Campus Crest Communities CEO Ted Rollins Has a Conviction for Assault In His Background

Ted Rollins

(Includes update at 8:05 p.m. on 5/6/12)

Ted Rollins, CEO of Wall Street darling Campus Crest Communities, was convicted of assault in the 1995 beating of his stepson.

Despite his criminal record, Rollins leads a company that in late 2010 completed a $380-million IPO on Wall Street. Campus Crest Communities has gone on to build, manage, and market student housing to young people at 33 universities around the country. With a preferred stock offering in the works--and it's expected to generate another $55 million--the company appears to be in growth mode.

As a member of one of the nation's wealthiest families--the folks behind Orkin Pest Control and its parent company, Atlanta-based Rollins Inc.--Ted Rollins has access to significant financial clout. Public documents show that Campus Crest's IPO and its latest stock offering were arranged by such investment heavyweights as Raymond James, RBC Capital Markets, Barclay's Capital, and Citigroup. Among the lead investors in Campus Crest are Cohen and Steers Capital Management, Wellington Management Company, and Neuberger Berman.

Major legal players also are at Rollins' disposal. Birmingham-based Bradley Arant and Chicago-based Sidley Austin, the sixth largest law firm in the country and one of the oldest firms in the world, were deeply involved in preparing the stock offerings for Campus Crest Communities.

Did any of the financial and legal big hitters bother to examine Ted Rollins' background before sinking millions of investor dollars into his venture? If they had, they would have found some deeply disturbing stuff.

A judge in Franklin County, North Carolina, found Rollins guilty of simple assault, a violation of Section 14-33(a) of the North Carolina General Statutes. Rollins was sentenced to probation, fined $100, charged $65 for court costs, and $250 in restitution to Franklin Regional Medical Center. (Various court documents related to the case can be viewed at the end of this post.)

We will take a detailed look at Ted Rollins' arrest and conviction for assault in upcoming posts. But for now, it seems clear the criminal-justice system treated Rollins in a stunningly gentle fashion. Perhaps that's because he was head of American Textile Services, one of the largest employers in and around Louisburg, North Carolina, when the beating took place on September 9, 1995.

Our research shows that, under North Carolina law, the beating should have been reported to social-services officials as a case of probable child abuse. Based on the description of an eye witness, Sherry Carroll Rollins, the beating inflicted serious physical injury and should have been treated as a felony.

Sherry Rollins now is divorced from Ted Rollins and lives in Birmingham with the couple's two daughters, Sarah and Emma. Zac Parrish, Ms. Rollins' son from her first marriage, was 16 when he became the target of Ted Rollins' wrath--and it remains unclear what sparked the beating. In fact, Zac Parrish denied to me in a phone conversation that the beating happened.

We do know that a report was made to North Carolina officials in 1993 about a possible dysfunctional and abusive relationship between Ted Rollins and Zac Parrish.

After an investigation produced no substantive steps to protect Zac Parrish, things got even uglier two years later. It appears that Ted Rollins probably would have beaten his stepson to death had Sherry Rollins not climbed on his back, ripping his shirt, and then called 911. Ted Rollins stopped the beating and fled the scene when sirens from an ambulance and sheriff's vehicles could be heard.

Parrish now is 33 and is the managing member of Parrish Building Company in Birmingham. His mother has told us that Ted Rollins and the Rollins family have provided substantial support to Zac Parrish's enterprise. Why is that? Well, that's not clear. But Zac Parrish responded with profanity-filled rage recently when I asked him for an interview about several issues connected to the Rollins v. Rollins divorce case, including the beating in North Carolina.

Meanwhile, Sherry Rollins and her daughters were so badly cheated in the divorce that they have been on food stamps--even though Mr. Rollins owns one company that has three private jet craft and his most recent venture has received Wall Street support that is starting to approach half a billion dollars.

We have shown in a series of posts that the Rollins divorce case could not lawfully be moved from South Carolina, where Sherry Rollins filed the initial complaint and it was litigated for three years, to Shelby County, Alabama, where Ted Rollins filed a complaint after his wife and daughters were forced to flee here after being forced out of the family home in Greenville.

The divorce case, it turns out, was not the first time Ted Rollins received outrageously favorable treatment in a court of law. Much the same thing happened in the assault case, where he was convicted but received nothing like the kind of punishment prescribed by law for such a brutal beating.

We soon will be taking a closer look at the assault case and other issues involving Ted Rollins and Zac Parrish. Meanwhile, corporate and legal titans are preparing another stock offering for Campus Crest Communities.

Do the Wall Street types know what kind of man stands as the CEO and public face of Campus Crest Communities? Do they care?


(Update at 8:05 p.m. on 5/6/12)

In paragraph 8 above, we wrote that, based on Sherry Rollins' description of the beating, it should have been treated as a felony assault. That does not appear to be a correct statement under North Carolina law, which we've had an opportunity to study further in the past few days.

Our original reporting would be correct under Alabama law, which is relatively straightforward on assaults. But our research shows that North Carolina assault law is unusually complex and is very different from the law in Alabama. The assault, of course, took place in North Carolina, so that state's law would govern--and it appears that the Rollins assault, if treated properly under the law, still would not have been a felony.

It did, however, appear to classify as the most serious level of misdemeanor assault in North Carolina, rather than the simple assault for which Ted Rollins was convicted. We will address this further in an upcoming post.



Ted Rollins Arrested for Assault Ted Rollins Convicted of Assault

How Will Alabama's Crimson Tide Nation React To CEO Ted Rollins And His History As A Child Abuser?

Ted Rollins (right), with
Penn State booster Jack McWhirter

I know many University of Alabama supporters, and they tend to be a conservative bunch, touting God, family, and football--not necessarily in that order.

How will Crimson Tide nation take to a corporate executive who is entering their environs with a documented history as a child abuser? How will that square with UA's notion of family values?

We are about to find out because Charlotte-based Campus Crest Communities is seeking approval to build a student-housing complex near the University of Alabama campus. It will be known as The Grove at Tuscaloosa, and the 228-unit complex is planned for Fifth Street Northeast, at the site of the former Riverview Water Treatment plant. 

Ted Rollins, CEO of Campus Crest Communities, has been the topic of frequent reports here at Legal Schnauzer, mainly because of his central role in the Rollins v. Rollins divorce case, which reached a conclusion in Shelby County, Alabama, even though it had been originally filed in Greenville, South Carolina (the proper jurisdiction), and litigated there for three years.

We have called Rollins v. Rollins the most grossly unjust outcome we've encountered in a civil court case. The judgment in Shelby County was so unlawful and one-sided that it left ex wife Sherry Carroll Rollins and the couple's two daughters (Sarah and Emma Rollins) on and off food stamps at their Birmingham residence. Meanwhile, Ted Rollins owns three private jets, and his company has received roughly $800 million in Wall Street support.

On top of that, Ted Rollins comes from one of the nation's wealthiest families--the folks behind Rollins Inc. (the umbrella company for Orkin Pest Control and RPC Inc.), plus Dover Downs Gaming and Entertainment and Rollins Jamaica Ltd. 

