Top News

JENNIFER LENZ CROWNED
MISS ARIZONA USA

By Randy Turner
PHOENIX, Ariz.- Jennifer Lenz, daughter of Andre and Vicki Lenz, Lamar, was crowned Miss Arizona USA during ceremonies held Saturday night in Phoenix. "I am extremely excited and still in a state of shock," she said. "I am anxiously anticipating competing in the Miss USA Pageant in Gary, Indiana, on March 1."
Jennifer's career as a beauty queen began on Aug. 23, 1994, when she was crowned Lamar Fair queen during ceremonies held at the Thiebaud Auditorium. Jennifer was only eight years old when someone first told that one day she would be crowned Lamar Fair queen. She was watching the Lamar Fair Rotary Parade in 1985. "The queen was Tanya Tahhan," she recalled. "When she came by, she waved at her grandfather, who was standing right by me."
Tanya Tahhan's grandfather looked down at little Jennifer and said, "That's going to be you someday."
What he didn't realize was that Jennifer did not intend to stop at being Lamar Fair queen, but that was where she got her start. On that August day in 1994, the prediction came true. It was a combination of Jennifer's grace, beauty, personality and a little item she had with her for good luck.
"She didn't want to do it," her mother said, "but I had her put a lucky penny in her shoe."
"When she told me to do that," Jennifer said, "I said, 'Mom, this is so stupid."
But it worked for Jennifer as it did later that year when she was crowned Black Walnut Queen at Stockton and it worked later when she appeared in numerous pageants on the state level in Missouri.
Jennifer attended college in Florida and lived in Fort Lauderdale for six years and now lives in Phoenix, working for a television production company that does work for MTV, Fox Sports, ESPN, NBA, NFL, NHL and for others. "I get to travel a lot so that keeps things fun and exciting," she said.
One more thing...when Jennifer competed in the Miss Arizona USA Pageant Saturday night, she took something special along with her for old times' sake, she said. "Well, the lucky penny worked again."

DR. GREG SMITH REMEMBERED
By Randy Turner
The death of Dr. Greg Smith, Diamond R-4 superintendent, cast a dark shadow over school districts across southwest Missouri. For the past quarter of a century, Dr. Smith made his mark on the lives of children and educators.
The latest monument to his hard work and faith in the patrons and students of the R-4 School District, the new high school, will open sometime during the spring semester. Dr. Smith spearheaded the drive to pass a bond issue to build the new high school, something that seemed almost impossible since a new high school was built in this school district less than a decade ago.
The way he did it was by finding the right people and then letting them do their jobs. He worked with the R-4 Board of Education to find the right plan, then helped find the people who could convince the public that the plan was needed to increase the educational opportunities for Diamond R-4 students. His job was made all the more difficult because a similar plan had been shot down by voters the year before. Dr. Smith not only had to convince voters that the plan was a good one, he had to convince them that the school district was being operated efficiently and compassionately. The overwhelming vote in favor of the bond issue proves that he met the challenge squarely and won the battle convincingly.
He had faced a similar challenge when he took his first superintendent job, in 1995 in the Sarcoxie R-2 School District. At Sarcoxie, he was able to lead a successful drive to pass a bond issue to build a middle school. He used the same approach there and explained his approach in an interview I conducted with him just after he took that position.
"These are good people in the community," Dr. Smith said. At the schools in Sarcoxie, just as he did in the Diamond R-4 schools, he consulted everyone from the board to the principals to the students and he had faith in his faculty. "This school system has a good faculty," he said about Sarcoxie. "They were doing a pretty good job when I came here and they'll do a good job after I leave." He left the Sarcoxie school system a much better place than he had found it, taking the Diamond job July 1, 1999.
Dr. Smith attended Missouri Southern State College from 1970 to 1975, earning a bachelor of arts degree in sociology and a bachelor of science degree in elementary education. He earned his master's degree from Pittsburg State University in 1981, his specialist's degree from PSU in 1982 and his doctorate from Oklahoma State University in 1984.
He began his educational career teaching sixth grade at Westview near Neosho in 1975. For the next five years, he taught at a Joplin elementary school. He spent 12 years in the Webb City R-7 School District, the first four as principal at Eugene Field Elementary and the next eight as assistant superintendent.
"My educational philosophy is kid-centered," he said during a 1997 interview. "We don't need to be a hurdle, but a help in every way possible." Though he always put the children first, he did not tolerate students who presented the school in a bad light. "I will not tolerate drugs or weapons on campus," he said. "I will not tolerate students fighting or showing disrepect to themselves and others, including faculty and staff." Though he had sympathy for students who came from troubled homes, Dr. Smith always believed that troubled homes was not an excuse for bad behavior. "I believe every person is responsible for their actions," he said. "We all have free will."
For nearly all of his adult life, Dr. Greg Smith devoted his time and effort to making things better for the students, first as a teacher, then as an administrator. The only break came during a two-and-a-half-year period when he took a position with an insurance firm in Joplin. It wasn't burnout with the educational system that led him to leave it for that period, he said, noting it was an opportunity to try something in the business community. He tried it, but during that time he was never able to get education out of his mind or out of his heart.
"What I found out (from his time in the business world) was that I had some people skills which work well in education that I didn't have a chance to use in the private sector." When the superintendent position opened unexpectedly in Sarcoxie after the beginning of the 1997-98 school year, Dr. Smith applied and was hired by the Sarcoxie R-2 Board of Education.
Even though Dr. Smith left Sarcoxie after just two years, people in that school district never spoke ill of him. "You've got yourself a good man in Greg Smith," former R-2 board member Kaare Gjeruldsen said, shortly after Dr. Smith began his tenure at Diamond.
Dr. Smith's return to education played a profound role in an increase of educational opportunities in two school districts. He not only led successful drives to improve the campuses in Diamond and Sarcoxie, but he also stood behind educators who came up with initiatives to improve curriculum and student performance on standardized test scores in both school districts.

Undoubtedly, the Diamond R-4 Board of Education will recognize the important role Dr. Smith played in the lives of the students and faculty in his all-too-brief time here when it names the new school or the new gymnasium at the school. The most important tribute that can be paid to Dr. Smith's memory, however, will be for students, faculty, administrators and the community to work together to make sure that the Diamond R-4 School District remains in the future just as it was when he was superintendent...a safe, caring place where the interests of our young people always come first.

