The N.C. Supremes Rule On Public Records: And It Only Fuels My Fire

Author's Note: This post has been edited & updated.

My criminal beef with Randolph Hospital executives, Bob Morrison and Steven Eblin, is that these two "non-profit" executives repeatedly lied under Oath in interrogatory responses filed during the discovery phase of their own SLAPP-suit . . . saying that financial information (very relevant to my damages claim) included on IRS 990 returns (public record, and actually posted on the Internet when they filed their responses) was "highly confidential".

Of course, the big-shot hospital attorneys, banked by all those taxpayer dollars and supposedly "experts" on the ins-&-outs of "non-profits", should have known better than to file false interrogatory responses on behalf of their clients (I believe it's called suborning perjury) . . . not that the North Carolina State Bar cares.

The lies, un-corrected by Morrison/Eblin/Randolph's attorney's, and un-challenged by my oh-so-stellar (NOT) attorney, Steven Schmidly (who became the strangest of bed-fellows with the hospital executives he once sued in their unifying zeal to bring alcohol to Asheboro . . . doctors obviously needing to drink heavily in order to stay here), allowed Morrison and Eblin to get off very inexpensively at settlement.

The State Bar didn't sanction Schmidly for his gross negligence either.

Perjury has no statute of limitations.

This ruling by the North Carolina Supreme Court only enforces the argument I've made all along: Public records are owned by the people!!!

And We-The-People should not have to beg to get them. We should not be lied-to when we request them.

Moreover, people charged with the public good . . . say like the executives running "non-profits" and charities . . . should NEVER be allowed to LIE during a court proceeding . . . negotiate a fraudulent deal upon their LIES . . . and totally GET AWAY WITH IT!

Their Board Members shouldnot be able to play the "we know nothing" game either.

I am more and more inclined to return to Court later this year. Simply put, I'm tired of this crap. The state of North Carolina has a responsibility to protect its citizens from this kind of garbage . . . particularly citizens who were fired for doing their duty as defined by the gutless/spineless North Carolina Medical Board.

The way the Randolph County District Attorney (Garland Yates) has "handled" this case is despicable and inexcusable. He has totally pandered and sold out to "the right people". Like so many others in Asheboro, he forgot what "community" really means, and who he's supposed to serve.

And, as a "victims advocate" the North Carolina Attorney General's office (Roy Cooper) could not have been more useless. These days, it's supposedly all about "healthcare reform". And the NCAG is lawyer to NCDHHS (which directly "oversaw" one of the programs I served in . . . and pimped for the other one . . . AND hands out boatloads of the taxpayer's money/Certificates-of-Need/etc.) . . . the North Carolina Secretary of State reports to the AG . . . and the Medical Board asked for assistance last year . . . but Cooper's "special prosecutors" cannot find a way around Randolph County's habitually intemperate DA and into this case . . . in order to hold a "non-profit" accountable and make it play by the rules the rest of us have to cower to? Who is Roy Cooper trying to kid?

What I've been put through for doing the right thing by a sick baby twelve years ago is just absurd/sick/warped and fundamentally WRONG.

Friday Afternoon Update: Don't ya just LOVE it when the same very important people who sat on the big, bad local Boards FOR YEARS and looked the other way while hospital executives lied and bank presidents drove local institutions into the ground, throw themselve parties and give themselves awards?

And OBTW, it makes great sense to me (insert sarcasm) that the leaders-of-a-mill-town who treated a homegrown Pediatrician SO-HORRIBLY-for-no-good-reason-other-than-she took-a-"risk"-and-challenged-the-status-quo-of-a-bunch-of-greedy-power-mongering-bullies . . . a mill-town with a newspaper that only just updated its website & discovered public comments (yet still censors anything that might reflect negatively on bad leadership by the aforementioned power-mongering bullies) . . . thinks that our town would be a great attraction/draw for medical manufacturing & Internet/technology (industries that, by definition, attract/require more highly-educated young professionals).

Try though she might, Bonnie Renfro's "thirty second" presentations (who in the blogosphere does that sound like?) are going to have a hard time masking twelve years of leadership-sanctioned ugly.

I'm thinking that today's "young professionals" are looking for a little more light and air . . . and a little less good-ole-boy BS.

I'M ALSO THINKING (CALL ME "SCARY") THAT MAYBE THOSE YOUNG PROFESSIONALS WANT TO RAISE THEIR KIDS IN A "COMMUNITY" WHERE THE DOCTORS TAKING CARE OF THEM ARE NOT THREATENED AND/OR FIRED FOR REPORTING PROBLEMS AT THE LOCAL HOSPITAL . . . AND/OR SAVING SICK CHILDREN'S LIVES.

And/so get real Keith.