How did Ted Rollins manage to pull off a monstrous cheat job against his ex wife and daughters in an Alabama courtroom? Public records suggest he did it with assistance from his corporate law firm, the highly influential Bradley Arant in downtown Birmingham.

If The Grove becomes a reality in Tuscaloosa--and it almost certainly will--UA students who rent apartments there had best beware. If they have a dispute with the property's owners, Ted Rollins has a documented history of bludgeoning his opponents--and receiving flagrantly unlawful favors--in Alabama courtrooms.

But that's not all. Ted Rollins also has a history of treating young people like punching bags--and we mean that quite literally. (See documents at the end of this post.)

Public records show that Rollins was convicted for assault on his 16-year-old stepson in Franklin County, North Carolina. Under North Carolina law, the beating met the definition of child abuse, although Rollins was not prosecuted for that. Here are a couple of posts where we have covered that issue:

Campus Crest Communities CEO Ted Rollins Has A Conviction For Assault In His Background (May 2, 2012)

How Was Campus Crest CEO Ted Rollins Convicted Of "Simple Assault" In North Carolina? (May 10, 2012)

Ted Rollins' ugliness toward young people does not end there. He also was investigated for child sexual abuse of the same stepson, based on a complaint from an anonymous citizen. We covered that in the following posts:

Campus Crest Communities CEO Ted Rollins Was Investigated For The Sexual Abuse Of His Stepson (September 12, 2012)

Towels Soiled With Feces Point To Child Sexual Abuse Involving CEO Ted Rollins (September 13, 2012)

Ted Rollins has proven that he is a brazen fellow. The Grove at State College is scheduled to open this month in central Pennsylvania. Campus Crest will be marketing the facility to students at Penn State, home to the still-unfolding Jerry Sandusky child-abuse scandal. We have yet to see any signs that Penn State supporters are concerned that a company led by a child abuser intends to make money off the university's students and their parents. That's probably because the Penn State community remains in the dark, for now, about Ted Rollins and the ugliness in his background.

University of Alabama supporters should not be able to claim ignorance. After all, Rollins has deep ties to our state. He already has student-housing complexes at four Alabama institutions--South Alabama, Troy, Jacksonville State, and Auburn. The gross corruption in the Rollins v. Rollins divorce case should be apparent to anyone who cares to check public court files in Alabama. Plus, a number of Ted Rollins' victims live in our state--and that includes his ex wife and two daughters, plus the stepson (Zac Parrish) Rollins abused on multiple occasions. Parrish, now in his early 30s, works as a residential-construction contractor in the Birmingham area.

Will the University of Alabama and its Crimson Tide nation sit quietly while Ted Rollins operates under their noses? Perhaps we will learn more when Campus Crest goes before the Tuscaloosa City Council on a rezoning request.

Ted Rollins Arrested for Assault by Roger Shuler

Ted Rollins Convicted of Assault by Roger Shuler

Why Was A Document Altered In The Assault Case Against Campus Crest CEO Ted Rollins?

Ted Rollins

Evidence indicates someone altered a key document in the 1995 assault case against Campus Crest Communities CEO Ted Rollins. Was the alteration a not-so-subtle attempt to help Rollins avoid jail time in the vicious beating of Zac Parrish, his 16-year-old stepson at the time? Based on our research of pertinent North Carolina law, the answer appears to be yes.

If we are correct, that means someone in authority took steps to protect Rollins, probably because he belongs to one of the nation's wealthiest families and headed a major employer (American Textile Services in Franklin County, North Carolina) when the assault occurred.

Is this a case where a member of the "1 Percent" received favorable treatment that would not be offered to regular folks? It sure looks that way.

And what about the tendency of doctored papers to appear whenever members of the Rollins family are around? We know that employees of Orkin Pest Control held pizza parties to forge customer signatures on termite contracts that had not been fulfilled. Orkin's parent company, Atlanta-based Rollins Inc., is headed by Randall and Gary Rollins, Ted's billionaire cousins. Are the altered documents in North Carolina another example of the Rollins family playing fast and loose with official papers? Does Sidley Austin, the powerful Chicago law firm that has long defended Orkin in all kinds of chicanery, have the clout to get Ted Rollins out of a criminal pickle in North Carolina?

This much is clear: Ted Rollins picked the right state to beat up his stepson. Under North Carolina law, Rollins' actions meet the definition for domestic violence, but that state has weak criminal provisions for enforcing the law. Even in a state as backward as Alabama, Rollins would have faced much more serious repercussions for an act of domestic violence than he did in North Carolina.

The alteration in the Rollins criminal-court file is significant because, under North Carolina law, hospitalization of the victim is a key consideration in an assault charge that could result in jail time. And the alteration involves someone marking out a reference to the fact that Zac Parrish was hospitalized.

That change apparently is the reason Ted Rollins was charged and convicted for a "simple assault," with a sentence of probation and restitution/fines totaling $415. Because Zac Parrish was hospitalized--and also because he suffered significant blood loss and had a broken nose and numerous lacerations and abrasions--Rollins should have been charged with "assault inflicting serious injury."

And that could have meant jail time for the man who now is CEO of Campus Crest Communities, a company that builds and manages student-housing developments at 33 universities around the country.

So how did Ted Rollins manage to be charged for a relatively minor offense instead of the much more serious crime he actually committed. The answer can be found in the warrant for arrest and criminal bill of costs in the court file. (Both documents appear at the end of this post.)

Come along with us for a brief guided tour, showing how a Wall Street titan catches a huge break in a criminal case. Do you believe that we have a justice system that applies the law equally across socioeconomic boundaries? If so, you probably will no longer believe that when you have finished our tour.

We start in the upper right-hand corner of the warrant for arrest. That's where someone has written a description of events in the beating of Zac Parrish. The description is written next to the words "Simple Assault [G.S. 14-33(a)] and strike." Not all of the narrative is legible, and the grammar is cringe inducing, but here is what we can make out:

Jack [sic] Parrish by hit him about face and mouth where Mr. . . . 

At that point, someone has marked out the following words:

Parrish was taken to the hospital to seek medical treatment . . . 

On the top line of the "Simple Assault" section, two or three illegible words have not been marked out. Our best guess is that they say "in shocking status." If that is correct, it appears to be a reference to the fact that Zac Parrish was in danger of going into shock after the assault. And that narrative fits with the words of Sherry Carroll Rollins (Zac Parrish's mother and Ted Rollins' ex wife) in our interview about the beating.

Ms. Rollins stated that she and her daughter, Sarah Rollins, rode in an ambulance with Zac Parrish to the emergency room at Franklin Regional Medical Center in Louisburg, North Carolina. Ms. Rollins also stated that she believes her son was given oxygen during transport. Our research indicates that emergency-medical personnel often administer oxygen to patients who appear to be at risk for going into shock, perhaps from blood loss. That might explain why a word that looks like "shocking" or "shock" appears on the arrest warrant.

What kind of con man (or woman) marked out the words about Zac Parrish's trip to the hospital? It apparently was not a very smart one. In another court document (see page 2 of the second document below), a criminal bill of costs for Ted Rollins includes restitution to Franklin Regional Medical Center. It's obvious that Zac Parrish was, in fact, hospitalized--even though that improperly was not considered in the charge and punishment against Ted Rollins.

