Former Alabama governor Bob Riley has family connections to the Ku Klux Klan (KKK), the Council of Conservative Citizens (CCC), and other extremist groups, sources tell Legal Schnauzer. While governor, Riley backed down from a plan to merge two holidays when angry neo-Confederate groups threatened to go public with his family history.
Riley's father, Eustace Riley Jr. (grandfather of Birmingham attorneys Rob Riley and Minda Riley Campbell), was a KKK Grand Dragon in the small Clay County community of Ashland, according to our sources. The Rileys also have long-standing ties to the CCC, Sons of Confederate Veterans, and United Daughters of the Confederacy.
The CCC's Web site reportedly inspired Dylan Roof, who is charged with nine counts of murder from a mass shooting in June at the historically black Emanuel A.M.E. Church in Charleston, S.C. Roof apparently was heavily influenced by such symbols as the Confederate battle flag, and the Charleston shootings have sparked racial and cultural tensions. At least five people were arrested when white-supremacist and African-American groups clashed on July 18 outside the South Carolina State House, where the Confederate battle flag recently was removed. Members of the KKK played a prominent role in the skirmish.
Why would Riley favor the use of tax credits from public-school revenues to help send kids to private schools? One answer might be money. The law allows an SGO to keep 5 percent of the maximum $25 million in tax-credited donations. Critics say more than $1 million could wind up in Riley's pocket each year.
Riley also might favor private schools because of his family's ties to white-supremacist groups. This was an issue several times while Riley was governor. It was widely reported in fall 2006 that Riley was a member of the Grand Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons of Alabama, a secret society governed by documents that forbid membership to "negroes or other inferior races." Birmingham radio hosts Russ and Dee Fine were fired after reporting on Riley's ties to a racist group.
In one report, Riley claimed he had not attended a lodge meeting since he was in his 20s, and he did not know the head of the masons in Alabama. That doesn't make much sense in light of a widely circulated photo of Riley with Grand Master Frank W. Little,
This August, the executive director of the Alabama Historical Commission, which owns and oversees major historic sites in the state, was forced to resign his position after what were described as conflicts with commissioners and Gov. Bob Riley over the director's support for civil rights preservation projects.
The episode was only the latest of the last several years in which museum professionals and preservation officials from around the South have come under sometimes severe pressure from neo-Confederate activists and their sympathizers, occasionally including harassment and various kinds of threats.
In case after case, members of groups like the League of the South and the Sons of Confederate Veterans have agitated against these professionals in a bid to push versions of history that mainstream curators and historians agree are bunk. . . .
And in Alabama, Lee Warner, the former Alabama Historical Commission executive director, told a reporter that many of Riley's appointees to the commission had opposed his plans to create a museum at the old Greyhound bus station, where Freedom Riders were badly beaten in 1961, and to memorialize the 1965 Selma-to-Montgomery civil rights march.
Also in 2004, Riley supported a Business Council of Alabama plan to merge Confederate Memorial Day with Jefferson Davis' Birthday. The plan met strong resistance from Confederate heritage groups, who said the plan would eliminate "the one holiday especially set aside to honor Alabama's Confederate Veterans."
Why the swift turnaround? Our sources say the Confederate groups knew about Riley's ties to hate groups, especially his father's status as a Grand Dragon in the KKK, and they threatened to go public with the information if he did not cave to their demands.
The Riley family's ties to the Ku Klux Klan have remained out of the public spotlight--until now.
Several writers, especially attorney Ken White of the Popehat blog and reporter Campbell Robertson at The New York Times, have taken me to task for not hiring an attorney while I was unlawfully incarcerated because of a defamation lawsuit from Alabama GOP operative Rob Riley and lobbyist Liberty Duke.
What to make of this criticism? I'm going to file it under the "that's easy for you to say" category. I'm also going to show you what it's like to interact with an Alabama attorney while you are in jail.
Why are White and Robertson more or less full of it? First, I feel sure they have no idea what it's like to try to hire an attorney--an endeavor that is tough as a free person--when you are behind bars. You must meet with someone in a tiny room, for a limited time, while you are wearing an orange jump suit with attractive accessories--handcuffs and shackles. Second, White and Robertson neglect to mention that I met with two attorneys while in jail, so I clearly was open to hiring one. Despite that, Robertson erroneously reported that I refused to consider legal assistance. Third, my critics seem to assume that hiring a lawyer, any lawyer, always makes things better. My experience, and that of many people I've reported about at Legal Schnauzer, has been contrary to that assumption.
White and Robertson never seemed to consider how a bogus incarceration trampled my due-process rights. I was arrested because of a civil matter--alleged contempt of court for violation of a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction--that involved zero allegations of criminal actions. As even White admits, my arrest runs contrary to First Amendment law that has been around in this country for more than 200 years. If we, in fact, have a right to hire an attorney of our choosing in a civil matter--and the due-process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment holds that we do--then we surely have a right to seek an attorney when we are not illegally behind bars. My choices were limited to lawyers who were willing and able to come to the Shelby County Jail, which probably ruled out 98 percent of the lawyers in Alabama--not to mention 100 percent of lawyers from other states.
Despite the obstacles, I met with two lawyers while in jail. One of them, Austin Burdick of Bessemer, I had communicated with previously via phone and e-mail. He seemed like a reasonable fellow with a solid approach to the case, but I was concerned about possibly being stuck with a major bill that I could not pay. The other, David Gespass of Birmingham, was like a character who fell off a train carrying the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey circus.
I had two meetings with Gespass, the first of which went OK and the second of which did not go well at all. That, in large part, is due to a letter Gespass sent me (with a copy to my wife, Carol, since Riley had made her a party to the case) between the meetings. I had a number of concerns with Gespass' letter, which you can read at the end of this post, mainly because I had researched much of the relevant law before I was arrested. (See here and here.) When Gespass failed to address my questions in an honest and straightforward fashion, I called an abrupt end to the meeting--essentially telling him to "get the hell out of here." I was left with the impression that David Gespass was not about representing my best interests; his mission seemed to involve protecting Rob Riley and the interests of the Alabama legal profession.
Let's take a look at a few key points from the Gespass letter. If you ever are involved in a legal matter--hopefully it won't involve an unlawful incarceration such as mine--you are likely to receive such a letter. When that day comes, I hope this analysis might help you determine whether you are dealing with a competent, caring lawyer--or one who is striking poses.
Before addressing the legal nuts and bolts, I must note Gespass' "professional demeanor." He spent much of his time, at least in our second meeting, twirling a pencil up in the air and catching it. I don't think I've seen anyone do that since third grade. Here I was, deprived of my freedom for the first time in my life--with a few serious issues on my mind--and Gespass looks like a grade-school kid killing time outside the principal's office. I thought, "This guy has ADD, Peter Pan Syndrome, or he just doesn't give a damn about my plight." I was tempted to grab the pencil out of the air and jam it down his throat--except I didn't have a free hand. Maybe that's why they make "prisoners" wear handcuffs during meetings with lawyers.
