A Rich Republican Puts His "Family Values" On Display In An Alabama Courtroom

Many progressives probably have heard so much about "pro family" Republicans that they could almost hurl.

If you are such a progressive, you will really want to hurl when you read about one deep-pocketed Republican and his display of "family values" in an Alabama courtroom. We're talking about Ted W. Rollins, CEO of Campus Crest Communities and the driving force behind a recent Wall Street IPO that is estimated at $380 million.

Rollins is part of the family behind Orkin Pest Control, one of the wealthiest clans in America, with deep ties to the Republican Party. In Alabama court documents, however, Ted Rollins portrayed himself as a relative pauper, causing his ex wife and two daughters to live on the kind of support that might be expected from a janitor.

Sherry Carroll Rollins, his ex wife, and their daughters, Sarah and Emma, have almost been on welfare and food stamps. At one point, they would have been homeless if an Alabama friend had not intervened. But that doesn't seem to bother Ted Rollins. After all, he has a $380 million IPO. And that's from just one of several companies he has helped spearhead over the past 20 years or so.

Here is all you really need to know about Ted W. Rollins: He is head of a company that recently issued a $380 million IPO, and court documents indicate his family is worth billions (with a "b"). But thanks to the extremely curious actions of Alabama judge D. Al Crowson, Rollins pays $815 a month in child support (that's the total, covering both children) and $500 a month in alimony.

For good measure, Crowson found that Ted Rollins had overpaid Sherry Rollins by $8,795, and he was ordered to offset his alimony payment by $300 a month until the overpayment was paid in full. That means Sherry Rollins received $200 a month alimony for more than two years. And that's from an ex husband who, based on court documents, appears to be a millionaire several times over.

Thankfully, I have no personal experience with divorce or child-support issues. But I'm told that $815 and $500 a month are the kind of child support/alimony that might be ordered from a salary-earning schmuck like myself. That it was ordered for a member of the Rollins family, the folks behind Rollins Inc. and its numerous highly profitable enterprises, is dumbfounding.

No wonder Ted Rollins wanted to have the divorce case unlawfully moved from South Carolina to Alabama. As we reported yesterday, Sherry Rollins had sued for divorce in Greenville, South Carolina, where the family had lived, and adultery was one of the primary grounds she cited. A South Carolina judge had issued a temporary order that called for Ted Rollins to pay $3,355 a month in child support, $5,000 a month in alimony, and continue paying the mortgage, taxes, and insurance on the marital home.

When the mortgage went unpaid, Sherry Rollins and her children were forced from their home. Mrs. Rollins fled to Alabama, where her two sons from a previous marriage were living. Contrary to black-letter law, Ted Rollins was allowed to sue Sherry Rollins in Alabama and wound up with a reduction of roughly $2,500 in his monthly child support and $4,500 in his monthly alimony.

What a deal! No wonder this guy's rich.

How did he pull it off? Hold on to your breakfast because you are liable to lose it when you read what comes next.

Court records indicate that Ted Rollins' current child support/alimony payments are based on a Child Support Obligation Income Statement/Affidavit, known as a Form CS-41 in Alabama. (See Ted Rollins' CS-41 form at the end of this post.)

Ted Rollins listed his gross monthly income as $4,166.67, which comes to $50,000.04 a year. That's real close to what I made as an editor before I was cheated out of my job at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB).

Interestingly, Ted Rollins claimed on his CS-41 that his only source of income was from Reynolds Mortgage and Investment Company of Brentwood, Tennessee. There's no mention of St. James Capital LLC, a family-owned business of which he had been president for several years. No mention of Campus Crest Communities, which he had started by then. No mention of any income from self employment, such as rent, proprietorship of a business, joint ownership of a partnership or closely held corporation. Ted Rollins swore under oath that he had no income other than $50,000 he made from a mortgage outfit in Tennessee.

While the divorce case was in South Carolina, court documents indicate that Ted Rollins claimed his income came from St. James Capital, making $4,166.66 per month. Isn't it interesting that the figure he cited in South Carolina matches almost to the penny the figure he cited in Alabama--but it's from a different company?

A South Carolina judge did not seem to be buying Ted Rollins' claims about his assets. Here is what the judge wrote in one order:

Defendant is a member of the Rollins family, one of the wealthiest families in America. While he asserts that his monthly income is only $4,166.66 per month, that level of income is not consistent with the standard of living enjoyed by this family during the marriage. Defendant has been historically involved in a number of family businesses. He may be one of the heirs to the family fortune, which is estimated in the billions of dollars. Convincing evidence was presented concerning Defendant's involvement in these businesses and of personal expenses regularly being paid for certain of the family businesses.

The writing apparently was on the proverbial wall in South Carolina. A judge had seen evidence that Ted W. Rollins was worth a whole lot of money, and it looked like a final divorce order would reflect that.

What's a rich guy to do? Well, he can cause his wife and children to get kicked out of their house and watch them flee to another state where they have relatives. Then he can unlawfully sue his wife in that state and get a final divorce order that allows him to pay cut-rate figures for child support and alimony.

Who helped Ted Rollins pull this off? We will be raising that question in future posts, looking closely at the Bradley Arant law firm in Birmingham, which has represented Mr. Rollins and Campus Crest Communities in a number of legal matters. Attorneys Dawn Helms Sharff and Walter Sears have been particularly involved with Ted Rollins.

Bradley Arant, of course, is known as one of the largest and most conservative law firms in Alabama.

Those conservatives and their "family values." You've gotta love 'em.

(To be continued)


Rollins CS-41 Form

Here's How Wealthy Republicans Receive Unlawful Favors in Alabama Courts

Ted W. Rollins

Americans went to the polls last week and voted overwhelmingly for the Republican Party, which historically has favored the wealthy over everyday folks. Voters apparently were anxious to cure our economic and social ailments by putting the GOP in charge. You might want to file that one under "Be Careful What You Wish For."