What about the possibility of a domestic-violence charge against Ted Rollins? Over the past 10 years or so, all states have adopted laws to address domestic violence. Some laws, however, have more teeth than others. Under North Carolina law, Ted Rollins' beating of Zac Parrish matched the description of domestic violence, outlined at General Statute 50B. Here is the definition, in pertinent part. (The full definition can be read here.)

(a) Domestic violence means the commission of one or more of the following acts upon an aggrieved party or upon a minor child residing with or in the custody of the aggrieved party by a person with whom the aggrieved party has or has had a personal relationship, but does not include acts of self‑defense: 

(1) Attempting to cause bodily injury, or intentionally causing bodily injury . . .

Unfortunately for Zac Parrish, remedies under North Carolina law focus on civil actions, such as restraining orders. There are no special criminal provisions for domestic violence; such acts are covered under regular criminal statutes. That is not the case in Alabama. In fact, I'm pleased to say this is a rare instance where our state actually looks progressive on an issue.

If Ted Rollins had committed such a beating in Alabama--where Zac Parrish, age 33, now lives--he would have been at risk for losing his freedom, assuming the law was applied correctly. A summary of Alabama domestic-violence law is available here. In Alabama, as in North Carolina, a domestic-violence relationship includes a child. But the Alabama law has real criminal teeth. Ted Rollins' actions, as described to us, would constitute a second-degree assault, which is a Class C felony. Under Code of Alabama 13A-6-131, that would be second-degree domestic violence, which is treated as a serious crime:

Domestic violence in the second degree is a Class B felony, except the defendant shall serve a minimum term of imprisonment of six months without consideration of probation, parole, good time credits, or any reduction in time for any second or subsequent conviction under this subsection.

Translation: Ted Rollins would have been looking at six months in the slammer if he had been convicted of beating his stepson in Alabama, instead of North Carolina. Even under the lenient criminal statutes of North Carolina, Rollins probably would have been subject to jail time if someone had not altered court documents in his case.

  Ted Rollins Arrested for Assault
Ted Rollins Sentence for Assault

What Would Cause the Victim of an Assault to Lie Years Later About the Crime?

Zac Parrish

In 1995, Zac Parrish pressed assault charges against his stepfather, Ted Rollins, for a beating that took place in Franklin County, North Carolina, when Parrish was 16 years old.

In 2012, Zac Parrish denied the beating ever happened.

Why the change in stories, especially when you consider that North Carolina court documents show Ted Rollins was convicted for an assault that occurred on September 9, 1995? To top it off, Birmingham resident Sherry Carroll Rollins (Zac Parrish's mother and Ted Rollins' ex wife) described the beating in considerable detail for a videotaped interview we conducted with her--and nothing we've seen in the public record conflicts with her account.

We don't mean to be overly harsh on Zac Parrish because he clearly has been victimized--used literally and figuratively as a punching bag for Ted Rollins. In addition to the 1995 assault, we know that North Carolina social-services officials received a report in 1993 about a possible dysfunctional and damaging relationship between Ted Rollins and Zac Parrish.

But why did Parrish respond with anger and profanity when I contacted him a few months back and requested an interview via telephone? (You can hear the conversation in a video at the end of this post.) After Parrish had refused to be interviewed and hurled insults my way, why did we have the following exchange? (Language alert, both in the following transcript and in the video below.)

LS: Why did Ted Rollins beat you severely when you were 15 years old? 

ZP: Ted Rollins never beat me severely, Roger . . . get your fucking facts straight 

LS: He didn't beat you? 

ZP: No, unh unh, sure didn't. 

LS: Really? Well, when you were 15 years old, I've been told, that you were beaten by Ted Rollins. 

ZP: You've been told . . . 

LS: Is that true?

All of this is an issue here in Alabama only because Ted Rollins filed a divorce lawsuit against Sherry Rollins in our state, even though she already had filed a divorce complaint against him and it had been litigated for three years in South Carolina, where the family had lived. As we have shown in a series of posts, a case cannot lawfully be heard in Alabama once jurisdiction already has been established in South Carolina--or any other state. That Shelby County Circuit Judge D. Al Crowson took the case, and issued a judgment that caused Sherry Rollins and her two daughters to wind up on food stamps, strongly indicates that someone caused Alabama's court system to be used in an abusive fashion.

Zac Parrish, in our conversation, repeatedly asked me why his mother's divorce case is any of my business. I stated that I live in Shelby County, and my taxpayer dollars are used to fund the courts, so it certainly is my business. If I were to answer that question again, I would put it in simpler, more direct, terms: Ted Rollins filed a lawsuit in Alabama, using public facilities and public officials and producing public records. All taxpayers in Alabama, not just me, help fund those public resources. So it should be of concern to all Alabamians how those resources are used.

Come to think of it, maybe I should have turned Zac Parrish's question around in this fashion: "Why is it that I'm concerned about what happened to your mother and half sisters in Shelby County court, but you don't seem concerned about it at all?"

Zac Parrish apparently views the Rollins v. Rollins divorce case, and everything associated with it, as a private family matter; perhaps that is why Parrish chose to deny the assault, which was a key event leading to the divorce. But Ted Rollins ensured that it would not be a private matter when he chose to file a lawsuit in a public forum and then refused to settle the matter, causing it to go all the way to a bench trial.

If I were in Zac Parrish's shoes, perhaps I would be agitated about press coverage of Rollins v. Rollins. If Parrish were in my shoes, perhaps he would understand why I have a special interest in the abusive use of Alabama courts--the very courts where my wife and I have been hideously abused. More importantly, perhaps Parrish would understand why, in my view, all Alabamians have a vested interest in the handling of Rollins v. Rollins and other court cases.

This much is certain from the video below: Zac Parrish is extremely angry about something. On the surface, the anger is directed at me. But all I've done is report accurately on injustices that have been inflicted upon members of his family in court. Assuming that Zac Parrish cares at least a little for his mother and sisters, he has no legitimate reason to be angry with me.

What do you hear in Zac Parrish's voice? I hear an anger that originates with Ted Rollins. But I also hear an attempt at deceit and misdirection, trying to deny an event that public records can prove took place.

Something complex and ugly is going on with Ted Rollins and Zac Parrish. The content and tone of this conversation makes that quite clear.

Former Wall Street darling Ted Rollins, angry about our reports on his dubious divorce case, has turned defamatory statements into the ugliest of "art forms"

Ted Rollins during his halcyon
days on Wall Street
(From tedrollins.org)

What is the price of reporting accurately about individuals connected to legal and political corruption in Alabama? It can be steep, especially if you care about your reputation.

Attacks from powerful forces can come in a variety of forms. I've been kidnapped by law enforcement and thrown in jail for five months, contrary to more than 200 years of First Amendment law. My wife, Carol, and I lost our Birmingham home of 25 years to a foreclosure that reeks of likely unlawful activity. We were subjected to a flagrantly unlawful eviction at an apartment in our new "home" of Springfield, Missouri, and a Greene County deputy brutalized Carol to the point that she was left with a shattered left arm that never will be the same.

Evidence strongly suggests these events were retaliation for our reporting on a number of conservative rogues--Rob Riley, Liberty Duke, Luther Strange, Jessica Medeiros Garrison, Bill Pryor, and more.