Now, on to the various issues raised in Gespass' letter:
* Were my wife and I lawfully summoned to court? -- In the third paragraph, Gespass provides critical legal information that was totally news to me. That, of course, is because Riley had asked for the case to be unlawfully sealed, which kept us in the dark about simple procedural matters. Gespass states that, according to his review of the court file, Carol and I faced rulings against us before we ever were served with the Riley/Duke complaint--and before a summons had even been issued. In fact, Gespass flat-out states that the temporary restraining order (TRO) and preliminary injunction, which caused me to be incarcerated, were "issued before service was effected." In other words, the court took extraordinarily unlawful actions against Carol and me before it ever had jurisdiction over us--just as I've argued all along.
Quoting Gespass: "The hearing on the preliminary injunction was on September 30, it [the injunction] was issued on October 4, and the summons was not issued until October 16." A summons is pretty important in a lawsuit; as the name implies, it's the document that "summons" a defendant to appear in court. You can get a more full picture about the importance of a summons by checking out Rule 4 of the Alabama Rules of Procedure. A summons is the document that generally begins the issuance of "process" on the defendants in a lawsuit. It's what really gets a case rolling; without it, a civil complaint is just a document sitting in a court file, with nothing happening--and the defendants have no reason to appear in court.
We supposedly were "served" via an unconstitutional traffic stop on September 29, less than 24 hours before the injunction hearing. But Gespass states in his letter that the file showed no service on that date--or any other date. Gespass indicates the material we received that day did not include a summons--and that's because no summons was issued until October 16. If that's the case--and Gespass said in our first meeting that he was going to contact Riley's law firm in order to review the sealed file--we had no reason to appear because the court had not ordered us to appear.
* A lawyer contradicts himself -- In the same paragraph, Gespass proceeds to admonish us, stating: "One could argue that you are entitled to a new hearing, since you were not able to defend at the first one, but that still does not excuse failure to comply with a court order or to seek reconsideration." This is pure nonsense. How are we supposed to comply with a court order when we--in Gespass' own words--had never been served in the case, when we'd never received a summons to go to court? Gespass admits there was no lawful reason for us to appear in court, but then he slaps our hands for not going.
* A lawyer protects a corrupt judge and deputy -- At the end of the third paragraph, Gespass addresses a Motion to Quash I had filed because Deputy Mike DeHart conducted an unconstitutional traffic stop in a bogus attempt to "serve" us court papers. Saith Gespass: "Incidentally, the motion to quash was also denied, and, I believe, correctly so." When I asked Gespass to explain this sentence, he fumbled for an answer, and that's when I told him to get the hell out of my sight.
This sentence from Gespass' letter is utter BS, on multiple levels. First, a Motion to Quash cannot be summarily dismissed. Under Alabama law, a motion challenging service puts the burden on the plaintiffs to prove service was properly completed, and that requires a hearing. (Again, I had researched this before I ever was arrested; in fact, I posted about this very issue on the morning of my arrest.) No such hearing was held--and I know because we never received notice of one--so the motion could not have been denied, "correctly so." In Gespass' own words, we had not been served and had not received a summons, so the court had no authority to even address our motion to quash--in fact, under the facts and the law, we had no reason to file anything with the court, no reason to even acknowledge the court's existence. The record shows, according to Gespass, that legitimate service had not even been attempted, much less "effected."
* A lawyer turns into a schoolmarm -- In the fourth paragraph, Gespass addresses a hearing on a Motion for Contempt and notes that court records show we were sent notice by both certified mail and first-class mail. Gespass then proceeds to lecture us thusly: "You should understand that you are not free to ignore court orders, even if they violate constitutional rights. Your remedy is to seek to have them set aside through the court process. If you do not do so, you have to accept the consequences of your failure, as well as the consequences of being found wrong on the constitutional questions." Now, let's examine Gespass' words in the context of what he's already stated in his letter:
(1) He says that court records show the TRO and preliminary injunction were issued before service was completed. That meant the court had no jurisdiction over us--that is from Gespass' words, not mine--so how could the TRO and preliminary injunction be lawful? They can't be--they are void, probably a nullity.
(2) Gespass says a summons was not issued until October 16. He doesn't say that it was served on us, just that it was issued on October 16. Judge Claud Neilson's Order on Petitions for Contempt says the hearing in question was heard on October 17. That's one day after a summons was issued, but not served. How we can be forced to appear at a hearing when we have not been served with a summons for the case? We can't.
(3) By Gespass' own words, service could not possibly have been completed until October 16--and given that the summons was not issued until that date, it's extremely unlikely that service could be completed that quickly. The chances of us being served prior to the October 17 hearing were virtually zero.
(4) Here are the facts: October 16 was one week before my arrest, on October 23. Carol and I know that during that week, we picked up nothing via certified mail, we were served with noting via a sheriff's deputy, a process server, or anyone else. According to Gespass' letter--which is based largely on court records that he had seen, but we had not--we never were lawfully served. Deputy Mike DeHart's bogus traffic stop was on Sept. 29--and aside from the Fourth Amendment issues raised by the stop--Gespass says a summons was not issued in the case until October 16. That means the material DeHart gave us did not include a summons, the very document that calls a defendant to court. Even giving DeHart way more leeway than he deserves, we had no legal reason to go to court--because we were not lawfully summoned to court, either on September 30 or October 17
How to summarize what we've learned so far? Numerous Web reports--from right-leaning sites to supposedly objective mainstream sites--have claimed I "ignored a court order" and deserved to be held in contempt. In fact, we never were lawfully summoned to court, and the record (combined with the facts as we know them) show we never were served at all. Again, those are from David Gespass' words, not mine.
And yet, I was brutalized inside my own home, doused with pepper spray, and hauled to jail for a five-month stay--based on the orders of a court that had no jurisdiction over me--and had not even lawfully summoned me to appear.
In an upcoming post, we will address the second page of David Gespass' letter, along with some curious public comments he made about our case.
We've presented evidence that members of a right-wing bloggers club might have been involved in, or at least had knowledge of, my unlawful incarceration. Would it be a surprise if members of the group, called the National Bloggers Club (NBC), engaged in such underhanded activity? Given that the club president has a history of engaging in underhanded activity--including some that might be described as downright sleazy--the answer probably is no.
NBC president Ali A. Akbar threatened to sue me for reporting accurately and fairly about a letter Alabama lawyer Jill Simpson wrote to Obama re-election counsel Robert Bauer in 2012. In the letter, Simpson wrote that her investigation turned up evidence that Akbar and Republican electoral guru Karl Rove had engaged in a homosexual relationship. Under the "neutral reportage doctrine," Akbar had no case for defamation against me--and his lawyer Baron Coleman, of Montgomery, Alabama, should have known that.