APPEALS COURT REJECTS
LAMAR SWINDLER'S PETITION

By Randy Turner
The appeals process for convicted Lamar swindler Patrick Dallas Graham appears to have reached the end of the road. U. S. District Judge Nanette K. Laughrey dismissed Graham's appeal with prejudice on June 21, meaning he cannot refile it. Graham appealed that decision, but a week later Judge Laughrey once more ruled against Graham.
This was the fourth time Graham had tried to have his sentence tossed out since he pleaded guilty to three counts of stealing and securities fraud in September 1997 in Barton County Circuit Court. In the earlier court decisions, the judges indicated there was no reason to throw his sentence out because he was the one who had entered the guilty plea.
In the June 21 decision, the judge rebutted each of the points Graham made in his appeal. Graham claimed that his conviction and 15-year prison sentence for securities fraud violations should be tossed out because Barton County Prosecuting Attorney Steven Kaderly had represented him in legal matters prior to his arrest and that he (Kaderly) was "a material witness to the events that were the basis of the charges," and that he had not received adequate representation from his attorney, Ross Rhoades of Neosho. Judge Laughrey noted that the Missouri Southern District Court of Appeals had disagreed with that contention. "The record shows that (Graham) was not threatened or coerced into entering his plea of guilty and that (he) was satisfied with plea counsel's representation. At both the plea and sentencing hearings, he failed to reveal that there was a conflict of interest involving Kaderly or that such an issue was raised with (Rhoades). The record indicates Graham pled guilty in order to obtain the benefit of the plea bargain and because he was, in fact, guilty of the crimes charged and he has failed to allege specific facts showing otherwise."
The judge also rejected Graham's claim that former Circuit Court Judge David Darnold was prejudiced against him and said he failed to show that he (Graham) is "probably actually innocent."
The U. S. District Court offered one last opportunity for Graham, a man who had been at the top of the world six years ago, at a time when he had already spent millions of dollars and planned to make millions more, bilking investors, including singer Pat Boone and a number of Branson high-rollers, by convincing them to invest in AIDS vaccine that did not exist. The AIDS vaccine scheme was the latest in a lifetime of schemes for Graham.
Pat Graham was born June 18, 1941, in Pleasanton, Iowa, the third of four sons born to Lawrence and Elizabeth Graham. He married Betty Woods July 3, 1959, in Pleasanton. They had two daughters, Marcia Martinson, 40, and Michelle Hoyt, 33. Graham graduated 21st in a class of 66 students at Leon High School, Leon, Iowa. His grades were average to superior, but he did receive a D in chemistry. He later attended Iowa State University from September 1964 until he dropped out n June 1970 with 155 hours of college credit. He had a grade point average of 1.79 (D+) on a scale of 4.0.
Robert Getty, chairman of the Department of Anatomy at Iowa State, gave him a job working with a colony of beagles in 1964, researching the clogging of coronary arteries. After Getty died, Graham left that job and worked for a time as a deputy sheriff.
Graham's difficulties with investors go back two decades. He had problems in previous dealings involving a veterinary medicine company and a Christian restaurant venture in Freeman, S. D., according to court records. His one foray into the restaurant business ended in bankruptcy and caused eight lawsuits. On Oct. 26, 1977, Graham held a groundbreaking ceremony for The Cornerstone, a Christian-themed restaurant in Freeman. Plans for the restaurant included several private dining rooms, a picturesque fountain and a stage for live gospel music.
By the time the restaurant had its grand opening in September 1978, Graham had skipped town and his workers had not been paid. Orville Waltner, an electrician, estimated Graham owed local tradesmen more than $130,000, including $8,000 owed Waltner.
Lawsuits were filed in South Dakota and in Missouri accusing Graham of stealing patents from Duane Pankratz, a Freeman veterinarian. When Graham moved from South Dakota to Missouri in the late 1970s, documents filed in Barton County Circuit Court indicate, he and Pankratz entered into an agreement which would allow Graham to sell Pankratz' products in Missouri. Graham did not pay Pankratz the money he owed him. The doctor sued him and a U. S. District Court jury awarded Pankratz $25,000.
Graham managed to avoid the criminal side of the judicial system until 1984, when he pleaded guilty to wire fraud charges in U. S. District Court. Charges were filed against Graham after he offered to pay three southeast Kansas businessmen, August Rua, Francis Usher and Ken DeLange $250,000 "one half of my finder's fee from a gold sale in South Africa," according to a promissory note on file at the Barton County recorder's office, in exchange for a loan of $25,000. Court records indicate Graham already owed the three businessmen $575,000. He sent letters to the men telling them the money he owed them was being held by the Internal Revenue Service until it completed an audit of his taxes. When the businessmen realized Graham had no intention of paying them the money he owed them, they went to the FBI. A plea agreement was worked out in which Graham would serve no prison time in exchange for his cooperation in other federal investigations.
Graham was placed on probation for five years. He was required to repay the $25,000, but the $575,000 was lost forever.
The scheme that finally put Pat Graham in prison began in the early 1990s when Graham started selling shares in Conquest Labs, Inc., a company he said had developed an AIDS vaccine. According to court records, he sold more than $5.3 million worth of stock in the company. He convinced potential investors with a deeply personal selling style, using his "Christian" background and oozing with sincerity. His sales pitch is captured in a transcript of a sales meeting in Branson, which is one file in Barton County Circuit Court.
At that meeting, he told potential investors he had turned down attempts by Elizabeth Taylor, Michael Jackson, Magic Johnson and Arsenio Hall to buy shares in Conquest Labs. "We have turned down money from all sorts of people," Graham said. Graham indicated he wanted only Christian people to invest in his company.
"My name is Graham," he said, introducing himself, "like the old brown crackers. I'd be less than honest if I didn't tell you that everything that I hope to have, I owe to the good Lord. Period. There's nothing else that I can add to that."
Graham talked about the history of Conquest Labs and said he had been teaching his grandchildren about the Bible, that the Christian life was the most important thing of all. "If you don't feel like you're serving number one, you better. I hope nobody noticed how polished my knees are. I've been on my knees a lot lately." He said his wife and his daughter had both had cancer scares.
The AIDS vaccine was brought to him by a university professor in 1991, he said. The professor, who was in his 80s, said he had come to Graham to ask him to take over the vaccine. "He said, 'Every time I've gone with a big company to do something, I've been done wrong.' "
Graham said he agreed to help the professor. "I don't want anybody to sit here and get the idea that Pat Graham is a genius or something like that. I'm an old south Iowa cow milker."
The old south Iowa cow milker then told his Bible belt audience how he had prayed about the product, since many of those who suffered from AIDS had lifestyles that were contrary to what he believed in. "At one time in my life," he said, "I didn't love those people enough and I don't condone one iota of anything they do, but I know God loves them and I know that He put me in charge of this product." An added benefit of his vaccine, Graham said, is that it wouldn't work on a homosexual unless he changed his lifestyle. "It doesn't matter if it's a horse or a human, if they are too far gone, you got to let them go. If they continued in their sinful ways, it didn't work at all." Graham said the vaccine would only work on homosexuals if they quit being homosexual. "God isn't going to let homosexuals continue their sinful lifestyle without punishment," he said. The spiel worked. Many of the investors in Conquest Labs came from that meeting...which was held in a Branson church.
Before Conquest Labs came under the scrutiny of state officials, Graham had convinced more than 500 investors to put in a total of $5.3 million.
Graham told the investors he was not in it for the money...when he was drawing a salary of $120,000 a year under his wife's name; his residence and those of his two daughters were bought with funds paid by Conquest investors, one of his daughters and his sons-in-law were receiving handsome salaries, their vehicles were paid for by investor funds and other living expenses were being covered by investments.
Tonya Ehrsam, a former Conquest employee, told state investigators that while she worked there, between Sept. 21, 1993, and Oct. 27, 1994, the firm only had $250 in income, a rebate, other than income received from investors.
The company's marketing plan indicated Conquest was also working on vaccines for cancer and Alzheimer's Disease.
The beginning of the end for Pat Graham's biggest scam came on Oct. 3, 1994, when Frederick Holloway, a securities investigator for the Missouri Secretary of State's office, received a call from David Hoyt, Graham's son-in-law. Hoyt told Holloway much of the investors' money was being used by Graham for himself and his family. "Mr. Hoyt stated that investor funds had been deposited in a number of banks under fictitious names which were controlled by Mr. Graham." On May 23, 1995, the Missouri Highway Patrol, working with the secretary of state's office and the attorney general's office, indicted Graham on 10 counts of securities fraud and 10 counts of stealing.
Graham finally agreed in 1997 to plead guilty to three counts of securities fraud and was sentenced to 15 years in prison. He could have been placed on probation if he had been able to repay his investors. He was given 120 days to pay back the money. The sentencing judge, David Darnold, had no doubt the investors would never see their money. "If someone wants to step up here and pay the $5.5 million," Darnold said, "I would be delighted." Darnold and the lawyers representing the Missouri attorney general's office were not amused by two ideas to raise the money that were brought up at the sentencing hearing. One would have had Graham working for one of his former investors to market serums made out of elks' blood. The other was a deal through which, Graham, an unpublished novelist ( a talent no one had known about up until that time) would sell one of his books to a Hollywood producer, who was interested in making it into a movie.
"I would like to not have to go to jail," Graham said. "I have a goal of paying back every one of my investors 100 percent. I would like to be with my family, my grandchildren and my church family and not be gone."
The elks' blood serums did not impress Judge Darnold, who was not impressed with Graham's scientic expertise, noting that Graham had taken chemistry in college six times before getting a D grade. It was not all bad for Graham on the educational front, the judge noted. "I see you had a B in volleyball," he said, adding, "This is not a scientist."
The investors did not receive a cent and Graham began making his motions, all of which have been rejected by Judge Darnold and in the appellate system.
As Graham was sentenced by Judge Darnold, his youngest daughter and his son-in-law watched intently. David Hoyt's phone call had begun the process that put his father-in-law behind bars for 15 years. "I felt we had a responsibility to those investors," he said. "Those people were being cheated."
Graham's daughter, Michelle, agreed with her husband's action, though the pain in her face as her father was sentenced was undeniable. "People think we took that money," she said, holding on to her husband's arm, "but we didn't come out of this with a cent. I want people to know that."