It's not breaking news that moneyed interests have all sorts of advantages in our capitalistic system. But we've seen firsthand evidence that those advantages can extend even to our court system, which is supposed to ensure "equal protection" for all.

In fact, we've seen one case where a member of a wealthy Republican family received favors in an Alabama court that are downright unlawful, possibly criminal. In the wake of last week's GOP tsunami, it seems likely that such injustices only are going to increase.

Consider Rollins v. Rollins, a domestic-relations case that was filed in Shelby County, Alabama, where I live. In fact, this travesty took place in the same courthouse, in Columbiana, Alabama, where my legal headaches began.

We wrote recently about the "public disintegration of the Rollins family," an unfortunate tale that has been receiving plenty of ink in the Atlanta press. The Rollinses, after all, are one of America's richest families, thanks to their interest in Orkin Pest Control and other enterprises, including outdoor advertising, broadcasting, truck leasing, and more. Whenever you see that an entity is associated with Rollins Inc., you can rest assured that big money is involved.

So how did the Rollins family intersect with our little corner of the world here in Alabama? It started when Sherry Carroll Rollins filed for divorce in Greenville, South Carolina, from Ted W. Rollins, the son of John W. Rollins. John W. was one of two brothers who built the Rollins empire.

Campus Crest Communities, one of Ted W. Rollins' ventures, recently entered the New York Stock Exchange with an IPO estimated at $380 million. You can see that he is continuing the family tradition of dealing in big bucks.

Court records indicate that Sherry Rollins' divorce case, at first, was moving along in a normal fashion. A South Carolina judge had issued a temporary order that called for Ted Rollins to pay $3,355 a month in child support for the couple's two daughters, $5,000 a month in alimony, and continue paying the mortgage, taxes, and insurance on the marital home.

Records indicate that the mortgage was not paid, and Sherry Rollins and her children were forced from their home. Mrs. Rollins fled to Alabama, where her two sons from a previous marriage were living.

What happened next? Ted Rollins failed to pay the court-ordered alimony and child support, and a warrant was issued for his arrest. For you or me, that would mean we were in deep doo-doo.

What did it mean for Ted Rollins? Not much. He filed a lawsuit for divorce against his wife in Alabama--and Shelby County Judge Al Crowson actually allowed it. For anyone who's had a few days of Law School 101, that last sentence should shock the conscience. That's because such a transfer of a case across jurisdictional boundaries simply cannot be done.

It can be done, however, in GOP-controlled Alabama when your name is Ted W. Rollins--and you are part of one of America's richest families. It probably did not hurt that Ted Rollins had worked for years with Bradley Arant Boult and Cummings, one of the largest and most conservative law firms in Alabama.

In fact, Ted Rollins has especially close ties to Bradley Arant lawyers Dawn Helms Sharff and Walter Sears. Bradley Arant, of course, is home to Rob Campbell, son-in-law to Alabama Governor Bob Riley. The firm has received huge sums of state dollars during the Riley era, and we will be taking a close look at the firm's action in future posts--especially as they relate to Ted W. Rollins.

Why was it unlawful for Ted Rollins to move a divorce case from South Carolina, where it already was well under way, to Alabama? It's a simple matter of jurisdiction, which is supposed to be a serious matter under the law. Judges are not to take action on a case where they do not have jurisdiction. And even the most clod-headed of attorneys should know that. The lawyers at Bradley Arant certainly should know that.

Such fundamental matters are governed by all kinds of law. One of the most clear-cut Alabama cases is styled Wesson v. Wesson, 628 So. 2d 953 (Ala. Civ. App., 1993). The case states, in very clear language:

Once jurisdiction has attached in one court, that court has the exclusive right to continue its exercise of power until the completion of the case, and is only subject to appellate authority.

A lawyer for Sherry Rollins filed a Motion to Dismiss, correctly pointing out that the Alabama court had no jurisdiction and the case could not be heard in Shelby County. But Judge Al Crowson, who mysteriously retired as Rollins v. Rollins was winding down, ignored the motion and let the case move forward. (See Motion to Dismiss at the end of this post.)

Did Ted W. Rollins benefit from having his case heard in Alabama? Oh yes, indeed. Did his friends at Bradley Arant also benefit? Sure looks like it. And we will show you exactly how it happened.

(To be continued)


Rollins v. Rollins Dismiss

Voters Blame Obama for Bush's Wall Street Bailout

What happens when American voters, in large numbers, are out of touch with reality? We are about to find out, according to an intriguing analysis of the 2010 midterm elections. And it probably will not be pretty.

Exit polls indicate that one of the primary reasons many voters gave for shunning Democrats is President Barack Obama's association with the Wall Street bailout. Yes, that's the same Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) that was started by . . . George W. Bush, Obama's Republican predecessor.

That's just one of many head scratchers that Ruy Teixeira and John Halpin present in a New Republic study titled "Job Loss and Liberal Apathy: A New Interpretation of the 2010 Election Results."

After reading The New Republic piece, one could make a strong argument that the 2010 midterms are the most glaring example of irrational voting in American history. In essence, voters blamed Obama and Democrats for something that George W. Bush and Republicans did.

If the issues at hand were not so serious, one would be tempted to guffaw upon reading the Teixeira/Halpin piece. Instead, a rational person can only shake his head and wonder if our society has become so dysfunctional that our future is imperiled.

Consider this from Teixeira and Halpin:

More voters (35 percent) blamed Wall Street for today’s economic problems rather than President Bush (29 percent) or President Obama (23 percent). But these Wall Street-blaming voters supported Republicans by 56-42 percent. The Obama administration’s association with bailing out Wall Street bankers, who are heavily blamed for the bad economy, apparently had a negative effect on Democratic performance in this election.