Threatening baseless lawsuits is pretty underhanded in itself. But that is a mere blip on the radar compared to the other shady stuff in Akbar's background, which includes trolling for gay sex online--plus multiple criminal convictions, including felonies.
Let's start with the online trolling because that's what prompted Simpson to take a closer look at Akbar. She obtained a copy of an ad Akbar placed at Grindr, a geosocial networking application "geared toward gay, bisexual, and bi-curious men." According to Simpson's letter, Akbar's ad stated that he "was looking for bisexual sex with men who were Republican, political, and loved to discuss politics and philosophy and just wanted to hang out and chill with them."
How forward-thinking is Foster Friess? Not very. In an interview with MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell, Friess was asked about contraception. "This contraceptive thing, my gosh, it’s so . . . inexpensive," Friess said. "Back in my day, they used Bayer aspirin for contraceptives. The gals put it between their knees and it wasn’t that costly."
So Foster Friess supports anti-gay candidates and bloggers, and seems to be a "tough on crime" conservative, but he financially supports a bloggers club with a president who has trolled for gay sex at Grindr and has an extensive criminal record? Hard to figure.
How did Ali Akbar rise to a prominent role in the Republican media galaxy, despite his criminal record? That also is hard to figure, given the GOP's stance as the supposed "law and order" party.
Borrowing from public records, BU describes the theft case as follows:
Five MP3 Players, Twenty CD’s, Three Camcorders, Two DVD Players, One Back Massager (How ghetto is this thief?) One Clock, Four Shirts, Two Belts (WTF?) and a Piece of Luggage, which had the value of over 1500.00 USD but less than 20,000.00 USD. This theft was obtained pursuant to one scheme or a continuing course of criminal conduct which began on or about November 1st 2006, and continued until on or about November 29th 2006. In other words, he was stealing from this person more than once, and over a course of time that lasted almost a full month before it came to an end.
That's quite a crime spree--and the ugliness doesn't end there. BU reports that Akbar also was charged with burglary of a vehicle, but that charge was dropped in a plea bargain that resolved his theft and credit-card cases.
How many other unattractive qualities does Ali Akbar possess? Well, let's consider that he likes to brag about his ties to the Alabama political/legal communities and issue thinly veiled threats based on his access to powerful friends. That's exactly what he did to Jill Simpson, in apparent retaliation for her letter to Robert Bauer. (By the way, how did Akbar develop such contacts in Alabama? Perhaps from Karl Rove, who is known to make his Alabama home base at the Montgomery law firm of Capell Howard?)
In a post dated October 24, 2013 (one day after my arrest), right-wing blogger Stacy McCain referenced the Simpson/Bauer letter and its allegations regarding a homosexual relationship between Ali Akbar and Karl Rove. Akbar piped up in the comments section and stated the following:
There's no alleged affair. It's made up an (sic) irresponsible to print. I'm a human fucking being and Jill Simpson should lawyer up buddy. Tell her not to worry about coming to Texas. I can come to Alabama. I'll dine with the Governor and then spend the afternoon cashing in favors with Alabama lawyers.
Since current Governor Robert Bentley almost certainly would want nothing to do with Ali Akbar, the reference must be to former Governor Bob Riley, who owes his two terms in office largely to the Karl Rove and Jack Abramoff political machines. (By the way, that hints that Akbar is chummy with Riley's son, Rob Riley, who just happened to file the dubious defamation lawsuit that led to my incarceration.)
Foster Friess (center), with Ali Akbar
and Robert Stacy McCain
What kind of favors would Akbar be "cashing in" with Alabama lawyers? What did he do for certain lawyers in order to earn favors? If Akbar had a valid claim against Jill Simpson, why didn't he file it and why would he need favors to move forward with it? Does it mean Akbar had some form of "extra legal" remedies in mind for Simpson?
And who are these lawyers who owe favors to Ali Akbar? Could they be from Capell Howard, Karl Rove's favorite Alabama law firm?
Public records show that Ali Akbar has a history as a thief, a burglar, and a credit-card abuser. His comment regarding Jill Simpson strongly suggests that he's not above abusing the Alabama legal system.
Coleman claims in his missive, which you can read at the end of this post, that I defamed Akbar by reporting on a letter that Alabama lawyer Jill Simpson wrote to Robert Bauer, counsel for President Barack Obama's 2012 re-election campaign. Simpson wrote the letter in response to a bizarre rant from GOP election guru Karl Rove on a Fox News program.
Rove took an unrelated question and turned it into an attack on Simpson, Bauer, and former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman. So Simpson stated in her letter to Bauer that she thought Rove became unhinged because he feared she was about to reveal damaging information about his personal life. In fact, Simpson wrote, she did have damaging information because her research had turned up evidence that Rove and Akbar had a sexual relationship at some point.
Are Simpson's statements true? She doesn't provide extensive details in the letter, but she does note that Akbar had placed an ad at the Grindr gay-sex Web site, stating that he "was looking for bisexual sex with men who were Republican, political, and loved to discuss politics and philosophy and just wanted to hang out and chill with them." (We will have more about the Akbar ad, and his rather extensive criminal history, in an upcoming post.)
Simpson is an attorney who has testified under oath before Congress about the Siegelman prosecution. She has come under regular attack from political figures on the right, but I'm not aware of anyone who has been able to prove that her sworn statements about the Siegelman matter were false.
I took her statements in the Bauer letter seriously and reported on them accurately, in a straightforward fashion, That means my work was protected by the "neutral reportage privilege," which has grown from a long line of First Amendment cases that date at least to the early 1970s.
The Alabama Supreme Court adopted the neutral reportage privilege in a case styled Wilson v. Birmingham Post Co., 482 So. 2d 1209 (1986). In Wilson, the state high court cited Edwards v. National Audubon Society, 556 F. 2d 113 (2nd Cir., 1977). (Ironically, Wilson involved two people I worked with at the now-defunct Birmingham Post-Herald--Editor Angus McEachran and reporter Kathy Biele.) Edwards, perhaps the best-known case on the neutral reportage privilege,grew from a New York Times article on statements from an Audubon Society editor about scientists who supported the continued use of the insecticide DDT. Such scientists, the Audubon editor wrote, often make false statements about the society's bird-count totals, leading to the editor's conclusion that they are "paid to lie."