July 19
KILLER'S APPEAL REJECTED
BY FEDERAL COURT PANEL

By Randy Turner
Convicted killer Doyle Kelley will not receive a new trial.
A three-judge panel of the U. S. Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled July 16 that Kelley's rights were not violated when he was convicted in 1994 of murdering both of his wives. Kelley was sentenced to life imprisonment for killing his first wife, Diana Kelley, and his second wife, Christy Kelley.
The Missouri Court of Appeals reversed the conviction on Christy Kelley's murder, saying that hearsay testimony had been improperly admitted at the trial. At that point, the federal court allowed Kelley to appeal on whether the two cases should have been tried as one. Kelley's attorneys argued that the cases should have been separated because the two women were killed in different ways. Christy Kelley drowned and Diana Kelley died of respiratory failure. The deaths occured two years apart.
In its opinion, the appellate panel said Kelley had "not demonstrated that he was subject to clear prejudice." The panel also rejected Kelley's contention that the two deaths were dissimilar. "As the state appellate court noted, both victims were married to and separated from him before their deaths, both had appointments to meet with him before they died, and evidence existed that both were battered around the time of death."
The body of Diana Kelley was found in her car in a Joplin parking lot on Sept. 26, 1990. Her husband had filed a missing persons report. He told the police he and his wife had been separated for about two weeks, but had agreed to meet at 9 p.m. the night before her body was found. Kelley said she did not show up for the meeting. He said that he had called Diana's mother twice the night before her body was discovered asking for her. Mrs. Kelley's mother, Virginia Stepp, told police that he had called and that her daughter had told her she was afraid of Kelley. She had been staying with her mother for about two weeks. The initial autopsy showed that she died of respiratory failure. Dr. James Habermann, who conducted the autopsy, said he could not tell if she had died of strangulation. Debra Stout, a friend of Diana Kelley, said she had visited her the night before and had been wearing a gold chain and a St. Christopher medal. Two days after Diana Kelley's death, Ms. Stout visited Kelley. While she was there, Kelley took the gold chain and St. Christopher medal to the basement and "smashed it, I believe, with a hammer," she testified at the trial. Kelley told her the items had been given to him by "the police or someone at the mortuary."
Police officers testified that the chain and medal had not been at the crime scene. Diana Kelley's mother said she had been at the mortuary when the employees gave her daughter's jewelry to Kelley. She said she did not see a St. Christopher's medal among the items given to Kelley.
The next year, Kelley married his second wife, Christy. They separated in March 1993. Kelley and Christy Kelley arranged to meet April 24, 1993, to exchange property. Witnesses saw them on the parking lot of Christy Kelley's apartment building that afternoon. One witness saw Kelley alone at his wife's apartment that day.
The next day, Christy's family contacted the Joplin Police Department and asked that officers check on Christy since she was several hours overdue to pick up her daughter. The officers had to break down the door of the apartment. They found Christy Kelley's body floating face down in the bathtub. The autopsy, performed by Dr. Darrell Swank, showed that Christy had a deep laceration on her forehead caused by blunt force trauma, vomit in her mouth and edema in her lungs. He concluded that her death was caused by drowning.
On Aug. 25, 1993, Diana Kelley's body was exhumed. Dr. Jill Gould conducted new autopsies on both of Kelley's wives. She concluded that Diana Kelley had died from strangulation and that the blunt trauma that Christy Kelley had suffered was not consistent with falling in the bathtub. While Doyle Kelley awaited trial, he allegedly told a fellow inmate, Lonnie Bell, that he had strangled both of his wives.

JOPLIN MAN'S CHILD SUPPORT
DOES NOT HAVE TO INCLUDE
EXPENSIVE PRIVATE SCHOOL

By Randy Turner
A Joplin man will not have to pay more than $6,000 a year to have his daughter educated at Thomas Jefferson Independent Day School, thanks to a ruling issued late last month by the Missouri Court of Appeals for the Southern District.
A trial court had earlier agreed with the man, who said there was nothing wrong with public schools for his child and did not include the tuition in the final judgment saying that the couple's daughter "does not have any special educational needs that cannot be met in a public school."
The wife testified that their daughter had always attended a private school and that she wanted her to continue there because "Her friends are there. She's been there for seven years. She's a smart child. She's excelling. She's doing very well. And that's the environment that she feels most comfortable with. That's like home to her."
She said that the divorce had been traumatic for her daughter and that changing schools would also be a traumatic experience. During cross-examination from her husband's attorney, she said there was "nothing wrong" with public schools.
The husband said he and his wife had discussed taking their daughter out of Thomas Jefferson and that his wife had not opposed the action at that time. He said he wanted his daughter in a public school so that she would have "a more rounded education" as far as "interacting with different people and this public school system is fine."
The cost of the private schooling, $6,000 would have taken up nearly 25 percent of the husband's income, according to the court decision. The trial court ruling said, "It's a true sacrifice for the parties to have been sending the child to Thomas Jefferson in the past. And if the child continues to go to Thomas Jefferson, it's going to be an extraordinary expense for a couple with this standard of living."
A dissenting opinion was written by Judge James K. Prewitt, who said, "I have every confidence that the public schools can provide the educational needs of most, if not any, child, However dissolution is difficult for the child. Not allowing the child to continue at the school she has been attending would make it more so. Allowing children to continue at a private school can be a condition essential to the welfare of the child. I do not see this as an issue of "particular educational needs,' but as one of making the dissolution trauma as minimal as possible for the child. I am a great believer in public education and think that in most circumstances a court should not order a party to pay all or part of the cost of private schooling over his or her wishes, except where the initial decision to send the child to a private school was made by both parents. I am not convinced that the financial circumstances of the parties would forego keeping the child in the school that she has always attended. For these reasons, I respectfully dissent in part."
JUNE 21, 2001
FORMER SARCOXIE CITY CLERK'S
ARRAIGNMENT IS POSTPONED ONE WEEK

By John Hacker
Sarcoxie Record
A former Sarcoxie city clerk will be back in Jasper Associate County Circuit Court on Wednesday to face a charge that she stole money from the city of Sarcoxie.
Leaetta Jasumback, who was Sarcoxie's city clerk from June 1998 until April 2001, was charged on June 1 with one count of misdemeanor stealing.
County Prosecutor Dean Dankelson said Jasumback is accused of stealing less than $750 from the city.
Dankelson said the theft allegedly occured on Jan. 17.
City officials would not comment on the case except to say that they were aware of the theft and the investigation, and that it hasn't significantly affected city operations.
"It's being handled internally as a personnel matter," said City Clerk Penny Dean. "The city has been on top of this for a long time and we've already turned the case over to our attorney."
Dankelson said the theft was filed as a misdemeanor because less than $750 was involved. He said cash was taken, but he could not be more specific about how much was taken.
Dankelson also said the case was investigated by the Highway Patrol.
City officials referred all other questions to City Attorney Henry Clapper.
Until Tuesday, June 19, however, Clapper was listed as Jasumback's defense attorney in court records.
The court docket says Clapper filed a motion for a delay on behalf of Jasumback on Monday, June 18. The Associate Circuit Clerk's office confirmed by telephone Tuesday that Clapper was listed in the case file as Jasumback's attorney of record.
Dean told The Sarcoxie Record early Tuesday afternoon, June 19, that Clapper could not represent Jasumback because he represented the city. Dean said later that day that she had talked to Clapper and he said he was not representing Jasumback.
The court record shows that Clapper filed a motion at 4:25 p.m. on June 19, to withdraw as Jasumback's attorney. He cited "a potential conflict" as the reason for withdrawing.
Jasumback is scheduled for arraignment on Wednesday, June 27.

JENNIFER MARTIN LEAVES
PRESS AFTER 32 YEARS

By Randy Turner
The glue that held The Carthage Press together for more than three decades ended her long association with the newspaper Friday, June 22.
Jennifer Martin, composing room foreman, who joined the paper directly out of high school, has taken a position with a Joplin shopper. Jenny began her career as a typesetter after her high school graduation in 1969. She said during a 1994 interview commemorating her 25th anniversary at the paper, that she initially intended to stay only one year. After The Press went from linotype to offset printing in 1971, her duties were expanded. In addition to typesetting, she began setting advertising copy.
Her excellent work in the composing room led to her promotion to foreman about 15 years ago.

JAMES R. MONTGOMERY, DEAD AT 60?

