Many of the Knights Templar in France were arrested on October 13, 1307 at the orders of King Philip IV of France. King Philip was severely in debt to the military order, and hoped to claim their wealth for his own purposes. Scores of charges were leveled at the Templars, many of them similar charges to those which had been directed at other of Philip's enemies, such as heresy and blasphemy. While tortured, some Templars "confessed" to these crimes. Pope Clement V interceded and directed that actual trials take place; however, Philip sought to thwart this effort, and had several Templars burned at the stake as heretics, in order to prevent them from participating in the trials. The actions taken by Philip would eventually lead to the complete disbanding of the Order on March 22, 1312.