Actually, there were signs before the election that this was going to happen. On August 12, CBS News produced an article titled "More Americans think Obama, Not Bush, Enacted Bank Bailouts, Poll Shows."
Reported CBS News:

Nearly half of Americans incorrectly think President Obama started the bank bailout program, otherwise known as the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), a new poll shows.

Just 34 percent of Americans surveyed by the Pew Research Center correctly said that TARP was enacted by the Bush administration. Almost half--47 percent--think Mr. Obama started the bank bailout, according to the survey, conducted July 1-5. There was no partisan divide on the issue.

What's the reality? CBS makes it clear:

The TARP program was created in 2008 to stabilize the financial system. The Treasury Department has committed more than $500 billion to more than 800 firms through the program. While Mr. Obama did not enact TARP, his administration has largely been responsible for administering it.

The facts are clear: TARP was created in 2008, and Obama did not take office until January 2009. Yet voters, many of them surely Tea Partiers, blamed Obama for a program that he did not create. That's like blaming Jimmy Carter for Watergate or Bill Clinton for Iran-Contra.

As CBS points out, the Obama administration has been saddled with trying to make TARP work--hence, it has been "associated" with the program. And reasonable folks certainly could debate how well Obama and Democrats have handled that task. But did Democrats create the program? Not even close. Did they cause the problems that led to TARP's creation in the first place? Nope.

Astute observers saw some time ago that TARP was going to be a political headache for Democrats. In early September, Brad Bannon of U.S. News and World Report, wrote "Bank Bailout Spawned Obama and Dems’ Tea Party Problem." From Bannon:

President Obama has almost no chance of getting Congress to approve the vital jobs initiatives he proposed this week. And the opposition to his initiatives, which are so vital to economic growth, is the residue of President Bush’s Temporary Assistance Rescue Program, which candidate Obama favored and the Democratic Congress approved. . . .

Barack Obama and congressional Democrats share in the blame for the opposition to vital economic programs that the country badly needs. The failure of Democrats to take a populist stand against Wall Street poisoned the well for President Obama’s economic agenda. When Democrats bit into the corporate apple in the fall of 2008, they created many of the problems which they are dealing with now.

The bottom line? Obama mishandled the political fallout from the bailout. But many voters who have placed their faith in Republicans actually believe Obama started the program. It can't be good for our republic when that many people are so wildly misinformed.

What else do we learn from Teixeira and Halpin? Get this: White working-class voters went overwhelmingly for Republicans. In fact, it appears that demographic, more than any other, is responsible for the result:

The most significant shift against the Democrats occurred among the white working class—defined here as whites without a four year college degree. Congressional Democrats lost this group by 10 points in both 2006 and 2008. Yet this deficit ballooned to 29 points in 2010—a deficit even larger than 22 point margin Democrats suffered in 1994. That created an awfully big hole for Democrats to crawl out of, especially given relatively depressed turnout among Democratic-leaning constituencies.

Raise your hand if you can think of anything Republicans have done for working class folks, of any color, especially over the past 30 years--when the Party of Lincoln evolved into the Party of Haley Barbour.

How does The New Republic sum it up?

What’s interesting is who voted for the Republicans and why. Independent voters, white working-class voters, seniors, and men broke heavily against the Democrats due to the economy. Turnout levels were also unusually low among young and minority voters and unusually high among groups that lean right, contributing to a midterm electorate that was extremely favorable to Republican candidates.

Was there any good news for Democrats? Maybe it's this:

The election did not appear to be a repudiation of the new health care reform law. About as many said they wanted to see it remain as is or be expanded (47 percent) as said they wanted it repealed (48 percent). Nor did it appear that voters were embracing the GOP position on tax cuts. A 52-percent majority of voters wanted to either keep only the Bush tax cuts for those under $250,000 or let them all expire compared to 39 percent who wanted to keep all the tax cuts.

Political commentators are notoriously prone to over-interpreting election results. Strategic and policy decisions certainly made some difference in the magnitude of losses, but in a horrible economy it’s difficult to escape the reality that Democrats were poised to lose a significant number of seats no matter what they did.

All of this makes me miss the late, great George Carlin. I would love to hear his take on this absurd election. To my knowledge, it was Carlin who first raised the notion that many Americans are too stupid to be entrusted with a task as important as voting. It was Carlin who uttered these immortal words:

If you have selfish, ignorant citizens, you're going to get selfish, ignorant leaders. Term limits ain't going to do any good; you're just going to end up with a brand new bunch of selfish, ignorant Americans. So, maybe, maybe, maybe, it's not the politicians who suck. Maybe something else sucks around here... like, the public. Yeah, the public sucks. There's a nice campaign slogan for somebody: 'The Public Sucks.'

We could use a few belly laughs. So let's enjoy a classic George Carlin rant about voting. These words really resonate today:

What If the BP Oil Well Had Still Been Gushing On Election Day?

Several million words probably have been written or spoken about the results of Tuesday's midterm elections. My favorite piece, so far, comes from Eugene Robinson of The Washington Post, who opines that the Republican tsunami was driven mainly by a sudden realization from America's white masses: "Dear God, we've got a black man in the White House!"

I suspect Robinson is awfully close to the truth, so I couldn't help but wonder, "Given that Barack Obama, indeed, is black, is there anything Democrats could have done differently that might have altered the outcome?"

Regular readers know I think Obama made a huge mistake with his "look forward, not backwards" approach to the apparent crimes of the George W. Bush administration. Be that as it may (as lawyers like to say), here is maybe the No. 1 political mistake Democrats made: They allowed the BP oil well to be capped before the election.

Would the election have been different if the BP well had still been spewing in the Gulf of Mexico when voters went to the polls on Tuesday? Given the somewhat anecdotal evidence we've seen in Alabama, I think the outcome would have been radically different. Heck, the Democrats might have even gained seats in both the House and Senate and picked up any number of governorships.

