061 { 1:34:15pm} 01 Urantia Movement was supposedly -- you know, they say it was 02 authored by William Sadler. Well, William Sadler is their 03 predecessor in interest and anything that he would say we 04 believe is an admission. 05 THE COURT: Okay. 06 MR. PLOURDE: And, so, we could get it in against 07 them. Now, we don't think it can come in against us because it 08 was their guy's out-of-court statement. They listed it, we 09 listed it, we objected to theirs, and they didn't object to 10 ours, and so now they want to get it in. 11 MR. HILL: Judge, they put a different History of The 12 Urantia Movement document than the ones that we put in. To be 13 candid, they put in one that was attached to a deposition in 14 the Maaherra case. It is not the same as the documents that we 15 put in. We did not tender Forsythe exhibit -- Forsythe 16 deposition exhibit 41, and they did. We don't have any 17 objection to it. They didn't reserve an objection to it. They 18 also put in another history document. Their exhibit 1 is not 19 an exhibit that we put in but we certainly don't have any 20 objection to it. 21 THE COURT: All right. Let me try to get back to 22 ground zero. Each of you have the right to object to any 23 exhibit that's being offered by the other side. Now, you waive 24 that right if you don't object -- list your objection. Both 25 sides agree with that? 00062 { 1:34:20pm} 01 MR. HILL: Agreed. 02 THE COURT: You waive that right if you haven't 03 objected to it. Now then, if you're going to offer an 04 exhibit -- now, what are you stipulating to then if different 05 from that? I thought you were saying that both sides 06 stipulated that all the documents not objected to could be 07 admitted. Is that right or not? 08 MR. PLOURDE: That's right, Your Honor, with the 09 exception that the documents that we listed that they haven't 10 objected to, we want to reserve the right -- 11 THE COURT: Okay. Now, on those -- in those, when 12 you offer them, consider them their right to be heard arguing 13 as to whether or not they should be admitted. 14 MR. HILL: That's fine, Judge. 15 THE COURT: I'm not going to make a general ruling. 16 MR. HILL: That's fine, Judge. We'll just take them 17 one at a time. 18 THE COURT: Take them one at a time. 19 All right. What else? 20 Let's go to work. 21 MR. ABOWITZ: The thing I wanted to address with you, 22 Judge, is does the Court have a view of whether you can give 23 the jury a brief preliminary instruction on copyright law so 24 that they will know where the evidence that we will relate to 25 in opening statement fits into the framework? Otherwise, it 00063 { 1:34:23pm} 01 would seem to me that for us to make a presentation that has 02 some continuity, that we would have to do that, and I know how 03 you feel about the lawyers talking about the law in opening 04 statement. 05 THE COURT: Well, I am not prepared to preliminarily 06 instruct the jury on copyright law but I'll allow you all some 07 leeway with the admonition -- you ought to say, "Now, keep in 08 mind that the Judge is going to instruct you with regard to 09 what the law is. And if there's any conflict between what I 10 say and what he says, keep in mind that you're to accept the 11 law as announced by the Court. But I'm telling you that with 12 regard to some general principles and so forth." 13 MR. ABOWITZ: That's good. 14 THE COURT: Fair enough? 15 MR. HILL: Yeah. I mean -- 16 THE COURT: Well, I probably should have -- 17 MR. HILL: How far are we going to go? 18 THE COURT: Well, -- 19 MR. ABOWITZ: Judge, I'm going to restrict it but I 20 think it's absolutely essential that they have some framework 21 within which to -- 22 THE COURT: Well, If you had suggested it, I might 23 have prepared a brief summary, preliminary instruction with 24 regard to it, but I haven't done it at this point. All right? 25 Here we go. 00064 { 1:35:09pm} 01 (THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HAD IN OPEN COURT, OUT OF 02 THE PRESENCE AND HEARING OF THE JURY:) 03 THE COURT: Keep your seat. 04 Refresh my memory. What kind of time limit did we agree 05 on for opening statement? 06 MR. HILL: 30 minutes, Judge. 07 THE COURT: That's what I thought. Is that your 08 understanding? 09 MR. ABOWITZ: Yes, sir. 10 THE COURT: You don't have to take all of it. 11 MR. ABOWITZ: Your Honor, Debbie Crabb is with my 12 office. May she sit at counsel table to assist me? 13 THE COURT: Sure. You all have no objection, do you? 14 MR. HILL: No, Your Honor. 15 THE COURT: Sure. 16 MR. HILL: Your Honor, can we approach? 17 (THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HAD AT THE BENCH, OUT OF 18 HEARING OF THE JURY:) 19 MR. HILL: We -- 20 THE COURT: Go ahead. The jury is not here yet. 21 MR. HILL: We have a chronology in time line fashion. 22 I don't think it's argumentative but it does -- and I think it 23 would be useful in opening. 24 THE COURT: Outlining your opening? 25 MR. HILL: To lay out the time and chronology. 00065 { 1:38:03pm} 01 THE COURT: Did you show it to him? 02 MR. ABOWITZ: Yeah. We object to it on the basis it 03 is argumentative and they're going to have a tough time proving 04 some of that stuff. 05 THE COURT: Okay. I'll overrule the objection and 06 let you use it, understanding that it's not necessarily an 07 exhibit; it's simply an outline of the evidence that you hope 08 to present. 09 MR. HILL: We're not tendering it. 10 MR. ABOWITZ: May that statement be made to the jury? 11 THE COURT: Absolutely. When you start to use it, 12 say, "This is not evidence in the case. This is an outline of 13 the evidence that we hope to present." 14 MR. HILL: Okay. 15 (THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HAD IN OPEN COURT AND 16 WITHIN THE PRESENCE AND HEARING OF THE JURY:) 17 THE COURT: Be seated, please. 18 Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, let me inquire if 19 anything occurred during the lunch hour that would in any way 20 prevent you from continuing to serve as fair and impartial 21 jurors in this case? 22 I gather not. 23 Now, let me tell you that we're ready to present this 24 case. The first thing you'll hear is the opening statements of 25 the attorneys. Now, the opening statements of the attorneys 00066 { 1:42:40pm} 01 are not evidence in the case. Evidence comes to you in the 02 form of sworn testimony from the witness stand and in the form 03 of documents, which we have a lot of in this case for you to 04 consider and weigh. But the attorneys are allowed to make 05 statements in opening in order to help you -- to suggest what 06 evidence they hope to present and hope to use. That doesn't 07 prevent the Court from ruling contrary to some of their offers, 08 and some of it may not come in, but they're allowed to outline 09 what evidence they hope to present to you so that you might 10 better follow and understand that evidence as it comes on from 11 the witness stand. 12 Remember that what the attorneys say is not evidence in 13 the case. It's what you hear from the documents or from the 14 witness stand that is evidence for you to consider. 15 Now, the attorneys will be allowed some leeway in 16 outlining what they think the law is with regard to that, and I 17 will instruct you. Keep in mind that when I do instruct you, 18 if there's any confusion or conflict in your mind between what 19 you understand me to say and what they say, keep in mind that 20 you're to follow the instructions of the Court. What I say is 21 controlling with regard to the law and not what the attorneys 22 may have said in opening or closing arguments and so forth. 23 Now then, after both sides have had an opportunity to 24 outline their evidence or make their opening statement, then 25 the plaintiff will call their witnesses in chief subject to 00067 { 1:44:14pm} 01 cross-examination by the defendant. 02 After the plaintiff has completed their case and rested, 03 as they say, then the defendant will be allowed to offer 04 witnesses and documents in support of their case in chief. Not 05 only are there cases in chief, we have a claim by the plaintiff 06 in this case against the defendant and the defendant defends 07 against that. We also have a claim by the defendant against 08 the plaintiff, what we call a counterclaim or a counter 09 movement against the plaintiff, and that plaintiff denies 10 that. So the plaintiff and the defendant are both aggressors 11 and defense people in a certain sense of the word and you have 12 to keep that in mind. 13 At any rate, after the defendant has presented their 14 evidence, subject to cross-examination by the plaintiff, then 15 both sides rest eventually, and at the end of that time, the 16 attorneys will be allowed again to address you in what's known 17 as closing arguments. Again, not evidence in the case, but to 18 suggest to you what they hope or believe that you should deduce 19 from the evidence that you've heard. In other words, suggest 20 facts that they hope you will conclude from the evidence that 21 you have heard. You're not bound by their conclusions or their 22 suggestions. Indeed, it's your own conclusions and your own 23 finding with regard to the facts that control in this case 24 coupled with the law that the Court gives you to apply to those 25 facts that you determine to exist. 00068 { 1:45:53pm} 01 With that brief explanation, I'll call on counsel for the 02 plaintiff. Mr. Abowitz will make no more than a 30-minute 03 opening statement. 04 MR. ABOWITZ: Thank you, Your Honor. 05 Before we do that, may I introduce Debbie Crabb to the 06 ladies and gentlemen of the jury? 07 THE COURT: You may indeed. 08 MR. ABOWITZ: As you will see, she's here to keep me 09 from fumbling around with the books and she usually does a 10 pretty good job. 11 May I proceed? 12 THE COURT: You may. 13 MR. ABOWITZ: Ladies and gentlemen, as the Court 14 said, generally these opening statements are restricted to the 15 lawyer's statements about what the lawyer believes the evidence 16 will show on behalf of his or her client. In this instance, it 17 will be a little bit different because I will give you what I 18 believe to be an accurate statement of the law so you can put 19 these facts as you hear them in the context of the law that I 20 anticipate the Court will give you at the appropriate time in 21 this case. 22 As the Court said, and I want to be -- I want to repeat it 23 because it bears repeating, although I believe that the 24 statement is accurate, if at the end of the day when you get 25 those instructions and the Court's version is different than 00069 { 1:47:21pm} 01 you recall what I gave you, you should disregard my statement 02 of the law and adopt the one that the Court gives you because 03 that will be the one that will govern your deliberations in 04 this case. In other words, you're going to have to make your 05 mind up about the facts and you're going to have to determine 06 and analyze how those facts fit within the frame work of the 07 legal instructions that the Court gives you. 08 With that, I will tell you that this is kind of a PBS 09 mystery. Let me start out that way. This story begins back at 10 the early part of the 1900s. The story involves a 11 psychiatrist, a well-known, well-respected psychiatrist in 12 Chicago, Illinois. That gentleman's name, the evidence will 13 be, was Dr. William Sadler. Dr. Sadler had a specialty of 14 treating people with psychiatric disorders. 15 The evidence in the case is that at some point in time, 16 early in the last century, a lady brings her husband to see 17 Dr. Sadler and her husband is afflicted with some disturbance 18 that she hopes Dr. Sadler will be able to straighten out. 19 Dr. Sadler takes this patient and addresses, we believe, his 20 psychological or psychiatric ailment. 21 The evidence is, insofar as it concerns this case, is that 22 that man, that patient, and you will hear that person be 23 referred to as "patient" or "subject" is, the evidence will 24 reveal to you, the author of The Urantia Book. 25 This is the book (INDICATING). It is over 2,000 pages 00070 { 1:50:04pm} 01 long. As the Court advised you this morning, it was published 02 in 1955, long after this patient first went to see Dr. Sadler. 03 The evidence in the case, somewhat astonishingly, is that 04 this person, this patient, hand wrote all of this book, and 05 what he wrote out in longhand ended up being this book without 06 change. There is nothing in this book, the evidence is, that 07 he didn't write out in longhand. 08 The interesting part of this is that the interests of 09 Dr. Sadler eventually become The Urantia Foundation. And the 10 question in this case is going to be: Who was the author of 11 the book? The evidence is -- the mystery comes into play 12 because they would never reveal who this patient was. The 13 evidence is that the people associated with Dr. Sadler took an 14 oath to keep that secret and to keep the origins of this book 15 under wraps. 16 The evidence is that this book was completed in two 17 sections. It contains four sections; the first three were 18 completed in 1935, and the last one, which is essentially the 19 part of the book published by The Michael Foundation, Jesus - A 20 New Revelation, was finished in 1936. 21 The evidence is that there was an assignment, a legal 22 giving by the patient to Dr. Sadler of his rights created by 23 his authorship and organization in longhand of this book to 24 Dr. Sadler. The evidence is, under the cloak of secrecy, there 25 is no assignment in writing. It was purported to be a verbal 00071 { 1:53:05pm} 01 assignment. There is no record and there is no evidence of 02 what condition this patient suffered from, whether this patient 03 could have given Dr. Sadler an assignment and whether or not 04 this patient was fully advised of what he was doing, if indeed 05 he made this assignment. 06 The Urantia Foundation, through this series of evolutions, 07 gets a copyright on this book and says to the United States 08 copyright office, "We are the author of this book and we got an 09 assignment." That copyright expired and The Urantia Foundation 10 had to renew the copyright in 1983. I anticipate that the 11 Judge will instruct you, under the copyright law, that if this 12 patient actually assigned his right in this book to The Urantia 13 Foundation, that only that patient or that patient's heirs 14 would qualify to apply for renewal. 15 The evidence in the case is that the patient died. The 16 evidence is nobody knows when he died, but the evidence appears 17 to be fairly strong that he was dead before 1983, which would 18 leave it to his heirs to renew this copyright. 19 The evidence is that his heirs did not renew the 20 copyright. The evidence is the same people who first went to 21 the copyright office and said, "Hey, we're the author of this 22 book," now go to the copyright office and say, "We are the 23 proprietor of this book and it's a work for hire." The 24 evidence is the reason they did that is that they couldn't have 25 renewed the copyright if they hadn't said that. And this is a 00072 { 1:55:42pm} 01 significant change in their position. The evidence is there is 02 no evidence that anybody was paid to do this. The evidence is 03 there is no evidence that anybody was in a situation that could 04 have been classified as one that would give rise to the 05 classification of work for hire. But they did it, nonetheless. 06 One of the issues in this case is that The Michael 07 Foundation and Mr. McMullan challenged the validity not only of 08 the first copyright but the second copyright. 