The Ideal Scientologist: Konrad Aigner

By John Brown

Konrad Aigner, who died in Munich in 1997, aged 43, was one of the six children of a farmer in Weiler Ruhmannsaigen, Rottal, in southern Germany. The only unusual aspect of his life was his 23-year involvement with Scientology. The only puzzling feature of his life was the way he died. His family say 'Scientology ruined his life, and ours'.

Konrad was in many ways the ideal recruit: 'a naive, trusting, inexperienced farmer's son, who had no idea of what the world was like'. He became a member of the cult sometime after 1976 when he moved to Munich to take up a job as a bus driver. His family knew about his connection with Scientology but never discussed it with him and had no idea how involved he was. In 1995 Konrad unexpectedly moved back to the family farm. He had given up his job and bought a second-hand bus. He told his mother that driving his own bus would enable him to earn more money and move up the Bridge more rapidly. To cross the Bridge to Total Freedom is the goal of every keen Scientologist. It is a very expensive process, currently believed to cost US$360,000. It is also a totally spurious process, leading not to Total Freedom but to Total Disillusionment, as several OT8s have stated in no uncertain terms.

Konrad's bus-hire business thrived but in 1996 his family noticed that he had changed. Normally cheerful and easy-going, he had become tense, nervous and preoccupied. His family attributed this to the worries of self-employment but still did not understand how deeply involved he was with Scientology. A friend reports that in 1996 Konrad tried to leave the sect. He had come to see what they were doing to him and did not like it. Then things apparently improved. But again, early in 1997, he told his mother he wanted to get away from them: he had learned something so terrible that it would kill her to hear about it. Bearing in mind that Konrad was a simple soul, not stupid but limited in his outlook and education, this terrible secret was not necessarily some criminal activity. It might have been no more than the story of Xenu, taken literally by the perfect recruit and always sold as a top-secret 'truth'. In fact he remained actively involved with the cult until his death.

It is perhaps no more than a coincidence that Konrad died a few months later, in August 1997, after three months in a coma. Here there is no question of murder or suicide but a great mystery remains. On Thursday 17 July 17 1997, Konrad responded to a phone call, evidently from the CoS, and drove his bus to Munich. He was sweating and shaking but still apparently healthy. He stayed in Munich until Monday July 21 but by then felt ill enough to cancel a booking for the following Saturday. Nevertheless on Monday he drove a party of Scientologists to Frankfurt to take part in a demonstration for religious freedom, ironically enough. Back in Munich that evening he was at last taken to hospital where he fell into a coma. The Scientology center in Munich lied to the family about Konrad and then fobbed them off with 'nice words'.

Whatever happened to him certainly happened within the Munich org. No-one seems to doubt that it was his involvement with Scientology which, directly or indirectly, led to his premature death, and it may be significant that vitamins were found among his possessions after his death. Konrad died of multiple organ failure - his heart, lungs and stomach had all stopped working. The autopsy report notes that their condition was abnormal for a man of his age. No answer to this mysterious collapse has so far been found. However several things point to a notorious and dangerous Scientology practice known as the Purification Rundown or Purif. It involves overdosing on vitamins and spending many hours for several consecutive days, in a very hot sauna. Prolonged exposure to abnormally high body temperatures causes soft tissue damage and death. Consequently multiple organ failure is a feature of severe or repeated heat exhaustion. An individual can survive a single episode if given the proper emergency treatment but he remains vulnerable to even a modest rise in body temperature for an unknown period. If Konrad had been forced to prolong his 'purif' or repeat it too often, it could produce exactly the symptoms which killed him. It is in fact difficult to think of any other possible explanation. He was already sweating and shaking before he left for Munich, which suggests that damage had already been done. As in other Scientology deaths we can point to the cult's negligence, arrogance, irresponsibility and a lack of the normal care due to one human being from another.

Konrad's bizarre death was a sufficient blow to his family but there was worse to come. If his encounter with Scientology taxed Konrad beyond his capacity and eventually killed him, it was no less a disaster for his brothers and sisters. This simple bachelor who lived at home, worked hard, lived frugally, never went on holiday, left huge debts. His brother Bernard calculated that during the last few months of his life Konrad had paid the cult 70,000 marks and estimated that his total payments over the years were at least 600,000 marks. Not only his own savings but those of his family had been given to Scientology. To repay his loans his brothers and sisters had to sell their land. The only thing they managed to save was their parents' house, and a useless e-meter for which their brother had paid 8,000 marks. 'We cannot bring Konrad back to life, but maybe he can serve as a warning to others.'

Sources: Gerhard Huber 'The Puzzling Death of Konrad Aigner', Passau New Press, February 14 1998. Copied into alt.religion.scientology 14 November 1998. http://cisar.org