Why do I say this? Well, our Legal Schnauzer Philosophy Department has developed a new political theory. We call it the "White People Will Automatically Vote Republican Unless Something So Godawful Happens That It Shakes Them Out of Their Stupor And Causes Them To Think Democrats Aren't a Bunch Of Commies After All" Theory.

Our theory is based on the notion that the white electorate has become like a computer with default settings. Their default setting for voting is set on "GOP"--unless something shakes them out of their comfort zone and causes them to say, "Dammit, now I've got to go into preferences and figure out how to change the default setting so that I can possibly vote for that other party . . . what's it called again?"

We think the Gulf oil disaster might have been such an event--if BP and the government hadn't figured out how to cap it a few weeks back.

Consider what happened here in Alabama while BP crude was washing up on our pristine shores. We are one of the most grotesquely right-wing states in the country, but even here, people seemed to start thinking, "You know, maybe it's not such a good idea to elect Republicans who turn around and let oil companies do pretty much as they please in the Gulf of Mexico, with precious little oversight."

While the oil was spewing, two political events took place in Alabama that indicated people were fed up with corporatist candidates who seemed likely to cozy up to Big Oil. In the Democratic primary for governor, Ron Sparks knocked off corporate suck-up Artur Davis in a landslide. And in the Republican primary, Dr. Robert Bentley stunned Bradley Byrne, who had been the hand-picked successor to GOP governor Bob Riley and the favorite of moneyed interests across the state.

Bentley beat Byrne in a runoff on July 13. Two days later, BP announced that the well had been capped. We still don't have a full grasp on the environmental and economic harm that has been caused by the gusher. But it's now roughly 2 1/2 months since the well was capped. And based on Tuesday's election, it's as if voters forgot the disaster ever happened.

BP once again is making profits, and the public no longer seems to care about the issues that caused the well to blow in the first place. There's no telling how close we came to having the Gulf of Mexico ruined beyond repair--and there is no question that lax regulation promoted by the Bush administration helped allow it to happen. But the well was capped, and in a classic case of "out of sight, out of mind," voters decided to jump on the GOP train once again.

The whole episode reminds us of the fundamental differences between Republican and Democrats. If Republicans had been in charge and seen a political advantage in allowing the BP gusher to continue, there is no way in hell the well would have been capped until after Nov. 2. An environmental disaster like we've never seen before? The ruination of an irreplaceable natural resource? Who cares? There is political hay to be made--and we're going to make it.

A Democrat, however, was in the White House. And like most Democrats, Barack Obama has a functioning conscience. And like many Democrats, Obama can be politically tone deaf. So what did he do? He did the right thing, dammit! He allowed the well to be plugged, and now we've got at least two years of Republican-fueled dysfunction to look forward to.

Obama could have come up with some reason for delaying the capping of the well. A few million fish would have died, several hundred thousand people probably would have gotten sick, and God only knows what other dreadful events would have happened. But Obama, rightfully, could have laid it all at the feet of Republicans--and sat back and relaxed while Democrats romped on Nov. 2.

With the election safely tucked away, the well could have magically been capped on, say, Nov. 12. It could have been the kind of autumn surprise that George H.W. Bush helped pull on Jimmy Carter back in 1980. Obama and Democrats could have reaped huge political dividends.

Speaking of Jimmy Carter, he probably is the most ethical, moral, and genuinely religious president in our nation's history. Now Obama is following him on the same moral high ground--the kind that leads to political defeat.

When will Democrats ever learn? You don't get anywhere in this country by doing the right thing!

The Dixiecrats Are Gone, But Their Influence Lives on in the 2010 Midterm Elections

Boutwell Auditorium

Many pundits attributed yesterday's midterm election results to the rise of the modern Tea Party movement. But a political scientist argues that the Republican advances of 2010 have their roots in 1948. That notion hits close to home because those roots of 62 years ago were planted in my home city, Birmingham, Alabama. And it reminds us that white resentment over integration and associated issues never has gone away.

Wilmer J. Leon III argues in an essay at Truthout that the Republican uprising of 2010 is just an extension of the Dixiecrat movement that split the Democratic Party in 1948. Leon, a political scientist at Howard University, says Tea Partiers are Dixiecrats dressed up in new clothing.

No one should be surprised that modern-day Dixiecrats would rise up just two years after the election of America's first black president. Writes Leon:

When you take a step back and look at our political landscape from a broader historical perspective, what you see is that our current dysfunctional situation is not a recent development, but the culmination of a conservative backlash that can be traced back to 1948 and the rise of the States' Rights Democratic Party, which quickly became known as the Dixiecrats.

What drove the Dixiecrats of 1948? The answer is simple, writes Leon:

The Dixiecrat Party was formed after 35 Democratic delegates from Mississippi and Alabama walked out of the 1948 Democratic National Convention. These delegates were protesting the adoption of Sen. Hubert Humphrey's (D-Minnesota) proposal of civil rights planks calling for racial integration and the reversal of Jim Crow laws in the party platform.

For a progressive living in Alabama, the Dixiecrats are like the crazy uncle we try to forget is living in our attic. We've written before about the Dixiecrats and noted their transformation into the Goldwater supporters of 1964, the Reaganites of 1980, and the Tea Party of 2010.

This is history that rises up to our back door because the Dixiecrats held their convention in 1948 at Boutwell Auditorium in downtown Birmingham, about 15 miles from where I sit writing this post. What was that convention about? Leon describes it:

They met in Birmingham, Alabama, and nominated Gov. Strom Thurmond of South Carolina for president. They opposed abolition of the poll tax, while endorsing segregation and the "racial integrity" of each race. Their campaign slogan was "Segregation Forever!" and their platform also included the call for "states' rights." Like the modern day Tea Party, the Dixiecrats called for freedom from governmental interference in an individual's or organization's prerogative to do business with whomever they wanted. Thurmond received more than one million votes in the 1948 election, won four states and 39 electoral votes.