By Randy Turner
The first and only time I ever raised the dead was a little more than 17 years ago. I was editor of The Lamar Democrat in the early 1980s when we ran an obituary on a former presidential candidate who died at a young age. I was still the editor of The Democrat a year later when I saw the same man, James R. Montgomery, walking into a bar in Lamar...the same bar where he allegedly wrote his obituary. The Democrat, The Carthage Press, Joplin Globe and other newspapers reported Montgomery's death.
He died again last month, according to an obituary in the May 8 edition of The Carthage Press. His obituary did not run in any other paper as far as I could tell. It said services were held Friday, May 11, at Lake Cemetery in Lamar. The obituary indicated he died in Lancaster. Pa.
The death of James R. Montgomery brought back a treasure trove of memories. My first meeting with Montgomery came when I was editor of the Lockwood Luminary-Golden City Herald in 1979. Montgomery, a Lamar native who was living in Oronogo at the time, picked the Barton County Courthouse as the site for his entrance into the 1980 U. S. presidential race.
I remember a reporter from Channel 7, another one from Channel 16 and Lou Nell Clark from The Democrat were surrounding the tall, distinguished gentleman with the booming baritone voice who was expounding his political beliefs on the courthouse steps. Unfortunately for them, that man was Leo Suiter, an Alabaman who served as Montgomery's vice presidential candidate. He had been chosen after answering an ad Montgomery put in a country music magazine. Suiter, in an obvious slap in the face at then President Jimmy Carter introduced his brother, Billy, to the media. Billy was dressed in overalls, smoked a pipe and claimed he was looking for something to drink, but could only find a Mountain Dew.
For about 10 minutes while the other reporters believed they were interviewing the presidential candidate, I was in the bandstand interviewing James Montgomery, the mousy little guy with the Wally Cox voice.
His voice may have been mousy, but he was impassioned in his beliefs. He was fighting Social Security inequities. He was fighting for God, country and the American dream...he was fighting a losing battle.
Montgomery got swallowed up in the 1980 presidential race, despite his early start. It was well reported in early 1980 when President Carter said, "If Teddy Kennedy runs, I'll whip his ass," no one ever confirmed the rumor that he said, "And that goes for James Montgomery, too." Suiter said at the 1979 press conference that he and Montgomery had considered the Democratic party but felt Carter was certain to be renominated.
Montgomery attacked Carter in his bandstand speech. "Our president gave away the Panama Canal,. If President Carter can give it away, James R. Montgomery can get it back."
He never got the chance.
After the 1980 presidential race came to a conclusion, it appeared that the media wouldn't have James Montgomery to kick around any more. His political career appeared to come to a tragic end when he died at the age of 42 in 1982.
You can say all you want to about Richard Nixon's political comeback. All he did was lose to Kennedy for president in 1960, lose to Pat Brown for governor of California in 1962, then come back and win the race for president six years later.
James Montgomery came back from the dead.
He admitted to me he never really was dead after briefly trying me to convince me that it was only a temporary thing. The news of his death, he said, had been greatly exaggerated by his enemies, the same socialists who had sabotaged his presidential candidacy.
In 1987, the politically savvy Montgomery filed for two political offices. He filed for Ward One alderman in the city of Lamar and for a seat on the Barton County Health Department Board of Trustees.
His entry into the Ward One race made it a three-way battle. With no incumbent running, Montgomery, a veteran of the political wars, faced two rookies, Max Simmons and Lamar Democrat Publisher Doug Davis. "This is one poor person, me, against the Lamar rich," Montgomery said, staking out a claim on the vote of the little guy. The 46-year-old noted his long political history, including "46 years experience in government."
Montgomery feared nothing, including the city of Lamar's biggest employer, O'Sullivan Industries."Right now," he said, "we have only one large manufacturer that seems to monopolize the labor force. When a company monopolizes, you leave the door open for discrimination." He also claimed he would clean out the "lazy city employees," if he were elected. "We have too many just putting in their time while those who do the work get little wages." The ones making the high salaries, he said, "just sit around and goof off all day long."
Montgomery vowed to work for those who were victims of discrimination. "I know what discrimination is," he said. "I've been there."
Montgomery's chances appeared to be good when the man perceived by most observers to be the top candidate, Davis, found out that a conflict of interest might keep his newspaper from being able to accept any advertising from the city if he were elected.
Davis said that a law that would require the city to seek competitive bids each time it needed to put a legal notice in The Lamar Democrat would cause considerable problems for him and for the city. If the city were to take bids, he said, it would have to publish a legal notice saying it was taking bids on the advertisement and would have no place in which to do it. Davis called the law absurd and blamed political activist Lou Rix (now Lou Scroggs), who brought up the issue. He said she would have used it against him if he were elected.
"If it hadn't been for her," Davis said, "I could have served the city. I don't think anyone else would have been bothered by it."
Mrs. Rix said she didn't think that was true. "I did not have anything to do with the law when it was written years ago, but I agree with it 100 percent. Besides, I wonder what other laws he is obeying just because I live in Lamar."
Davis dropped out of the race, making the announcement that he would not be able to serve if elected in an an issue of The Democrat. A few days later, as Democrat editor, I served as moderator of a candidate forum in the Lamar Middle School cafeteria. It included mayoral candidates Gerald Gilkey (who recently retired after serving as mayor for 36 years) and Dr. Kent Torbeck, Third Ward alderman candidates Marion Elswick and Pat Ross and First Ward candidates Davis, Simmons and Montgomery.
With Davis apparently unable to serve, Montgomery, the former presidential candidate, appeared to have the inside track. But, in doing my background checks on the candidates, I discovered some big discrepancies in Montgomery's resume.
He claimed to be a member of the Screen Actors Guild, the American Federation of Radio and Television Artists and the American Society of Composers and Publishers. I checked with those organizations and they had no record of James Montgomery ever having been a member.
He also claimed to be a member of three non-existent organizations, "Christians United for Justice," "Americans Against Political Punishment," and "Christians Against Drunk Doctors." He had even served on the Christians Against Drunk Doctors' board, he said.
He also claimed to have been appointed as one of the two American delegates to attend a meeting in Geneva, Switzerland, for the non-existent Christians United for Justice.
An apparently fake charity drive in 1986 also came back to haunt Montgomery. The Joplin Globe reported that Lamar area churches and the Boy Scouts were helping Montgomery with a door-to-door canned food drive. I checked at that time with the Lamar Police Department and with the Barton County Division of Family Services. Police Chief Ron Hager told me Montgomery had broken no laws but his activities were questionable.
Montgomery told me he had been misquoted by The Globe. I didnt say the Boy Scouts would be helping. I said some Boy Scouts would. He said he had also been misquoted about the churches. "I didn't say churches would be helping us, just some church members." The drive never took place.
With Davis apparently out of the race and Montgomery crippled by these shattering revelations, Max Simmons emerged as the front runner. That was the political atmosphere on March 23, 1987, as the candidate forum began. It was a night filled with magic moments.
Staking out the high road on the issues, Dr. Torbeck claimed he was the best looking candidate in the mayoral race. Mayor Gilkey's wife, Betty, jumped up and said that wasn't true.
The suspense at the forum came when it was time for the Ward One candidates to be introduced. Only one, Simmons, was there. But at the last moment, Davis walked in. A hush fell over the cafeteria. Mothers held their children close as he strode to the stage. He made a brief statement, echoing the newspaper announcement that he could not run, then left the stage and walked out of the cafeteria.
"My job's getting easier," Simmons said. "I found out this morning one of my opponents (Davis) has dropped out. I don't know my opponent James Montgomery. I appreciate your vote and I'll do my best for my ward and the entire city."
Montgomery later claimed he could not attend the forum because he had to be in Kansas City for a civil rights meeting.
After the candidate forum, Davis made a dramatic re-entrance into the race, running full-page advertisements in his newspaper, declaring "I can serve."
Davis was elected with 242 votes. Simmons had 162. Montgomery pulled in only 16. Montgomery came much closer in the Health Department Board of Trustees race, getting 1,409 votes in an apparently well-financed effort to defeat Mrs. Rix. She finished third in the race for three seats. Montgomery finished fourth.
After that defeat, times grew tough for the former presidential candidate. In September 1988, The Joplin Globe reported that Montgomery was living in a cardboard box on the banks of Muddy Creek. He said that after his trailer had burned on May 12, 1988, he had been left homeless and had slept in the cardboard box, which he said was "like sleeping in your own grave."
A Golden City resident told me that during much of the time Montgomery was allegedly sleeping in the cardboard box, he was staying at a home in Golden City. After the Globe story was printed, Barton County law enforcement officials found no evidence that anyone had been living on the banks of Muddy Creek.
In March 1989, James R. Montgomery, under a plea agreement, pleaded guilty in Barton County Circuit Court to a charge of misdemeanor stealing. He admitted to changing a $5 Salvation Army voucher to $55 and trying to pass it off at Lamar Supermarket. Judge David Darnold followed Prosecuting Attorney James Nichols's recommendation and sentenced Montgomery to 60 days in the Barton County Jail, then placed him on one-year supervised probation.
It appeared that it was curtains for Montgomery's political life, but he bounced back for one more campaign in 1991. Montgomery, 50 at the time, mounted a second effort to be elected to the Health Department Board of Trustees. He picked up 677 votes to finish fourth in a race for three seats. Defeating him were incumbent Larry Kuhn with 2,070 votes, Doris Kelsey with 1,987, and Karen Wegener with 1,832.
Eventually, Montgomery left Barton County. A friend of mine saw him in Springfield, then later I heard that he had moved east. The last I heard of Montgomery four years ago, was a story that he was in need of a kidney transplant. That seems to lend credence this time to the report of Montgomery's death. It sure would be nice, though, if it were just another scam the wily political veteran was pulling on the non-suspecting news staff at The Carthage Press.
Lamar residents rejected Montgomery's efforts for political office. If he had been elected to that Ward One council seat, then re-elected every two years, Lamar could have been the only place in the country to still have a Montgomery Ward.