Times journalist John Devlin wrote an accurate, straightforward article about the editor's statements, and the scientists wound up suing the newspaper. A trial court found for the scientists, but the appellate court reversed, finding that Devlin's reporting was protected by the neutral reportage privilege. From the Edwards ruling:
At stake in this case is a fundamental principle. Succinctly stated, when a responsible, prominent organization like the National Audubon Society makes serious charges against a public figure, the First Amendment protects the accurate and disinterested reporting of those charges, regardless of the reporter's private views regarding their validity. See Time, Inc. v. Pape, 401 U.S. 279, 91 S.Ct. 633, 28 L.Ed.2d 45 (1971); Medina v. Time, Inc., 439 F.2d 1129 (1st Cir. 1971). What is newsworthy about such accusations is that they were made. We do not believe that the press may be required under the First Amendment to suppress newsworthy statements merely because it has serious doubts regarding their truth. Nor must the press take up cudgels against dubious charges in order to publish them without fear of liability for defamation. Cf. Miami Herald Publishing Co. v. Tornillo, 418 U.S. 241, 94 S.Ct. 2831, 41 L.Ed.2d 730 (1974). The public interest in being fully informed about controversies that often rage around sensitive issues demands that the press be afforded the freedom to report such charges without assuming responsibility for them.
The contours of the press's right of neutral reportage are, of course, defined by the principle that gives life to it. Literal accuracy is not a prerequisite: if we are to enjoy the blessings of a robust and unintimidated press, we must provide immunity from defamation suits where the journalist believes, reasonably and in good faith, that his report accurately conveys the charges made.Time, Inc. v. Pape, supra. . . .
It is clear here, that Devlin reported Audubon's charges fairly and accurately. He did not in any way espouse the Society's accusations: indeed, Devlin published the maligned scientists' outraged reactions in the same article that contained the Society's attack. The Times article, in short, was the exemplar of fair and dispassionate reporting of an unfortunate but newsworthy contretemps. Accordingly, we hold that it was privileged under the First Amendment.
First, the media must report the charges neutrally and accurately. Second, the charges must have been made by a responsible and prominent speaker. Third, the subjects of the accusations must be public figures. Finally, the charges must be newsworthy.
Let's briefly review these four elements in the context of my report on Simpson's letter:
(1) My report on the Simpson letter can be read here. I quote directly from the letter, and a full copy of the letter is embedded in the post. My reporting clearly was an accurate portrayal of her charges, and there is nothing in the post to suggest that my work was anything but neutral.
(2) Simpson is a prominent and knowledgeable speaker, who once served as a Republican operative under Rove. Her willingness to testify under oath before Congress goes to her history of responsible conduct.
(3) Rove, Akbar, and Bauer--by virtue of their deep involvement in political activities--unquestionably are public figures.
(4) At the core of Simpson's letter is this question: Why did Karl Rove use an appearance on Fox News to attack her and a key member of President Obama's re-election campaign? What were Rove's motivations? Rove helped George W. Bush get elected president twice (2000 and 2004), and he raised record numbers of campaign dollars for the 2012 Mitt Romney campaign against Obama. Anything involving Karl Rove's motivations clearly is newsworthy--it's hard to imagine that Rove himself would deny that.
In summary, my post meets all four elements of the neutral reportage privilege. That means it is protected from a defamation lawsuit, and Ali Akbar had no case. Perhaps he knows that because he never followed up Baron Coleman's threatening letter with a lawsuit.
Foster Friess (center), with Ali Akbar
and right-wing blogger Robert Stacy McCain
Our research indicates Akbar never threatened a lawsuit against Jill Simpson, with whom the alleged defamatory statements originated. That indicates Akbar has no interest in a court tussle with Simpson. Is that because the burden of proof to show the statements are false would rest with him--and he knows he can't meet that burden?
Maybe Akbar and his allies decided it would be best to go after Simpson in some sort of deceptive fashion--rather than going the straightforward (but likely baseless) lawsuit route?
Does Foster Friess, the devout Christian conservative businessman who helped bankroll Akbar's bloggers club, endorse this sort of shady, underhanded thuggery? Does Friess, who claims on his Web site that the private sector is the answer to most of America's challenges, endorse abusive use of the justice system?
This much is clear: If Ali Akbar is engaging in underhanded tactics now, it would not be his first experience with such activities.
Tests on feces that washed ashore in south Alabama reportedly reveal that birds, not humans, were the source of the icky finding. But a consumer group devoted to exposing political corruption in the area says the tests were a sham. A video taken of the befouled beach appears to support the consumer group's claim that it's human waste, not goose poop. that washed up on sand.
The Ripp Report(TRR), published by F. Paul Ripp, blames Tim Kant, mayor of Fairhope (a town across the bay from Mobile), for perpetrating a scam on the public. A report at the TRR Facebook page said goose poop from the area was gathered and sent to Auburn University for testing. But workers, apparently at the direction of Mayor Kant, did not gather fecal samples that obviously appear to be from humans or animals much larger than geese. In some instances, it looks like elephants have been hanging around the Fairhope beach. (See link to video at the end of this post.)
In fact, TRR reports that its sources say the poop is from humans--and it came from pier bathrooms that were being renovated at the time of the incident. The Auburn tests showed no human feces because no human feces was sent to the lab. And that likely is because no one from Auburn or the Alabama Department of Emergency Management (ADEM) was involved in the collection process.
Only goose poop, available in relatively small amounts, was sent--and that means geese have been left to wrongfully take the crap--I mean rap. Reports TRR, in a post titled "Scoop on Poop":
With a viral video and a flash of media coverage, the media lost interest and did no investigation as to the source of the infamous poop. The Ripp Report, however, had a very reliable source come forward and offer information, we also have caught Mayor Kant lying so many times that we knew he would stay true to form.
The sample sent to Auburn was NOT collected by Auburn or ADEM. It was actually collected by two employees of the sewer plant, dispatched by the manager of the plant. This information took over two weeks to obtain. The mayor ordered the sample taken, and then [told] the public that Auburn and ADEM were in charge of an independent, unbiased report on water quality at a public beach, which is totally FALSE.
The test results proved the poop on the beach, COLLECTED, was geese poop. If they collected geese poop, then they knew the test would come back as geese poop. This is classic Kant. Now if you viewed the video [and] are a sober adult and had the unfortunate experience of seeing human poop, you know Kant is full of BS.
TRR goes on to report what appears to be obvious from a video that area resident Elliott Gordon shot. These are human turds, and some of them look like they were deposited by the Dallas Cowboys defensive line after a dinner of baked beans and wieners. If we have geese dropping "bombs" like these, all of us need to wear industrial-strength helmets upon going outside. And TRR sources know where the human feces came from:
Our source is telling us it came from the pier bathrooms, which were under renovation at the exact time of the incident. The holding tank of raw sewage is suspended under the bathrooms, you can see it easily. The contractor is George Robards, who constantly gets contracts from the city as well as the Single Tax Colony for sidewalks, bathrooms, etc. Mr. Robards sits on Planning and Zoning, is a major contributor [to] Mayor Kant and friend of Lee Turner, who is in heading both Planning and Zoning and Single Tax--no poop, one big happy family, but no conflict of interest?