Today's Tea Party message is cloaked mainly in fiscal terms, with concerns about the "deficit" and "out of control spending." But Leon says something darker is going on:

The Institute for Research and Education on Human Rights report "Tea Party Nationalism: A Critical Examination of the Tea Party Movement and the Size, Scope and Function of Its National Factions" says from the outset, "... the majority of Movement supporters are people of good will." But integrated into their calls for a reduction of the budget deficit and smaller government are concerns about race, sexual orientation, national identity, national birth rights and who qualifies to be an American. As the Tea Party Movement has taken shape amid this fiscal rhetoric; racist, white nationalist, anti-immigrant, homophobic and anti-Semitic elements have found their way into the "Movement."

Tea Party's keynote Sarah Palin calls for "states rights" and says, "it's pretty simple. It's a smaller, smarter government, not growing government to control more of our lives and our businesses and make decisions for us." This sounds a lot like a page taken right from the Dixiecrat playbook.

Yes it does. And after yesterday's election results, it makes us wonder how much progress we've really made in 62 years.

November 2, 2010: The Day Our Democracy Teetered?

If our democracy someday collapses, historians surely will sift through the wreckage to find a date that might have signaled what was to come. It looks like November 2, 2010, might be the date they will be looking for.

Surveys show that Americans will go to the polls today and vote overwhelmingly for Republicans, possibly restoring GOP leadership in the U.S. House--and maybe even the Senate. That's like taking the guy who ransacked your house and supporting him for sheriff.

If Republicans indeed make major advances in today's midterm elections, it will be a colossal failure of both political parties and the American electorate. We fear that a democracy infected with such irrational thinking might not be long for this world.

How nutty is this talk of a possible GOP sweep? From 2000 to 2008, George W. Bush ran one of the most inept and corrupt administrations in American history. He inherited peace and prosperity from Democrat Bill Clinton and turned them into war and waste. The Bush White House failed on almost every substantive issue you can think of--the economy, foreign affairs, domestic security, justice, the environment. Bush, with the help of his fellow Republicans and conservative Democrats, brought our financial system to the edge of collapse and unleashed the worst economy since the Great Depression.

When Bush's reign mercifully ended in 2008, Americans wisely determined it was time to put adults in charge, ushering Barack Obama into the White House and putting Democrats in control of both houses in Congress.

After two years of tepid leadership from Obama, Democrats can point to at least one major achievement--they helped avoid a complete economic disaster that almost certainly would have ensued if Republicans John McCain and Sarah Palin were in charge.

The Democrats should have accomplished more. But avoiding a second Great Depression is, in itself, a major accomplishment. Unfortunately, Obama and company have failed to make that case to the American people.

That's why this is a failure of both parties. The Republican Party has devolved into such a dysfunctional mess that it is incapable of governing. Democrats, meanwhile, continue to specialize in snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.

Obama reminds me of a relief pitcher who entered a baseball game with a 14-2 lead. Fearful of challenging hitters, he decided to nibble on the corners. That caused him to walk hitters, and combined with a few big hits from the other side, he saw his lead dwindle to 14-11. Today, the other team is about to tie the game--and maybe even take the lead.

I've heard about a pitching coach who would visit the mound when one of his charges was afraid to challenge hitters and offer this bit of advice: "Babe Ruth is dead. Throw the f-----g ball over the plate!"

Yes, Babe Ruth is dead. And so is the Republican Party as a governing entity. But Barack Obama refused to throw dirt on their grave.

If today turns into a disaster for Democrats, the seeds for it probably were planted before Obama even took office. Here is how we reported it in an earlier post about Scott Brown's U.S. Senate victory in Massachusetts:

We would suggest that the seeds of last night's fiasco for Democrats were planted much earlier than that--on January 11, 2009. That's the date that ABC's George Stephanopoulos asked President-Elect Barack Obama about the possible appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate crimes of the George W. Bush administration.

Obama replied by saying that he was inclined to "look forward as opposed to looking backwards," indicating that he was willing to give Bush criminals a free pass. It was that show of weakness, buttressed by similar statements that Obama has made since then, that many Massachusetts residents probably remembered as they went to polling places yesterday.

We suspect that Obama's refusal to take a principled stand on matters of justice was the No. 1 reason Democrats lost a seat that Kennedy had held for almost half a century.

Obama's refusal to take a principled stand on matters of justice, his refusal to hold the Bush administration accountable for its myriad crimes, probably will cost Democrats again today.

We tend to think of CNBC's Chris Matthews as a pompous windbag. But we agree with Matthews' assessment that Obama has had two major failings. (See video below.):

* He campaigned as an "inclusive" candidate but has governed as an elitist;

* He failed to adequately explain to the American people how we got into our current fix--and what we need to do to get out of it. Lincoln did it in the Civil War. Franklin Roosevelt did it in the 1930s. Obama, Matthews correctly states, has failed to "take people along" with him.

Obama and his fellow Democrats had mountains of evidence that the Bush administration was a monumental failure--and bold action was needed to get us out of a hole the GOP spent eight years digging.  But Democrats, other than Bill Clinton, failed to make that case. And now they are in the pathetic position of hoping that polls under-represented likely voters who have given up land-line phones and use only cell phones. Here is how election analyst Nate Silver explains the "cell phone effect":

This one is pretty simple, really: a lot of American adults (now about one-quarter of them) have ditched landlines and rely exclusively on mobile phones, and a lot of pollsters don’t call mobile phones. Cellphone-only voters tend to be younger, more urban, and less white — all Democratic demographics — and a study by Pew Research suggests that the failure to include them might bias the polls by about 4 points against Democrats, even after demographic weighting is applied.