09 Now, what makes this even more interesting is the evidence 10 will be that this is not the only lawsuit that has taken place 11 over the validity of these copyrights. There was a case that 12 preceded, that happened before the copyright renewal, and what 13 was the position that Urantia Foundation took in that case? 14 The position was not that it was a work for hire because they 15 didn't have to go there yet. 16 Now, there's litigation, additional litigation, after the 17 copyright renewal. Do they take the position of work for hire 18 in that case, the principal position they take? Do they take 19 the position that they have been assigned the rights of the 20 patient? They take another position. They now say, in that 21 litigation, and the evidence will be that this book was 22 authored by spiritual beings and that gives rise to a different 23 impact in the copyright law. 24 The evidence is they have taken several significant, 25 different, unreconcilable positions about why they're entitled 00073 { 1:58:18pm} 01 to a copyright. We will bring all that evidence to your 02 attention and you will have to determine what you make of that 03 in the context of the law. 04 Now, the evidence on behalf of The Michael Foundation is 05 simple. Back at the beginning, the first position that these 06 people took was the patient was the originator and author of 07 the book; the patient was the only one, other than his heirs, 08 that had the right to renew the copyright in 1983. The 09 evidence is, as I said earlier, the patient -- neither the 10 patient nor the patient's heirs appeared at the copyright 11 office and said, "We want to renew this," nor did Urantia 12 Foundation show up at the copyright office and say, "Look, we 13 have a written assignment" -- which would have been necessary 14 to do this -- "from either the patient or the patient's heirs 15 to renew this." They didn't do that. The evidence, I submit 16 to you, leads to the conclusion that that copyright is invalid. 17 Now, there are other issues that are subsumed in this 18 case, if you will, contained in it. There is an issue about 19 what this book is technically, whether it is a compilation. 20 This book, as I've shown it to you, contains what I'm going to 21 call the original manuscript, the original papers as written 22 out in longhand by the patient which gave rise to his right to 23 the copyright. And there is, in the beginning, the contents of 24 the book, and the evidence is that I believe the Court will 25 instruct you that you're not to consider that. Mr. Sadler -- 00074 { 2:00:43pm} 01 Dr. Sadler's son, Bill Sadler, Jr., put that together, and the 02 evidence is clear that this first part, the contents of the 03 book, has nothing to do with the text of the book. 04 The evidence is, on behalf of The Michael Foundation, that 05 in the technical terms of the law, that it is not a 06 compilation, it's not an assemblage, and it is not a composite 07 work. The evidence is that those are the other two exceptions 08 along with the work for hire that The Urantia Foundation -- 09 under which The Urantia Foundation would be entitled to the 10 copyright. 11 The evidence is clear, I submit to you, and it will be 12 presented to you, that that is not the case here. It is not a 13 compilation; it is not an encyclopedia; it is not a composite; 14 it is not a work for hire. And under those factual situations, 15 they are not entitled to a copyright. 16 The Michael Foundation determined back during the period 17 of time of this other litigation, through a legal opinion not 18 rendered by anybody in this room, that this copyright was no 19 good. And what he did, he will tell you that this book changed 20 his life. He will tell you that this book is the basis of his 21 daily life, it is his religion. He will tell you that he felt 22 that it was necessary to proselytize his religion by putting 23 out the fourth portion of this book. He did so. It's called 24 Jesus - A New Revelation. 25 The only respect in which it is different from what's in 00075 { 2:03:11pm} 01 this book is the cover, which has a wonderful painting that 02 hangs in a museum in Scotland; the back of the book; and an 03 index; an appendix that is many pages long. It's over 100 04 pages long. 05 The evidence is that Mr. McMullan has made this book -- 06 this book, this book, his life's work and he prepared an index 07 to this book. There wasn't one before that. He has not 08 profited from it. He has not profited from this. The evidence 09 is his motives were to spread the word that's contained in this 10 book. 11 The evidence is that based upon that publication he was 12 sued in the State of Arizona. That case was thrown out on 13 legal grounds and it came back here -- or it didn't come back 14 here -- but The Michael Foundation that published this book 15 filed this lawsuit asking the Court to declare a copyright is 16 invalid and this is improper. 17 There's another issue in this lawsuit: trademarks. 18 Mr. McMullan and Michael Foundation registered Internet domain 19 names in the name of The Urantia Book, the very name of this 20 book. The evidence is going to be that The Urantia Book is not 21 a name that can be trademarked. I should say the law also will 22 be to that effect. So the effect of the trademark is you can't 23 say The Urantia Book, you can't say you're a reader of The 24 Urantia Book, you can't say you are a studier of The Urantia 25 Book, you can't say you are a serious student of The Urantia 00076 { 2:05:46pm} 01 Book as long as these people have the trademark. 02 The other point at issue is the word "Urantia." That's 03 the other domain name. "Urantia" in this book means the 04 earth. The evidence is there are many different iterations. 05 Urantian is a person that studies this book. Urantian, a 06 person that tithes to the Urantia movement, the Urantia 07 movement, the Urantia students, the Urantia church. 08 The evidence will be that Mr. McMullan, through The 09 Foundation, attempted to set up a church, the Urantia Church, 10 in Oklahoma City. For reasons other than the disputes in this 11 case, it didn't work. Kind of a personality conflict between a 12 gentleman that was asked to be the minister of the church that 13 came from Australia and the people who would attend the church 14 here in Oklahoma. Essentially, what it got down to was that 15 the Okies and Aussies didn't get together, couldn't understand 16 one another, I guess, notwithstanding the common bond of their 17 religion. 18 The evidence that will be presented in the case will 19 include statements from the records of The Urantia Foundation 20 in writing signed by officials of that organization which 21 support each and every facet of the proof I told you you would 22 be presented. One, the author was the patient. Number two, no 23 evidence of any assignment. Number three, a work for hire. 24 Number four, it's not a work for hire. Number five, it's a 25 composite. It's not a composite. Number six, something else, 00077 { 2:08:21pm} 01 and it's not something else. Number seven, ad infinitum. The 02 evidence is it comes out of their records. 03 Maybe one of the most interesting pieces of evidence in 04 this case will be an opinion from one of their lawyers about 05 this. We anticipate we will get that to you if the Judge 06 admits that evidence. 07 In conclusion, the evidence that you will be presented 08 clearly speaks to the conclusion that we believe that you will 09 reach after you hear the evidence, that, number one, they have 10 no right to a copyright, the copyright is invalid, and, as a 11 consequence, everyone that wants to spread the word contained 12 in this book can do so. Number two, that the uses of 13 Mr. McMullan and The Michael Foundation of the terms "The 14 Urantia Book" and "Urantia" are clearly, clearly fair uses of 15 that name and they should not be restricted from using it. 16 I appreciate your time and your attention and we look 17 forward to presenting this evidence to you over the next 18 several days and hope that we can keep it in a fashion that we 19 don't -- that we can be as clear and concise as we can. 20 Thank you. 21 THE COURT: Mr. Hill? 22 MR. HILL: Thank you, Your Honor. 23 Members of the jury, my name, again, is Steve Hill. 24 Urantia Foundation is a charitable trust that was founded 25 in 1950 in Chicago, Illinois. It was formed pursuant to a 00078 { 2:10:50pm} 01 declaration of trust after many of the events that Mr. Abowitz 02 told you about. There are agreements between the parties as to 03 some of the facts of this case. Both parties agree and I 04 expect will present evidence in this case to the effect that a 05 patient or a subject or a conduit, if you will, a person was 06 under observation by Dr. William Sadler, who was a prominent 07 Chicago psychiatrist. That when Dr. Sadler realized that he 08 was in touch with something that he didn't quite understand, he 09 then sought to bring in other people into the process of 10 observing this person who I'm going to refer to as the subject 11 or the conduit. And the reason is that because some of the 12 documentary evidence in this case suggests that Dr. Sadler and 13 others believed that this person was a conduit for the 14 transmission of information from celestial beings, if you 15 will. But whatever you believe about that, I would encourage 16 you to be respectful of the fact that Urantia Foundation's 17 representatives, many of whom will testify in this case, 18 believe that celestial beings are, in fact, the authors of The 19 Urantia Book. That is a statement of belief. It is not 20 evidence. I am going to encourage you, as you review the 21 evidence in this case, to take into consideration the fact that 22 much of what you're going to be seeing -- 23 MR. ABOWITZ: Your Honor, I'm going to object to 24 that. That's argument. 25 THE COURT: Overruled. Go ahead. 00079 { 2:12:33pm} 01 MR. HILL: Much of what you're going to be seeing is 02 documentary evidence that is reflecting what are, in fact, the 03 religious faith of the spiritual beliefs of the authors when it 04 pertains to the book. 05 That having been -- that being set aside, there are some 06 things that we don't agree about, apparently, from the way 07 Mr. Abowitz set out the facts regarding how we got The Urantia 08 Book. 09 Urantia Foundation's position is that there was some human 10 involvement and some human interaction in the process of 11 creation for The Urantia Book. There's no denying, for 12 example, that Dr. Sadler and five other people who came to be 13 known as The Contact Commission were responsible for monitoring 14 sessions with the sleeping subject, or with this subject who 15 was speaking. At some times during these sessions, one of the 16 Contact Commissioners, a woman named Emma Christensen, would 17 take down physically notes regarding the content of what the 18 subject was saying. She would then go back and type up this 19 content into manuscript -- typescript form. Those typescripts 20 eventually were shared by Dr. Sadler and the other Contact 21 Commissioners at his home in Chicago, Illinois with a larger 22 group of people that Dr. Sadler met with on Sundays. That 23 larger group of people are known as The Forum. 24 So what you have, in a nut shell, the diagram of the 25 traffic accident in this case, ladies and gentlemen, is that 00080 { 2:14:17pm} 01 you have a Contact Commission, and you have a sleeping subject, 02 who is being monitored by The Contact Commission. 03 Eventually, the evidence shows that The Contact 04 Commissioners were asking questions to the subject while he was 05 in an unconscious state. The subject then began giving 06 responsive information to these questions. Some of the 07 responsive information was given in sessions, some was given in 08 a different way, and we'll get to that in a second. 09 But in the early time in which this was occurring, Emma 10 Christensen was right there taking her notes and typing them up 11 so that the Contact Commissioners could then take the written 12 documents, show it to this larger group of people known as The 13 Forum, and solicit more and more questions from them. "What 14 should we ask the subject next?" must have been what was going 15 through the minds of these people. "How do we get more and 16 elicit more and more information?" 17 What accounts for the size of the book is the fact that 18 this process, which began in the early 1900s, didn't culminate 19 until at least the mid 1930s, and we suggest that there will be 20 evidence in the case that actually it went beyond that even 21 into the early 1940s. 22 The Contact Commission then is sort of the leader of this 23 three-ring circus, and it is a voluntary cooperative process 24 that is going on. We submit that the evidence will show that 25 no one participated in this process against his or her will. 00081 { 2:16:12pm} 01 The evidence will also show that although the conduit or 02 subject was unconscious or semi-conscious at best during these 03 sessions, nevertheless, in a conscious state he was shown these 04 papers and he was aware of their existence. 05 Now, The Contact Commission in 1941 approached a 06 publishing company known as R. R. Donnelley & Sons about taking 07 all of the manuscripts that had come by that point in time and 08 putting them together in a book form. At that point, a 09 contract was entered into by one of the Contact Commissioners, 10 a man named Wilfred Kellogg, who was a cousin of Dr. Sadler's 11 wife. Wilfred Kellogg entered into this contract in 1941. The 12 funds that paid for the contract were raised by The Forum and 13 The Contact Commission. 14 Furthermore, in 1932, during the middle of this voluntary 15 process, the evidence shows that The Contact Commission was 16 writing and engaging in correspondence with the United States 17 Copyright Office about how to go about copyrighting a work. 18 The strong inference from those letters is that they were 19 considering taking out a copyright on whatever the finished 20 work product was. 21 In 19- -- In 1950, Urantia Foundation was formed. 22 Urantia Foundation was formed by those persons who had paid for 23 the contract to set these manuscripts down onto printing plates 24 so that a book could be published. Urantia Foundation, upon 25 its formation, accepted the rights and obligations that went 00082 { 2:18:11pm} 01 along with publishing The Urantia Book. 02 The declaration of trust of Urantia Foundation says that 03 Urantia Foundation is supposed to maintain the text of the book 04 inviolate, and it is supposed to retain all of the means of 05 reproduction of the book. With that in mind, the trustees, the 06 original trustees of Urantia Foundation, three of whom had been 07 Contact Commissioners before them, set out to attempt to 08 register a copyright in The Urantia Book. Indeed, on that 09 registration certificate, Urantia Foundation listed itself as 10 author. The evidence suggests there are two reasons for that. 11 The first is to retain the anonymity of the subject. The 12 second is because compilers and proprietors of works for hire 13 are deemed authors under the law, and we believe that the 14 evidence on the copyright application will provide us with 15 that -- with support for that proposition. 16 In Jesus - A New Revelation, the book that Michael 17 Foundation and Mr. McMullan have propagated, there is a 18 copyright claim on the inside by Michael Foundation, an 19 organization. It says that the volume arrangement and cover 20 design are copyright 1999, Michael Foundation, Inc. Arranging 21 materials in a creative way is compiling. It gives rise to an 22 authorship claim. 