CICERO OFFICIAL TO APPEAL
VERDICT IN NIEBUR LAWSUIT

By Randy Turner
Despite a $1.7 million judgment against her by a federal jury, Cicero, Ill. Town President Betty Loren-Maltese hasnt changed her estimation of the citys former police chief David Niebur one bit. Ms. Maltese, according to The Chicago Tribune, called the former Joplin police chief "unprofessional" and said she would appeal the jurys ruling that Niebur had been fired for cooperating with an FBI investigation into town corruption.
In addition to the $1.7 million penalty assessed against the city, the jury awarded Niebur and another officer an additional $100,000 in punitive damages from Ms. Loren-Maltese.
Niebur was featured in an article in the Saturday, May 26, New York Times. He told a Times reporter, "The hell hopefully is over now. It's just like I had just taken the most wonderful hot shower and whirlpool bath. It was just a cleansing effect. It was three years of hell."
The controversy Niebur ran into in Cicero was not the first that had enveloped the veteran police officer. As reported in an earlier edition of The Turner Report,Niebur had run into controversy earlier during his brief stint in Cicero.
According to a March 13, 1998, Associated Press article, Niebur supported a deal in which Cicero city officials agreed to pay $10,000 to print and distribute Ku Klux Klan literature in exchange for the Klan agreeing not to stage a rally in the city.
"I guess it could be deemed extortion in one sense," Niebur said in the AP article, "but I don't see it that way. I think this is really a sensible solution under the circumstances." The deal was struck by city officials to prevent violence. In the article, Niebur said security fences alone would have cost approximately $20,000 and the town would have had to foot the bill for state troopers for added security.
A Niebur deal with the Ku Klux Klan would not have surprised people who knew him from his days with Minnesota police departments. According to an article in the May 1, 1998, Chicago Tribune, Niebur was one of several officers named in a federal civil rights lawsuit in the 1960s in a small Minnesota town where he worked as a police supervisor. A jury found the officers and the department had harassed a black driver, the article said.
When he was with the Minneapolis, Minn., Police Department, he had a running battle with the Minneapolis Urban League over arrest rates of African-Americans, the article said. "He had a reputation for being a racist for stopping a lot of black people on the road," former Minneapolis Police Chief Tony Bouza told The Tribune.
Bouza, however, did not agree with that assessment. "I looked at the racism issue and didn't see any racism in his actions," he told The Tribune. Bouza, in fact, promoted Niebur to head of internal affairs, according to an article in the Jan 12, 1989, Minnesota Daily, despite a record that included "42 investigations into charges of brutality, harassment and assault, primarily involving minorities," the article said.
The article noted that there was not enough evidence to prove wrongdoing in almost all of the charges. The Chicago Tribune article placed the number of investigations at 48 and said charges against Niebur were sustained in eight of them.
Shortly after Bouza appointed Niebur head of internal affairs, Urban League President Gleason Glover sent Bouza a letter complaining about Niebur's record for dealing with minorities.
Niebur was removed from the position shortly after Bouza was replaced by John Laux as police chief. "His (Niebur's) appointment was inappropriate in the first place," Urban League Vice President Gary Sudduth told The Minnesota Daily. "I think Chief Laux realized that if there was going to be honest rebuilding of relations with the minority community, Niebur would be a glitch in that process."
Though Niebur had asked the minority community in Minneapolis to give him a chance during an interview with the Minneapolis Star-Tribune shortly after he was appointed head of internal affairs, any chance of receiving one might have ended five years earlier when he was involved in the shooting death of an unarmed black man named Sal Saran Scott, according to the article in The Minnesota Daily. Niebur also didn't help his cause when he told the Star-Tribune about his activities when he was a traffic control officer. According to the article, "He said that he unlawfully searched cars without probable cause and issued a record number of citations in one year, almost 6,000. Minority leaders complained that a disproportionate number of those citations was given to minorities.
"I stopped a lot of blacks," Niebur told the Star-Tribune, "but I stopped a lot of whites. I stopped everybody, anyone that moved."
Since the Cicero firing, Niebur has been unable to land a law enforcement ;osition. He told The New York Times, "I miss law enforcement every breathing moment of my life."

TIMES TOUGH FOR LEGGETT HONCHOS

By Randy Turner
Carthage's Fortune 500 company, Leggett & Platt, has not been immune to the misfortunes that have struck our nation's economy during recent months. Documents filed earlier this week with the Federal Securities and Exchange Commission show that Leggett officials have had to tighten their belts just like everyone else.
As always, they have sought to make sure that the attention of the public is focused squarely on their employees. Leggett closed its Springfield facility a few months back costing 75 people their jobs. And even though Leggett officials were also bearing the brunt of financial hardship, they kept that from the media, choosing, quite modestly, to let the publicity go to their loyal former employees.
Sure those people had to find other lines of work, but they weren't the only ones who suffered. Despite reassuring Leggett stockholders by eliminating superfluous jobs in Springfield and elsewhere, Chairman of the Board Harry M. Cornell Jr. actually took a PAY REDUCTION in 2000, according to the SEC documents. Cornell received only $603,000 in salary, down from the $620,885 he received in 1999. Fortunately in this area, there are coupons waiting to be clipped.
Of course, helping to ease the burden was the $400,000 in bonuses Cornell received to lift him up to slightly over the million mark. Even that was down from the over half a million in bonuses he received the year before and the more than $660,000 in bonuses he earned in 1998.
Cornell is not the only official who might be well advised to save a penny or two for a rainy day. Chief Executive Officer Felix Wright dropped from the $652,874 he received in 1999 to the $698,180 (wait a minute, he actually had an increase, can that be correct?)
Yes, Wright did receive more money in 2000. Not only did he get a salary increase of more than $45,000, according to the SEC documents, but he received more than $447,000 in stock options and $200,000 in bonuses.
Other Leggett officials and their compensation, according to the SEC documents, include: Michael Glauber, senior vice president, $328,341 salary, $157,261 bonus; David Haffner, executive vice president, $472,411 salary and $252,042 bonus and Robert Jeffries, strategic planning, $414,138 salary, $198,721 bonus. Jeffries, Haffner and Glauber each received sizable salary increases in the year 2000.
A good pension plan helped Mr. Cornell, who reached age 70 1/2 on April 5, 1999. Under his retirement plan, according to the SEC documents, he began receiving monthly retirement income in April 2000. He received a lump sum payment of $324,977 and received $44,708 in retirement benefits each month in 2000. He is scheduled to receive $25,776 a month this year.
Mr. Cornell is required to receive his retirement benefits, even though the SEC documents indicate he has not retired. "If Mr. Cornell retired at Dec. 31, 2001," the document said, "his estimated annual supplemental pension payment would be $762,848. If Mr. Wright retired at Dec. 31, 2001, his estimated annual supplemental pension payment would be $406,879."
But what happens if Cornell, Wright or other Leggett officials get fired? Are they in danger of losing their benefits. Not according to the SEC documents. Cornell, Wright and Jeffries have severance agreements in place with Leggett. These benefits "have no fixed expiration dates." They have employment contracts that expire on May 10, 2002, Oct. 1, 2002, and Dec. 31, 2006, respectively.
According to the terms of their contracts, even if Leggett has to lay off hundreds of workers, Wright, 65, and Jeffries, 59, will receive increases in their salaries.at least equal to the percentage increase they received the previous year. Of course, they have the option, according to the contract, of turning down their pay increases.
If Wright is fired, the SEC documents say, he will not only receive his pension, but a supplemental pension will automatically kick in. If Wright is fired, he will receive his full pay until Oct 1, 2002. Jeffries would receive full pay until April 4, 2006, if he were fired tomorrow (April 4, 2001).
Unless, they are fired, Cornell and Wright also have the option of becoming highly paid consultants for Leggett for two years if they quit. If Cornell elected to do so, they would receive 100 percent of their 1998 salaries for the first year and 75 percent of those salaries for the second year. Wright would receive 60 percent of his 1998 salary the first year and 60 percent during the second year.
The SEC documents also say that Cornell leases property in Keystone, Colo., to Leggett for $1,925 a month.
During Leggett's annual shareholders' meeting next month, the shareholders will vote on a proposal that would restate its 1989 flexible stock plan, which is "intended to aid the company in attracting, motivating and rewarding management employees through the granting of stock options and other stock-based benefits.
Obviously, some kind of incentive is needed. You'll never be able to attract good management if this is all you are offering in benefits.