This race should not have come down to that; it should not even be close. Conventional wisdom holds that the party in control of the White House always loses seats in the next midterm election. First, that conventional wisdom does not always hold true:

Do Presidents Always Get "Shellacked" in Midterm Elections?

Second, it certainly should not have held true in November 2010. Had Democrats made the case that the George W. Bush administration was an unmitigated disaster and it would take time to recover from it--an incredibly easy case to make--they should have actually gained seats across the board.

We've established that both parties have failed us, so what about the American people. In the past, when our country has been in a vulnerable position, we have found ways to look forward, to take progressive action even if it meant enduring some "growing pains." In 1964, with the country facing a possible crisis in race relations, Americans voted overwhelming for Democrat Lyndon Johnson and his plans to ensure basic civil rights for blacks.

We are facing an economic crisis today, one that has been years in the making and is nowhere near resolved. And yet voters probably will go to the polls and vote for the very people who caused the problems in the first place.

That kind of irrational thinking does not bode well for our democracy.

The Best Lawyer Joke Ever!

I recently started reading a new book called Our Corrupt Legal System: Why Everyone Is a Victim (Except Rich Criminals).

Regular readers will understand immediately why I would be interested in a book with a title like that. But I'm happy to report that the book, by Australian journalist Evan Whitton, has much more going for it than a captivating title. It is an insightful and scathing critique of the common-law adversarial justice system, which began in Great Britain and spread to its colonies, including the United States and Canada.

To top it off, Whitton includes the best lawyer joke we've ever heard.

What is the crux of Whitton's argument? He says the British adversarial system has failed us and should be replaced with an inquisitorial model that prevails in much of Europe. Whitton provides a simple chart that shows how the two systems stack up:

                                                Investigative                      Adversary
Seeks truth                               Yes                                   No
Conceals evidence                    No                                    Yes
In charge of evidence             Judges                               Lawyers
Length of hearings                 About a day                       Months
Conviction rates                     95 %                                50 %
Innocent in prison                     Rare                                 1-5 %

The Age newspaper of Australia recently presented a profile of Whitton and examined his latest work:

Whitton has spent 30 years covering crime, corruption and courts, using a keen eye, an inquisitive mind and rare research talents to produce unique essays that shine lights into dark places. His opinions are backed by facts, and the former journalist of the year has concluded our court system is irreparably broken.

Even more startlingly, he has discovered there is something morally lower than a working hack from the press: criminal lawyers. It would appear he believes such creatures think that Integrity is a small island in the South Pacific and Scruples a board game played following after-dinner mints.

Whitton holds lawyers in even lower esteem than I do. No wonder I like this guy. And he has a prescription for what ails our sickly justice system:

He argues in his new book Our Corrupt Legal System, Where Everyone is a Victim (Except Rich Criminals) that the British adversarial system has failed and we should move to the European inquisitorial model.

He says the European system is cleaner and less open to abuse than our present process, which is unnecessarily complicated and designed not to discover but to hide the truth. He believes lawyers, judges and politicians (many of them former lawyers) are wedded to a process that is too expensive and fails too often.

He writes that the European model empowers judges to find evidence and discourages lawyers from concealing it. Trials are quicker and more just.

Whitton has a sense of humor about the whole corrupt enterprise:

''The adversary system is biased against people in business, industry, medicine and the media and in favour of criminals,'' Whitton writes. ''The bias makes business for trial lawyers and the rule of law a joke in the worst possible taste.''

Lawyers work for their clients and routinely ignore facts that do not suit their arguments, he says. ''Controlling evidence enables them to omit the damaging bits; spin out the pre-trial and trial process; procure enough pelf to retire comfortably, if they choose, to the social status of untrained, uninformed and passive judge.

''Judges, of course, do the decent thing: they try to stay awake.''

Oh, and about that lawyer joke . . .

How do you save a lawyer from drowning?

Shoot him before he hits the water.

Going On the Attack Against the Thugs Who Stole Our House

William E. Swatek

The nation's attention has been riveted in recent days on video of a woman being stomped at a Rand Paul rally in Kentucky. The thuggish behavior of Paul's tea-party supporters was captured on tape for the entire nation to see.

Republican thuggery is not new for my wife and me. We've been dealing with it in Alabama for roughly 10 years, long before most people had heard of Rand Paul.

One of the more unusual moments in our legal travails came in May 2008 when Republican thugs in Alabama caused our house to be unlawfully auctioned. We still live in the house, but our full ownership rights were essentially stolen. My wife and I now are fighting to get them back.

We have filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court alleging that attorney William E. Swatek and Shelby County Sheriff Chris Curry led a conspiracy to violate our equal-protection rights under the Fourteenth Amendment. Other named defendants include Mike McGarity, our criminally inclined neighbor; Sheriff Deputy Bubba Caudill; and Alabama Circuit Judge Hub Harrington. (See the complaint at the end of this post.)

Long-time readers might recall that we captured the bizarre sheriff's sale on video for our Legal Schnauzer audience. You can relive those memories here:

Showdown in Shelby County, Part II

What is the gist of the lawsuit? This section of the complaint pretty well sums it up:

The sale allegedly was for the purpose of satisfying a judgment against Roger Shuler in the amount of $1,525. The judgment had been entered in Shelby County Circuit Court in June 2004, in favor of Mike McGarity, who was represented by Attorney William E. Swatek.

Swatek made the only bid on the property, and he was awarded rights to the Shulers’ property. A sheriff’s deed was placed on the Shulers’ property in Swatek’s name, and the deed remains in place.

The sheriff’s sale was conducted without due process of law and violated Alabama statutory, procedural, and case law in multiple respects.