23 The evidence is going to suggest that even though 24 handwritten manuscripts made it into The Urantia Book, the 25 earliest manuscripts, those that were typed up by Emma 00083 { 2:20:06pm} 01 Christensen from her notes of the earliest contact sessions 02 apparently did not. The evidence is further going to suggest 03 that even once papers started appearing in longhand, there was 04 still this ongoing voluntary process where questions were being 05 asked from The Contact Commission and more information in 06 written form was being received in response to that 07 information, and The Contact Commission always was responsible 08 for maintaining tight custody and control over those 09 manuscripts and they never let them off the premises of 10 Dr. Sadler's home until it was time to publish the book. 11 Dr. Sadler's home, coincidentally, is the address of the 12 headquarters of Urantia Foundation in Chicago. The evidence 13 will show that Dr. Sadler's son, William Sadler, Jr., was an 14 initial trustee. And the evidence will further show that 15 Urantia Foundation was, in fact, the successor in interest to 16 The Contact Commission. 17 Now, we get to the tricky part: the original registration 18 term expires and in 1983 Urantia Foundation registers its claim 19 of copyright claiming that it is the proprietor of a work for 20 hire. Of course, no one was paid for the contribution in this 21 case and there's not going to be a dispute about that. Money 22 was raised, substantial sums were raised. We expect to 23 introduce at least one document that shows that over $100,000 24 was raised and expended by the Contact Commissioners and The 25 Forum in order to get this book into the marketplace. However, 00084 { 2:21:58pm} 01 we're going to be looking in this case at a doctrine that's not 02 very often used in the law, and that is the Doctrine of 03 Voluntary Works and Commissioned Works. While the Judge is the 04 final arbiter of what the law is in this case, we expect that 05 although we may not meet the classic definition of a work for 06 hire, that the Judge is going to give you instructions 07 regarding what a commissioned work is, which shares a sort of 08 kinship with works for hire and is deemed the equivalent of a 09 work for hire, but, nevertheless, a voluntary work which would 10 never be considered for hire can still be considered 11 commissioned, and that's what the evidence is going to show. 12 That over these numerous decades, The Contact Commission was 13 engaged in the process of commissioning this work. 14 Now, there is also an entirely different issue in the 15 case, because under the law as we believe the Judge is going to 16 give it to you, keeping in mind, of course, that Judge West is 17 the final arbiter of the law in this case, a proprietor who 18 renews a copyright only has to have a valid basis. So if you 19 make a mistake and you write down the wrong theory of renewal, 20 that's not a penalty as long as a valid theory of renewal does, 21 in fact, exist. That's where we get to the nature of the work 22 itself. 23 The Urantia Book has 196 papers. Not chapters. Papers. 24 Each paper, the evidence shows, is itself a compilation of 25 numerous facts and substantial information and each of the 00085 { 2:23:45pm} 01 papers -- and I should qualify this by saying if you don't 02 believe that the papers are, in fact, revelations and if that 03 belief doesn't impact your view of what The Urantia Book is, 04 each of those papers can stand alone. In fact, students of The 05 Urantia Book, as the evidence will show, take entire courses 06 and classes just to study one of these 196 papers. These 07 papers were received discreetly over the years by The Contact 08 Commission. The Contact Commission was maintaining the 09 arrangement of these papers and ultimately, of course, 10 published The Urantia Book, but by then The Contact Commission 11 had dissolved and Urantia Foundation had been formed to carry 12 on the preverbal torch. 13 So, what we have then is a book that is not only a work 14 for hire in the sense that it has -- that it is a voluntary 15 work that is akin to a work for hire, not a traditional work 16 for hire in the classic sense, but we also have a book that is 17 a composite work under the law and we expect to show you that 18 that is, in fact, the case. 19 Therefore, Jesus - A New Revelation, which contains 995 20 pages of identical quoting from The Urantia Book, 76 21 consecutive papers that comprised the last 76 papers of The 22 Urantia Book, we've got a case of plagiarism, otherwise known 23 as copyright infringement. We don't expect that there's going 24 to be any defense to the copy in this case and the fact that it 25 is substantial, nearly 400,000 consecutive words. We expect 00086 { 2:25:43pm} 01 that they're going to put all of their eggs into the basket of 02 attempting to invalidate our copyright. 03 Mr. McMullan has had previous experience in trying to in 04 validate Urantia Foundation's copyright. The evidence is going 05 to show that in a previous litigation involving the renewal 06 copyright of The Urantia Book, Mr. McMullan was involved, not 07 on the front lines but he provided, the evidence will show, 08 over $73,000 directly or indirectly to assist a woman named 09 Kristen Maaherra in her frontal assault on the validity of this 10 copyright. That assault was successful at the district court 11 level. However, the United States Court of Appeals in 1997, 12 the evidence will show, reversed and upheld the validity of the 13 copyright and held that Ms. Maaherra had infringed. 14 Mr. McMullan, the evidence will show, was not pleased with 15 that outcome and, in fact, remarked, when he learned of the 16 Court of Appeals' decision, that, "We might have to take this 17 to the Supreme Court and Urantia Foundation just cost me 18 $30,000." 19 Now, when Mr. McMullan goes back to The Fellowship, which 20 is an organization of readers of The Urantia Book that he 21 participates in that formerly was a sister organization to 22 Urantia Foundation but that broke away from Urantia Foundation 23 in 1989, Mr. McMullan offered his resignation from The 24 Fellowship because he anticipated he was going to once again go 25 back into court, and now that's where we are. He offered his 00087 { 2:27:30pm} 01 resignation as a gentleman because The Fellowship and Urantia 02 Foundation, ever since they split, have had tensions but there 03 have been a lot of efforts between those two organizations to 04 get back together or at least be friendly with one another. 05 Mr. McMullan knew that this litigation would be a thorn in the 06 side of coexistence between those two organizations and he 07 offered his resignation. He knew in 1997 when he offered that 08 resignation that one day he was going to be in this courtroom 09 again attacking this copyright. That's not all he did in 1997 10 though. 11 He also began registering Internet domain names. Now, 12 it's important to note that the evidence shows that Michael 13 Foundation has and -- has operated web sites such as 14 WWW.ChurchofChristMichael.org and WWW.JesusRevelation.org. But 15 what Mr. McMullan did was he went out and registered for 16 himself, and in some cases on behalf of Michael Foundation, 17 WWW.Urantian.org, WWW.UrantiaBook.org, WWW.UrantiaBook.com, and 18 he never put up a web site. He just put them up on the shelf. 19 Cybersquatting is a relatively new phenomena in the 20 courts. Congress in 1999 passed the act. This is one of the 21 first cases where a jury will be applying the cybersquatting 22 act principles to determine whether or not those registrations 23 were motivated by good faith on the part of Mr. McMullan or 24 whether or not they were motivated by a bad faith intent to 25 profit by putting those domain names on the shelf and out of 00088 { 2:29:30pm} 01 the reach of Urantia Foundation. There's another fact that you 02 need to know in connection with that, and that is that 03 Mr. McMullan told Tonia Baney, the executive director of 04 Urantia Foundation, in a telephone conference in 1997 that he 05 was going after the marks too, that he would tie up Urantia 06 Foundation in the courts for the rest of his and her life, and 07 I believe he predicted that that would be 30 years. 08 The issue then squarely becomes whether or not 09 Mr. McMullan was attempting to bait Urantia Foundation. 10 Urantia Foundation brought these claims because it owns and 11 uses federally-registered trademarks, Urantia and Urantian, in 12 connection with its distribution of books and other services. 13 It also operates a 1,600 member collective membership 14 organization, a fraternal or social organization for readers of 15 The Urantia Book to get together and study the book. 16 What Mr. McMullan is going -- what we anticipate that 17 Mr. McMullan is going to do is he's going to say that, "I am 18 entitled just like anybody else is to use these words." Fine. 19 We all use these words. We all use words that operate as 20 registered trademarks. I say, "Look at Mars in the sky," and 21 that's fundamentally different than branding a candy bar with 22 Mars and the circle R next to it. Our concern, of course, is 23 that Internet domain names are becoming progressively more 24 valuable as our economy migrates onto the Internet, and indeed 25 we expect to offer significant evidence that shows that the 00089 { 2:31:16pm} 01 Internet is a large part of Urantia Foundation's business 02 activities. 03 Now, I want to say a word about Urantia Foundation because 04 I know that this is all hitting you very fast and you're trying 05 to make up your mind about what could possibly be in The 06 Urantia Book that would cause someone to break out the last 07 part and publish a book called Jesus - A New Revelation. 08 Urantia Foundation is not a church. In 46 -- in the last 51 09 years of Urantia Foundation's existence, it has never formed a 10 church, it has never affiliated with a church, it has never 11 issued official proclamations of doctrine or official 12 interpretation of anything in The Urantia Book. Urantia 13 Foundation stands for the principle that The Urantia Book is a 14 book that, if read and understood, will uplift people's 15 religious thinking and, therefore, is a book that could be read 16 by any of the people -- or any of the religions of the world. 17 Not to say at Urantia Foundation that it is not a proselytizing 18 agent; it is not out seeking to convert people. It is, though, 19 selling the book and the evidence is going to show that a 20 historical kinship has developed between Urantia Foundation and 21 The Urantia Book such that there is the extreme possibility, 22 indeed the likelihood of confusion regarding these registered 23 domains and why Urantia Foundation wants to have those domains 24 for its own purposes, because The Urantia Book and Urantia 25 Foundation have co-existed in the commercial marketplace for 00090 { 2:33:12pm} 01 the last 46 years. Urantia Foundation, for a large, large part 02 of those 46 years has been the sole publisher of The Urantia 03 Book, except for that two year hiatus while the Maaherra case 04 was on appeal from 1995 to 1997. 05 We have a big bull's eye on our back in this case and that 06 is the fact that Urantia Foundation, in its 50-plus year 07 history, has been involved in copyright litigation before. 08 Urantia Foundation has never taken the position that a human 09 author of The Urantia Book exists because its religious faith 10 precludes it from doing it, and I am not going to be permitted 11 in this case to attempt to argue about who a human author is. 12 They're going to have evidence in this case, I recognize 13 that, that the papers that make up the book are written in the 14 handwriting of the subject. We have to live with that 15 evidence. Urantia Foundation's spiritual faith does not allow 16 it to accept the proposition though that celestial authors did 17 not -- or were not responsible for offering this book. Respect 18 that belief, please, but we'll make up our minds in this case 19 based upon the actual evidence and we'll see where that takes 20 us. Certainly, if what Mr. McMullan says is true and the 21 subject is, in fact, the writer author of each of the 22 manuscripts in these papers, then we expect to show that our 23 copyright is fully valid because The Urantia Book meets not 24 only the definition of voluntary commissioned work but it also 25 meets the definition of a composite work under the law. 00091 { 2:35:22pm} 01 It is -- It is, by definition, 196 separate detailed 02 intimate factual compilations that are strung together to make 03 up an impressive work, even to someone who like myself does not 04 read the book on a regular occasion. The way the book is 05 divided out is rather interesting. It starts in part I with a 06 description of the entire -- the entirety of the universe. In 07 part II, it then describes the story of our part of the 08 galaxy. Part III is devoted to discussing nothing but the 09 history of our planet, which in the book is named Urantia. And 10 part IV is called The Life and Teachings of Jesus. 11 We expect that the evidence is going to show that because 12 of the substantial information that's imparted in this book, it 13 also meets the definition of a subset of composite works known 14 as cyclopedic works, and we believe, although ultimately Judge 15 West will have to advise you as to the law in this matter, that 16 a cyclopedic work is something that exhaustively treats a 17 number of fields of human learning. 18 With that in mind, we hope that when all of the evidence 19 is in, what will have been shown definitively is that 20 notwithstanding the subject's participation in this voluntary 21 process of questions and answers causing papers that were in 22 the custody at all times of The Contact Commission, which later 23 formalized itself as Urantia Foundation, we expect that the 24 facts, as they come out, are going to show that there was this 25 voluntary process that makes this book a commissioned work and 00092 { 2:37:28pm} 01 also that the book itself is composite in nature, or compiled 02 in nature, and, therefore, we expect that you're going to find 03 that this is, in fact, a case of plagiarism with just a hint of 04 the desire for revenge to even up the score for that $73,000 05 that was lost by Mr. McMullan in the last case in which he 06 attempted to invalidate this copyright. 07 Thank you. 08 THE COURT: Will all the witnesses in the courtroom 09 who expect to testify in this case please stand and raise your 10 right hand and be sworn, if any. 11 Call your first witness. 12 MR. ABOWITZ: Call Richard Keeler, Your Honor. 13 THE COURT: Present in the courtroom? 14 MR. ABOWITZ: I don't see him, Your Honor. 15 THE COURT: You'll have to recover him. 16 MR. SCHOENTHALER: I'll get him. 17 MR. ABOWITZ: Judge, we need a minute to haul the 18 rest of these books up, by the way. 19 THE COURT: Pardon? 20 MR. ABOWITZ: We need a minute to haul the rest of 21 these books up, if we might. 22 THE COURT: Sure. 23 Call your witness, counsel. Is he here? 24 Come right up, if you will, please, and take the stand and 25 raise your right hand and be sworn. Raise your right hand and 00093 { 2:41:40pm} 01 be sworn, please. 02 (WITNESS SWORN) 03 KENNETH RICHARD KEELER, 04 being first duly sworn to testify the truth, the whole truth, 05 and nothing but the truth, testified as follows: 06 THE COURT: Would you be seated. 07 I'll ask you to speak directly into the microphone. I'll 08 ask you to state your full name and spell your last name for 09 the Court and for the jury. 10 THE WITNESS: Kenneth Richard Keeler, K-E-E-L-E-R. 11 MR. ABOWITZ: May I proceed? 12 THE COURT: Yes. 13 DIRECT EXAMINATION 14 BY MR. ABOWITZ: 15 Q. Mr. Keeler, you are currently the president of the board 16 of trustees of The Urantia Foundation? 