RULING PUTS LAWSUIT AGAINST FORMER
GUEST HOUSE OWNERS ON HOLD

By Randy Turner
A federal judge ruled last month that a lawsuit against Robert J. Dupont, Jr, owner of the Guest House of Joplin and others accused of defrauding Medicare will be delayed until after criminal charges against them are settled.
Senior U. S. District Judge Scott O. Wright issued the ruling March 22 to enable Dupont and other defendants to fully concentrate on preparing their defense for the criminal case.
The United States government opened a second front in its battle with the owner of the Guest House of Joplin Nov. 9, filing a lawsuit against Dupont Jr in U. S. District Court for the Western District of Missouri.
DuPont and a number of business associates are cited in the lawsuit. They were also indicted in June 2000 by a federal grand jury for Medicare fraud. Among those indicted and also listed as defendants in the lawsuit are DuPont's former Guest House partner, Karl Otis Householder of Milo, and DuPont's daughter, Kelley Liveoak. Dupont currently owns the Joplin Guest House, Anderson Guest House, Carl Junction Guest House and the St. Louis Guest House. Ms. Liveoak served as the administrator for those facilities.
In the first and second counts of the seven-count lawsuit, the government alleges that false or fraudulent claims for homebound health services were made for an individual who was not homebound.
The third count alleges that Dupont and Ms. Liveoak made false or fradulent claims for personal care for people who were hospitalized at other facilities.The fourth count alleges Householder made false or fraudulent claims for personal care for people who were hospitalized in other facilities. Householder was claiming the people were at the Lamar Guest House, the Butler Guest House or were under the care of Regal Home Health or Sterling Home Health, two businesses co-owned by Householder.
Another count alleges common fraud. On each count, the government is asking for $10,000 in damages for each of dozens of cases and then asking that that amount be tripled.
The Guest House of Joplin, as reported exclusively in The Turner Report, has been denied license renewal by the Missouri Division of Aging because of a continued problem with contaminated drinking water.
According to Division of Aging documents, the drinking water was contaminated because the Guest House does not dispose of its sewage properly. Raw sewage backed up in the backyard, eventually contaminating the drinking water. The problem was first noticed in a May 31 state inspection. It had not been corrected when state inspectors returned Aug. 7 and Aug. 10.
A notice of non-compliance has been issued, as well as a notice of denial of license renewal "due to lack of correction of (violations of) Class I and Class II standards."
As The Turner Report noted recently, Dupont and Householder lost another battle in court when the U. S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit ruled in favor of the city of Springfield, which Dupont and Householder's company, Sandhill, Inc., claimed had violated the Fair Housing Act when it closed its Springfield Guest House due to zoning regulations.
Sandhill was also the owner of the Lamar Guest House, which was closed by the Missouri Division of Aging in 1997.
The federal indictment indicates Dupont, Householder and the others were involved in a conspiracy to send Sandhill patients to specific doctors. The doctors would then say that the patients needed home health services from Sterling Home Health Care, Inc., a Lamar company owned by Householder and Dupont, Home Health Care, Inc., and A to Z Billing Services, Inc., both of Joplin, and both owned by Dupont. Dupont had been co-owner of Sandhill from 1993 to 1996.
The problems of Sandhill, Inc., were spelled out in documents filed in U. S. Bankruptcy Court. The company bought property in Springfield and opened a residential care center but ran into a tidal wave of opposition from people who lived near the proposed center and from city officials.
The city of Springfield refused to issue necessary local licenses, company officials claimed in the Bankruptcy Court documents. They also claimed the Department of Housing and Urban Development had referred the matter to the U. S. Justice Department with a recommendation to bring discrimination charges against the city of Springfield. Householder and Dupont filed the discrimination suit against the city March 7, 1997, in U. S. District Court. Dupont said they were seeking more than $5 million in damages. The city had closed the Guest House in 1993 saying it did not have a city business license. Dupont said the closing was motivated by the presence of black residents at the Guest House.
In Bankruptcy Court documents, Sandhill officials said the city of Springfield closed the Springfield Guest House solely because "mentally handicapped people resided therein." Dupont told this reporter in a 1997 interview that many of the accusations made by officials of the Missouri Division of Aging against the Springfield facility were not accurate. He said accusations that people were administering insulin shots without training were incorrect. Another problem cited by the state was a lack of counseling for a patient with a history of cocaine abuse. Dupont said, "We were told by the Department of Probation and Parole to hold off on the counseling program, then we were cited by the Division of Aging for doing what we were told to do." The District Court did not agree that Sandhill had been the victim of discrimination and granted a summary judgment in favor of the city of Springfield.

J. R. EMBREY LOSES ANOTHER
ROUND IN FEDERAL COURT

By Randy Turner
Though he has already been rebuffed once in his efforts, convicted bank robber William J. R. Embrey, a former Granby resident, is taking another shot at suing the Highway Patrol officers who stopped him near Norwood on Dec. 5, 1998, claiming they violated his civil rights.
In the lawsuit, filed last week in U. S. District Court for the Western District of Missouri, Embrey, who is spending his days in a medium-security prison in Beaumont, Texas, is suing Missouri Highway Patrol troopers Stephen L. Grass and C. N. Ponder, Assistant U. S. Attorney David C. Jones, Magistrate Judge James C. England and Darryl B. Johnson Jr.
Embrey, acting as his own attorney, outlined the "facts" in his petition. He said Grass and Ponder were "trolling the highways for the purpose of targeting out-of state and rental vehicles then creating and/or finding reasons to stop said vehicles for the sole purpose of searching for drugs" on Dec. 5, 1998.
Embrey, 60, and his half-brother, Luie White, 51, Diamond, were charged with possession of firearms by a convicted felon following the traffic stop, according to court records. White, who was driving, initially denied knowing who Embrey was, according to a news release from the U. S. Attorney's office, but then identified him as Herbert Jensen. After further questioning, the passenger identified himself as William Embrey. The trooper asked for permission to search the car. At that point, according to the federal indictment, Embrey began to show heart attack symptoms and asked for antiglycerine pills which he said were in the trunk of his car. Embrey has a history of heart problems.
As he got out of the car, the trooper noticed two 9 mm ammunition clips on the seat where he was sitting, according to the indictment. After putting Embrey in an ambulance, authorities said, a loaded handgun was found on the ground where he had been sitting. Three shotguns, three revolvers, more ammunition, Halloween masks, wigs, makeup, gloves, a police scanner and two-way radios were also found in the car's trunk.
According to an Associated Press report, one official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said state and federal authorities believed Embrey and White, who were convicted in 1980 for the 1979 robbery of the Cornerstone Bank of Southwest City, were preparing to rob another bank.
The Southwest City robbery took place on March 11, 1979, when Embrey and White approached Darrell Spillers and his family at their Southwest City home and demanded money. Spillers, a bank official, took more than $11,000 from the bank, while Embrey and White held his family hostage.
They took for Oklahoma in Spillers' car, taking him with them as "insurance," in case Spillers had called the police while he was at the bank. When they reached their getaway car, they released Spillers unharmed.
Embrey was later convicted in U. S. District Court for the Western District of Missouri on charges of armed bank robbery, in violation of the Federal Bank Robbery Act and kidnapping in violation of the Federal Kidnapping Act.
On Sept. 19, 1980, Embrey was sentenced to two consecutive 20-year sentences. After numerous appeals were thrown out, Embrey finally struck gold in 1997 when a panel of the Eighth District Court of Appeals ruled that he should not have been convicted of kidnapping as well as bank robbery and that he was, in effect, being punished twice for the same crime.
Since Embrey had already served his time on the bank robbery charge, he was released from prison. The full court of appeals later reversed that decision and Embrey was free on bond awaiting a hearing on his appeal when he was stopped near Norwood.
He had been living and working in the Fargo, N. D., area since he was freed on appeal.
White's efforts to appeal his kidnapping conviction were also unsuccessful...because he waited 18 years to file them. The reason he waited so long was because he had already served time and was out on probation when he was arrested in Missouri on the weapons charge.
Embrey is asking to be awarded $250,000 from each of the Highway Patrol officers, that an injunction be issued against them to keep them from trolling and targeting out-of state and rental vehicles. He is asking for a jury trial.