All of that has been reported here, and at other news sites, but less well known are the attacks on my reputation. And that is a timely subject, given recent reports that Gov. Robert Bentley tried to use law-enforcement resources to gather dirt on me and try to stop our reporting on his extramarital affair with former advisor Rebekah Caldwell Mason.

How ironic is this? I've twice been accused of, and been sued for, defamation--by Garrison and Riley/Duke--and in both cases, my reporting was found (as a matter of law) not to be false or defamatory. Less well known are the defamatory attacks against me--that I've been a repeated victim of the most vile defamation. I've yet to receive justice for any of the false information published about me--but that might change in the not-too-distant future.

The defamation against me has come from a variety of sources, but perhaps no one has been more blatant about it than Ted Rollins, the former CEO of Campus Crest Communities and the subject of numerous posts here about the cheat job administered in Shelby County against his ex wife (Birmingham resident Sherry Carroll Rollins) and their two daughters.

Rollins once was a darling of Wall Street, despite our reports here about his ties to domestic violence, child abuse, failure to pay child support, and other unpleasantness. Wall Street analysts, in fact, had direct knowledge of Rollins' abusive tendencies, but they chose to ignore it. Only when it appeared Rollins was about to drive Campus Crest Communities into the financial gutter, did the company's board give him the boot.

According to reports in the business press, Rollins has resurfaced as the founder of Valeo Groupe, which is focusing on student housing in places like Great Britain and Finland. He also is principal and chairman at Watercrest Group and Watercrest Holdings, which focus on senior housing.

How long will it be before investors, employees, or customers become aware of Rollins' background and his tendency to run companies into the ditch? Who knows, but the CEO's primary talent seems to be producing defamatory Web sites--with yours truly as the target.

Rollins is the "genius" behind Legal Schnauzer Exposed, an attack site that seems to have disappeared from the Web in recent days--hmmm, wonder why that is--but still can be found in archive form. It seems clear that Rollins, or someone connected to him, was behind the uber classy rogershuler.com, which has mostly disappeared, but a search still produces an entry that refers to me as "Satan's Earthly Emmissary" (sic). If my memory is correct, the site intimates that I have sex with animals and that I am a racist and a homophobe.

Finally, we discovered legalschnauzer.info, which suggests I have "psychological issues," based largely on the words of highly informed right-wing blogger Stacy McCain. (All of us who have brains have "psychological issues," right? That doesn't mean we have psychological problems, I presume. The only way not to have psychological issues is to be dead. You can see the nonsensical form of writing that tends to appear on these sites.)

We also know that Zac Parrish, Rollins former stepson and Sherry Rollins' biological son, set up an attack site, cleverly called mountschnauzer.com. Parrish got outed here for his handiwork before mountschnauzer.com could get off the ground, and the site died a quick death. What a loss for the literary world.

You will notice that the words "mount schnauzer" form a clear reference to anal, or doggy style, sex. Talk about Freudian, given that North Carolina social services investigated Ted Rollins for possible child sexual abuse, based on the complaint of a citizen who apparently had observed his interactions with Zac Parrish. On top of that, it's a matter of public record that Ted Rollins was convicted of assaulting Zac Parrish when the latter was about 16 years old and roughly half his stepfather's size.

Rollins has saved some of his finest "craftsmanship" for tedrollinstruth.com, of which he must be quite proud because he provides a link on his LinkedIn page. Most people use LinkedIn as a resource to show that they are competent professionals. Not Ted Rollins. He uses it to show he is a lying, defaming, bullying thug. Just the kind of guy I would want to run a company with my investments.

How off the rails is Rollins? You can get an idea from a post, published February 24, 2015, with the title "The Truth About Ted Rollins." Here we go, for starters:

In the fall of 2010, Mr. Ted Rollins came under attack by the Legal Schnauzer, a known and convicted cyber bully by the name of Roger Shuler. Mr. Shuler collaborated with Mr. Rollins’ ex-wife to spread untruths in the wake of her divorce from Mr. Rollins. This was an attempt to discredit Mr. Rollins after their divorce and also to extort additional money from him beyond what was provided by the divorce.

The only source that Mr. Shuler has ever had is Mr. Rollins’ ex-wife, who has used false information and Mr. Shuler’s lack of integrity to try and advance this ill-intentioned outcome. There are countless negative stories circulating on the web about Mr. Rollins and his family, all written by the Mr. Shuler aka the Legal Schnauzer blog. These stories are based on the untruths told by Mr. Rollins’ ex-wife and embellished further by the Mr. Shuler.

Exhibit A is an affidavit from Mr. Rollins’ ex wife that clearly states Mr. Schnauzer misrepresents the truth.

Let's see if we have this straight: Ted Rollins claims his ex wife, Sherry Rollins, tells "untruths" about him. But then he has Ms. Rollins sign an affidavit claiming I misrepresent the truth. If Sherry Rollins is a congenital liar, as Mr. Rollins claims, why should anyone believe a word she says in an affidavit about me? If she lies about Ted Rollins, she can lie about me, right?

Here is the real story behind Sherry Rollins' goofy, and utterly untruthful affidavit. Ted Rollins was threatening to have her utilities shut off at the Birmingham rental house where she lives with their two daughters. She felt she had no choice but to sign the bogus affidavit Ted Rollins wanted her to sign.

Ted Rollins still is using such threats. According to Ms. Rollins, he has vowed to stop paying court-ordered alimony and child support in May 2016--when youngest daughter Emma graduates from Mountain Brook High School--and have daughters and ex wife kicked out of their rental home. What a guy, that Ted Rollins.

How nutty is tedrollinstruth.com? He claims the only source I've had on the case is Sherry Rollins? I guess that doesn't count the dozens of court documents upon which I've based my reporting.

Let's check out more from Ted Rollins Truth, which might be the most ironically named site in the history of the Web:

About Roger Shuler – The “Legal Schnauzer”

Below is a summary of Mr. Shuler aka the Legal Schnauzer Blogger.

▪ The Legal Schnauzer aka Roger Shuler is a one-man blogger who claims to be a journalist, but is not. Furthermore, he does not bother to follow practices of a professional journalist. Rather, he plays fast and loose with some facts, fabricates most of his content and uses unreliable sources to create a tabloid-type blog that produces false information.

▪ He is known in Alabama as a negative blogger for hire that writes destructive innuendo to harass his victims.

▪ The Legal Schnauzer has been incarcerated twice for slandering various parties in Alabama. (FYI: Ted Rollins was convicted for assault on his teen-aged stepson in North Carolina. Ted Rollins "Truth" makes no mention of that.)

▪ From 1989 until 2008 Mr. Shuler was a content editor for the University of Alabama at Birmingham until he was terminated for inappropriate behavior. At the time Mr. Shuler also threatened the then President of the University.

▪ Mr. Shuler has been unemployed since 2008 and uses his blog as a means for extorting money from people by posting negative blog comments and trying to evoke a response from his subjects. He does this by writing his main post on his blog, The Legal Schnauzer and then by linking this post to other sites such as Daily Kos. (FYI: Mr. Rollins here falsely accuses me of a crime--extortion. Under the law, it's not a good idea to falsely accuse someone of a crime; it's called "defamation per se.")