17 A. True. 18 Q. How long have you had that office? 19 A. For three years. 20 Q. And did you have an official attachment to that 21 organization prior to that? 22 A. Prior to being president? 23 Q. Yes. 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. What? 00094 { 2:42:36pm} 01 A. I was trustee. 02 Q. And now you are president of the trustees? 03 A. President and trustee of The Urantia Foundation, yes. 04 THE COURT: That may be my ears. I apologize. I 05 can't hear them but everyone else can. 06 Go ahead. Is that still singing? 07 MR. ABOWITZ: No, sir. Are we all right? 08 THE COURT: Yeah. Go ahead. 09 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) How long did you serve as a trustee of 10 that organization? 11 A. For about nine years before I became president. I became 12 a trustee in 1989. 13 Q. Is that longer than anybody else that served in that 14 capacity? 15 A. Oh, no. 16 Q. But give me a date. When did you first assume the duties 17 as a trustee of The Urantia Foundation? 18 A. July of 1989. 19 Q. And did you have an association with -- I'm going to call 20 it the Urantia movement prior to that date? 21 A. Yes. 22 Q. Can you explain for the ladies and gentlemen of the jury 23 what that was? 24 A. I was at the University of Kansas -- originally from 25 Bartlesville, Oklahoma, by the way -- I was at the University 00095 { 2:44:10pm} 01 of Kansas and a fraternity brother of mine told me about The 02 Urantia Book and I heard about The Urantia Book in 1959 and 03 began -- bought a copy in 1960 and began reading it, and for 04 about the first 10 years I just read it on my own and was 05 interested in it. Was busy with other things. And then in 06 probably 1970 I became interested in interacting with other 07 readers in The Urantia Book and started attending a study 08 group. 09 Q. And you have maintained that interest and association up 10 till today? 11 A. Yes. 12 Q. As president of the board of trustees of The Urantia 13 Foundation, did you authorize a lawsuit to be filed against The 14 Michael Foundation in Arizona? 15 A. The board of trustees did. 16 Q. And you were the president of that board? 17 A. Yes. 18 Q. And as the president of that board, did you and your 19 fellow trustees authorize the claims against Mr. McMullan and 20 The Michael Foundation in this case? 21 A. Yes. 22 MR. ABOWITZ: Your Honor, we'd move that 23 Mr. Keeler -- we be allowed to treat Mr. Keeler as an adverse 24 witness in this case. 25 THE COURT: You may proceed, counselor. 00096 { 2:45:43pm} 01 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) You are here in that capacity today as 02 the president of the board of trustees of The Urantia 03 Foundation? 04 A. I assume so. I assume that's the reason you've called me 05 here. 06 Q. How many trustees are there? 07 A. Five. 08 Q. Could you name them, please? 09 A. Mo Seigel, Gard Jameson, Georges Michelson Dupont, Kwan 10 Choi, and Richard Keeler. 11 Q. Have all of those people been trustees longer or shorter 12 period of time than you? 13 A. Less time than I have. 14 Q. So you have seniority on the board? 15 A. You could say that. I've been on the board longer than 16 they. 17 Q. Doesn't that equate to seniority? 18 A. Not necessarily. I sometimes say I get no respect. 19 Q. No perks no, respect; right? 20 A. Right. 21 Q. Let me turn, sir, to The Urantia Book itself and how it 22 came to be. Did you ever meet Dr. William Sadler? 23 A. Yes. 24 Q. And he was a psychiatrist? 25 A. Yes. 00097 { 2:47:09pm} 01 Q. Practiced his profession in Chicago? 02 A. Yes. 03 Q. He published many books, didn't he? 04 A. Yes. 05 Q. And although he published books himself, he really wasn't 06 a publisher as such, he was an author; is that correct? 07 A. That's my understanding. 08 Q. You met Dr. Sadler when? 09 A. 1962. 10 Q. And on how many occasions did you meet him? 11 A. Fewer than a dozen. More than -- more than half a dozen. 12 Q. When was the last time you met him? 13 A. Probably in 1968. He died in 1969. I may have seen in 14 '69, but '68 or '9, I suppose. 15 Q. So he passed away some 30-odd years ago? 16 A. Yes, sir. 17 Q. Now, in the course of your association with the Urantia 18 movement and The Urantia Book, have you come to a view, a 19 theory, or a belief as to how that book came about? 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. And in the course of your dealings with the Urantia 22 movement and The Urantia Foundation, have you personally taken 23 an oath not to reveal some of the information that you 24 acquired? 25 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Objection, Your Honor. Compound. 00098 { 2:49:02pm} 01 THE COURT: Restate your question, counselor. 02 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) Have you taken an oath not to reveal 03 some of the information that you acquired in reaching those 04 views? 05 A. No. 06 Q. Have you taken an oath not to reveal certain facts or 07 circumstances that you've learned during the process of 08 developing your views? 09 A. It was understood that -- I didn't raise my hand and take 10 an oath, as I did here a few minutes ago, but it was understood 11 that certain information was shared with me in confidence. 12 Q. And if I asked you to share that information with the 13 ladies and gentlemen of the jury, you would decline to do so? 14 A. I think so. 15 Q. Based upon what? 16 A. The fact that I gave -- or indicated my word that I would 17 not communicate, communicate that information with other 18 persons. 19 Q. Is that information the basis of an attorney/client 20 relationship? 21 A. No. 22 Q. Is that information the basis of information you got from 23 a clergyman? 24 A. Is it information I got from a clergyman? 25 Q. Yeah. 00099 { 2:50:46pm} 01 A. No. 02 Q. Is there any other reason that you know, a legal reason, 03 why you shouldn't be required to reveal that information? 04 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Objection, Your Honor. Calls for 05 a legal conclusion. 06 MR. ABOWITZ: I'll withdraw the question. 07 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) What is the general subject nature of 08 the material that you have -- may I use the word "promised" -- 09 promised not to reveal? 10 A. Close enough, promised. 11 What's the nature? 12 Q. Yes. 13 A. Well, I don't know that it relates -- if I had to say a 14 general category, maybe it has a little bit to do with the 15 origin of the book but there was some curious events that took 16 place at the time The Urantia Book was being materialized and 17 certain of that information that I think is not relevant, not 18 even close to being relevant to this case was shared with me. 19 It was personal information that was shared with Contact 20 Commissioners. 21 Q. Did it have to do with the identity of the patient? 22 A. I'll give you an example of the type of information that 23 it was. 24 Q. Please just respond to my question, sir. 25 A. Once Dr. Sadler -- 00100 { 2:52:34pm} 01 MR. ABOWITZ: Your Honor, may I have a response to my 02 question? 03 THE COURT: Yes. 04 THE WITNESS: I'm sorry. Repeat your question. 05 THE COURT: Restate your question and respond to his 06 question, if you can, directly without any explanation and so 07 forth and you'll be given an opportunity by your counsel since 08 he has you, in effect, on cross-examination. Answer "yes" or 09 "no" if you can, and then you'll be given an opportunity to 10 explain further. 11 Let me move this over a little. I'm having a little 12 difficulty hearing you. I'll move that out of the way. 13 Go ahead. Restate your question. 14 MR. ABOWITZ: Thank you, Your Honor. 15 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) Does the information that you have 16 declined to reveal include information regarding the identity 17 of the patient? 18 A. No. 19 Q. You've indicated that part of the information that you 20 will not reveal has to do with the origin of The Urantia Book. 21 A. In a very remote way. 22 Q. That's your characterization? 23 A. True. Everything I say is my characterization. I'm the 24 world's expert on my opinion. 25 Q. We would hope so. 00101 { 2:53:49pm} 01 You have declined in this case to reveal that information 02 with respect to the origin of this book; is that correct? 03 A. Well, I think I want -- 04 Q. Yes or no. 05 A. Yes. If I have to answer yes or no, yes. 06 Q. Now, let's talk about the patient. Your understanding is 07 that a man that had a psychiatric malady came to Dr. Sadler for 08 treatment of that condition; is that correct? 09 A. False. 10 Q. That is not correct? 11 A. That's not the way I would characterize it. 12 Q. Do you recall that this patient came to Dr. Sadler 13 voluntarily with his wife and his wife asked Dr. Sadler for his 14 medical advice with respect to his condition? 15 A. I would agree with that. 16 Q. And that occurred when, sir? 17 A. In the early 1900s. 18 Q. Your information is that Dr. Sadler was a psychiatrist? 19 A. Yes. 20 Q. A medical doctor? 21 A. Had been a surgeon before he became a psychiatrist. 22 Q. But a medical doctor? 23 A. Yes. 24 Q. And he was skilled and expert in the diseases of the mind? 25 A. I think so. 00102 { 2:55:23pm} 01 Q. And this patient presented himself with his wife suffering 02 from a disease of the mind? 03 A. I wouldn't characterize it that way. I don't think -- 04 well, go ahead. 05 Q. This patient presented himself with his wife to Dr. Sadler 06 with a condition that his wife believed that Dr. Sadler could 07 help him with? 08 A. If I have to answer yes or no, yes. 09 Q. Thank you. 10 The identity of that patient was never revealed to 11 anybody; is that correct? 12 A. That's my understanding. 13 Q. You don't know the identity of that person? 14 A. True. 15 Q. You have never seen any medical records on that person? 16 A. True. 17 Q. You have never seen any diagnosis about that person? 18 A. True. 19 Q. You have never seen any treatment schedule that purports 20 to outline what Dr. Sadler did for this patient? 21 A. True. 22 Q. Has anybody? 23 A. Not that I know of. 24 Q. Now, this patient -- What is your understanding of the 25 time frame we're talking about? 00103 { 2:56:45pm} 01 A. This project started in the early 1900s and went on for 02 about 50 years until 1955. 03 Q. Was the patient around in 1955? 04 A. I assume so. 05 Q. Do you know? 06 A. No. 07 Q. Do you know when the patient died? 08 A. No. 09 Q. Does anybody know when the patient died? 10 A. I don't know. 11 Q. Do any of the present members of the board of trustees 12 know when the patient died? 13 A. In my opinion, none of the present board of trustees knows 14 when the patient died. 15 Q. Does anybody know whether or not the patient died prior to 16 1983, the date of the copyright renewal? 17 A. No one knows when the patient died. 18 Q. Have any representations been made that the patient was 19 alive in 1983? 20 A. No. 21 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Objection, Your Honor. 22 Representations? 23 THE COURT: Sustained. Go ahead. 24 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) Are you aware of any information that 25 would indicate that the patient was alive in 1983? 00104 { 2:58:00pm} 01 A. I know of no such information. 02 Q. Do you know of any information that would indicate whether 03 or not the patient was alive in 1955? 04 A. Yes. 05 Q. And what is that information? 06 A. I spoke with Dr. Sadler in 1962 and he told me of 07 communications that were going on between The Contact 08 Commission and certain celestial beings through the contact 09 person as late as October of 1955. 10 MR. ABOWITZ: We'd move that the answer be stricken 11 based upon that its hearsay content. 12 THE COURT: Overruled. 13 MR. HILL: Judge, I'm sorry. I didn't hear your 14 ruling. 15 THE COURT: Overruled. 16 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) Now, during the course of assembling 17 information that you used to come to your own views and 18 conclusions regarding this work, your information is that the 19 196 papers in The Urantia Book were originally in the 20 handwriting of the patient; is that correct? 21 A. Dr. Sadler told me as much. 22 Q. And you've come to that view? 23 A. I believe that. 24 Q. And there isn't anything in this book that wasn't in 25 longhand of the patient other than the additions to this book 00105 { 2:59:51pm} 01 by Bill Sadler, Jr.; is that correct? 02 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Your Honor, if he's going to be 03 referring to an exhibit, I'd like it to be tendered in 04 evidence. 05 THE COURT: I'm sorry? 06 MR. SCHOENTHALER: If he's going to refer to an 07 exhibit, I'd like it tendered into evidence. 08 MR. ABOWITZ: I will do that, Your Honor. 09 THE COURT: All right. 10 MR. ABOWITZ: May I approach the witness, Your Honor? 11 THE COURT: Sure. Let me know and understand who's 12 going to be objecting and so forth. 13 MR. SCHOENTHALER: (COUNSEL INDICATES BY RAISING 14 HAND) 15 THE COURT: You are? Okay. 16 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) Would you identify that for the ladies 17 and gentlemen of the jury, please. 18 A. This is a first printing of The Urantia Book. This is a 19 first printing of The Urantia Book. 20 Q. And that is known as The Urantia Book in hard cover? 21 A. Yes. 22 MR. ABOWITZ: We have marked that as exhibit 80, Your 23 Honor, and we'd ask that it be admitted. 24 THE COURT: Any objection? 25 MR. SCHOENTHALER: None. 00106 { 3:00:57pm} 01 THE COURT: Be admitted. 02 MR. ABOWITZ: Thank you, Your Honor. 03 While we're at it, may I approach again, Your Honor? 04 Your Honor, it might be easier for the jury if I might ask 05 the covers of those be projected so the jury can get a sense of 06 the -- 07 THE COURT: Sure. 08 MR. ABOWITZ: It's exhibit 78. 09 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) Sir, would you please identify that 10 exhibit, 78. 11 A. I have two books here. They're both exhibit 78. 12 Q. I'm going to remedy that. Let me call this one 78-A and 13 78-B. 14 What is 78-A? 15 A. It is a Urantia Book published by Uversa Press. 16 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Pardon me, Your Honor. If I may 17 interrupt. They only have one exhibit for 78. It does say 18 that it's Urantia Book, paper back. 19 THE COURT: Are these identical? 20 MR. ABOWITZ: No, they're different. That's why I 21 made one A and one B. 22 THE COURT: Okay. Your objection is they only list 23 one? 24 MR. SCHOENTHALER: They list one book, Your Honor. 25 I'm not sure what the other book is. 00107 { 3:03:07pm} 01 MR. ABOWITZ: He knows what the other book is. Is he 02 objecting? 03 THE COURT: Wait a minute. I'm sorry. I can't hear 04 you. 05 MR. ABOWITZ: I said I believe they do know what the 06 other book is, but I will withdraw it if that's -- 07 MR. SCHOENTHALER: I actually don't know what the 08 book is. 09 THE COURT: Have you shown it to him, counselor? 10 MR. ABOWITZ: Excuse me, Your Honor. 11 MR. SCHOENTHALER: I object that it's not on the 12 exhibit list, Your Honor. 13 THE COURT: Object on the grounds it is not listed as 14 an exhibit? 15 Do you wish to respond? 16 MR. ABOWITZ: I'll withdraw it. 17 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) Now, let me show you exhibit 78. That 18 is, sir, please? 19 THE COURT: Question? 20 A. What was the question? 21 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) Would you identify that for the Court 22 and ladies and gentlemen of the jury. 23 A. This is the third printing of the soft-cover edition of 24 The Urantia Book printed by Urantia Foundation. 25 Q. Are the two books in front of you identical, sir, other 00108 { 3:04:39pm} 01 than one's hard and one's soft, and one is larger than the 02 other? The contents, are they the same? 03 A. Yes. 04 Q. When was the paperback first published? 