Our source and the history of the pier clearly show this has happened before and has been the subject of a lawsuit. That’s why the city could not take responsibility, liability, forget about public safety, let's protect the good ole boys at all costs.
Mayor Kant blames the geese, kills the geese and will continue to do so, ignoring the problem and public safety. It will happen again; Auburn and ADEM suggested the public collect samples at the time of the incident. You cannot believe the mayor or council members who have never looked into a toilet.
Blaming geese for an administration's inability to fix toilets without spreading human feces everywhere? What a sh---y thing to do.
Baron Coleman, a lawyer in Montgomery, Alabama, issued the Akbar threat via a letter dated October 26, 2013, three days after I landed in the Shelby County Jail. You can read Coleman's letter at the end of this post. Obviously, I never read it--or even knew about it--until I was released from jail in March 2014. Once I did read it, I knew right off that Baron Coleman is a sorry excuse for a lawyer--or he has motivations for participating in the con games that seem to bring so much joy to many Republican operatives.
Having earned a bachelor's degree in journalism and practiced professionally in the field for more than 30 years, I know a thing or two about communications law. In order to graduate from my university in journalism, you had to take at least one course in the field. I knew right off that Baron Coleman's letter was as worthless as a 1980-model typewriter.
Rove took a question about the tax-exempt status of certain PACs and turned it into an attack on Simpson, Bauer, and Siegelman--who was the target of perhaps the most notorious political prosecution in U.S. history. Rove told Van Susteren that Bauer represented Simpson in her 2007 testimony before the U.S. Congress and that she never testified under oath.
Both statements are demonstrably false, and Simpson responded with a letter to Bauer in which she included an affidavit stating that the two of them had never met, and he had never represented her. Simpson also wrote that she thought Rove became unhinged on live TV because he knew she had damaging information about his personal life, and it soon might become public knowledge.
Greta Van Susteren and Karl Rove
What was the damaging information? It grew, according to Simpson's letter, from an ad that Akbar placed at an adult Web site/app called Grindr, stating that he "was looking for bisexual sex with men who were Republican, political, and loved to discuss politics and philosophy and just wanted to hang out and chill with them." (We will have more about Akbar's ad, and his fairly extensive criminal history, in an upcoming post.)
In her letter to Bauer, Simpson stated that she took the Akbar ad and used it to unearth more information about his ties to powerful Republicans. Her research, she stated, indicated that Akbar and Rove had a sexual relationship.
I received a copy of Simpson's letter and reported on its contents in a post dated June 27, 2012. Roughly 18 months later, Ali Akbar decided he had been defamed and enlisted Baron Coleman to send me the letter you can read below.
Curiously, it seems Akbar's lawyer did not send such a letter to Jill Simpson, even though the allegedly defamatory material originated with her. Is that because Akbar knows the burden of proof to show that Simpson's statements are false would be on him--and he probably could not meet it?
Organizers used the party to announce the formation of a new nonprofit started with seed money from millionaire Santorum-backer Foster Friess. Called the "National Bloggers Club," the group will use donations to fund private reporting projects. It also hopes to issue press passes, serving as a clearinghouse so event organizers can differentiate between a blogger with honest intentions versus someone looking for a free pass by starting a Blogspot account. But mostly, the organizers said, the new organization will support and encourage online writers.
Foster Friess: The Man Atop the Horse
(From fosterfriess.com)
We are left with this thought-provoking question: Who came up with the "hat and the horse idea" first--Foster Friess or Dale Peterson? Given that Friess has a whole lot more money than Peterson, we'll have to go with Friess. On his Web site, Friess seems to portray himself as a "rugged individualist" who believes private-enterprise can solve social ills that the government only makes worse.
Would such a moral, Christian, tough guy support the idea of sending letters that threaten baseless lawsuits? Well, that's exactly what Ali Akbar is doing, and his bloggers club got off the ground largely because of Foster Friess' financial support.
How do we know, by the way, that Ali Akbar's lawsuit threat has no meat to its bones? What does the law say about such matters? We will address those questions in an upcoming post.
Pepper spray generally has been seen in the United States as a harmless way to subdue suspects during an arrest. It might be time to rethink that after an Alabama man died late last week, minutes after law-enforcement officers directed pepper spray at him.
Anthony Dewayne Ware, 35, ran into nearby woods when officers from the Tuscaloosa Police Department (TPD) approached him at an apartment complex on the city's east side. Officers, claiming Ware was resisting arrest, used pepper spray to help subdue and then handcuff him. As officers were walking Ware out of the woods, he collapsed and was pronounced dead later that evening at DCH Regional Medical Center.
A Tuscaloosa resident called police Friday night after spotting Anthony Dewayne Ware, 35, sitting on the front porch of a home with a gun, police said.
"Mr. Ware had an active warrant that had been verified for attempting to elude police," Tuscaloosa police Assistant Chief Ronnie Dunn said.
When officers arrived, police said, Ware fled.
"Officers chased him into the woods, and when the officers caught up to him, he resisted arrest," Dunn said.
Police pepper-sprayed Ware, who continued struggling but was eventually handcuffed, Dunn said. But while officers were walking out of the woods with him, Ware collapsed.
The Tuscaloosa News reported that investigators have requested an expedited autopsy in the Ware case, and they plan to release its results and video of the pursuit. Did the justice system have a legitimate reason to be targeting Ware? That appears to be in doubt, according to The Tuscaloosa News:
TPD had a warrant to charge Ware for attempting to elude police. Ware was arrested in September after a woman told officers that he choked her until she was unconscious, sexually assaulted her and stole her 2011 Honda Accord. The woman recanted that statement in a letter that is included in the court documents. A judge denied his request to dismiss the case, which was pending when he died.
The Ware case and my case differ in a number of respects. Ware had a criminal record (convictions for second-degree assault, escape, drug possession and drug trafficking), while I don't think I've even had a speeding ticket. Ware was wanted on a criminal matter--although it appears the supposed victim might have made up or embellished her story--while my case was 100 percent civil, with no allegations of criminal conduct.
Ware was apprehended in a wooded area, while cops nabbed me inside my own home in a manner that appears to violate state and federal law. Police did have a warrant for Ware, while any evidence of a warrant has yet to be produced in my case--Officer Blevins, on the scene, did not present a warrant, never said he had a warrant, and never even stated his purpose for being on my property until I had been knocked to the concrete floor of my garage three times and doused in the face with pepper spray.
What's it like to be the target of pepper spray? Here's how The Tuscaloosa News reported its effects:
Oleoresin capsicum, called OC or pepper spray, is a chemical compound that irritates the eyes. It causes tears, pain and temporary blindness and is used by police to subdue suspects.
Based on my experience, pepper spray has much more severe effects than that indicates. I was seated on the floor of my garage, with my arms resting on my raised knees, My hands were right there, where any semi-competent officer could have put handcuffs on them. But Blevins sprayed OC into my face, apparently from about a foot away.