▪ Mr. Shuler cannot pay his bills and has a very uncertain employment history. He lives on unemployment, welfare and disability and has not been employed since he was terminated from the University of Alabama, Birmingham where he threatened the life of some school officials. (FYI: Ted Rollins failed to pay court-ordered child-support for almost three years. Records indicate much of the money owed to Rollins' daughters never has been paid. In other words, Ted Rollins is a deadbeat dad. Ted Rollins "Truth" does not want you to know that. Again, Ted Rollins falsely accuses me of threatening to kill certain UAB officials. That's known as "defamation per se.")

▪ Mr. Shuler’s credit reports indicate that he routinely defaults on his debts and litigates as a strategy to avoid payment. (FYI: Court records show that Ted Rollins still owes child support to his children and that he failed to make court-ordered payments on mortgage and insurance to ensure his wife and children had a place to live during divorce proceedings. No word from Ted Rollins "Truth" about that. And by the way, how does Ted Rollins know anything about the contents of my credit reports? Does he have any lawful grounds for obtaining that information? I can't think of one.)

▪ Mr. Shuler was arrested and convicted in 2014 for failure to follow a judge’s order regarding the removal of defamatory and untrue statements regarding one of his targets. (FYI: A South Carolina court issued a bench warrant for contempt of court [failure to pay child support] and ordered Ted Rollins' arrest. That warrant was in place for more than two years, and records show Rollins never paid the full amount he owed, so he was a fugitive from justice. South Carolina law enforcement apparently did not bother to execute the arrest warrant, which apparently is one of the benefits Ted Rollins receives from being born into one of the nation's wealthiest families. On a final note, none of my reporting ever has been found to be false or defamatory, as a matter of law.)

▪ A default judgment was entered against Mr. Shuler in the amount of $3.5 million. (Editor's note: No lawful default judgment ever has been entered against Mr. Shuler.)

▪ Mr. Shuler is currently believed to be in hiding to avoid answering the default judgment, but continues to publish his blog. (In hiding? My contact information is available in multiple places on this blog. Plus, I've already answered the default judgment and proven that it is void, as a matter of law. Why "answer" it again?)

▪ More information can be found about Roger Schuler (sic) on http://www.legalschnauzers.com,

To borrow a phrase from the late Ann Richards, it looks like Ted Rollins was "born with a silver foot in his mouth."

How many ways has Ted Rollins defamed me here? Well, I'm not sure I have enough fingers to count that high. But the highlighted sections above show some of the biggest doozies. For fun, we suggest you click on the legalschnauzers.com link and see what you get. It was active just a few weeks ago.

Why hasn't the author of Ted Rollins' posts put his name to them? Shouldn't he be proud of such "work product"? Here are a few reasons the author might wish to remain anonymous:

(1) He has falsely accused me of crimes (extortion, terroristic threats)--not a good idea under defamation law;

(2) He falsely claims I've been incarcerated twice;

(3) He falsely claims I've been incarcerated for "slandering" someone. I've never been accused of slandering anyone, and slander is a tort (not a crime), which means you can't be arrested for it;

(4) He falsely claims I was fired at UAB for "inappropriate behavior" and that I threatened university president Carol Garrison and other university officials;

(5) He falsely claims I cannot pay my bills and I live on "welfare and disability";

(6) He falsely claims I was "convicted" of failing to follow a judge's order in a civil case.

I could go on, but you get the idea. There is very little truth to be found at Ted Rollins "Truth." And these kinds of bogus attacks are what you can expect from a CEO whose sense of entitlement apparently dwarfs his intelligence.

Sewanee's Honor Code Apparently Doesn't Raise Concerns About Interactions With CEO Ted Rollins

University of the South at Sewanee

The University of the South at Sewanee is noted in higher education for its honor code. So it's curious that one of the school's most prominent alums has no concerns about breaking bread earlier this year with Campus Crest Communities CEO Ted Rollins--even though our reporting has shown, and public records make clear, Mr. Rollins hardly is an honorable fellow.

Sewanee, which is just north of Chattanooga, Tennessee, enjoys a reputation as one of the nation's finest private, liberal-arts colleges. Anna Durham Windrow, head of The Windrow Group in Nashville, has more than 25 years of experience in government relations and is a prominent and visible alumna of Sewanee. She has served on the school's Alumni Board and its College Visiting Committee.

Earlier this year, Windrow met with Ted Rollins and his daughter, Sarah, having lunch and showing them around the campus. Windrow is so close to Sewanee that she has a home in the mountains near the school.

Sarah Rollins wound up being admitted to Sewanee and became part of the freshman class in August. Best we can tell, Ms. Rollins is a bright young woman who would merit inclusion in the Sewanee student body, on her own merits. So why was Ted Rollins the one to lead the visit with Anna Durham Windrow? Why was Sherry Carroll Rollins, the mother and Birmingham resident who actually raised Sarah and her sister Emma, kept at an arm's distance?

I contacted Anna Durham Windrow recently to ask this primary question: Was she aware that Ted Rollins had taken steps in an Alabama divorce case that would lead to Sarah and her mother and sister winding up on food stamps? Was she aware that Ted Rollins had been convicted for a brutal assault on his stepson? Was she aware that Ted Rollins had been investigated for child sexual abuse in North Carolina?

Anna Durham Windrow

Anna Durham Windrow, is a seasoned public-relations professional, and she gave all the right answers. She did not seem to be aware of the ugliness in Ted Rollins' background, but that was not the focus of the visit at Sewanee. That, Ms. Windrow said, was all about Sarah Rollins, her interest in the college, and her qualifications as a promising student. (See video at the end of this post.)

Ms. Windrow gave a reasonable answer, and one hardly can blame her for wanting to focus on Sarah Rollins and not her father. If I had an opportunity to deflect attention away from Ted Rollins, I would do it, too. But it still does not answer this question: How does Ted Rollins, and his considerable ethical baggage, fit with an institution that sends the following message to its students?

In signing the Honor Code, you are pledging on your honor not to lie, cheat or steal or more simply put, to live honorably as a part of the Sewanee Community.

If Sewanee takes honor this seriously, why did it even allow Ted Rollins on campus? Is Rollins, trying to wrangle a deal where he can build one of his The Grove apartment complexes on the pristine Sewanee campus? If so, would this institution of honor conduct business with a CEO of dishonor?

We don't have the answers to those questions at the moment. But we do have my conversation with Anna Durham Windrow, and she was made well aware of the ugliness in Ted Rollins closet. You can check it out in the video below.

Actually, Ms. Windrow is aware of only a portion of the ugliness regarding Ted Rollins. I did not tell her about a maid discovering roughly 100 towels, soiled with fecal matter and other debris, in a closet at the family home back in the 1990s--around the time of the investigation regarding child sexual abuse. I did not tell Ms. Windrow of stories Sherry Rollins has shared with me on multiple occasions about two mysterious automobile accidents, involving both her and her daughters, in the years leading to her divorce from Ted Rollins. Ms. Windrow also wasn't told about a three-story fall that Ms. Rollins' son suffered while working on scaffolding at one of Ted Rollins' properties. That's the same son that Mr. Rollins assaulted--and the same son who was at the heart of the investigation for possible sexual abuse. The fall resulted in life-threatening injuries that required multiple surgeries and caused the son to lose his spleen.