05 A. In the 1990s. 1995. 06 Q. Incidentally, how have the sales of that book gone in the 07 last five years? 08 A. Of which book? 09 Q. Either book. Both books. 10 A. Does that include translations? 11 Q. Let's just talk about the English version. 12 A. Sales have grown dramatically. 13 Q. I'm sorry? 14 A. Sales of The Urantia Book have grown dramatically. In 15 1958 we sold three copies, and last year we sold almost 40,000 16 last year. 17 Q. And isn't it true that the publication of Jesus - A New 18 Revelation did not interfere with the increase in the sales of 19 those books? 20 A. I don't know. 21 Q. You don't know to the contrary, do you? You don't have 22 any evidence that would establish that it has; is that correct? 23 A. True. 24 Q. All right. Now, is it true, sir, that the patient's 25 handwriting of the text of The Urantia Book is the first 00109 { 3:06:33pm} 01 tangible expression of the contents of The Urantia Book? 02 A. As a matter of belief, what you just said is -- as a 03 matter of belief, I believe that what you just said is true. 04 Q. You know of no -- 05 THE COURT: Counsel, will this be a good place to 06 take a 15-minute recess at this point? 07 MR. ABOWITZ: Yes, Your Honor. 08 THE COURT: All right. Ladies and gentlemen, we're 09 going to be recessed for 15 minutes. I'll ask you to be back 10 in the jury box in your exact seats at the end of 15 minutes. 11 I again remind you of my previous admonition not to 12 discuss this case. 13 Everyone please stand until the jurors clear the 14 courtroom. 15 (THE JURY WAS EXCUSED FROM THE COURTROOM, AFTER WHICH THE 16 FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HAD IN OPEN COURT:) 17 THE COURT: Court's in recess. 18 (A RECESS WAS HAD, AFTER WHICH THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS 19 WERE HAD IN OPEN COURT AND WITHIN THE PRESENCE AND HEARING OF 20 THE JURY:) 21 THE COURT: Mr. Abowitz. 22 MR. ABOWITZ: May I proceed? 23 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) The first tangible expression of the 24 substance of the 196 papers of The Urantia Book was not from 25 multiple sources; is that correct? 00110 { 3:24:07pm} 01 A. From multiple sources? That's my belief and 02 understanding. 03 Q. You just told us that the first tangible expression of 04 that book was in the handwriting of the patient. 05 A. It was in the handwriting of the patient. 06 Q. It was not in the handwriting of anybody else but the 07 patient? 08 A. That's my belief. 09 Q. There weren't others that hand wrote? 10 A. Not that I know of. 11 Q. All right. Thank you. 12 Now, there was, with respect to what was handwritten and 13 finally ended up as The Urantia Book, it was exactly the same 14 thing except for maybe spelling and punctuation; is that 15 correct? 16 A. I think so. 17 Q. And there were no substantive changes in the text? 18 A. Substantive changes? There was a question and answer 19 process that went on. Dr. Sadler said no questions, no 20 papers -- 21 Q. I understand. 22 A. -- and after the papers were materialized, then they were 23 read to a group called The Forum and there were comments and 24 there was feedback and it's my understanding that the papers 25 were revised as a result of the input from these humans. 00111 { 3:25:31pm} 01 Q. Everything that got into The Urantia Book was written in 02 the hand of the patient; is that correct? 03 A. I believe that. 04 Q. There is no record of any questions that were asked by 05 anybody; is that correct? 06 A. A written record? 07 Q. Yes. 08 A. I've heard of oral records. 09 Q. I'm asking about written. Something we can look at, 10 something we can see. 11 A. There is no written record that I know of. 12 Q. There is nothing that we can see and touch and feel that's 13 evidence of any of these questions; is that correct? 14 A. I think what you just said is true. 15 Q. And it is also correct, is it not, that there isn't 16 anybody that can look at that Urantia Book and say, "This part 17 came from a question"? 18 A. I think there probably is at least one individual who 19 could say that. 20 Q. Who? 21 A. Mary Lou Hales. 22 Q. And it's her view that she can look through that book and 23 say, "I can remember this was a question and this is how it was 24 resolved"? 25 A. I think so. 00112 { 3:26:39pm} 01 Q. All right. But she has no written record of it either? 02 A. I don't know. 03 Q. And when did that happen? How many years ago? 04 A. In the '30s. 05 Q. 70 years ago? 06 A. Yes. 07 Q. Okay. Now, you agree that the book did not come from what 08 Emma Christensen wrote down that the sleeping patient said 09 verbally; is that correct? 10 A. True. 11 Q. So, there are no parts of that book that come from what 12 Emma Christensen wrote down that she did what the patient said 13 verbally? 14 A. That's my belief. 15 Q. You can't, as the president of the board of trustees of 16 The Urantia Foundation, tell the Court and the ladies and 17 gentlemen of the jury today specifically what part of that book 18 came from any of this questioning process that you've alluded 19 to; correct? 20 A. True. 21 Q. Did anybody see the patient write this out? 22 A. Dr. Sadler told me that no one saw the patient write any 23 of the material that's in The Urantia Book. 24 Q. But the belief is, your belief is that the writing was the 25 handwriting of the patient; there is no doubt about that? 00113 { 3:28:41pm} 01 A. That is my belief. 02 Q. And there is no evidence to dispute that; is that correct? 03 A. None that I know of. 04 Q. Now, the patient wrote them and they somehow moved beyond 05 the patient; is that correct? The transcript, the handwritten 06 transcript produced by the patient. 07 A. It was in that patient's handwriting. You said he wrote 08 them. I don't know that. I just know it was in his hand -- or 09 I believe that it was in his handwriting. 10 Q. There is no evidence to the fact that the patient did not 11 write them; is that correct? 12 A. There is no evidence that I know of that the manuscripts 13 were in anyone's handwriting but the contact's. 14 Q. The patient? 15 A. The sleeping -- well, I prefer to call him the sleeping 16 subject or the contact because that was the term that 17 Dr. Sadler always used. You earlier wanted me to say "patient" 18 and I feel uncomfortable saying "patient." 19 Q. All right. Well, let's define who this person is. This 20 isn't a different person, is it, than the one that was brought 21 by his wife to Dr. Sadler for help with his malady, is it? 22 Same person. 23 A. The person who went to Dr. -- you're saying "malady." I 24 have difficulty with that. But what you're calling the patient 25 is the same person that I'm calling, in my opinion, is calling 00114 { 3:30:38pm} 01 the contact or the sleeping subject. Those were the terms that 02 Dr. Sadler used. He did not say "my patient" that I recall in 03 my conversations with him. 04 Q. But you are not disputing that the person I am calling the 05 patient is the same person that you're calling the contact that 06 is the same person that hand wrote this book; is that correct? 07 A. No, I'm saying it was in his handwriting but, as a matter 08 of belief, I believe he did not write the book. 09 Q. All right. But you do concede it was his handwriting? 10 A. He was the sleeping subject. Yes, it was in his 11 handwriting. 12 Q. Okay. You know of no evidence, do you, that will support 13 the proposition that he was the sleeping subject? 14 A. Well, I was not there. I'm just going on what Dr. Sadler 15 told me. 16 Q. All right. 17 A. He was a sleeping subject. He was not conscious of any of 18 this that went on for almost 50 years. 19 Q. And you weren't there and there isn't anybody else that 20 was around that can tell us that? 21 A. No one directly with the sleeping subject. None of the 22 Contact Commissioners are alive. 23 Q. Now, you have reached the view that there was an 24 assignment of the rights of the patient/ -- what did you call 25 him? 00115 { 3:32:08pm} 01 A. Sleeping subject. 02 Q. Well, let's call him the patient/subject; is that -- will 03 that help? The patient/contact? 04 A. Okay. Contact. The contact. 05 Q. Patient/contact? 06 A. Well, we'll say "patient" for you and "contact" for me. 07 Q. All right. And we can have an agreement on that? That's 08 how we'll refer to him so we can cut off this debate, okay? 09 A. Okay. 10 Q. The patient/contact assigned his right in that handwriting 11 to Dr. Sadler? 12 A. What do you mean by "assigned"? 13 Q. Somehow it moved from the patient to Dr. Sadler. 14 Dr. Sadler got a hold of these; right? 15 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Your Honor, I'm going to object to 16 the question. I think they're vague, frankly. What does he 17 mean by "it" and what does he mean by "right"? 18 THE COURT: Overruled. I think he can answer the 19 question if he knows the answer. 20 A. "Assigned"? "Assigned" sounds like something very legal 21 and official and in writing. 22 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) Or it could be as simple as, "I give 23 this to you." 24 A. Yeah. He turned them over to the Sadler team known as The 25 Contact Commission. 00116 { 3:33:32pm} 01 Q. Is there any evidence that you can direct us to that 02 establishes how he gave him? 03 A. None that I know of. 04 Q. Is there any evidence to establish that it was by virtue 05 of a written assignment? In other words, a writing that says, 06 "I give this to you." 07 A. There was nothing that I know of that was in writing. 08 Q. Is there any evidence that you know of that we can look to 09 to determine whether the patient/contact was competent to give 10 this to Dr. Sadler? 11 A. None that I know of. 12 Q. Is there any evidence that you can point to that would 13 show us that the patient/contact was advised of his rights 14 before he gave it away? 15 A. I know of no such information. 16 Q. Now, we know Dr. Sadler -- let's call -- let's term it as 17 took possession of the handwriting, the handwritten text; is 18 that correct? 19 A. I would feel more comfortable saying that The Contact 20 Commission, this group, this entity, The Contact Commission, 21 took possession. 22 Q. The Sadler team? 23 A. The Sadler team. 24 Q. Took possession? 25 A. Yes. 00117 { 3:35:25pm} 01 Q. And they had this handwritten version of this book 02 transcribed into type? 03 A. Yes. 04 Q. And they destroyed the handwritten manuscript? 05 A. That's my understanding. 06 Q. And they eventually destroyed the typewritten manuscript? 07 A. That's my understanding. 08 Q. So there isn't anything today that we can look to as 09 evidence with respect to either the handwritten version or the 10 typewritten version, the first typewritten version? 11 A. True. 12 Q. Now, the Sadler team took possession, however that 13 happened, and essentially printing plates were made of that 14 book; correct? 15 A. That's my understanding. 16 Q. And the first printing plates were destroyed? 17 A. That's my understanding. 18 Q. And the subsequent printing plates that were used to print 19 the book was used to print the version of the book that was 20 copyrighted? 21 A. Would you repeat that? 22 Q. I'll start all over again. 23 Eventually, the book was copyrighted; right? 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. And that was in what year? 00118 { 3:37:21pm} 01 A. It was copyrighted in 1955 but the copyright was 02 registered in 1956. 03 Q. Now, have you developed a belief as to how the four 04 portions of the book came into being? Were they all -- Did 05 they all come into being at the same time? 06 A. No. 07 Q. Do you agree that the last portion of the book which now 08 comprises Jesus - A New Revelation, came approximately a year 09 after the rest of the book? 10 A. I have heard that. 11 Q. Do you believe that? 12 A. I think I believe that. 13 Q. Is there any evidence to dispute that? 14 A. None that I know of. 15 Q. And is it true that the fourth portion of the book Jesus - 16 A New Revelation came as a whole from paper 120 to paper 196? 17 A. The fourth part of the book is not called Jesus - A New 18 Revelation. 19 Q. I'm talking about the fourth part. I'm sorry. 20 A. It's called The Life and Teachings of Jesus. 21 Q. I'm sorry. Please excuse my confusion. 22 Let's talk about the fourth portion of the book that 23 became Jesus - A New Revelation. That portion of The Urantia 24 Book came as an entire part; it did not come in pieces; is that 25 correct? 00119 { 3:38:55pm} 01 A. I have heard that said. 02 Q. And there's no evidence to dispute that; is that correct? 03 A. True. None that I know of. 04 Q. And that portion of the book, the fourth portion of the 05 book, came as a whole a year after the first three parts? 06 A. I had heard that. 07 Q. And there's no evidence to dispute that? 08 A. True. 09 Q. And you believe that? 10 A. Yes. 11 Q. Now, let me get back to something you said earlier. You 12 indicated that you were first introduced to The Urantia Book by 13 a fraternity brother; is that correct? 14 A. True. 15 Q. And that was a gentleman by the name of Mr. Grimsley? 16 A. Yes. 17 Q. Mr. Grimsley was active in the Urantia movement? 18 A. Yes. 19 Q. And can you tell us whether or not you became involved -- 20 if you did, at what point -- with Mr. Grimsley and his Urantia 21 activities? 22 A. Would you be more specific? 23 Q. Well, what was -- Did Mr. Grimsley set up a radio 24 broadcast ministry in California? 25 A. Yes. 00120 { 3:40:31pm} 01 Q. Were you part of that? 02 A. Indirectly. 03 Q. In what fashion? 04 A. I invested some money that had been contributed to his 05 foundation. 06 Q. What was the name of the foundation? 07 A. The Family of God Foundation. 08 Q. And you essentially had a role by virtue of your 09 investment in that? 10 Strike that. "Investment" is a bad word. 11 Your contribution to that enterprise? 12 A. I was investing money that had been contributed to 13 Mr. Grimsley's foundation. 14 Q. I misunderstood you. 15 People contributed to that foundation and your business is 16 that of an investment counselor and you took that money and 17 invested it for The Foundation? 18 A. True. 19 Q. To create a return for The Foundation? 20 A. True. 21 Q. All right. Other than that, did you have any -- did you 22 have any formal association with that ministry? 23 A. Well, I was called a co-worker of the organization. It 24 was in northern California and I lived, by plane, probably an 25 hour-and-a-half away, so I was officially a co-worker but I -- 00121 { 3:42:07pm} 01 Q. What is a co-worker? 02 A. That's what they call people who were officially 03 associated with the organization. 04 Q. And what did the organization do? 05 A. It mostly was a service organization related to a radio 06 ministry that was conducted by Mr. Grimsley. 07 Q. And that essentially was run out of Mr. Grimsley's 08 apartment in Berkeley, California? 09 A. It wasn't his apartment. It was a residence. 10 Q. Did you furnish financial support to that organization? 11 A. Yes. 12 Q. How much? 13 A. $25,000, I think. 14 Q. And what year was that? 15 A. Probably in the mid '60s. 16 Q. And at some point -- 17 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Your Honor, I'm a little confused 18 as to the relevancy of this. 19 MR. ABOWITZ: I'm going to tie it up, Your Honor. 20 THE COURT: All right. Go ahead, counselor. 21 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) At some point, did Mr. Grimsley move 22 that facility? 23 A. Yes. 24 Q. Where did he move it? 25 A. To a community some miles from Berkeley, California, where 00122 { 3:43:39pm} 01 he had his foundation. 