I immediately had the sensation of my breath being taken away, of being disoriented in a way I've never experienced. In fact, I felt immobilized, like someone had reached the switch that operates my limbs and clicked it to "off." I don't know what science has found about OC, but I believe it has an immediate impact on the neurological system. Is it safe? Well, when I got to the Shelby County Jail, officers made me strip off all my clothes and I was told I was being "de-toxed," placed into a special area with a shower. None of the officers, it seemed, was anxious to get close to me.
This much is certain: I have never felt the same since the night I was pepper sprayed? Is that due to the PTSD with which I've been diagnosed by multiple medical professionals Or has my neuromuscular system been damaged by pepper spray?
We might discover that Anthony Ware had an underlying condition--heart disease, asthma, epilepsy, or something else--that contributed to his death. But it seems clear, for now, that he would be alive if police had not directed pepper spray at him.
That makes me think I might have been lucky, on October 23, 2013, to come out of my garage alive.
Here is a video about the pepper-spray death of Anthony Ware:
Members of a right-wing bloggers' club concocted the notion that I was encouraging a federal lawsuit against them, and other conservative figures, and they wrote about it obsessively in the days leading to, and following, my October 2013 arrest.
At the heart of the matter is a commenter at a progressive Web site who goes by the handle "RogerS" and appears to have a fair amount of knowledge about legal matters--in fact, he was encouraging liberal activist Brett Kimberlin to file a federal RICO lawsuit against members of the bloggers club and other individuals on the right. When Kimberlin did, in fact, file a RICO suit, I wound up in jail roughly one week later. Coincidence? That's hard to say, but let's look at what we do know.
In certain corners of the blogosphere, it became popular to suggest that "RogerS" and Roger Shuler (me) were one and the same--even though I had nothing to do with the comments in question, I was not aware of any possible federal lawsuit, and I have no clue about the identity of "RogerS." Still, evidence suggests I might have paid a high price--loss of my freedom for five months-- for something that did not involve me.
With Ali Akbar's criminal record and his apparent tendency to troll for gay sex online, he seems to make a strange bedfellow for Foster Friess. But then, the Friess-supported bloggers club is a strange outfit to begin with. The "RogerS" episode they created out of thin air is one of the most bizarre sagas I've ever witnessed--and it was personal for me, given that I was portrayed as a "boogey man" for something I did not do.
Were the bloggers, or the people to whom they answer, upset enough about "RogerS" to somehow get involved with my five-month incarceration? On the surface, my arrest grew from a dubious defamation lawsuit filed by Alabama GOP operative Rob Riley and violated more than 200 years of First Amendment law. But NBC bloggers went into a virtual feeding frenzy in the days before and after my arrest, apparently convinced that I was "RogerS," the pseudo lawyer who was encouraging Brett Kimberlin to file a RICO lawsuit against them. (See here and here.)
Were the right-wing bloggers, and their benefactors, worried enough about Kimberlin's lawsuit that they decided to make me pay--for something I was not remotely involved with? Heck, did Foster Friess help bankroll an operation that led both to my incarceration and a legally shaky foreclosure on our house?
Foster Friess: Man Atop the Horse
(From fosterfriess.com)
I don't know the answers to those questions--yet. In fact, I didn't even know my name was linked to such a bizarre Web-generated "controversy" until late 2014, roughly eight months after my release from jail.
But the timing of the episode is curious, and the list of questions it raises is lengthy: Were right-wing interests concerned because they thought I was encouraging a legal action that might unlock some of their secrets? Or was the "RogerS episode" a diversionary tactic to attract attention away from those who really were responsible for having me jailed? Was I actually incarcerated because of my reporting about U.S. Judge Bill Pryor and his ties to 1990s gay pornography?
Did liberal interests, who one might expect to be my comrades, play a role in helping to set me up as "RogerS"? Or did liberals throw the idea out there, more or less as a joke, only to have conservatives run with it in nefarious ways?
I've come to no solid conclusions about all of this. But since I lost five months of my freedom under historic and outlandish conditions--and my wife, Carol, almost joined me in being abducted--I have obvious motivation to learn the truth about what happened.
This much is clear: Ali Akbar himself was deeply invested in the notion that I was "RogerS," as evidenced by this tweet from early November 2013. Does that mean Akbar encouraged members of his bloggers club to spread a false narrative about me?
Public documents show the following: Liberal activist Brett Kimberlin filed a federal RICO lawsuit against Akbar, the bloggers, and other right-wing figures on October 15, 2013, with an amended complaint filed on October 17. Six days after that, a Shelby County deputy entered my garage, beat me up without showing a warrant or stating his purpose for being there, directed pepper spray into my face, and hauled me off to jail.
You see what I mean by curious timing. So let's follow the trail, as we know it so far.
Another commenter on the same post replied: "RogerS is one of two very cool people in Alabama . . . Everyone should read his latest: A very "stiff" portrayal of a federal judge." That's the first sign I can find of connections forming between "RogerS," Roger Shuler, and the Bill Pryor story--and it came from a commenter at a liberal Web site.
On a BU post dated October 11, 2013, "RogerS" wrote in a comment that he was a lawyer who had experience with RICO cases. He then stated the following:
I say this because if Kimberlin had us as his lawyers, we would have advised him to sue under RICO and go after a broad conspiracy, including some deep pockets. The defendants in the state case are very lucky they were not sued under RICO in federal court. It certainly appears that they have engaged in a pattern of racketeering. Those treble damages are very nice.
It didn't take long for conservatives to pick up on the idea that I was RogerS--and I was the "legal wizard" who was encouraging Brett Kimberlin to go after them under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO). Never mind that my only connection to Brett Kimberlin is one post I wrote about his long-and-winding feud with various conservative bloggers and entities. I've never pretended to give Brett Kimberlin, or anyone else, legal advice--after all, I'm not a lawyer, and I've never claimed to be a lawyer.
Kimberlin, acting pro se,actually filed a RICO lawsuit on October 15, 2013, four days after the "RogerS" comment above. A RICO lawsuit is a civil claim based largely on criminal allegations that typically involve a possible conspiracy. In other words, RICO involves allegations of organized crime, and it can be a pretty unsettling matter to be named as a defendant in such a lawsuit. Kimberlin filed an amended complaint on October 17, and six days later (on October 23, 2013), a Shelby County deputy attacked me in my own home and arrested me.
Again, is that a coincidence? Well, it didn't take long for conservative bloggers to start targeting me as the evil mastermind behind Kimberlin's RICO suit. The first connection on the right apparently came in the comments to a post dated October 24, 2013, at Patterico's Pontifications (written by California lawyer Patrick Frey). That was the day after my arrest, and you can see the first "RogerS"/Roger Shuler comparison in comment No. 65, which was written by "Patterico" himself.