Just how dishonorable is Ted Rollins? Why have Sherry Rollins and at least three of her four children experienced curious accidents that put their lives at risk? We will examine those questions in upcoming posts.

As for Ms. Windrow, she and I agree on one thing: It's heartening to see Sarah Rollins as part of the Sewanee family, especially given the hell Ted Rollins forced her, her mother, and her sister to experience. I've only had one conversation with Sarah Rollins, and that came when she called me out of the blue a few months ago. On that occasion, she seemed to want to talk about the relationship between her father and her half brother, the stepson Ted Rollins did abuse physically and was alleged to have abused sexually.

Sarah Rollins clearly was troubled by the relationship, and she did not pull any punches about what she understands to have gone on with her father and half brother. I found her to be most articulate and insightful.

We will examine her take on a difficult subject shortly, but for now, here is my discussion with Anna Durham Windrow:

CEO Ted Rollins, with ugliness in his personal life, steps down as head of Campus Crest Communities

Ted Rollins

Ted Rollins, the CEO who brutally beat his stepson and likely committed perjury in a grossly unjust Alabama divorce case, was forced out yesterday as head of Campus Crest Communities. The decision apparently was based on the company's slumping financial performance.

Charlotte-based Campus Crest builds student-housing developments near universities around the country. According to the firm's Web site, it has 81 properties in 27 states--and that includes five projects under The Grove brand that are in operation or planned for Alabama (at South Alabama, Troy, Jacksonville State, Auburn, and Alabama).

As of August 2013, Wall Street investors had showered roughly $800 million on the company, and that figure probably tops $1 billion by now.

Ted Rollins belongs to one of the South's wealthiest families. His cousins, Gary and Randall Rollins, are Atlanta billionaires and direct Rollins Inc., the umbrella company for Orkin Pest Control and other profitable enterprises. The Atlanta side of the Rollins family, and their public squabbles over trust funds and divorces, was recently spotlighted in an article by reporter Clare O'Connor at Forbes magazine.

Wall Street was well aware of the messiness in Rollins personal life. Paula Poskon, an analyst with Robert W. Baird and Company, learned in October 2012 that Rollins had been convicted in 1995 for assaulting his stepson in Franklin County, North Carolina. She also learned that Rollins had been the target of a social-services investigation, based on a citizen complaint, for possible sexual abuse of the same stepson.

Poskon's reaction to this news? "Oh, my God, I was not aware of any of that. . . . It certainly sounds like I need to do a lot more digging."

Did Poskon do more digging? Apparently not. A few months later, she tried to strong arm me into retracting her statements about Ted Rollins.

Wall Street did not get alarmed, it seems, until Campus Crest Communities took a financial nosedive under Ted Rollins' leadership.

One account yesterday, from streetinsider.com, said Rollins "resigned." Another article, from seekingalpha.com, said Rollins had "been terminated, effective immediately." It also said "the stock price soared" as the news got out.

The company stock (with NYSE symbol CCG) had not been soaring lately. From Street Insider:

Campus Crest Communities (NYSE: CCG) reported Q3 FFO of $0.15, $0.01 worse than the analyst estimate of $0.16. Revenue for the quarter came in at $28.3 million versus the consensus estimate of $27.83 million.

The company also announced additional changes in senior management, as well as its intent to acquire Copper Beech assets, discontinue its construction and development business, reduce joint venture exposure and sell non-core assets as part of the Company’s release of financial results for the three months ended September 30, 2014.

Effective immediately, Ted W. Rollins, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, has resigned and will no longer be actively involved with the Company. The Independent Directors of the Board of Directors of the Company have elected Richard Kahlbaugh, lead independent director, as Executive Chairman and Interim CEO. It is intended that Mr. Kahlbaugh will guide the Company through the completion of its strategic repositioning.

What about that "strategic repositioning"? Here is what it entails:

* Discontinuing all construction and development to simplify the business model and focus on organic growth;

* Identifying cost savings at the property and corporate level to enhance profitability;

* Reducing joint venture exposure through select asset dispositions to reduce indebtedness and increase liquidity;

* Exploring strategic options for our projects in Montreal, to include capital solutions to reduce exposure, concurrent with ongoing efforts to drive occupancy; and

* Marketing development pipeline assets for sale to increase liquidity and simplify balance sheet.

It sounds like Rollins' company was about as messy as his personal life--and that is pretty messy. We first became aware of Ted Rollins via Rollins v. Rollins, his divorce from second wife, Sherry Carroll Rollins, a Birmingham resident. The case was heard in Shelby County, Alabama, before Circuit Judge D. Al Crowson, even though clear law shows jurisdiction already had been established in South Carolina, and the case could not be heard anywhere else.

Crowson essentially stole a case that belonged to another state and proceeded to grant Ted Rollins such a favorable judgment that it left Sherry Rollins and the couple's two daughters on food stamps over large portions of the past six years. I've called Rollins v. Rollins the worst courtroom cheat job I've encountered in seven years of writing about Alabama legal issues.

Why might Ted Rollins receive favorable treatment in Alabama. His corporate law firm, Bradley Arant, is based in Birmingham.

Wall Street knew Ted Rollins had a criminal conviction that involved the physical abuse of a child, but analysts and investors remained mostly silent about that. An Alabama judge unlawfully took a divorce case and issued a grossly one-sided judgment--and appellate courts upheld it with an "affirmed, no opinion" ruling. The legal community has been mute about that.

What does that say about the values of Wall Street? What does that say about the values of our "justice system"?

While we ponder those questions, here are documents from Ted Rollins assault conviction in North Carolina:

Ted Rollins Arrested for Assault by Roger Shuler

Ted Rollins Convicted of Assault by Roger Shuler

How Was Campus Crest CEO Ted Rollins Convicted of "Simple Assault" in North Carolina?

Ted Rollins

North Carolina has an unusually complex set of assault laws, covering dozens of varieties of assaults, with four levels of misdemeanors and 10 levels of felonies. By comparison, Alabama assault law is a model of simplicity.

But it doesn't take much research into North Carolina's byzantine criminal system to realize this: Someone cut Ted Rollins major slack when he was convicted in 1995 of "simple assault" [General Statutes 14-33(a)] in the beating of his stepson.

Rollins, the CEO of Campus Crest Communities, could have faced a charge of "assault inflicting serious injury" [G.S. 14-33(b)]. A conviction under that statute, which was justified based on our review of the evidence, could have resulted in jail time. But Ted Rollins belongs to one of the nation's wealthiest families--and he was head of a large employer in Franklin County, North Carolina, at the time--so it seems authorities did not want a member of the business elite to spend time behind bars.

Under North Carolina law, previous convictions and the nature of the victim's injuries are key considerations in an assault charge. Rollins probably was in good shape on the issue of previous convictions. But the injuries he inflicted upon his stepson clearly go beyond the boundaries of "simple assault."