02 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Your Honor, I'd like to approach 03 the bench, if I may, and bring something up. 04 (THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HAD AT THE BENCH, OUT OF 05 HEARING OF THE JURY:) 06 MR. SCHOENTHALER: I have no idea where he's going 07 with this. 08 THE COURT: I'm sorry. I don't hear you. 09 MR. SCHOENTHALER: I have no idea where he's going. 10 THE COURT: I don't have any idea either. I wonder 11 if Murray does. 12 MR. ABOWITZ: I do. 13 THE COURT: What is it? Tell me now pretty plainly 14 where we're going. 15 MR. ABOWITZ: I believe this witness will testify 16 that this gentleman became possessed of spirits and was 17 involved in channeling, in fact, to this patient/contact and 18 was some medium for these spirits. 19 THE COURT: You're going to get this guy to testify 20 that, who, Grimsley? 21 MR. ABOWITZ: Uh-huh. 22 THE COURT: Was a medium or a channeler himself? 23 MR. ABOWITZ: Yeah. 24 THE COURT: And what if he says no? 25 MR. ABOWITZ: Then I'm done. 00123 { 3:44:44pm} 01 THE COURT: All right. Let's be sure. 02 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Hold on, Your Honor. May I? His 03 spiritual beliefs are not in issue. 04 THE COURT: Pardon? 05 MR. SCHOENTHALER: His spiritual believes are not in 06 issue. Even if he says yes, all they're doing is trying to 07 prejudice the jury. It has absolutely nothing to do with this 08 case. 09 MR. ABOWITZ: It has nothing to do with him except 10 his opinion and view of The Urantia Foundation. 11 THE COURT: He has been giving some opinions here 12 with regard to this thing. Where do you shut him off and where 13 do you keep him? 14 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Well, he's been giving opinions as 15 to The Urantia Book, which he believes to be a revelation. 16 Whether or not this guy was possessed by spirits, how is that 17 at all relevant to this case except to prejudice? 18 MR. ABOWITZ: The relevance is is that I believe that 19 when we get to the end of this question-and-answering session, 20 that he will say the very -- that The Urantia Foundation, as a 21 matter of principle, does not believe in the phenomenon or does 22 not countenance this business that they now ascribe to. 23 THE COURT: I'm going to give you a little while on 24 this but if you don't get -- 25 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Your Honor, I will tell you that 00124 { 3:45:55pm} 01 he will testify -- that it's likely that he will say that they 02 do not believe in channeling. Let him ask that question. 03 THE COURT: But if he says that, you're through. 04 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Let him just say, "Do you believe 05 in channeling?" 06 MR. ABOWITZ: No, no, no. If he says they believe in 07 channeling, I go on. If he says they don't, then I sit down. 08 THE COURT: Okay. Go ahead. 09 (THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HAD IN OPEN COURT AND 10 WITHIN THE PRESENCE AND HEARING OF THE JURY:) 11 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) Sir, at one point, Mr. Grimsley became 12 possessed of spirits -- 13 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Your Honor, I thought we 14 were going -- that he was going to ask a question. 15 MR. ABOWITZ: I am. 16 THE COURT: All right. Overruled. Go ahead, 17 counselor. 18 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) Sir, at one point, Mr. Grimsley became 19 possessed -- 20 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Your Honor. Objection. 21 Foundation. 22 THE COURT: Overruled. Go ahead. 23 MR. ABOWITZ: Your Honor -- excuse me. 24 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) Mr. -- Did at one time Mr. Grimsley 25 become possessed of spirits that told him there was going to be 00125 { 3:47:18pm} 01 a nuclear third world war? 02 A. I would not characterize his experience that way. 03 Q. I'm sorry? 04 A. I would not characterize his experience that way. You 05 used the term "possessed by spirits." I would not use that 06 term. 07 Q. Did the spirits give him the information that there would 08 be a third world nuclear war? 09 A. He believed, in some way that I don't understand, that he 10 believed that somehow he had been told by celestial beings that 11 there was going to be world war III. 12 Q. And people reacted to that; they moved out to his compound 13 in preparation for this; correct? 14 A. Some did. Some did. 15 Q. And would you describe that, sir, as channeling? 16 A. I don't know what it was. No. 17 Q. What is channeling? 18 A. I wouldn't describe it as channeling or not as 19 channeling. I don't really know -- I don't think I know what 20 channeling is. 21 Q. Would you say that he was possessed? 22 A. No. 23 Q. What is The Urantia Foundation's position on channeling? 24 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Your Honor, would counsel describe 25 what he means by "channeling"? He just said he doesn't know. 00126 { 3:48:47pm} 01 THE COURT: Overruled. Answer, if you can. 02 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) Let me rephrase it. 03 Does The Urantia Foundation have a view of channeling? 04 A. Well, those individuals -- I'll put it this way: Those 05 individuals who describe what they're doing as channeling, we 06 have gone out of our way to say that there is no official 07 connection between us and those individuals even though they 08 may be readers of The Urantia Book. 09 Q. And would you agree that an acceptable definition of 10 channeling is a meditative or trance-like state? 11 A. Would you repeat that? 12 Q. Yes. 13 Would you agree that a working definition of channeling is 14 a meditative or trance-like state in order to convey messages 15 from a spiritual being or guide? 16 A. I don't know. 17 Q. You don't know if that's a working definition? 18 A. I don't know. That's correct, I do not know if that would 19 be a good working definition. 20 Q. If that is a working definition, would you agree that 21 that's essentially how you've described the patient contact? 22 A. I don't know. 23 Q. And -- 24 A. I don't know if it's a good working definition. And if I 25 agreed with you that it was a good working definition, I don't 00127 { 3:50:16pm} 01 know that I would say, "Well, that's what the contact was 02 doing." I don't know. 03 Q. Did you say he was in a trance? 04 A. I only know what Dr. Sadler told me. He said he was 05 sleeping, the sleeping subject. He never used the word trance. 06 Q. But he was essentially functional while he was sleeping; 07 right? 08 A. What do you mean by "functional"? 09 Q. Was he writing while he was sleeping? 10 A. I don't know. 11 Q. Was he communicating while he was sleeping? 12 A. Dr. Sadler went out of his way to say they never saw the 13 individual write. 14 Q. Did he communicate while he was sleeping? 15 A. There was -- verbally or in writing? 16 Q. Any way. 17 A. My understanding is that verbally, yes, there was 18 communication. You say did he communicate? My belief is he 19 was not communicating. 20 Q. And if that is channeling, The Urantia Foundation would 21 have no part of it; is that right? 22 A. If what is channeling? 23 Q. Sleeping, trance-like, meditative state, so that one would 24 be receptive to spiritual beings, if that is channeling and 25 that's what this person is doing, The Urantia Foundation would 00128 { 3:51:42pm} 01 have no part of that; is that right? 02 A. Well, that would be difficult for me to agree with that if 03 we go back to, of course, how the book came into existence and 04 given my belief system. You're trying to induce me to label 05 what he was doing as channeling and I'm not prepared to do 06 that. I really don't know -- 07 THE COURT: Just move on. 08 A. -- what to call what he was doing. I choose not to call 09 it channeling. 10 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) How do you define inspiration? 11 A. What kind of inspiration? 12 Q. I'm inspired to write the Ninth Symphony. 13 A. Are we talking about intellectual inspiration, emotional 14 inspiration, genetic inspiration, theological divine 15 inspiration? What kind of inspiration? 16 Q. Let's talk about -- Let's talk about inspiration in the 17 hypothetical example. I'm Ludwig Beethoven and I say that I am 18 inspired to write the Ninth Symphony. How would you define 19 that? 20 A. Beethoven would have felt moved. Compelled, perhaps. 21 Q. Pardon me? 22 A. Compelled, perhaps. 23 Q. But -- 24 A. Driven. 25 Q. Driven, compelled, moved, but writing the Ninth Symphony 00129 { 3:53:25pm} 01 in the context of his own resources? 02 A. I don't know. I can't speak for Beethoven. 03 Q. No, I'm talking about in our hypothetical situation. He 04 was inspired. That didn't mean somebody -- 05 A. He may say that but it would depend on the individual. 06 THE COURT: Counselor, I'm having a great deal of 07 difficulty finding any value of this discussion to the issues 08 in this lawsuit. Now, get to something that has something to 09 do with the issues in this lawsuit. 10 MR. ABOWITZ: Okay. Let me get to it this way, Your 11 Honor. 12 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) Would you agree that if the patient 13 contact were inspired as I related the Beethoven hypothetical, 14 that he would be using his own resources to write out in 15 longhand this book? 16 A. I don't know. Maybe if he were awake when he did it, you 17 could argue that. 18 Q. Could people be inspired if they're asleep? 19 A. I'm not sure what you mean by expired -- inspired. I 20 asked you to attach an adjective to the word "inspiration." 21 But I don't think the patient was -- well, I wouldn't 22 characterize him as having been inspired. I'm going from what 23 Dr. Sadler said. 24 Q. I understand. 25 A. He was the sleeping subject. He had no knowledge 00130 { 3:55:08pm} 01 whatsoever of what went on during the verbal -- there were 02 verbal transmissions. And these written transmissions, I don't 03 know that I believe he actually wrote it, though it was in his 04 handwriting. 05 Q. I understand. But nobody saw him write it? 06 A. That's right. I went out of my way to ask Dr. Sadler, 07 "Did you try to find his -- see him writing"? And he said, 08 "Yes, we tried to spy on him and we were never able to see him 09 physically writing the book." 10 Q. As far as we know, he could have written it while he was 11 awake and inspired; is that correct? 12 A. Yeah, you could believe that if you want. 13 Q. All right. Is there any evidence to establish that this 14 patient was paid? 15 A. No evidence to establish that the patient -- excuse me -- 16 the subj- -- the contact -- 17 Q. I'm sorry. Is there any evidence to establish that the 18 patient/contact was paid? 19 A. There is no such evidence that I know of. 20 Q. Is there any evidence to establish that anybody was paid 21 with respect to the generation of the first tangible expression 22 in writing of The Urantia Book? 23 A. They were all volunteers, to my knowledge. 24 Q. Did you hear my question? 25 Is there any evidence -- 00131 { 3:56:34pm} 01 A. There is -- Excuse me. 02 Q. May I? 03 A. Please. 04 Q. Is there any evidence to establish that there was any 05 payment made to anybody that produced the first tangible 06 expression of The Urantia Book in writing? 07 A. No such evidence that I know of. 08 Q. Was anyone paid by anybody to produce the writing that 09 took place? 10 A. No one that I know of. 11 Q. Are you well enough informed with the issues in this case 12 to address what Urantia Foundation has termed a work for hire? 13 A. That's a legal term and I'm -- I have a vague familiarity 14 with it but don't consider myself qualified to -- 15 Q. If you were -- I'm sorry. Have you finished your answer? 16 A. -- to speak with any expertise what that means. 17 Q. If you were -- I'm sorry. I keep interrupting you. Have 18 you finished? 19 If you were to take the common understanding of the words 20 "work for hire" and apply them to the first tangible expression 21 of this book, is there any evidence to establish that it was a 22 work for hire? 23 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Your Honor, I object. "Work for 24 hire" is a legal term and we -- 25 THE COURT: Sustained. 00132 { 3:58:27pm} 01 MR. SCHOENTHALER: -- and we -- 02 THE COURT: Sustained. 03 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) Do you have an understanding of that in 04 its common sense, outside of a legal -- 05 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Didn't you just sustain my 06 objection? 07 THE COURT: Yes, I sustained your objection. 08 MR. ABOWITZ: May I proceed with this question? 09 THE COURT: Yes, but if you're going to ask him the 10 same question, it doesn't do me any good to sustain the 11 objection. The objection is sustained, counselor. 12 MR. ABOWITZ: Thank you, Your Honor. 13 THE COURT: Now, ask him a different question. He 14 said he didn't know anything about "work for hire" as a legal 15 or a common concept and I sustained the objection to that 16 question. 17 MR. ABOWITZ: Thank you. 18 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) Now, getting back to the process of 19 moving from handwritten transcripts to typewritten, how was 20 that done? 21 A. My understanding is that one member of the Contact 22 Commission read the manuscripts and then produced on a 23 typewriter the typed scripts. 24 Q. Who was that? 25 A. My understanding, it was Emma Christensen. 00133 { 3:59:39pm} 01 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Your Honor, I'm going to object to 02 his understanding. I'd like to know how he learned this. If 03 counsel -- 04 MR. ABOWITZ: I can't hear him. 05 THE COURT: Restate your objection. I didn't hear 06 you. 07 MR. SCHOENTHALER: I would like to know how the jury 08 -- or how Mr. Keeler got an understanding of this since he 09 wasn't there. 10 THE COURT: Restate your question for my benefit and 11 for the benefit of the attorney. 12 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) Do you know how the handwritten 13 manuscript got to be a typewritten manuscript? 14 THE COURT: Do you know how? 15 A. I don't know how but I have beliefs as to how it was done 16 and I was told. 17 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) And that's the same information you've 18 been relating to me since we started this; is that correct? 19 A. Yes. 20 Q. And what is your belief? 21 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Objection. Hearsay, Your Honor. 22 THE COURT: Sustained. 23 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) You have no information then based on 24 your knowledge of how that happened? 25 A. No direct information from anybody that did it but I was 00134 { 4:00:41pm} 01 told -- 02 Q. All right. The Court -- 03 A. -- that a certain member of the Contact Commission did it. 04 Q. The Court has sustained the objection. 05 Do you know why the handwritten manuscript was destroyed? 06 A. My belief is that the personalities, the authors of the 07 Urantia Papers, instructed The Contact Commission to destroy 08 the manuscripts after they had been type scribed. 09 Q. Why? 10 A. I don't know. 11 Q. Now, this process of producing this book, we've talked 12 about the dates 1935 and 1936. The book was not published 13 until some 19 years after that; is that correct? 14 A. You said 1936. To my knowledge, none of the Urantia 15 Papers were produced in 19- -- in 1936. It was all, I think, 16 '33, '34, '35. 17 Q. All right. Whatever the date. 18 A. But they were not published until 1955. 19 Q. So, instead of '35 or '36, we're talking about a year or 20 two earlier? 21 A. Yes. 22 Q. So it was more than 20 years until they were published? 23 A. True. 24 Q. And do you know if this patient was alive in 1933, '34, 25 '35, that range? 