The Other McCain (written by Robert Stacy McCain) took it even further in an October 26 post. At that point, my bunk in the Shelby County Jail had barely gotten warm. From the McCain item:
If, as some have suggested today, “RogerS” is actually the self-same Roger Shuler (Shelby County Jail inmate No. 288928), then his comments at a pro-Kimberlin web site are what lawyers called “evidence.”
Evidence of what? I have no idea, especially since I wasn't, and never have been, "RogerS."
And while I feel the evidence is not conclusive beyond a reasonable doubt that “Roger S.” is Roger Shuler, in my opinion there is a high probability that it is.
And this could be a very big problem. As I believe it is in most states, unauthorized practice of law is a crime in Alabama.
Now look, legal advice happens all the time, on the internet. Someone says what someone should do in a suit and that is arguably legal advice, but the bar associations generally let that slide. Everyone knows you aren’t a lawyer, so an intelligent reader will take what you said with a grain of salt.
But if the person actually starts identifying him or herself as a lawyer and then starts dispensing advice on how to handle a suit... that becomes much more problematic.
In a post written two days later, Robert Stacy McCain jumped on the "Roger Shuler must be committing a crime" train. The lengthy November 2 post includes screenshots of comments "RogerS" left at BU and then attempts to draw some conclusions:
See, there are coincidences and then there are coincidences. As anyone can see from the comments I’ve screencapped, “RogerS” had been commenting quite frequently: Oct. 17, Oct. 18, Oct. 19, Oct. 21, Oct. 23 and then . . . silence, beginning the same day Roger Shuler was arrested in Alabama, continuing for a full week until, after Aaron Walker pointed out that it is a crime in Alabama to impersonate a lawyer, suddenly “RogerS” pops up to say he is definitely not Roger Shuler.
What kind of coincidence do you think that was? And don’t you think that authorities in Alabama, who seem to be very zealous in their enforcement of the law, might be able to get a subpoena to determine whether Roger Shuler was indeed the phony lawyer “RogerS”?
Because it seems to me that if there were probable cause to suspect Roger Shuler of actually committing a crime — as opposed to a mere contempt of court problem regarding civil litigation — they could get a search warrant for Roger Shuler’s computer.
McCain seems to be big on "coincidences," so isn't it curious that he has a keen interest in searching the contents of my computer, where perhaps my research related to Judge Bill Pryor was stored?
What does all of this mean? I still don't know, but we have clear evidence of a coordinated campaign to falsely suggest that I was "RogerS"--and I was encouraging Brett Kimberlin to file a RICO lawsuit.
Matt Osborne, editor at Breitbart Unmasked, tried to put the whole thing in perspective with a post titled "Why is Team Akbar So Invested In Believing That Roger Shuler Comments Here?" Osborne stated that "RogerS," whoever he is, posted comments from a geolocation far removed from my home base of Alabama. Osborne also showed that "RogerS" had left a comment just hours after my arrest--and correctly noted that it would have been impossible for me to comment from jail.
Here is Osborne's broader take on the "RogerS" saga:
After the arrest of Alabama blogger Roger Shuler on October 23, right wing blog speculation over the identity of RogerS, who leaves comments here from time to time, reached fever pitch. Robert Stacy McCain, Aaron Walker, John Patrick Frey, Kimberlin Unmasked, and even Ken White (of Popehat blog) all weighed in with excitement bordering on bloodlust. In fact, one might even be tempted to think that all their blogging about Shuler’s arrest was driven by an intense desire to link Mr. Shuler with this website, as if they thought such a link would magically absolve Team Akbar of defamation. But last Thursday evening, RogerS spoiled their plans with a comment from the same IP address that he always uses. . . .
Looking over Team Akbar’s blog coverage of Shuler’s arrest, we find Aaron Walker the most hypocritical. A few weeks ago, Walker pretty much admitted to practicing law without a license in Maryland; now he tries to compensate by speculating about RogerS, Roger Shuler, and whether the latter has broken the law by making litigation-related comments as the former. But for sheer dumbassery, R.S. McCain is impossible to beat. As if to underscore just how desperately he needs to believe RogerS is Roger Shuler, on Saturday McCain wrote a breathless justification for his conspiracy theory. McCain’s writing is far short on proof, but overly long on speculation. He seems to think that Shelby County deputies would be justified in seizing Mr. Shuler’s computer to search for proof of nefarious criminal coordination with McCain’s mythical “Team Kimberlin. . . . ”
(McCain) hates liberals with the utter contempt and eliminationist loathing of a racist. He does no fact-checking against what he thinks he knows. He panders to a reactive audience that actually believes the president was born in Kenya, and (McCain) hoards guns and gold in anticipation of the Second Amendment remedies for Obamacare. The tone is absolutist and authoritarian: if you disagree with McCain’s politics, you are not human, and therefore not entitled to constitutional protections. Team Akbar is characterized by two kinds of thinking, magical and misanthropic, and McCain is the perfect avatar for both.
How is this for irony? I've never had much interest in the Kimberlin v. Team Akbar story. The one post I've written on it was at the request of a valued source. While the story raises some important issues in the digital age, it generally falls outside the boundaries of what I normally report.
Someone, though, decided to drag me into the fray--based on false assumptions that I was encouraging Brett Kimberlin to file a RICO case. I intend to find out more about why that happened.
Before we go, here is a video where Ali Akbar admits (at about the 2:17 mark) that he has worked with Karl Rove:
Today is one of the saddest days in the history of Legal Schnauzer. Chloe, the female half of our brother/sister Tonkinese cat combo, died last night.
The title of this blog is a hint that my wife, Carol, and I are animal lovers, and we've tried to treat and love our pets as if they were true members of the family. We always enjoy hearing from readers about the animals who have brought much joy to their homes. I've written several times about Chloe and her brother, Baxter, trying to give a sense of their personalities--and how much we've enjoyed having them with us. (See here, here, and here.)
Losing Chloe has us in a state of shock and grief--I'm literally typing through tears as I try to write this.
We spent most of last evening at an emergency veterinary clinic, and blood work showed that Chloe's kidneys were shutting down, and her other key numbers were in dangerous territory. She had to be euthanized, and even though she hadn't been eating right for about three months, we thought we had her headed in the right direction. We thought the lethargy she showed yesterday was due to dehydration, and we hoped an IV treatment would make her much better. But it turned out that we were dealing in the past few months with something much worse than what we had imagined.
What did Chloe mean to us--what will she always mean to us? Gosh, it's hard to find words right now. Of the three pets we've had in 25 years of marriage, she wasn't the most active, or the most alert, or the most playful. But she was the sweetest. She had a round "moon pie" face, and gorgeous blue eyes--and while we sometimes joked that she wasn't "burdened with heavy thoughts"--she was invariably good natured and very low maintenance. She loved her "noms" at meal time, and when she was ready for some loving, she would rub back and forth against our legs, and she seemed to enjoy being patted on her rather ample rump. But mostly, she was just a great "chill buddy," a gentle, calming presence in an often stormy world.