According to a North Carolina criminal-law blog, you do not even have to make contact with another person to be charged with simple assault. Putting someone in the position that he fears an unlawful touch meets the standard. From the law blog:

A simple assault is the most basic assault, and is a class 2 misdemeanor. (Misdemeanors are broken into four classes, from A1, the worst, to Class 3, the least serious.) Someone who commits an unlawful touching of another, or who engages in a “show of violence” (raises a hand, but does not hit), is guilty of a simple assault.

According to the statements of an eye witness, Sherry Carroll Rollins, her husband at the time definitely made contact with his stepson, Zac Parrish, and inflicted serious injury. Ms. Rollins stated that Zac Parrish (her son from her first marriage) had a broken nose, with his face a bloody mask from various lacerations and abrasions ("as if he had no eyes"). She also said her son stumbled around after the beating, a sign that he probably had a concussion.

Was this, in fact, a simple assault? Absolutely not, according to the North Carolina law blog:

An assault inflicting serious injury (also defined under N.C.G.S. 14-33) is a class A1 misdemeanor. The injury that the victim suffers can either be a physical injury (causing “great pain” and “suffering”) or can be a “serious mental injury.” The judge or jury ultimately decides whether the injury is serious, and can look to whether the victim was hospitalized, experienced pain, suffered blood loss, or was out of work for a time. Courts have found that a victim who suffered from shards of glass in in the arm had experienced serious injury.

Zac Parrish was taken via ambulance to a hospital emergency room. He suffered pain and blood loss, and as a minor being beaten by his stepfather, surely endured "serious mental injury." Consider Sherry Rollins' words in our interview about the assault. (You can view a video of the interview at the end of this post.)

"If Ted had walked up to Zac and had a conversation, where Zac might have said something that Ted didn't agree with and hit him once or pushed him--or even punched him once--I guess that might have been a simple assault. But from what I saw from the time Ted was on Zac, there was nothing simple about it. It was a beating. . . . 

"In the world we live in today, he probably would be classified as a child abuser."

In the world as it was then, Ted Rollins should have been classified as a child abuser, as we explained in a recent post. If Rollins had been charged with the crime he actually committed--assault inflicting serious injury--he would have been looking at possible time behind bars. A Class A1 misdemeanor can be serious business in North Carolina. From another criminal-law blog in the state:

A class A1 is the most serious type of misdemeanor in North Carolina. Examples include Assault on a Female, DWI, and Assault on a Law Enforcement Official. Even for a first offender, a class A1 misdemeanor can be punishable by jail time. The maximum sentence on a Class A1 misdemeanor for a Level III offender (five or more prior convictions) is 150 days in jail.

Five months in jail was unlikely for Rollins since he probably was not a Level III offender. But one or two months was a real possibility. So how did he wind up with probation (no jail time) and a total of $415 in fines and restitution? We can think of only one answer: Ted Rollins comes from a family with lots of money, and that makes him an elite--and elites receive special treatment in our two-tiered "justice system."

Campus Crest CEO Ted Rollins Once Beat His Stepson to a Bloody Pulp

Ted Rollins

Ted Rollins is the CEO of a company that in late 2010 completed a $380-million IPO on Wall Street--and as head of Campus Crest Communities, Rollins markets student housing to young people. So it is grimly ironic that the same Ted Rollins once beat a young person so severely that the teen-ager's face was a bloody mask.

In a videotaped interview with Legal Schnauzer, Sherry Carroll Rollins describes an act of domestic violence that fits every definition of child abuse that we can find. Ms. Rollins is Ted Rollins' ex wife, and she now lives in Birmingham with the couple's daughters, Sarah and Emma. The full interview can be viewed at the end of this post, but let's first consider the stark, unflinching language that Sherry Rollins uses to describe the condition of Zac Parrish, her son who was about 15 at the time, after he had been beaten by Ted Rollins:

I couldn't tell what his injuries were exactly. He was stumbling as he walked toward the house. His face was all blood . . . as if he had no eyes, completely covered. There was no way of seeing his eyes. How he walked, I don't know. He stumbled into the house as the ambulance was coming. He said he felt he should get the gun . . . and started looking for the gun. I asked him what he was trying to do, and he said, "I'm going to use it on him." He wanted to kill Ted.

This account leaves us with at least two glaring questions: (1) If Ted Rollins committed a grotesque act of child abuse, why has he never been held accountable for it? (2) Why have investors poured hundreds of millions of dollars into a company that is led by a man with a record of child abuse?

Rollins was head of American Textile Services, near Louisburg, North Carolina, when he exploded with anger one fall afternoon in 1995. Rollins' rage was directed at Zac Parrish, his stepson from Sherry Rollins' first marriage. The Zac Parrish beating was one of several events that led to a breakdown of the Rollins marriage, ending with a 2005 divorce judgment in Shelby County, Alabama--even though Sherry Rollins had initiated the proceedings in Greenville, South Carolina, where the family lived by 2001, and the case was litigated there for three years.

Zac Parrish, now 33, is managing member of Parrish Building Company in Birmingham and responded with a profanity-filled tirade when I recently asked him for an interview on subjects related to Rollins v. Rollins.

As we have reported in a series of posts, the Rollins divorce case could not lawfully be shifted to Alabama once jurisdiction was established in South Carolina. But the change in judicial scenery led to an outrageously favorable outcome for Ted Rollins, causing Ms. Rollins and her daughters to wind up on food stamps. How was Ted Rollins able to pull this off? Well, he is a member of one of the nation's wealthiest families, the folks behind Atlanta-based Rollins Inc., the umbrella company of Orkin Pest Control. It also probably helped that Campus Crest Communities' primary corporate law firm is Birmingham-based Bradley Arant. The Rollins v. Rollins divorce case provides ample evidence that money and connections can help buy "justice" in an Alabama courtroom.

Now the story has a new element. Bradley Arant and Shelby County Circuit Judge D. Al Crowson did more than just create a friendly environment for a corporate big dog. They aided a man who has a documented history of committing child abuse. What does that say about the values of the lawyers at a powerful Alabama firm--and of a judge in one of our most conservative, "pro family" jurisdictions?

Parents and teens have been having "go arounds" for centuries, but Sherry Rollins describes something much darker than a standard family spat. She describes an act of frightening brutality, and it started when Ted Rollins was mowing grass, with his stepson nearby, in the rural area where they lived:

I was not aware of what was said between Ted and Zac. I came on the scene of the assault when I heard loud screaming and loud talking and the dog barking. I had my daughter, Sarah, who was about 18 months old, on my hip. I saw Ted on top of Zac, with his knees around his chest, and Zac was flat on his back, and Ted was hitting him in the head. Ted is 6-4, and Zac at the time weighed roughly, I'd say, 100 pounds.

He was defenseless in that Ted is so big and weighed at the time 225 to 230 pounds, at least, and was on top of him--sitting on Zac's abdomen and holding him down with his knees and pummeling him in the face. Zac had no choice but to take the strikes that were coming at him and turn his head from side to side.

It sounds like Ted Rollins might have killed his stepson if Sherry Rollins had not figured out a way to intervene:

I put Sarah down and went inside and got the house phone and called Zac's father in Alabama and put the phone on Ted's ear and said, "You've got to stop beating Zac; Zac's father wants to talk to you." He just ignored me. At that point, I jumped on his back and shook him repeatedly and tried to pull him off Zac. I ripped his shirt, a cotton knit golf shirt, which is pretty hard to tear. . . . When that didn't have any affect on Ted hitting Zac, I dialed 911. Only when Ted heard the 911 sirens . . . did he get off Zac.