00135 { 4:02:48pm} 01 A. I don't know that he was. 02 Q. Do you have a belief? 03 A. I believe that he was. 04 Q. And do you know if he was alive in 1955? 05 A. Dr. Sadler told me that there was communication through 06 the sleeping subject through the contact in October of 1955. 07 Q. But we've agreed before that there's no evidence to 08 establish that; correct? 09 A. None that I know of. 10 Q. All right. Sir, I've shown you what we've marked as 11 exhibit 83. Would you tell the ladies and gentlemen of the 12 jury what that is. 13 A. It appears to be a book entitled Jesus - A New Revelation. 14 Q. Before we move on to that, sir, Mr. Keeler, do you know of 15 any evidence that would establish that the work of the 16 patient/contact was voluntary? 17 A. I have only my belief about that. I believe it was 18 voluntary. But I know of no evidence that would support -- 19 certainly no written evidence that would support that. 20 Q. And what's the basis of that information? 21 A. My 1962 conversation with Dr. Sadler. 22 MR. ABOWITZ: Your Honor, with your permission, I'd 23 like to put that exhibit up on the screen, exhibit 83. 24 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) That's the front cover of that. Does 25 the book explain what that painting is? 00136 { 4:05:22pm} 01 A. I don't know. 02 Q. Have you ever read that book? 03 A. No. 04 Q. Have you ever looked at it? 05 A. Yes. Not much more than I've looked at it right here. 06 Q. In a cursory fashion? 07 A. Very cursory. 08 Q. You've never examined its contents? 09 A. True. 10 Q. Can you look through there briefly and see if there's an 11 explanation of the painting on the front. 12 A. There appears to be. 13 Q. And what is that explanation? 14 MR. ABOWITZ: Could you put that up on the screen, 15 please. 16 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) What page is that, Mr. Keeler? 17 A. There's no page number. 18 Q. If you count from the front, can -- 19 A. It's on the third -- the reverse side of the second leaf 20 on the book. 21 MR. ABOWITZ: I think we've got to go back one. 22 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) What does it say with that? 23 A. It says, "Cover Art is Christ of Saint John of the Christ 24 by Salvador Dali." 25 Q. Does that painting appear in any of the -- either of the 00137 { 4:06:48pm} 01 exhibits of The Urantia Book before you? 02 A. None that I know of. 03 Q. Does it appear in any version of The Urantia Book that has 04 been published? 05 A. None that I know of. 06 Q. In any place? 07 A. True. 08 Q. Now, this book explains that it is a portion of The 09 Urantia Book, does it not? 10 A. I don't know. 11 Q. Would you please turn to the page that appears on the 12 screen. 13 A. Okay. I've turned to that page. 14 Q. And it discusses The Urantia Book, does it not? 15 A. It appears to -- 16 Q. And it -- 17 A. -- mention The Urantia Book. 18 Q. And it discusses a reference section -- system that 19 relates to The Urantia Book; is that correct? 20 A. So it appears. 21 Q. All right. Please turn to the back of that book. Can you 22 tell the ladies and gentlemen of the jury what that is? 23 A. The last page of the book? 24 Q. Well, the last several pages of it. Is it an index? 25 A. It appears to be a list of dates. 00138 { 4:08:18pm} 01 Q. Is there a portion of the book that is an index? 02 A. Oh, yes, the list of dates is the chronology. And before 03 that, there appears to be an index. 04 Q. And is that a portion, if you can tell by looking at it, 05 of the index that Mr. McMullan produced for The Urantia Book? 06 A. I don't know. 07 MR. ABOWITZ: May I, Your Honor? 08 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) Let me show you exhibit 76. Do you 09 recognize that, sir? 10 A. It doesn't indicate if this is exhibit 76, you say? 11 Q. Yes, sir. 12 A. And what's your question? 13 Q. Do you recognize it? 14 A. No. 15 Q. Do you recognize it to be the index to The Urantia Book? 16 A. It appears to be an index to The Urantia Book. 17 Q. Was there an index to The Urantia Book produced by 18 Mr. McMullan or The Michael Foundation? 19 A. It is my understanding that he produced an index to The 20 Urantia Book. 21 Q. And who produced this book today? 22 A. It says it's published by Michael Foundation, copyright by 23 Harry McMullan. 24 Q. Is this the only index to The Urantia Book? 25 THE COURT: What was your question again, counselor? 00139 { 4:10:28pm} 01 MR. ABOWITZ: "Is it the only index?" 02 I'm sorry, Your Honor. 03 A. No. 04 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) Is it the most comprehensive index? 05 A. I don't know. 06 Q. Do you know how many indexes there are? 07 A. No. 08 Q. Do you know whether the back portion of Jesus - A New 09 Revelation is a portion of this index? 10 A. I don't know. 11 Q. Do you know or would you agree that the index portion of 12 Jesus - A New Revelation does not appear in any edition of The 13 Urantia Book? 14 A. I think that's a true statement. 15 Q. And would you agree that the comments on the back cover of 16 Jesus - A New Revelation do not appear on any edition of The 17 Urantia Book? 18 A. I believe that they do not appear -- they do not appear on 19 any version of The Urantia Book with which I am familiar. 20 Q. When was that book published, The Urantia Book -- I'm 21 sorry -- the Jesus - A New Revelation. 22 A. 1999. 23 Q. Was the -- Do you know how many copies of that were 24 published? 25 A. No. 00140 { 4:12:14pm} 01 Q. Do you know how many were sold? 02 A. No. 03 Q. Have you taken any steps to find out? 04 A. No. Do I know? I've heard numbers, I've heard several 05 numbers, but I don't know. I've been curious to know the 06 accurate numbers. I'd like out of curiosity to know from 07 Mr. McMullan, but I don't know. It's no longer being 08 distributed and made available at this time. 09 Q. Would you agree with me that the contents of The Urantia 10 Book that are papers 121 through 196 -- I'm sorry. Let me 11 start over. 12 Would you agree that the portion of Jesus - A New 13 Revelation that contains papers 121 through 196 of The Urantia 14 Book are true and correct copies of those papers as The Urantia 15 Book published them? 16 A. I think, as a matter of belief, I believe that they are. 17 Q. Have you ever analyzed it? 18 A. No. 19 Q. Was there a time that Mr. McMullan corresponded with The 20 Urantia Foundation to offer them an attribution in that book if 21 it were published, Jesus - A New Revelation? 22 A. I think there was. 23 Q. And what was the reaction of The Foundation? 24 A. We decided that we did not wish to have -- that the 25 trustees decided that we did not want The Foundation to be 00141 { 4:14:32pm} 01 connected officially with this publication. 02 MR. ABOWITZ: Would you give me a minute, Your 03 Honor? 04 May I have exhibit 36, please. 05 Take that off the screen. 06 May I approach the witness, Your Honor? 07 THE COURT: Sure. 08 MR. ABOWITZ: It doesn't appear that that comes up 09 too well. I can't see that. May I inquire if the jury can? 10 THE COURT: I'm sorry. I can't hear you. 11 MR. ABOWITZ: May I inquire of the jury if they can 12 see that? 13 THE COURT: Are you able to see that, ladies and 14 gentlemen of the jury? 15 MR. ABOWITZ: Can we blow that up? 16 Is that a little bit better? 17 A JUROR: A little, yes. 18 MR. ABOWITZ: How about that, is that better? 19 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) I'll represent to you that's a copy of 20 an e-mail message from Mr. McMullan starting out from Gard 21 Jameson to Mr. McMullan. Tell us who Gard Jameson is. 22 A. He's a trustee of Urantia Foundation. 23 Q. Is the substance of that message in keeping with your 24 understanding of what happened? 25 A. I think so. 00142 { 4:17:32pm} 01 MR. ABOWITZ: We'd move that 36 be admitted, Your 02 Honor. 03 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Oh, we have no objection. 04 THE COURT: Be admitted. 05 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) And it said, "I called to ask whether 06 Urantia Foundation would like to be cited as a publisher of The 07 Urantia Book on the publisher's preface of the Jesus edition I 08 am preparing. You thought it would be a good idea." 09 Was that matter discussed with the board? 10 A. Yes. 11 Q. And did Mr. Jameson indicate to the board that that was a 12 good idea? 13 A. I don't recall that he did. 14 MR. ABOWITZ: Could you scroll this up, please? 15 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) And the next paragraph is, "There's been 16 no word about this and I presume that it's not going to 17 happen." And the final message is, "Your presumption is 18 correct, it hasn't happened." 19 Did there come a time when the board finally and 20 absolutely rejected that? 21 A. Yes. 22 Q. Why? 23 A. We didn't choose to be associated with Mr. McMullan's 24 publication. 25 Q. Would you agree with me that if somebody bought Jesus - A 00143 { 4:19:23pm} 01 New Revelation, read it, became interested in it, that there 02 would be a significant possibility that that person would then 03 purchase The Urantia Book? 04 A. I don't know. 05 Q. Did you ever contemplate that? 06 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Your Honor, asked and answered. 07 THE COURT: Sustained. 08 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) Was there ever discussion at the board 09 level about that issue, whether it would generate additional 10 sales of The Urantia Book? 11 A. I don't think in an official meeting, but I believe that 12 it was informally among members of the trustees. 13 Q. Were you a participant in any of those informal 14 discussions? 15 A. Probably. 16 Q. What was discussed? 17 A. Well, we didn't know. We were -- we didn't know what the 18 result would be. 19 Q. The result in what sense? 20 A. There was some curiosity expressed. Notwithstanding that 21 we disapproved of his publishing it, we were curious, or I was 22 curious to know what might be the -- whether there would be any 23 demand for his publication and what that effect might be on the 24 sales of The Urantia Book. 25 Q. But no conclusion was ever arrived at in that regard? 00144 { 4:20:50pm} 01 A. True. 02 Q. And as you say, you essentially rejected that offer? 03 A. True. 04 Q. Was that ever formally communicated to -- 05 A. I don't know. 06 Q. -- Mr. McMullan? 07 Did you communicate it? 08 A. Not that I recall. 09 Q. Were you communicating with Mr. McMullan during this 10 period of time? 11 A. No. 12 Q. You and he were friends at one time? 13 A. Yes. 14 Q. Stayed in each other's houses? 15 A. Yes. 16 Q. When did the friendship cease to be? 17 A. In 1989 I received a letter from Mr. McMullan telling me 18 with regard to my removal as an area coordinator, a personal 19 note from him saying with regard to that remove, "Good riddance 20 and words fail to express the contempt I feel toward you." 21 Q. Did you have a conversation with Mr. McMullan about that? 22 A. No. 23 Q. Did you have a conversation that preceded that? 24 A. What do you call precede? 25 Q. Preceding the letter, did you understand -- 00145 { 4:22:11pm} 01 A. I think not. I think I communicated -- before I received 02 that letter, probably I communicated with him maybe a few 03 months before I received that letter. 04 Q. Why was he contentious of you? 05 A. Because the board of trustees made the decision -- well, 06 I'm not sure. 07 Q. Did you ask him? 08 A. No. 09 Q. Now, you say you were removed as an area coordinator? 10 A. Yes. 11 Q. Why? 12 A. I don't know. 13 Q. Who removed you? 14 A. Mr. McMullan. 15 Q. And what organization is this we're talking about? 16 A. Urantia -- well, at that time the organization that had 17 been known as Urantia brotherhood then was no longer officially 18 affiliated with Urantia Foundation and they became known as a 19 group called The Fellowship, and so it was as a communication 20 from The Fellowship, I think, that I was removed as an area 21 coordinator. 22 Q. Let me see if we can avoid this confusion here. Mr. Hill 23 mentioned some of that in his opening statement. The Urantia 24 brotherhood was the successor to what? 25 A. In my view, it was the successor to The Forum. 00146 { 4:23:50pm} 01 Q. And The Urantia Foundation was the successor to what? 02 A. In my opinion, to The Contact Commission. 03 Q. That's what we call the Sadler team? 04 A. Yes. 05 Q. So, if I've got this straight, the Sadler team became The 06 Foundation? 07 A. Yes. 08 Q. The Forum, which was the larger group of people -- 09 A. Yes. 10 Q. -- became The Urantia Brotherhood? 11 A. Yes. 12 Q. Were the two organizations affiliated? 13 A. Yes. 14 Q. And when was The Brotherhood founded? 15 A. 1955. 16 Q. And they essentially shared the house on Diversey Street; 17 is that correct? 18 A. True. 19 Q. For how many years? 20 A. From 1955 until 1989. 21 Q. And that's the year that you went on the board of The 22 Foundation? 23 A. True. 24 Q. So for some period of time you were on the board of The 25 Foundation and you were a member of The Brotherhood? 00147 { 4:25:12pm} 01 A. True. 02 Q. Did you have an official function with The Brotherhood? 03 A. No. 04 Q. What is the area -- Was the area coordinator some 05 official function? 06 A. Oh, I guess it was. I retract my former statement. 07 Q. Okay. 08 A. I was an area coordinator and it was an official function. 09 Q. And the responsibilities of an area coordinator were what? 10 A. I currently live in Wyoming and if there were readers of 11 The Urantia Book in Wyoming and I was informed of that and they 12 were interested in communicating with other readers, then it 13 was my job to coordinate and facilitate their communication. 14 Q. And at the time that both of these organizations were 15 under the same roof, there was an arrangement that they could 16 share the marks of The Urantia Foundation; is that correct? 17 A. True. 18 Q. What was the arrangement? 19 A. There was a written agreement between the two 20 organizations, The Urantia Foundation as the register of the 21 marks, owner of the marks, licensed Urantia Brotherhood to use 22 the marks on publications. 23 Q. And at that time was The Brotherhood the arm of the 24 Urantia movement that was responsible for the sale of The 25 Urantia Book? 00148 { 4:26:51pm} 01 A. Well, actually, I think it was not Urantia Brotherhood but 02 it was -- it was -- there was an official sales agent for The 03 Urantia Book. I can't remember the name. It was before I 04 became a trustee. And so it was not The Brotherhood but it was 05 very close -- worked very closely with The Brotherhood. 06 Q. So one of The Brotherhood's functions was to promote the 07 sale of this book? 08 A. To disseminate the teachings. It was in their 09 constitution that their job -- one of their jobs was to 10 disseminate the teachings. 11 Q. Now, when you moved on the board, a disagreement ensued 12 between The Foundation and The Brotherhood; is that correct? 13 A. Between the trustees and the leadership of The 14 Brotherhood. 15 Q. And the result of that was that The Foundation took away 16 the right of The Brotherhood to use those trademarks; correct? 17 A. True. 18 Q. And you dispossessed them from their offices in this 19 building; correct? 20 A. We asked them to leave. 21 Q. And they left? 22 A. Yes. 23 Q. Did you give them a choice? 24 A. No. 25 Q. Mr. McMullan was a member of The Brotherhood at that time; 00149 { 4:28:31pm} 01 correct? 02 A. True. 03 Q. Did he have an official function? 04 A. I don't know. 05 Q. Was he part of the leadership of The Brotherhood? 06 A. Yes. 07 Q. And you say the differences were between the board of The 08 Foundation and the leadership of The Brotherhood? 09 A. That's the way I saw it. 10 Q. And you were a member of the board? 