My family's legal case, attempting to have my wife, Carol, and me declared "disabled and incapacitated" under Missouri law, has been dismissed. The case, which sought to have a guardian, conservator (or both) appointed for us in probate court, was absurd from the outset. It could essentially have made us wards of the state, but we never came close to fitting the definition of "incapacitated," under the law.Why did my family ask to have the case dismissed? I'm not sure, but the timing dovetails curiously with events in the Alabama sex scandal involving Gov. Robert Bentley and former advisor Rebekah Caldwell Mason. We already have seen signs of a possible Alabama connection to our unlawful eviction that left Carol with a shattered left arm. Dismissal of the incapacitation case, in my view, adds to the possibility of an Alabama connection to the abuse we've suffered in Missouri. (By the way, not a single member of my family has asked about Carol's well-being or expressed any sorrow/regret for what Greene County sheriff's deputies did to her. For that matter, they've expressed no concern about my well being either.)
The incapacitation petition, filed by my brother Paul, is filled with false information and deals with issues about which he has zero knowledge--given that he has spent about three hours with us over the past 24 years or so. In Paul's defense, he is a radiology technologist at Mercy Hospital in Springfield, and I feel certain my lawyer brother, David, was the driving force behind this con game. Paul, I guess, was a willing guinea pig, but I have no idea why someone felt the need to put his name on a document where he testified falsely under oath (under penalty of perjury) on matters he knew nothing about.
Dan Menzie, our court-appointed attorney, said Paul's lawyer (Linda K. Thomas) filed a Motion to Dismiss the case--and that was that. I occasionally have troll commenters here claim I've never won a legal case. Well, they can't say that anymore; I won this one, with the other party essentially throwing in the towel and admitting he never had a case. (See judgments at the end of this post.)
The court ordered that Menzie be paid $600 for his trouble, half from a court fund and half from Paul. When I last talked with Menzie, he had not received the money my brother owes him. And Paul thinks Carol and I have trouble keeping up with our finances? Sounds like he isn't so great at it either.
What about damages for Carol and me? We've essentially had our reputations trashed, with documents appearing both online and in printed form indicating (more or less) that we aren't capable of wiping drool off our chins. Those documents will remain in the public sphere forever, I guess, if we don't try to do something about it.
Robert Bentley and Rebekah Caldwell Mason
Have Carol and I been damaged? Well, my brother's petition about me claimed that I, as respondent:* "Lacks capacity to meet essential daily living requirements for food, clothing, shelter, safety or other care such that serious physical injury, illness or disease is likely to occur . . . "
* "Lacks ability to manage his financial resources without supervision . . . "
The petition also claims that I am homeless, although Carol and I never have been homeless. Yes, Carol and I have had our jobs, our careers, and our home of 25 years stolen from us. We've been diagnosed with PTSD, our living circumstances are not good, and we could use help in a number of areas. But we have not been homeless, and we've never shown any sign that we can't take care of ourselves.
This blog alone, which broke one of the biggest Alabama political stories of the past 10 years and has been named one of the top 50 law blogs in North America, is evidence that I'm hardly incapacitated--and neither is Carol.
Do we intend to seek damages for having our reputations smeared? We are considering that possibility.
What about that curious timing regarding the Bentley/Mason scandal in Alabama? Consider this timeline:
March 23, 2016--Audio surfaces that confirms the Bentley/Mason affair, which I broke last August here at Legal Schnauzer, just nine days before our eviction;
March 28, 2016--Reports surface that Bentley pressured law enforcement to use criminal databases in order to gather dirt on me and fellow citizen journalist (and lawyer) Donald Watkins;
March 28, 2016--Paul Shuler's attorney files a motion to dismiss the incapacitation case.
What was my family really hoping to achieve with this charade from the outset? Well, the petition was filed on September 29, 2015, exactly 20 days after Carol and I were unlawfully evicted from an apartment in Springfield, and a Greene County deputy brutalized Carol to the point that her left arm was shattered. I suspect the "incapacitation" lawsuit was some sort of lame response to the fact law enforcement, a landlord, and several lawyers screwed up big time in our eviction case.
On the positive side, the incapacitation case did turn up one piece of fascinating health-care information--and it produced irony that I doubt my family even is capable of comprehending. Both strongly suggest that they are more interested in harming Carol and me, than they are in helping.
More on that in an upcoming post.
Incapacitation Dismissal by Roger Shuler
Incapacitation Dismissal2 by Roger Shuler