FROM JAN. 20, 2001 TURNER REPORT

SETTLEMENT CONFERENCE SET FOR
TEACHER, NEOSHO R-5 OFFICIALS
By Randy Turner
The Turner Report has received information that a settlement conference between Cammy Brown and the Neosho R-5 School District has been scheduled for 9:30 a.m. Tuesday, Jan. 23, in Suite 2200, of the United States Courthouse at 222 North John Q. Hammons Parkway in Springfield.
U. S. Magistrate Judge James C. England has ordered that the lead attorneys for Ms. Brown and the school district be present, as well as anyone else whose approval is needed for a settlement to be official. R-5 officials attempted to fire Ms. Brown after she sent a nude e-mail of herself to a person who turned out to be working in league with her estrange husband. The husband allegedly tried to use the pictures to get his wife to return to him and then used them to try to get her to lose her teaching position.
Sources close to the lawsuit have indicated that R-5 officials will drop their efforts to have the state revoke Ms. Brown's teaching license. One result of the negotiations is expected to be that Ms. Brown will not be fired from her position at Neosho, but will submit her resignation. A buyout which could pay her for the 2000-2001 school year may be included in the settlement, one source indicated. In return, Ms. Brown will drop her lawsuit against R-5 officials, including former Superintendent Ron Barton, who released information about the e-mails to the media.
The attempts to fire Ms. Brown came after the only incident in a career which has seen her serve as president of the local chapter of the International Reading Association, serve as one of the directors of the annual Young Authors Conference at Missouri Southern State College and write several successful state grants.
The most recent actions were taken after documents were filed Dec. 18 and 19 in U. S. District Court, asking Ms. Brown to provide the district's attorneys with eight years worth of telephone records plus numerous records of her e-mail messages and chatroom conversations. Ms. Brown received copies of seven subpoenas which had been served on people who are not parties to the lawsuit filed by Ms. Brown in an effort to regain her teaching job at a Neosho elementary school. The R-5 Board of Education fired Ms. Brown, citing moral reasons, but a judge stayed that firing and she remains suspended with pay. The first subpoena mentioned in the most recent court filing went to Leah Brecunier of Critical Path, Inc., a California firm. The R-5 District's attorneys said they wanted "any and all documents" related to Ms. Brown's e-mail address or the e-mail address of Steve Hobbert, the man to whom she allegedly sent the nude photos. The second subpoena was to AOL Custodian of Records asking for all e-mail communications made by Ms. Brown. The most wide-reaching subpoena was directed to Southwestern Bell. The R-5 District asked for all of Ms. Brown's long distance records back to 1992. "Despite (Ms. Brown's) request, defendants refused to narrow the scope of these subpoenas to cover information relevant to this lawsuit," Ms. Brown's attorney said in the court document. The attorney asked the judge to limit the discovery. The lawyer also offered another alternative, saying that if the judge decided not to limit the scope of inquiry, that the documents should be delivered to the judge to be examined first. Ms. Brown's attorney noted that nothing related to the lawsuit happened in 1992, but when the lawyer contacted attorneys for the R-5 School District, they refused to limit their subpoenas. The filings were the first in the case since Ms. Brown indicated she intended to seek punitive damages against former Superintendent Ron Barton. In documents filed Nov. 17 in U. S. District Court, Western District of Missouri, Ms. Brown indicated that Barton was responsible for making information about the nude pictures public during an interview with a Joplin Globe reporter. During that interview, Barton said, "She might be able to get by with this in Chicago, but she can't get away with it in Neosho." Ms. Brown is also suing current R-5 Superintendent Mark Mitchell and the members of the R-5 Board of Education. Mitchell was added in the amended complaint. He took over for Barton on July 1. The amended complaint also says that a letter written by Barton to the State Board of Education in an effort to have Ms. Brown's teaching certificate revoked contained allegations with which she was never confronted, and that "some of the allegations were not true." Ms. Brown also charges Barton with having an "evil motive" in taking the actions which he took against her. The details of the events that brought about Ms. Brown's suspension are spelled out in the court documents. "In the fall and early winter of 1999, (Ms. Brown) e-mailed private, revealing pictures of herself from her home computer to a person she had developed a relationship with over the Internet and through telephone conversations. "(She) later learned that the person she was conversing with on the Internet was acting in cooperation with her estranged husband, Richard Brown, from whom she had been separated since August 1999." After that, the petition says, Brown threatened to show the photos to school officials "if she did not take him back." In August and December, Brown entered Ms. Brown's home and took computer discs containing the revealing photos, the petition says. On Jan. 9, Ms. Brown received a phone call and e-mail from a person claiming to be Renee Cooper telling her she had until midnight to take her husband back "or she was going to e-mail (Ms. Brown's) private pictures to the principal and Barton, the petition said. The next day, Ms. Brown told her principal and Barton about the threat and that she had e-mailed the pictures to someone she met on the Internet. "Prior to January 10, 2000," the petition said, "the principal and Superintendent Barton were aware that (Ms. Brown's) husband had wrongfully taken private, revealing pictures from her home and had threatened to blackmail her with them, and that he was and had been mentally and physically abusive towards her." At the close of the meeting, the petition said, Barton told Ms. Brown it was "a personal matter" and "she should not worry about the situation." On the same day, the principal and Barton received an e-mail with the photographs attached. Ms. Brown's husband, using the Webb City Police Department's fax machine (he worked there) sent a fax saying that Renee Cooper and others wanted to set up a meeting with the R-5 Board of Education to discuss the photos. Barton denied the request. "Shortly thereafter," the petition said, "Barton informed the Board of Education of the situation and informed them that he did not intend to take any action against Ms. Brown's employment because it involved a personal matter." That was the way the situation stayed until March, according to the petition. Early that month, Renee Cooper set up a meeting with Barton and brought him additional pictures of Ms. Brown along with a number of "Internet exchanges between Ms. Brown and a person referring to himself as 'Steve.' " On March 10, Ms. Brown's principal called her into the office and told her it would be "in her best interest to resign." Ms. Brown met with Barton, who told her "he was concerned that the matter would become public because Renee Cooper threatened that she would make the information public," the petition said. Ms. Brown's divorce attorney attended the meeting and told Barton she was in the process of getting a protective order to prevent Brown and his friends from distributing the photos. Barton said that would help the situation. At that meeting, according to the petition, Ms. Brown asked Barton if she could see the photos. Barton said she cold not see them because he had given them to the district's attorney. Barton never told her about ICQ logs containing Internet exchanges with Steve at that time, the petition said. On March 15, Missouri NEA representative Lori Cox met with Barton about the situation. Barton said he was concerned with the information becoming public and told her he had already spoken to a Joplin Globe reporter about it. On that same day, Barton placed Ms. Brown on a leave of absence with pay. The Joplin Globe article was published the next day and everyone knew about Ms. Brown's nude photos. The headline of the article, a copy of which is included in the court file, read, "Teacher Refuses to Resign; Nude Photographs at Issue." "We wanted her to resign," Barton told Globe reporter Jeff Lehr. "We thought that would be the best thing. But I don't want to violate her civil rights." According to the article, Barton said a perceived likelihood that the existence of the photos would become public knowledge compromised Ms. Brown's credibility as a teacher in the Neosho community. Barton told The Globe that what a teacher does in the privacy of her home is not normally a concern. "But if it becomes public knowledge that she's doing that sort of thing, we have a problem." The only reason it became public knowledge was because of Barton, Ms. Brown's petition indicated. "(He) was responsible for making Ms. Brown's personal affairs public on March 16, 2000, through the information he provided to The Joplin Globe and other media." The petition noted that Ms. Brown had "made every reasonable effort to avoid the disclosure of her private affairs to the public and declined various reporters' requests for interviews." On March 16, she obtained a temporary restraining order against Brown and Ms. Cooper, preventing them from distributing the photos. A permanent injunction, a copy of which was included in the court filed, was issued April 21 in Newton County Circuit Court. The Board announced on April 28 that it would seek to have the State Department of Elementary and Secondary Education revoke Ms. Brown's teaching license. A resolution was approved by the board at its May 11 meeting and papers were filed with the state on the following day. The board leveled two major charges at Ms. Brown. The first was "Immorality in that Ms. Brown distributed obscene pictures of herself through an Internet chatroom and agreed to engage in sexual conduct with an unknown person on or about Sept. 11, 1999 to wit: -"Ms. Brown engaged in a conversation with a person whom she did not know and whom she believed to be male. -"During that conversation, Ms. Brown discussed sexual activities that she enjoyed. -"During that conversation, Ms. Brown agreed to meet this unknown person in a motel room that evening and to engage in sexual activity. -"During that conversation, Ms. Brown sent photographs of herself to this unknown person. These pictures included photographs of: 1. her bare breasts, 2. her genitalia, 3. her manual manipulation of her genitalia. -"Ms. Brown's interactions with this unknown person on or about Sept. 8, 1999, became known in the Neosho community. -"Ms. Brown's conduct violated the conditions of the IRCQ the net server, which specifically prohibits transmission of obscene and objectionable material." The second charge was "Immorality in that Ms. Brown distributed obscene pictures of herself through an internet chatroom on or around December 1999 to wit: -"Ms. Brown engaged in a conversation with a person whom she did not know and whom she believed to be male. -"During that conversation, Ms. Brown discussed sexual activities that she enjoyed. -"During that conversation, Ms. Brown sent photographs of herself to this unknown person." The photographs contained the same information as given on the first charge. The charges were signed by Barton and the resolution was approved by the R-5 Board of Education by a 6-0 vote. Ms. Brown initially filed her lawsuit May 15 and obtained an injunction keeping the R-5 School District from firing her. In her petition, she said she has "suffered and continues to suffer emotional distress, physical manifestations of emotional distress, pain and suffering, harm to her reputation, humiliation, embarrassment, lost earning potential and lost job opportunies during the summer semester." She claims the actions taken by Barton and the board violate her right to freely associate and right to privacy as guaranteed by the 1st, 4th, 5th, 9th and 14th amendments and that she was deprived of due process. She is asking that the court permanently prevent the board from seeking to revoke her license, let her keep her job and that she be awarded damages and costs against all defendants and punitive damages against Barton.

