The 69-year-old Canadian filmmaker Paul Haggis won the Oscar for Best Picture for his self-written and directed "Crash," and has also written "Million Dollar Baby," "Flag of the Fathers," and "Iwo Jima." Letters", "007: Battle of Casino Royale", "007: Quantum of Solace" and other film scripts. However, on June 19 this year, the news that he was arrested by the local police for sexual assault while attending a film festival in Italy suddenly came out, which shocked the outside world.

Paul Haggis won two Oscars for "Crash."

Now, after a month and a half of investigation and evidence collection and court debate, the three judges of the Court of Appeal in the southern Italian city of Lecce have finally made a decision recently to completely restore Paul Haggis' freedom, which is basically the same. The assertion that he has been accused of raping women is completely groundless.
Film festival promoter who became rape suspect
This trip to Italy, Haggis was originally to participate in the Arolla Film Festival in Puglia from June 21 to June 26. The film festival is held for the first time this year. Haggis, through his extensive network, invited Marisa Tomei, Edward Norton, Jon Hamm, Matt Dillon, Jeremy Irons, Oliver Stone, Paviu Pawi Wlikowski, Martin Campbell and other big names in the European and American film and television circles came to be guests. He himself would have also participated in master class lectures during the film festival, which can be said to be the mainstay of this film festival.
Unexpectedly, just before the official start of the film festival, Haggis suddenly became a rape suspect and was arrested by the police in Brindisi, where the film festival was held. Several film festival lectures that James Haggis and Alissa Haggis, who had a movie meal, were supposed to attend, were also implicated and cancelled.
It is reported that the victim of the rape is a 28-year-old British woman, the police did not disclose her name and occupation to the outside world. The two are said to have met at the Monte Carlo Comedy Film Festival in late April, where Haggis was a judge. According to Haggis' defense lawyer, the woman is also engaged in acting work and dreams of becoming the next Bond girl. Knowing that Haggis had worked as a screenwriter for two 007 series films, she offered to represent Haggis Provide sleeping services in exchange for future performance opportunities.
According to the agreement, the two came to Ostuni, a resort more than 40 kilometers away from Brindisi, to meet on June 12, and then spent three days together in the same hotel room. According to the woman, Haggis raped her multiple times during this period, and then drove to the local airport early on June 15 and left her there. "I was raped for days," she told Brindisi District Attorney Antonio Negro. "We said we were going to make a movie together, and he raped me from Sunday to Wednesday."
Alone, in the sparsely populated Italian airport in the early morning, she looked particularly abrupt, and quickly attracted the attention of the service staff. Soon, the local police arrived and took him to the hospital. On June 19, Italian police arrested Haggis on charges of rape and asked him not to leave the Ostuni hotel room where he was staying.
Since then, when the defense lawyer accepted media interviews on behalf of Haggis, he always insisted that the client was innocent and innocent. Although there was indeed a sexual relationship between the two, it was your own will and never involved violent coercion. Moreover, the lawyer produced the most direct evidence: the injury report issued by the local hospital responsible for receiving the woman for the first time clearly stated that she was not injured, and there was no trace of violence or sexual assault. . In this context, on July 3, Brindisi District Court Judge Vilma Gilli ordered the lifting of Haggis' stay-at-home order, but in order to prove his innocence, Haggis decided to stay in locally.

After the incident, Haggis (middle) has been stranded in Italy.

Just a week later, the relentless prosecutor Negro re-applied for the reinstatement of Haggis's stay-at-home order, on the grounds that the case had not been fully clarified and the suspect could still abscond, and for solemnity, the judge also granted it. It granted approval, but also rejected the prosecutor's request to formally file an indictment, citing insufficient evidence. In this context, prosecutor Negro sent the case to the higher-level Lecce Provincial Court of Appeal, but the three judges finally made a decision not to file the case. As of press time, Haggis is still staying in Italy, and the prosecution has not publicly admitted defeat for the time being. However, according to the current case and evidence, since four judges have found Haggis to be innocent, I am afraid that it will be more The chances of reopening the criminal investigation are slim.
Revenge from Scientology?
After the incident, Haggis only accepted an interview with the local media in early July. In addition to continuing to defend himself, he also admitted that he had indeed made two mistakes. "Allowing someone I don't know very well to come directly to me was the first mistake I made; it was so stupid," he told La Repubblica. "The second mistake was , When I encountered something and felt very uncomfortable and decided to end everything between me and her, I chose to take the initiative to accompany her to the airport, and arrived at the airport a few hours before her flight was scheduled to take off."
According to Haggis, looking back now, he felt that the other party was suspicious from the very beginning. "I saw the picture of her being investigated by the police, and she looked very prepared, as if she had been rehearsed in advance, not at all like they said she had a nervous breakdown and was hit hard. For the time being, of course I have no evidence, but from my Judging from the years of experience in dealing with Scientology, I believe that these people can do anything. For those who criticize them publicly, Scientology will do anything to ruin your reputation, career and family."
The "Scientology" in Paul Haggis's mouth is the so-called cult that is sometimes translated as the Church of Scientology. Scientology, which will celebrate its 70th anniversary next year, has been standing tall despite the constant scandals over the years, thanks to the celebrity influence of big-name believers such as Tom Cruise.

Tom Cruise at a Scientology event.

In Hollywood, in addition to "Tom", John Travolta, Elisabeth Moss, and Vivian Kubrick, the daughter of the great director Kubrick, are also its faithful believers. Custer, the protagonist in Paul Thomas Anderson's The Master, bears the shadow of L. Lang Hubbard, the founder of Scientology.

"The Handmaid's Tale" star Elisabeth Moss, is also a faithful believer of Scientology.

Part of the inspiration for the film "Master" came from Scientology founder Herbert.

Paul Haggis, who was an atheist in his youth, also joined the local Scientology Church in Ontario, Canada for various reasons, from the age of 22 to 56. In October 2009, stimulated by the Church of Scientology's stance against same-sex marriage, Haggis, who had long been dissatisfied with the organization, angrily chose to quit in a high-profile manner, bringing the Church of Scientology into disrepute. And so—according to Haggis himself—it also led to covert retaliation from the group.
In 2017, Haleigh Breest, who worked in Hollywood film distribution, took Paul Haggis to court, saying he sexually assaulted him in 2013. After the news came to light, three more women who did not want to be identified made similar allegations. One, who also worked in film distribution, met Haggis in 1996 while promoting a TV show, accusing the latter of forcing her to perform oral sex on him and then raping her. She remained silent for so many years out of fear that no one would believe her claims, and Haggis threatened to end her film career if she did. Another accuser stated that he entered Haggis's office because of his work relationship, but was forcibly kissed by the latter, and finally escaped from the devil's lair. According to the accuser, Haggis, who was a husband, told her shamelessly at the time that he and his wife had already made a contract for three chapters, and that he cheated in marriage, and his wife would not have any opinion. A third accuser said Haggis also forcibly kissed her in 2015.
As for Haggis himself, he denies the above remarks and implies that it is Scientology's revenge against him, while TV actress Leah Remini (Leah Remini), who also has the experience of breaking away from Scientology, and former Scientology executive Mike ·Linder (Mike Rinder), who supported Haggis' innocence after the incident. In July 2019, the New York court that heard the case asked Haggis to provide a DNA sample for a merits inquiry. Since then, due to the epidemic, the trial of the case has been pushed again and again, and it is currently scheduled to officially open in October this year. It seems that Paul Haggis, who has not released a new work for at least three and a half years, will find it difficult to relax even if he can retire from Italy.