Scientology Volunteer Minister and actress says Haiti changed her life

| Haiti 9 March 2010 |

Cassandra Hepburn

A week in Haiti on the Scientology Disaster Response Team changed actress Cassandra Hepburn’s life. Born in the Philippines and raised in London, Hong Kong and Switzerland, she has led no sheltered life, but she says her week in Haiti opened her eyes to what helping others is all about.

Hepburn arrived in Haiti on February 14, 2010, aboard a Scientology-sponsored charter flight and went to work helping refugees in three IDP (Internally Displaced Persons) camps. “Living conditions for the volunteers and medical professionals were pretty rugged—we slept in tents on cots or in sleeping bags on concrete slabs or hard floors, and we ate MREs (meals ready to eat—food rations for the United States Armed Forces), but compared to the conditions at the IDP camps this was luxurious,” she said.

In the IDP camps, entire families live out in the open, their only protection from the elements a sheet or a tarp suspended from a branch. “Unless we act now to provide shelter for the refugees there will be devastation during the rainy season.” Hepburn’s assignment in Haiti also included working in local orphanages with a team of medical professionals who provided checkups while volunteers gave food and toys to the children. “They were so happy to see that someone cared,” she said.

Hepburn, 33, appeared in the Quentin Tarantino film “Hellride” and in the daytime drama “The Young and the Restless.” A Scientologist since 2005, she recently joined staff at the new Church of Scientology and Celebrity Centre in Las Vegas, which held its grand opening on February 6, 2010.