As we fast forward to 2010, investors were heaping $380 million on Campus Crest Communities, turning it into a Wall Street darling at a time when mainstream Americans were struggling with the worst economy since the Great Depression.

Does it concern the corporate lawyers and investment gurus who drive IPOs that Ted Rollins has a history of abusing a child under his care? Do they see irony in the fact that Ted Rollins, who once left his own stepson a bloody mess, now markets student housing to college students and their parents?

And here's the biggest question of all: Why was Ted Rollins never held fully accountable for what appears to be a clear act of child abuse, under the law?

We will be addressing those questions, and much more, in upcoming posts. For now, here is the full Sherry Rollins interview:

CEO Ted Rollins And A Former Alabama Policeman Prove The Wealthy Can Get Away With Child Abuse

Mitchell Breland

This is not a story that will warm your heart as we wind down from the holidays. But it does show how we tend to mistreat "the least of these"--and that should be a year-round concern for those who claim to take the New Testament seriously.

At center stage for this immorality play is Mitchell Breland, a former Moulton, Alabama, police officer who was indicted just before Christmas on two counts of child abuse. Playing opposite Breland is Ted Rollins, the CEO of Charlotte-based Campus Crest Communities and a regular subject here because of his leading role in pulling off a monstrous cheat job in an Alabama divorce case styled Rollins v. Rollins.

Public records and published reports show that Ted Rollins committed an act of child abuse that was every bit as monstrous as the acts alleged against Mitchell Breland. Rollins was convicted of misdemeanor assault and paid a small fine, but records indicate he never was investigated for the much more serious offense of child abuse. Breland, meanwhile, faces Class C felony charges that could land him in prison for one to 10 years.

Not only did Ted Rollins receive light treatment from the criminal-justice system, he has gone on to receive solid support from Wall Street. The Vanguard Group, one of America's most prominent investment firms, was a powerful backer in a $380-million IPO that Rollins' company completed in late 2010. Does that mean The Vanguard Group, from its hallowed base in the Philadelphia suburb of Malvern, Pennsylvania, isn't much concerned about child abuse, as long as an abuser can help make money for stockholders? A reasonable person could reach that conclusion.

Why the different outcomes in criminal cases involving Mitchell Breland and Ted Rollins? Well, to be sure, the incidents happened in different states, in different time frames. Rollins was charged in 1995 with beating up his 16-year-old stepson in Franklin County, North Carolina. Breland was arrested last September in Lawrence County, Alabama, on charges that he had beaten two eight-year-old girls.

Here is how a report in the Florence Times Daily describes the charges against Breland:

Authorities said Breland is accused of repeatedly whipping the girls. It was unknown if they were whipped with a belt or some other item. 

Reports indicate one girl was beaten so severely that she had to be taken to the hospital. Medical personnel there contacted DHR.

How does that compare to Ted Rollins' actions? Consider the account of Alabama resident Sherry Rollins, who is Ted Rollins' ex wife and the mother of his victim, Zac Parrish (now 33 years old). She said her son's face was a bloody mask after the beating, and emergency medical personnel administered oxygen in a trip via ambulance to a nearby hospital. That is a sign that blood loss was severe enough that the victim was at danger of going into shock. Ms. Rollins said her son suffered a broken nose and numerous lacerations and abrasions. From one of our reports on the incident:

Was there any doubt that Zac Parrish had been abused? Consider Sherry Rollins description of the trip to the hospital with her son. . . . 

"In the ambulance, my daughter and I were with him. I believe he was given oxygen. He was badly beaten. He had lacerations around his mouth. Ted had repeatedly beaten him around the mouth area. You could see the inside of his lip hanging down."

Ted Rollins' actions at least match those of Mitchell Breland--and probably were far worse. After all, we know that, two years prior to the beating, North Carolina social-services officials investigated Ted Rollins for child sexual abuse of the same stepson--and that was based on a citizen complaint.

So why did Ted Rollins receive barely a wrist slap, while Breland is facing up to 10 years in prison? (Breland, by the way, already has been terminated from his job.)

It's not as if one state has strict laws on child abuse, while the other takes a lax approach. The statutory language is different, but the meanings of the relevant laws in North Carolina and Alabama are pretty much identical. In a post titled "The Truth About Ted Rollins: The CEO of Campus Crest Communities Got Away With Child Abuse," we showed that child abuse is covered under Chapter 7B of the North Carolina General Statutes.

The heart of the law is found at Section 7B-301, which reads in pertinent part:

7B‑301. Duty to report abuse, neglect, dependency, or death due to maltreatment. 

Any person or institution who has cause to suspect that any juvenile is abused, neglected, or dependent, as defined by G.S. 7B‑101, or has died as the result of maltreatment, shall report the case of that juvenile to the director of the department of social services in the county where the juvenile resides or is found. The report may be made orally, by telephone, or in writing. . . .

Alabama's Mandatory Child Abuse and Neglect Reporting Law can be found at Code of Alabama 26-14 (1-13). Alabama's law is wordier than the one in North Carolina, but it's meaning is the same--and the crux of it can be found at Section 26-14-3(a):

Mandatory reporting. 

(a) All hospitals, clinics, sanitariums, doctors, physicians, surgeons, medical examiners, coroners, dentists, osteopaths, optometrists, chiropractors, podiatrists, nurses, school teachers and officials, peace officers, law enforcement officials, pharmacists, social workers, day care workers or employees, mental health professionals, members of the clergy as defined in Rule 505 of the Alabama Rules of Evidence, or any other person called upon to render aid or medical assistance to any child, when the child is known or suspected to be a victim of child abuse or neglect, shall be required to report, or cause a report to be made of the same, orally, either by telephone or direct communication immediately, followed by a written report, to a duly constituted authority.

The bottom line? All of the law-enforcement, health-care, and court personnel who handled the Zac Parrish beating in North Carolina were required to report it as a case of suspected child abuse. Public records indicate that numerous individuals violated their duty to report, and that largely is why Ted Rollins never was held accountable.

Key personnel connected to the case in Moulton also were required by law to report suspected child abuse. Published reports indicate medical personnel contacted the Alabama Department of Human Resources (DHR), and that prompted the investigation of Breland.

Ted Rollins

What's the critical difference in the two cases? We can think of only one: As a police officer, Mitchell Breland probably earned a modest income that placed him more or less in America's middle class. As a member of one of America's richest families--the folks behind Orkin Pest Control, Dover Downs Gaming and Entertainment, and other profitable enterprises--Ted Rollins is safely ensconced in our "1 Percent."

Can money and status help America's elites avoid scrutiny, even in cases where a child has been abused?

The stories of Mitchell Breland and Ted Rollins tell us the answer is yes.

Is there any serious doubt that Ted Rollins committed acts of child abuse? Here is a video of Sherry Rollins' eye-witness account of the beating, followed by court documents that show Ted Rollins' conviction for assault:




Ted Rollins Arrested for Assault

Ted Rollins Sentence for Assault