We have a tendency to create "personas" for our pets. Murphy, the miniature schnauzer for whom this blog is named, was a feisty, playful sort, who was an utter joy but could be a bit overprotective of her family unit. She reveled in her "humans," but she probably didn't come across as overly friendly to people she didn't know.
Baxter, Chloe's brother (from the same litter), is our court jester and clown. He's got the typical curiosity of a cat and tends to get into things and occasionally causes messes. We think of him as this "dude" kind of fellow, who likes to go to the gym with his guy friends--where they swim, play racquetball, tell off-color jokes, and snap each other in the butt with towels when showering in the locker room. Baxter tends to be right under our feet, but he can turn into a "fraidy cat" when strangers enter the house. (Baxter, by the way, is doing fine, although he seems puzzled by his sister's absence.)
As for Chloe, it's like she never met a stranger. It's not that she would be all over them with affection. But she seemed to say, "Hey, come on in, there's tea in the fridge, snacks in the cabinet, and I'll be around listening to music if you need me. Hopefully, you won't need me, but make yourself at home anyway."
Music was a big part of the persona we created for Chloe. Something about her big, round face and clear blue eyes made us think she would like songs that maybe weren't terribly deep, but had a happy, bouncy vibe to them. We decided that her favorite band was Wings, and she was particularly enamored with the band's lead singer and songwriter, "Mr. McCartney." We imagined that she always thought Mr. McCartney was about to celebrate his 29th birthday--"Girl, we're pretty sure Mr. McCartney is a little bit older than that--and she refused to believe that he ever had played in another band besides Wings. We would say, in our minds, "Girl, Mr. McCartney was in this other band before Wings, and a lot of people actually think they were pretty good." Then we would imagine her shaking her head and saying, "Nope, no way. No band could ever come close to Wings."
Then she would put buds back in her ears and groove along to her all-time favorite song, "Band on the Run." In fact, in the strange little world we created for her, Chloe listened to "Band on the Run" over and over and chatted with her girl friends about the latest Wings news from the Internet. Her dream was to someday see Wings in concert and have them play "Band on the Run" for two hours.
If Chloe had been a child, she would have been one of those quiet, unassuming kids, who maybe isn't a "star" this or "star" that, but gets along with everybody and never causes any problems. She was anything but a "drama queen."
Chloe was a gorgeous, happy, healthy kitty kat until her eating problems developed back in April. First, we learned that she had feline tooth resorption, a condition where tissue essentially grows over the teeth, causing sensitivity and pain. We had several of Chloe's teeth pulled and hoped that would correct the problem. (By the way, this isn't caused by lack of dental cleanings. Scientists apparently don't know what causes resorption, but it happens with many cats.)
When the dental procedure didn't solve Chloe's eating problems and she began to throw up regularly, we took her back to the vet, and an X-ray showed a "thickness" in her gastrointestinal (GI) tract. The vet said it probably was one of two things--(1) Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), or (2) Cancer.
The only way to know for sure was to do exploratory surgery and take biopsies. If it was cancer, the only treatment was low-dose chemotherapy, which would provide comfort care but might not extend Chloe's life for very long. If it was IBD, we likely could manage it with a combination of medicine and diet change. Since there were no real positive options with cancer, we elected to treat it as IBD and hope that putting her on a moist, grain-free food, and gut-soothing medicines like Pepcid, would get her back on track. (It's thought that IBD is an autoimmune disorder, with the inflammation caused by an allergy to grain or other additive in many cat foods.)
Chloe seemed to do pretty well on her new regimen. Her vomiting went away for the most part, and her poops began to get more solid. She lost weight, but that seemed to have stabilized in recent weeks, and our hope was that she would start putting pounds back on soon. She often would not eat on her own, and Carol fed her almost every meal by hand and squirted water into her mouth with a syringe.
It wasn't until two days ago that we noticed Chloe looking unsteady on her feet. Then yesterday, all she could do was lay on her side, and her eyes looked sunken. That's when we made the appointment for her regular vet this morning. When we read on the Internet about the dangers of dehydration, we decided to seek emergency care last night. The hope was that IV treatment would make her much better.
The emergency vet palpated her abdomen and said, "This might be something more than IBD." We waited for about half an hour for the results of Chloe's blood work, and the news was devastating. All of her numbers were way off, her kidneys were shutting down, and it looked like she was heading for multi-organ failure. The vet said euthanasia was the only reasonable option.
This was the first time we'd ever had to have a pet "put to sleep," and the experience was gut wrenching. The vet staff put Chloe in a little pet bed, covered her in a blanket, and brought her back to the exam room, so we could say our goodbyes. We patted on her and kissed her and whispered in her ear that we would always love her--and we would always be thankful for all she had done for us. Carol said a prayer, thanking God that He had brought Chloe into our lives, thanking Him for the sheer goodness and grace she brought to our home, and praying that Murphy would be the first to greet her in Heaven.
Chloe's beautiful blue eyes were open, and as we loved on her one last time, we noticed that our tears more or less covered her eyes. The vet came in, injected her with an anesthetic, and she was gone in a matter of seconds.
Our best guess, based on what the vet told us and our research, is that Chloe had feline gastrointestinal lymphoma. It's a form of cancer that comes in two varieties--a small-cell version that is not too aggressive and a large-cell version that is very aggressive. Even with chemotherapy, survival with the large-cell version is about two months.
Thanks to Carol's ability to feed her by hand and vigilantly give her medicine and water, Chloe lived for three months--and except for yesterday, she seemed to gradually be getting better during that time.
We chose to have Chloe cremated, and will get her ashes in a cedar box, engraved: "Chloe, 2003-2015, Our Sweet Girl."
That's how we will always remember her--for her gentle, sweet nature. We pray that she knew how much her guile-free spirit meant to us, especially with the torment we've experienced via the "justice system."
During her 12 years on this earth, Chloe seemed to bring the Biblical concept of "loving-kindness" into our home. Her presence seemed to say, "Everything is going to turn out OK. Look how calm I am. You can be calm, too." It's as if she trusted in a higher power, with a connection that we can't comprehend. To us, she always will represent the "fruits of the spirit," the kind that we so seldom see in humans.
Chloe brought a sense of peace and stability to two people who desperately needed to feel that. She did a tremendous amount of good, and I'm not aware of her ever harming another living being.
Hers, truly, was a life well lived. Thank you, Sweet Girl.
In Chloe's memory, here is the ever-youthful "Mr. McCartney" singing "Band on the Run." Below that, is a video where we introduced Chloe and Baxter to Legal Schnauzer readers.