NANCY CRUZAN
REMEMBERED ON 10-YEAR
ANNIVERSARY OF HER DEATH

By Randy Turner
"Thank you."
The words are simple ones, but to those who followed the ordeal the Cruzan family went through after a 1983 automobile accident left Nancy in a persistent vegetative state, those two words have a significant meaning.
The words are etched in her tombstone in a cemetery just outside of Carterville. They can be interpreted in more than one way. It could be a thank you to the U. S. Supreme Court, which made it possible for Judge Charles Teel to render the Dec. 12, 1990, decision that ended what remained of Nancy's life. It could be a thank you for all the people who fought to make those decisions possible...people like Nancy's parents, Joe and Joyce Cruzan, and her sister, Chris White, the nieces she loved, Angie and Miranda Yocum, or the attorney, Bill Colby of Kansas City, who fought all the way to Washington, D. C. and back for Nancy's right to die.
Tuesday, Dec. 26, 2000, marked the 10-year anniversary of the end of a saga that began on a county road just outside of Carthage and ended up gripping the nation.
Nancy Cruzan made the most of the quarter of a century that she "lived." She was vivacious, outgoing, looking forward to every day. My encounters with her were brief and both came when we were teenagers. When my baseball team played in Carterville, one of the highlights was the Cruzan sisters, whose laughter and joy of life came across to everyone they met. I only met her a couple of times, but she made enough of an impression that I, like the others who knew her, was shocked when she was robbed of her life at such an early age.
On Jan. 11, 1983, Nancy had worked the late shift at Schreiber's Cheese Plant in Carthage. She was driving east on Elm Road and was only one mile from her home when the accident occurred. There were no weather conditions that would have explained why she lost control of her car. It ran off the left side of the road, hit some trees and a mailbox, then swerved back across the road and went off the right side, going through a fence, overturning several times and coming to rest on its top. She may have fallen asleep, authorities speculated.
By the time CPR was administered to her, her brain had already been deprived of oxygen for about 14 minutes. About six minutes is all it takes to cause permanent brain damage. She was left in what doctors called a "persistent vegetative state." The cerebral hemisphere of her brain, which controlled her thinking and her emotions no longer functioned. All she had left were physical reflexes.
Nearly five years into that existence between life and death, Joe and Joyce Cruzan asked Judge Teel if they could remove the feeding tube that was attached to their daughter...the only thing that was keeping Nancy alive. Teel warned that someone could bring legal charges against them unless they petitioned to have it done legally. The Cruzans filed the motion in Jasper County Circuit Court and that began the long legal battle. Testimony at the circuit court level was provided by people who said that Nancy had indicated she would never want to be kept alive by artificial means. She had worked for a time as the Stapleton Center in Joplin caring for a retarded three-year-old boy who had to be forcefed. During a conversation with other workers at the center, Nancy indicated if she were in that situation, she would want to have the plug pulled.
Teel granted permission to have the feeding tubes removed, but the decision was appealed by the Missouri Attorney General's office, which had taken an interest in the case, and it was sent to the Missouri Supreme Court, which overturned Teel's ruling. The Cruzans and their attorney, Colby, took the case to the United States Supreme Court. It was the first time the Supreme Court had ever considered a right-to-die case.
The Court ruled that a person does have the right to die, but also indicated state courts should hear the evidence and determine if Nancy really had indicated what she would want to happen.
That brought the case full circle and the eyes of the nation were on Carthage, Mo., that day in October 1990. The courthouse square was filled with vans from all the Joplin and Springfield stations, plus stations as far away as Kansas City and St. Louis.
Since the case was going to be heard by Judge Teel once more and not by a jury, reporters filled the jury box so they could get a little closer to the judge, the attorneys and the witnesses. The national media was present, including representatives of The New York Times, The Associated Press and other metropolitan newspapers.
Three more witnesses were presented who testified that Nancy had indicated to them she would never want to be kept alive through artificial means if she were left incapacitated in an accident. One of the witnesses was a man whom she had worked for when she lived in Oklahoma City.
The Cruzan family listened attentively as the man began his testimony, clearly answering the questions that were posed to him by Colby and by Carthage attorney Thad McCanse, who had been appointed by the court to represent "Nancy's interests."
Joe and Joyce Cruzan were seated with Colby. In the row behind them was Nancy's older sister, Christy White, and Christy's two young daughters, Angie and Miranda Yocum, who at the time were students at Webb City High School. Nancy had loved those two girls more than she loved anyone else in her life.
Miranda, a ninth grader and a budding artist, had brought along a sketchpad and was drawing a courtroom scene that matched the efforts being put forth by the two professionals who were seated in the jury box. Her eye for detail was evident as she sketched Colby perfectly, right down to his suspenders and caught all other aspects of the courtroom.
As the testimony continued, Nancy's former boss recollected the conversation he had with her, recalling that she had said she wouldn't want to live as a vegetable because "vegetables can't hug their nieces."
After hearing that, Angie, the older niece, began to cry. Miranda's face was also reddening as she put her arm around her sister's shoulder and began patting her on the back. When the testimony ended and the hearing concluded, Miranda took her sketch to William Colby and presented it to him. Maybe the first time during the case, the attorney was able to smile. "That's really good," he said. "That's really good."
Judge Teel took the testimony under advisement and on Dec. 12, 1990, he ordered the feeding tubes to be removed. In a written statement, Joe Cruzan said, "I suspect hundreds of thousands of people can rest free, knowing that when death beckons they can meet it face to face with dignity, free from the fear of unwanted and useless medical treatment." Twelve days later, Nancy Cruzan, whose life ended on that county road nearly eight years earlier, died.
The end did not come peacefully for the Cruzan family as protesters gathered around the Southwest Missouri Rehabilitation Center in Mount Vernon where Nancy had been a patient for several years. Even though many of the protesters were calling him a murderer, Joe Cruzan still had sympathy for them. He knew they believed in what they were doing, just as he did. On one particularly cold night, he took them hot coffee because, as he said, "No one should have to be cold."
Nancy Cruzan died 10 years ago, but her influence is still being felt.
For a time, her sister, Christy ran the Nancy Cruzan Foundation, helping people who faced similar situations. "I think we have come a long way," she told the Associated Press in 1996. "There are a lot of caring medical professionals ready to listen to what patients want. I truly believe because of Nan's case there are a lot of families that won't have to go to court now."
Missouri went from being behind other states in providing patients the right to control their own destinies to establishing a living will law that makes sure that what the patient wants is taken into consideration. The public awareness created by the Nancy Cruzan case made it easier for people to put into writing what they would want to have done for them medically if they should ever be incapacitated.
Missouri also now has a durable power-of-attorney law, put into effect shortly after Nancy's death, that allows a person to name another person who will make the life-and-death decision if it needs to be made. The Cruzan case also made a difference on the federal level. The Federal Patient Self-Determination Act, primarily sponsored by former U. S. Senator John Danforth of Missouri, requires hospital officials to tell patients about their right to determine in advance what should be done and then requires the hospitals to honor those wishes.
Joe Cruzan committed suicide in 1995. His life had never been the same since Nancy's accident. An intensely private person, he suddenly, against his will, became a celebrity with many sworn enemies who felt he had no right to make a life-and-death decision for his daughter.
Joyce Cruzan died in 1998. The Christmas holidays will always bring bittersweet memories for the remaining members of the family. But they do know that Nancy's life, as well as her death, made a difference.
Their attorney, Bill Colby, was also greatly affected by the case. He took a leave of absence from his law firm to write a book on the Cruzan case. On the fifth anniversary of Nancy's death, he wrote an op-ed article for The Kansas City Star, in which he said what he hoped would be the lasting impact of Nancy Cruzan and the court battle that earned her the right to die.
"The more information we provide while healthy, the more each of us communicates with our loved ones, the greater the chance that we will empower those loved ones to ask the right questions and make the decisions we would choose at the end of life."
In that article, Colby described the call he received from Joe Cruzan the night that Nancy died. "When Joe saw that Nancy was no longer breathing, he reached up and gently closed her eyelids. As we wound up (our) conversation early that morning, I asked Joe, 'What are you going to do now?' He replied, 'Well, I guess we are going to go home.' "