The "auction" was a legal fiasco, apparently designed to threaten me into discontinuing my blog. It took place on May 12, 2008 (while I was on administrative leave from my job at UAB), and I was fired on May 19. That strongly suggests that the sheriff's sale and my unlawful termination are connected.

Swatek's son, Dax Swatek, is a Montgomery-based political consultant for the Republican Party and was Gov. Bob Riley's campaign manager in 2006. Dax Swatek's mentor is Bill Canary, president of the Business Council of Alabama and husband of corrupt U.S. Attorney Leura Canary (of Don Siegelman-case infamy). Bill Canary, of course, is a close associate of Tom Donohue, head of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and Karl Rove, Bush White House and GOP fund-raising strategist.

Bill and Dax Swatek are the Kevin Bacon characters in our Legal Schnauzer story, providing "six degrees" of connections to some of the sleaziest Republicans in American history. Does all of this suggest that my unlawful termination at UAB and the bogus auction of our house were driven, at least in part, by GOP political operatives? Does it suggest that our problems with debt collectors also might involve GOP politicos? We think the answer to both questions is yes.

(By the way, the photo of Bill Swatek above is not a gag. That's really him, and he really is an "officer of the court" in Alabama. Comforting isn't it? The photo is from the Web site swateklaw.com. If you have some time on your hands and want to have a little fun, try this: Check out the Alabama Rules of Professional Conduct and then peruse the Swatek Web site. See how many violations of ethics rules you can find.)

How big a joke was the process leading up to the auction of our house--and why does it appear connected to my blog? The complaint states:

As of fall 2007, more than three years had passed, with McGarity making no effort to collect on the judgment. Neither Swatek nor McGarity ever sent a demand letter regarding the judgment. But roughly three months after Shuler started writing about the case on his blog—and also writing about debt collectors who had repeatedly violated federal law—McGarity and Swatek suddenly became interested in collecting the judgment.

In September 2007, Swatek applied for a writ of execution on McGarity’s behalf, threatening seizure of the Shulers’ cars and house. The writ was issued by Clerk Mary Harris on September 21, 2007. On February 8, 2008, the Shulers received a notice of levy, signed by Sheriff Chris Curry, stating that the house and property at 5204 Logan Drive would be advertised and sold. Over a period of several weeks, the Shulers received approximately 25 phone messages from Deputies Bubba Caudill and Eddie Moore. The tone of the calls was “we’re fixing to sell that property” and “have you worked something out with the other side?”

In a phone conversation with Bubba Caudill, Roger Shuler stated there was nothing to work out. The judgment itself was void, Shuler said, and he had filed a claim of exemption with the sheriff’s office—and McGarity had not contested it, meaning the property was exempt from levy and no sale could took place. Caudill told Shuler that Judge Harrington had ordered that the sale proceed, and the court file shows that Harrington indeed signed off on the sale. This occurred even though Alabama law holds that a sheriff’s sale is recognized by statute and does not require any action by a judge. (Ex Parte Arthur Lynn, Ala. Civ. App. 1999.) In fact, that court found that a sheriff’s sale is not a judicial sale, so Harrington acted outside his official capacity as a judge in causing the Shulers’ property rights to be unlawfully auctioned.

What has been the fallout?

As a result of the unlawful auction, a sheriff’s deed now is recorded in Shelby County Probate Court, falsely asserting that Bill Swatek has legal rights to the Shulers’ property. The Shulers now frequently receive mail at their home, addressed to William E. Swatek, as if he is the owner of the property.

Imagine that you are outside on a 90-degree summer day in Alabama, mowing your yard, pulling weeds, trimming shrubs--doing the kinds of things that homeowners do to try to keep their property looking nice. Imagine that sweat is pouring down your face, and your shirt is thoroughly soaked.

Then this thought comes into your head: Thanks to a neighbor with a long criminal record and his lawyer with a long history of ethical violations and corrupt public officials, you are working your ass off on property that you don't fully own.

Imagine how that would make you feel. Mrs. Schnauzer and I don't have to imagine it. We know how it makes you feel. It makes you so pissed off that you are tempted to take the bogus sheriff's deed and jam it up someone's orifice. It makes you want to take Bill Swatek's "hog" and drive it over a cliff--with him on it.

We try to be civilized folks, so we are going about things in the proper manner. But to say we are determined to get justice in this matter would be a vast understatement.


Shuler-Swatek Lawsuit2

Going On the Attack Against the Thugs Who Cheated Me Out of My Job

We recently posted about our experiences with adult bullies and noted that the bullying phenomenon, so much in the news recently, does not end with youth.

So what is a victim to do? Well, the only recourse we know of is to fight back. And that's exactly what my wife and I are doing.

Regular readers know that I was unlawfully terminated from my job at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB). Much the same thing happened to Mrs. Schnauzer at Infinity Property and Casualty. And we had the full rights to our house unlawfully auctioned by the sheriff's office in Shelby County, Alabama. We officially have begun to fight back in federal court.

I recently filed a lawsuit against the University of Alabama Board of Trustees (the legal entity over UAB) and various individuals in connection with my unlawful termination. (See the complaint at the end of this post.)

My wife and I have filed a lawsuit against Shelby County Sheriff Chris Curry and other individuals involved in the unlawful auction of our house. We will be reporting about the basics of that case, and publishing the complaint, shortly.

Evidence strongly suggests that unlawful actions in both cases were driven, at least in part, by individuals connected to Republican Party politics.

Both lawsuits were filed in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Alabama. Defendants have been served, and the early phases of both cases are under way. We will be reporting on both cases, in real time, here at Legal Schnauzer. (My wife's case against Infinity is being investigated by the EEOC, and we will move forward once that phase is completed.)

Our reporting on these cases will be different from what you find in mainstream news outlets. I know from 11 years in the newspaper business, that reporters who cover courts often regurgitate what judges, lawyers, and clerk's offices feed them. Reporters almost never ask the following questions: Are the judges and the lawyers handling this case in a lawful manner? Are the parties acting in a truthful manner?