11 A. Yes. 12 Q. And Mr. McMullan was a member of the leadership of The 13 Brotherhood? 14 A. Yes. 15 Q. And is it accurate to state in that dispute that The 16 Foundation had the big stick? 17 A. We had the ownership of the copyright and marks. We had 18 the power to de-license The Brotherhood, which we did. 19 Q. And you had control of the building? 20 A. Say again? 21 Q. And you had control of the premises? 22 A. Well, we did. We owned the building. The Foundation owns 23 the building. 24 Q. So you took away the marks and you took away their office 25 space? 00150 { 4:29:40pm} 01 A. Yes. 02 Q. What was the basis of the dispute? 03 A. The president of Urantia Foundation at that time was 04 someone that the leadership of The Brotherhood found difficult 05 to work with. 06 Q. Mr. Myers? 07 A. Mr. Myers. And The Brotherhood decided, because, I guess 08 -- I wasn't involved at the time either as a trustee or I was a 09 member at large of The Brotherhood -- and The Brotherhood 10 decided that they were no longer going to share office space 11 with The Foundation; they were no longer going to share office 12 staff; they were no longer going to share the mailing lists; 13 they were no longer going to joint fund raise. And they put 14 that in writing, I would add, and they were no longer going to 15 promote goodwill for The Foundation. We saw that -- much of 16 that, most of that was in writing and we saw that as a 17 declaration of independence and we formalized the declaration 18 by saying we are now separate, separated. We are no longer 19 interdependent. 20 Q. You didn't like the independence statement, did you? 21 "You" meaning the board of the trustees of The Urantia 22 Foundation. 23 A. Well, I don't know -- I was barely on the board at that 24 time. Personally -- what's your question? 25 Q. My question was: As a member of the board of trustees, 00151 { 4:31:25pm} 01 the board of trustees of The Urantia Foundation didn't care for 02 this statement of independence, did they? 03 A. That's accurate. 04 Q. And Mr. Myers was somewhat of a despot, wasn't he? 05 A. Somewhat of a -- 06 Q. Despot. 07 A. Some people would say so. 08 Q. And the letter that came from Mr. McMullan was after this 09 dispute? 10 A. That's true. 11 Q. And that was the end of your friendship? 12 A. In his mind or in mine? Or in his mind or in my mind? 13 Q. Well, I don't know that you can speak to his mind. Let's 14 hear what your mind is. 15 A. Temporarily, I suppose. I hope for a reconciliation one 16 day. 17 Q. Did you take steps in that regard, to reconcile the 18 relationship? 19 A. I don't know if you would define them as such, but I have, 20 yes, in my mind, I have taken steps. 21 Q. What are those steps? 22 A. Prayer. 23 Q. Other than that. 24 A. When I've been around Harry, I've always been friendly and 25 inquired about his family and his well being and I think I've 00152 { 4:32:40pm} 01 communicated to him that he is daily in my prayers. 02 Q. And he has done likewise; is that correct? 03 A. Well, you'd have to break it down. He has inquired. 04 Q. He's very cordial of you? 05 A. Yeah. 06 Q. He inquires about your family? 07 A. Yes. 08 Q. And he's inquired about your health? 09 A. Yes. 10 Q. Did you tell him that you kept him in your prayers? 11 A. Yeah -- um, I think I have. I know that was conveyed to 12 him through somebody else. You would have to ask him. 13 Q. All right. Now, after The Brotherhood -- after this -- 14 how would you describe this parting? Is there a word that you 15 would be comfortable with that I could describe it with? 16 A. Sad. 17 Q. Well, unfortunate or sad. But the parting itself, I was 18 going to use the word "schism." Is that a correct word? 19 A. I pronounce it schism. 20 Q. Schism. I'll accept your pronunciation. 21 Would you agree that that's a correct descriptive term? 22 A. That would be one accurate descriptive term. 23 Q. What happened to The Brotherhood after this? 24 A. They formed their own organization, an organization called 25 The Fellowship. 00153 { 4:34:24pm} 01 Q. Was that the whole name of it? 02 A. I think that was the only official part, but there was a 03 trailer: The Fellowship for Readers of The Urantia Book. 04 Q. And did the board of trustees of The Urantia Book object 05 to the use of that name? 06 A. I think not. 07 Q. Isn't there a dispute that is in the process of being 08 disposed of in which The Urantia Foundation objected to that -- 09 to the use of that name? 10 A. Not that name. The Fellowship for Readers of The Urantia 11 Book, we never, in my opinion, objected to that name. 12 Q. What did you -- What is the dispute with The Fellowship 13 about? 14 A. The Fellowship changed their name, I think, two times 15 after that, and now they want to refer to themselves as The 16 Urantia Book Fellowship, I think, and we have felt 17 uncomfortable about their using the name of The Urantia Book in 18 their name. 19 Q. And did you sue them? 20 A. No. The Fellowship? 21 Q. Yeah. Yes. 22 A. With reference to that name? 23 Q. Yes. 24 A. No. 25 Q. Did you threaten to sue them? 00154 { 4:35:45pm} 01 A. I -- I would not say we threatened to sue them. We 02 encouraged to have negotiations with them and we recently 03 reached an agreement with them to license them use of a name -- 04 well, that name, as a matter of fact. 05 Q. So, the dispute with them is being resolved and they can 06 use that name? 07 A. The Urantia Book Fellowship, yes. 08 Q. What is the relationship now between The Fellowship and 09 The Urantia Foundation? 10 A. Well, the relationship -- they are now a licensee of 11 Urantia Fellowship -- of Urantia Foundation, and our 12 relationship as individuals and organization is on the mend, in 13 my opinion. In my 12 years that I've never felt more hopeful 14 and confident about a raprishmal (sp). 15 Q. Now, The Forum -- let's get back to The Contact Commission 16 and The Forum, Sadler's team, Contact Commission. 17 MR. SCHOENTHALER: Your Honor, if I may, out of 18 respect, this was an organization that had a name. It was The 19 Contact Commission. 20 MR. ABOWITZ: I believe the witness referred to it as 21 the Sadler team, Your Honor. 22 MR. SCHOENTHALER: I think it was a descriptive term 23 that they had. 24 THE COURT: State your question, counselor. 25 Q. (BY MR. ABOWITZ) With respect to the Sadler team, that 00155 { 4:37:46pm} 01 was the smaller group of the original two groups that were 02 functioning? 03 A. I'm willing to use that term. By the way, I prefer also 04 what counsel has said. I do prefer the name Contact 05 Commission. 06 Q. I apologize. I thought you had used that term. 07 A. I may have. 08 Q. I'm comfortable with using whatever term you want to use. 09 A. May we use "Contact Commission"? 10 Q. Absolutely. 11 A. Thank you. 12 Q. Now, The Contact Commission was composed of what people? 13 A. Dr. Sadler, Emma Christensen, Dr. Sadler's son: Bill 14 Sadler, and two Kelloggs, a Wilfred Kellogg and an Anna 15 Kellogg. 16 Q. Were they all somehow related? 17 A. Blood related? 18 Q. Yeah. 19 A. Oh, did I say Dr. Sadler's wife also? 20 Q. Well, before -- let's go through -- 21 A. There was some -- 22 Q. Excuse me. May I interrupt? Let's go through the list 23 and make sure we have them all now. Dr. Sadler and 24 Mrs. Sadler, Lena Sadler? 25 A. Yes. 00156 { 4:39:02pm} 01 Q. Who was a physician by the way, was she not? 02 A. Yes. 03 Q. Bill Sadler, Jr.? 04 A. Yes. 05 Q. The son of Mr. -- of Drs. Sadler? 06 A. Yes. 07 Q. And Emma Christensen? 08 A. Yes. 09 Q. Any relation to the Sadlers? 10 A. No. 11 Q. The Kelloggs, Mr. and Mrs.? 12 A. Yes. 13 Q. Any relation to the Sadlers? 14 A. Yes. 15 Q. What? 16 A. Dr. Sadler's wife was a Kellogg. 17 Q. Is that the same as the cereal people in Michigan? 18 A. Not directly, but, yes, it is that family. 19 Q. Now, that was the group of people that originally 20 essentially -- well, I don't want to use my words. What was 21 their function? 22 A. The Contact Commission was under oath not to reveal the 23 identity of the contact and they worked with the contact for 24 some 50 years. 25 Q. Did they take any other oaths? 00157 { 4:40:09pm} 01 A. None that I know of. 02 Q. Now, there has been reference to a group called The 03 Forum. What was The Forum? 04 A. In about 1923, Dr. Sadler and his wife agreed that they 05 would have a philosophical society, a book discussion club 06 unrelated to The Urantia Book. People, friends of theirs, 07 associates, acquaintances, began to come to the house on 08 Sunday, I think it was, Sunday afternoon. And soon after that 09 started, I have the idea within a few sessions, that Dr. Sadler 10 told them something about this Urantia phenomena, and that's 11 all they wanted to talk about after that. They decided then, 12 in December of '23, or January of '24 I think was when The 13 Forum got started, and their function -- well, I think of their 14 function as being related to the statement made by 15 Dr. Sadler: no questions, no papers. They would ask questions 16 and The Urantia Book came -- the papers in The Urantia Book 17 came as answers to those questions. 18 Q. In the handwriting of the patient contact person? 19 A. That's my understanding, yes. 20 Q. How many people were in The Forum? 21 A. I think the total number at any one time, it was fewer 22 than 200 but people would move into and out of Chicago and join 23 The Forum and then become inactive members, I suppose, because 24 they moved out of Chicago. I think the total number was -- I 25 know it was over 300. It may have been over 400. 00158 { 4:42:33pm} 01 Q. Were those people required to sign some oath or affirm 02 some oath of secrecy? 03 A. Yes. 04 Q. And what was the nature of the oath? 05 A. They took an oath to not tell any member of their family 06 or anyone else about The Urantia Book and what was being said 07 at these Sunday afternoon gatherings. 08 Q. Would you agree with the characterization that there were 09 rather stringent rules regarding communi- -- that no one was to 10 communicate what was discussed in these meetings? 11 A. That's an accurate characterization, I think. 12 Q. Is it a true statement, sir, between the time that that 13 Forum first began and the time of the publication of The 14 Urantia Book, that those stringent rules governing 15 communication of that group were in place? 16 A. I'm sorry. Would you repeat that? 17 Q. Yes. 18 Is it true that between the time The Forum was established 19 and the time The Urantia Book was published in 1955, that these 20 stringent rules developed by Dr. Sadler governing that there 21 was to be no communication about what they heard, saw, 22 observed, talked about in these sessions, remained in place? 23 A. Yes. 24 Q. Did those people know of the identity of the 25 patient/contact person? 00159 { 4:44:27pm} 01 A. I was told by Dr. Sadler there were only six individuals 02 who knew and those individuals were the members of the Contact 03 Commission. Again, they took an oath not to reveal the 04 identity of the contact, the sleeping subject. 05 Q. As time went on, did any of the members of the Contact 06 Commission become board members of The Urantia Foundation? 07 A. Three of them did. 08 Q. Who? 09 A. Bill Sadler, Jr., Dr. Sadler's son; Wilfred Kellogg; and 10 Emma Christensen. They were three of the first five trustees. 11 Q. And who was the last surviving person in that group? 12 A. Emma Christensen. 13 Q. When, please, sir, did she pass away? 14 A. I think she died in 1982. 15 Q. And how old was she at the time? 16 A. '93, I think. 17 Q. And when was the last time she had functioned as a member 18 of the board of trustees of The Urantia Foundation? 19 A. I don't know. 20 Q. Now, I'd like to change courses here for a minute and 21 briefly discuss other litigation. 22 You were on the board at the time of the Christian (sic) 23 Maaherra lawsuit? 24 A. Kristen Maaherra. Yes, I was. 25 Q. Kristen Maaherra. I'm sorry. 00160 { 4:46:47pm} 01 Was there more than one party to that lawsuit as a 02 defendant? 03 A. More than one party? 04 Q. Yes, sir. 05 A. There was Urantia Foundation versus Kristen Maaherra. 06 Q. And The Foundation brought -- instituted a lawsuit against 07 her? 08 A. Yes. 09 Q. Where? 10 A. In Arizona. 11 Q. Why? 12 A. She had duplicated the entire Urantia Book and put it on 13 computer diskette and distributed it using also the marks, the 14 three concentric marks on the white background, and also using 15 the mark on what she sent to people. 16 Q. And did The Foundation take a position in that case as to 17 why what she did was improper in their view? 18 A. We did. I was not that involved in such matters at that 19 time. 20 Q. So you cannot relate that to us today? 21 A. No. Or that's a true statement. 22 Q. Pardon me? 23 A. What you just said is true, that I could not relate to you 24 any detail. 25 Q. You are aware, are you not, of litigation involving a man 00161 { 4:48:18pm} 01 named Burton? 02 A. Barely aware. 03 Q. Are you aware, other than this lawsuit, the Maaherra and 04 Burton, if there were any other lawsuits involving Urantia 05 Foundation wherein the issue was either the trademark or 06 copyright? 07 A. I'm aware of two or three others. 08 Q. And can you relate those to us? 09 A. There was in Los Angeles a -- I think it was called 10 Urantia Massage and we asked them to not use our name for their 11 massage parlor. They refused to do it and we told them we 12 would ask a judge to order them to remove their sign and not 13 use our name. 14 Q. And hopefully you were successful? 15 A. And we were successful. 16 Q. Any others? 17 A. There was also I think a race horse that bore our name and 18 we asked the owners to not use our name or the name Urantia on 19 the race horse and he agreed to do that. 20 And there was, I think, a bar -- a restaurant/bar in New 21 Orleans, somewhere in the south, and my understanding is that 22 upon request the owners ceased using the name Urantia in the 23 name of their bar and restaurant. 24 Q. What was the name of the race horse? 25 A. I don't know. I don't know. 00162 { 4:49:57pm} 01 Q. You said "using our name." 02 A. Well, somewhere in the name of the horse. It may have 03 been called Urantian, but it might have been called Urantia -- 04 Q. Some form of that? 05 A. Yes. 06 Q. Were they followers -- were the owners of the horse 07 followers of the Urantia movement? 08 A. No. I think all of these cases to which I've referred, 09 they were nonreaders of The Urantia Book. They just heard -- 10 in the case of the massage parlor, they heard the name and they 11 liked the sound of it. 12 Q. Was the horse at least a winner? 13 A. I don't know. 14 THE COURT: Counsel, let's recess for the day. You 15 ready? 16 MR. ABOWITZ: Yes. 17 THE COURT: 9 o'clock in the morning be agreeable? 18 MR. ABOWITZ: Yes, sir. 19 THE COURT: Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, we'll 20 be recessed until 9 o'clock in the morning. Be back here just 21 prior to that time in the jury assembly room. We'll try to 22 start very promptly. My bailiff will come for you. 23 I'll remind you again of my previous admonition not to 24 discuss this case. Don't read anything about it that might in 25 any way influence your determination in this case. Don't 00163 { 4:51:05pm} 01 listen to anything about it. Make up your mind with regard to 02 the facts in this case based upon the evidence that you hear 03 here in open court and nothing else. 04 Everyone please stand for the jurors to clear the 05 courtroom. 06 (THE JURY WAS EXCUSED FROM THE COURTROOM, AFTER WHICH THE 07 FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HAD IN OPEN COURT:) 08 THE COURT: Court will be in recess. 09 (THE EVENING RECESS WAS TAKEN) 10 (PLEASE REFER TO VOLUME II) 11 12