We will be asking those questions, and providing answers, as the cases unfold. It's another example of how the Web has changed the world of journalism. Such reporting would not have been possible a few years back. With the advent of blogs, it very much is possible now.

What is the gist of my lawsuit against the University of Alabama? The No. 1 allegation is that the university fired me because of the content on my blog about matters of public concern. This constitutes a First Amendment violation, encompassing retaliation and wrongful termination. UAB certainly will contest this, but the truth is not in doubt. From the complaint:

One of the university’s own employees, Anita Bonasera, stated in a tape-recorded conversation that plaintiff was targeted for investigation and ultimately termination because of his blog content about the Don Siegelman case.

We have published key segments of this audiotape before, and you can check it out again. I tape recorded the conversation with Bonasera, who is UAB's director of employee relations, after she and my former supervisor, Pam Powell, placed me on administrative leave. A link to the three-minute segment is below. For about the first 1:40, Bonasera and I discuss the nature of my job duties. At about 1:50, she admits my job issues are related to my blog. And at roughly the 2:08 mark, she admits I was targeted because of the Siegelman content on my blog.

A key point: Bonasera states that Powell had met with university IT personnel to examine how I had used my computer at work. I was the only person in our department who was subjected to this kind of investigation--and it revealed, as came out in my grievance hearing, that I had never written the first word of my blog on UAB equipment or time. Powell apparently designated certain items from my computer usage as "non-work related activity." Bonasera reveals this to me in a conversation that took place roughly two weeks after I had filed an official grievance against Powell in UAB human resources and had complained to Powell's superior, associate vice president Dale Turnbough, about ongoing age discrimination.

UAB policy says an employee is to use the grievance process without fear of reprisal. But roughly two weeks after I filed these grievances/complaints, I was placed on administrative leave. One week after that, I was fired. It's hard to imagine a more blatant example of retaliation. And my taped conversation with Anita Bonasera reveals that UAB targeted, harassed, and terminated me because of the content on my blog:

Audio: UAB and the Cost of Blogging About the Siegelman Case

The lawsuit also includes federal charges of age discrimination, gender discrimination, conspiracy to interfere with civil rights (42 U.S. Code 1985[3]) and action for neglect to prevent (42 U.S. Code 1986). State-law claims for defamation and tortious interference are included in the complaint. The lawsuit also lists fictitious defendants who I plan to name once they are identified through the discovery process. Anonymous threats I've received on this blog, including one specifically mentioning my job, indicates persons outside of UAB were partially driving this termination train.

A scan of Legal Schnauzer archives shows that the vast majority of posts are about legal matters involving other people--former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman, Mississippi attorney Paul Minor, U.S. Justice Department whistleblowers Jill Simpson and Tamarah Grimes, and many others.

But the case against the University of Alabama hits about as close to home as you can get. Several individuals, with the OK of the university's leadership, effectively ruined a career that I had spent 19 years building--30 if you count my 11 years in the newspaper business--and left me in a position where it is almost impossible at age 53 to find a job in my chosen field.

My guess is that the vast majority of Americans never have had an inside look at an employment lawsuit, especially one that involves such flagrant violations of basic civil and constitutional rights.

We intend to provide an inside look that, to my knowledge, has never been presented in American journalism. Does our justice system still work for everyday Americans? We will be finding out.

(Note: I was terminated on May 19, 2008, and the UAB lawsuit was filed on May 17, 2010, within the two-year statute of limitations for a First Amendment claim. The EEOC took way more than the 180 days it is allowed to investigate my claim, but upon my request, the agency issued a right-to-sue letter. Rule 4(m) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure allow a plaintiff 120 days to complete service on defendants. Service was completed on all defendants by September 15, within the time frame allowed by law.)

Shuler--UAB Lawsuit2

U.S. Senate Candidate Raises Tough Questions in Aftermath of the BP Oil Spill

Did the Obama Justice Department restrict access to information in an effort to limit BP's damages in the wake of the Gulf oil spill? What will happen to Gulf Coast residents who become sick years from now as a result of exposure to toxins from the spill?

Those are some of the hard questions U.S. Senate candidate William G. "Bill" Barnes (D-AL) is asking, just one week from next Tuesday's midterm elections.

Barnes faces an uphill battle against GOP incumbent Richard Shelby and his fund-raising machine. But Barnes is in Washington now, asking the kinds of questions that seem to have gone unnoticed by Shelby and Alabama's other senator, Republican Jeff Sessions.

During his stay in D.C., Barnes has sought meetings with Attorney General Eric Holder, EPA Administrator Lisa Perez Jackson, and White House assistant Carol Browner, who focuses on energy and climate-change issues.

In letters to D.C. officials, Barnes says he has seen signs of responsiveness from some in the Obama administration and from special compensation master Kenneth Feinberg. But he also has concerns, especially about Alabama citizens who are likely to be feeling the health and economic impact of the oil spill for years to come. Writes Barnes:

Alabama residents, like others in the Gulf, are justifiably concerned that criminal and civil procedures will fairly compensate for damage and deter future misconduct.

Regarding civil cases:

* Have you investigated any complaints that Justice Department improperly helped restrict reporters, environmental groups or other members of the public from obtaining evidence regarding the scope of BP’s damages?

* What is the latest information on your monitoring of the work of compensation “czar” Kenneth Feinberg to ensure that his work has gone forward with due process and is otherwise fair under the law? Even after being impressed with recent progress under his leadership, I am particularly interested in your overview and assurances that those who may become ill perhaps years later by oil-created illnesses, as yet-unknown, be treated fairly.

Barnes conducted a briefing last week at the National Press Club, and here are highlights regarding environmental issues: