Political Undertones

Many times I have referred to myself as a political prisoner.  That is an odd distinction for me as I have never been considered a political person.  My interests have always swayed toward economic theory and psychology...and the next Sudoku puzzle.  My case brought to light the politics of the Texas justice system and what is going on inside the Legislature, of course.  But even that is not what I am talking about here.

Today I spent time on the blog called Grits For Breakfast as I do everyday to get my fill of what is going on in the Texas justice system and to make comments when something sparks a nerve or an idea.  The "Grits" blog has been recognized by many, including The New York Times:  On criminal justice, Grissom wrote, "WHO TO WATCH Scott Henson, a very knowledgeable blogger, who writes about all things criminal justice at gritsforbreakfast.blogspot.com."   In reading this blog, participating in the very active discussions via comments and in general enjoying how Scott Henson seems to have no fear...just puts it out there...he has the John Wayne version of "true grit", I decided this morning to just get more brave. 

It is time to put a piece of my case out there that I have been keeping to myself (and my attorneys and my husband and my mom....).  I suppose you might be saying: but haven't you said it all by now?  Well, far from it...after all I have to leave something for the book, RIGHT?  Okay...here's another piece to this case of mine, although there was some mention of it in my post called A DEAD BATTERY? I did not really explain and give you the timeline so you could see the significance.  This may also explain more of the reason the Contributor's business partner is so involved.  For those of you who are new to my blog, in my case the "Contributor" made the false allegations and his "business partner" masterminded the scheme against me and conspired in the fabrication. It has his signature all over it.  I am just introducing David McCall in this post.  I give this to you in the form of a timeline:

July 1, 1992  The business partner loans $200,000 to an insurance man's corporation who was buying an existing insurance company.  The loan was made because he could not have ownership in an insurance agency in the state of Texas without having an insurance license.  The rate of the loan is 18%.  Its considered a "sweetheart" loan as no lender would have done this or accepted the terms of repayment (cash flow).

October 28, 1992  The business partner loans an additional $100,000 at a rate of 12% to same corporation for initial operating expenses.  Another "sweetheart" loan.

Throughout 1993 and 1994  Interest on loans is paid as cash flow allows.  Not something a typical lender would accept, but it is how someone having ownership in the business would be distributed cash.  Further, the business partner and the insurance man have monthly meetings to go over the operations of the company.

October 1994  The insurance business is sold.  The loans and any remaining unpaid interest are paid off as well as a "back-end fee", called a "consulting fee" amounting to $185,910, in effect the business partner's share of the profits from the sale.  He couldn't own a percentage of the business so he accomplished the same thing through the guise of a series of loans and a consulting fee.

October 1996  David McCall, an ex-mayor of Plano, pleaded guilty to bank fraud (after another ex-mayor of Plano, Jack Harvard, pleaded guilty to related charges and agreed to be a government witness against McCall).  McCall is a new character in the story and his charges relate to the S&L scams of the 1980's.  So McCall is now a felon and owns his own insurance company.

August 13, 1998  Date of stock issuance for TCT Holdings, Inc. and the date newspapers say TCT was formed (by the insurance man from 1992 above) through the merging of three agencies which includes "The McCall Insurance Agency".  I have copies of the stock issued to the Contributor and his business partner.  The business partner bragged that once again they had ownership in an insurance agency without being licensed.  So not only was that illegal but McCall 's continued ownership, once a felon, is illegal.  Felons are not allowed to have ownership in insurance agencies in the state of Texas.  I checked, there is no grandfather clause to that.  Apparently David changed his name to Bruce McCall for the insurance company purposes.  David's middle name started with "B", but was Benjamin, not Bruce, which is what he was using. 

1998- 2003  The business partner continues to require the insurance man to have monthly meetings with him to go over the operations and financials of the business.  Micromanaging as usual.  Once I started NOAH we used their agency for our policies.  (Uh, would I use their agency if I was stealing from them?  That would be bold!)

October 30, 2003  I received a call from Betsy of TCT telling me to extend the Directors & Officers insurance policy to cover end-of-business contingencies. The policy had lapsed a couple weeks earlier.  Her example was ...what if a parent decided to sue us.  I told her "No, we did not have the wherewithal to pay and I was not going to extend it."  TCT went on and paid it anyway, extending without my permission.  Remember the Contributor and his business partner have ownership in TCT!!

November 2003  False police report and false insurance claims filed with regard to alleged theft for the funding of The NOAH Project school.

Thursday, February 12, 2004  McCall goes into a coma as a result of cancer.

Saturday, February 14, 2004  President Bush approves pardon of McCall. Alberto Gonzalez, then the General Counsel to the White House, drew up the pardon papers.

Monday, February 16, 2004  Presidential pardon of McCall is announced.

Tuesday, February 17, 2004  McCall dies, never came out of coma so doesn't even know he was pardoned.

Monday,  February 23, 2004  Temple-Inland purchases TCT and renames it Guaranty Insurance Services.

The pardon accomplished several things.  It caused the continuing Federal investigation on McCall and subsequently his estate to cease.  It cleared the way for the sale of TCT to an SEC regulated company.  It also made the paper trail of the fraudulent claims and the extension of the policy related to my case impossible to follow.  And, outside of the McCall pardon, the Contributor and business partner, once again get away with owning and profiting from an insurance agency that is not allowed under Texas law.

Don't you wonder, given the false allegations on me and false insurance claims, how many more false claims there might have been?  All of the Contributor's and business partner's development deals and existing finished properties and business operations were insured through this agency.  Don't you wonder when someone changes their name to do business and was a felon as a result of the S&L insurance scams of the 80's  what kind of business they were doing in this group of insurance companies that merged in the late 90's?  There was a big question when Bush pardoned McCall....it was so out of pattern from all prior pardons of Bush.  Much was written about that, in newspapers and blogs with many people speculating.  It's far from a coincidence that a week after the pardon TCT was sold to Temple-Inland (a Texas based SEC regulated company).  You know Temple-Inland would have done a fair amount of due diligence before buying TCT.  But, not one word was ever spoken to me about this before I left at the end of October (just three months prior) and I was always placed in the middle of these types of transactions for my ex-clients....as a sort of watch dog.  (No, I'm not a dog.)

I handed this information to the prosecutors and what I was given in return was a Motion in Limine saying we could not bring up past "bad acts" of the Contributor or his business partner.  That would include the false insurance claims made from the false allegations of me and the unlawful extension of NOAH's Directors and Officers policy....which was quite relevant to my defense.

Further we subpoenaed all the insurance records from TCT (then Guaranty).  They were not required to bring them to court.  Instead my attorney and I went to their offices, after being told on the phone we would have to sort through about 15 to 20 boxes.  When we arrived, we were ushered into a conference room and given two small stacks of paper with two of the previous TCT employees watching us and answering questions.  Of course what we were looking for was not there.  They were never made to render the documents as outlined in the subpoena.  Nor did my attorney bring any of the people from TCT into the trial to be questioned.  There were three people I specifically requested: the insurance man heading up all the deals and operations, and the two women who sat at that table the day we went to their offices, the three key personnel of TCT.

Perhaps you see the political overtones I first spoke of in this blog.  There is more and it relates to Harlan Crow, business partner to my two ex-clients and trustee to Bush's campaign funds. I was specifically told in the fall of 2004 to take nothing of what I knew regarding other issues to the media because this country could not afford to have John Kerry as President.  At the same time my attorney asked for another $50,000 to continue on my case, of which everyone involved knew I could not afford, thus precipitating the recategorization of me to "indigent" and throwing me to the public defenders.

For being a-political I managed to get right in the middle of things, wouldn't you say?

A TIMELINE IS IN ORDER!

By now you know the trial and all that led up to it was a travesty of justice.  It seems it is as good a time as any to set out a timeline showing the events I have shared and adding a few illuminating details.

• December 1999  Non-profit corp ("The Noah School Project, Inc.") was filed with the state of Texas.
• 2000 - 2002  Provided a free to the public - Speaking Series while researching the market plus best treatments and strategy.  Training for eventual school was on-going at my home.
• January 2001  Filed application for 501(c)3 - Federal Non-Profit Determination.
• October 2001  Received Non-Profit status from IRS and began search for appropriate school site.
• April 2002  Signed lease for school.
• April - June 2002  Obtained approval from city to build out special purposes school.
• June 2002  Began construction.
• October 2002  Construction completed, school opened.  Client's/contributor's divorce process commenced.
• November 24,2002  CBS aired The NOAH Project segment on Evening News (national coverage).
• December 2002  Meeting with client's divorce attorneys to determine what information and schedules I would need to provide.
• January 2003  After receiving the December 31, 2002 financials on a timely basis my client's wife called informing me she was going to "bust" his Separate Property and apologizes for all the extra work that would cause me, knowing I was also busy with NOAH.  The details of all Separate Property transactions plus bank/brokerage statements had to be reported from inception (1988).  In the case of investment in real estate development deals - walk forward increases on both cash and tax basis, plus all supporting documents of the legal entities and their transactions.
• January - October 2003  Continued to work for clients, plus direct the school.  Repeatedly asked client for 2nd Separate Property Partition so I could make needed adjustments to allocations based on effective date of partition.  Client never actually allowed me to have the signed partition (or even a copy as support in the accounting records).  This was very unusual and created an error in allocations.
• July 2003  Called to a meeting with my client and his divorce attorney.  The attorney reviewed with me everything I knew about my client's two partitions to create Separate Property and all activity since inception, asking me to diagram on a board in the conference room.  He told me to stop sending things directly to wife's attorney but send everything to him from that point on.
• July or August 2003  Client says this is when he found out about "theft" according to his deposition in the civil suit.
• August 2003  Client tells me of threatened litigation regarding his collaborative divorce.
• August 2003  Business trip to Washington DC to meet with NIH regarding research grant for NOAH.
• September 2003  Meetings with client's business partner to discuss recasting of client's contributions to debt. This was to help him with his divorce issues.  Treating his contributions as a start-up cost that could be recouped through NIH research grant funding.  He had me prepare several amortization schedules, varying the term and rate, saying the client would review and decide which terms he wanted.
• October 1, 2003  Conference call with client and his business partner saying he could no longer fund NOAH as he was in trouble with his divorce.  They gave me the choice to continue with NOAH (either keep it going or reorganize it) or go back full time with them and let NOAH close for good.  I chose to stay with NOAH and agreed to a 3 - 4 week transition period.  I was given a list of work priorities to do during the transition period.  There was a parent training meeting scheduled for that evening.  I canceled the training and called an emergency meeting of key parents, Board members and business consultant group.  The main topic was how do we keep the school open in the short term.  Many of us left that meeting with assignments.
• October 2003  Transitional meetings with client's business partner throughout the month.   
• October 3, 2003  Clients had their corporate controller rent a U-Haul (in his own name) and along with another business associate pick up their file cabinets and oldest files from my garage at 7:00am.  Later that day I had my first transitional meeting with client's business partner, at which time he instructed me to provide a resignation letter, which I did.  Parts of that resignation letter were recovered from computer but date at top of letter was removed as were my words of gratitude for all the years of working for them.  Did a dead battery pick those things to delete?
• October 7, 2003  At trial (2007) Contributor testified this is the date he found out about "theft" and froze his personal accounts.  In contrast to Contributor's deposition saying July or August.  In further contrast to police report and statement provided by Contributor's business partner saying "some time in October".  You'd think their "memory" would have been best for the police report but instead the exact date comes four years later in my trial.  Curious?
• October 11, 2003  Date of contrived confession.  Not found in the computer, but a letter I wrote on that date to Reese Technology, saying just the opposite was recovered from the computer. 
• October 15, 2003  Meeting with client's business partner to go over their personal tax returns.  At this transitional meeting I was asked to explain all exposure items of client's divorce.  For which I named three major issues  related to the 2nd Separate Property Partition of which I was further questioned about each.  In addition I named two other items having explosive potential in the divorce proceedings.
• October 15, 2003  Follow up meeting with key parents, Board members and business consultants to communicate our progress on search for emergency funding, meetings with local foundations, timing of payables and a brainstorming of what else we could do.
• October 25, 2003  Meeting with Contributor's business partner to go over strategy regarding meeting with Texas Tech and Reese Technology in Lubbock.  The Lubbock trip was to discuss emergency funding, moving the school and families to Lubbock and the purchase of the NOAH assets and transfer to Lubbock.  I was instructed to bring that list of NOAH assets to the meeting for review by the Contributor's business partner.  He kept a copy.
• October 26, 2003  That evening flew to Lubbock with a business consultant for meeting next day as referenced above. 
• October 27, 2003  Meetings all day in Lubbock.  At the end of day it was determined they could not fund fast enough to keep The NOAH Project open in Plano or move the school and families to Lubbock.  Their money would not be available for about nine months.  So we knew on our flight home that we would need to close the school the next day in order to cover payroll and most of accounts payable with remaining money in operating account.
• October 28, 2003  The last day of school for The NOAH Project.  At end of day we had a joint meeting with parents and staff so they could more easily transition their children's programs to their homes, setting up on-going work for employees as they left NOAH.  All parents were called during the day (prior to the meeting) to tell them what was decided about the school and to prepare them to move programs to home setting.
• October 29, 2003  The NOAH Project files were packed, desks cleared out, preparing for the furniture and equipment move the next day to Contributor's storage as they were going to keep assets  for us while we worked on reorganizing the school with new funding.  Many of us, including NOAH friends worked late into the night.
• October 30, 2003  The Contributor's business partner showed up with four of the largest commercial moving vans of a major moving company along with their moving professionals.  They worked from 8 in the morning to almost 10 at night.  Now tell me that was only $20,000 of assets as he testified in my trial!  He probably spent $20,000 on the move itself!  The same night I received a call at home from insurance agency, partially owned by Contributor.  They were trying to get me to extend the Director's & Officer's policy for which I did not approve.  Although, they chose to go ahead and extend it and pay for it out of agency funds.
• November 2003  Tied up loose ends of school as best I could.  Worked with business consulting group on reorganization, preparing an investment package.  I worked on book about The NOAH Project.  Went to New Mexico for Thanksgiving to be with my family.  My dad had been diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer earlier that year. I decided to move out there for a few months to be close to my dad while working on book and reorganizing NOAH, plus had to move out of Plano home since I was no longer earning income from clients (now ex-clients).  I had been packing since early October (with help from several friends) knowing I would have to move to a smaller place.
• December 6, 2003  Moved last truckload of furniture - left Plano that evening.  
• December 9, 2003  My parents received call from DPD detective saying I was being charged with theft of money to fund school.  The detective called me back at their home once my dad was able to reach me, my phone wasn't set up yet.
• Remainder of December 2003  Received several calls at my home from detective.  He was always calling me a liar no matter what I said.  I asked him to get the computer, knowing there would be evidence on the computer of correspondence and contribution calls.  Plus documentation on the Contributor's financials statements and supporting schedules regarding contributions.  In addition to bank reconciliations with same information. 

There is the timeline of initial events in a nutshell.  Some nutshell, right?  If you've made it this far, you probably need a break...I know I do.  I have spent the day writing this and it feels as though I've relived it.  I have so many good memories of the school, the creation of the school itself, the kids, their unique personalities and their progress, the parents and their enthusiasm and love for their children, and our staff was extraordinary, an inspiration unto itself.  We taught and ran the school on the 3 E's.  Energy, Excitement and Enthusiasm.  Those were at the center of all we did, we wanted the most for our kids and in the process we received the gift of growth and joy for ourselves.  As I look back I will remember the best and going forward I know I'll get through this.  One thing I forgot to do at the time, but its never too late....that is to give God all the Glory.  That school would have never existed without Him.  He was so very present as we watched the miracles of transformation in each of those special childrens' lives.  I am grateful for the time we all had together and will never regret a moment of it as I continue to work towards clearing my name.

The "I DON'T KNOW MEN"

There was a civil suit that paralleled the criminal case.  The two false insurance claims (thus the civil suit) were likely one of the main reasons for the criminal case instigated by my ex-client and his business partner.  The attempt to replace the charitable contributions made to The NOAH Project with insurance proceeds, when his separate property came under attack in the divorce proceedings, cannot be underestimated.  That is only next to the attack on me to make certain I did not reveal where all the skeletons were buried by destroying my credibility.

While on the face it was a collaborative divorce, litigation had been threatened.  Once threatened, within a month and half the charitable contributions ended. That was the time it took them to put the specific scheme in place.  Divorce had been imminent for years, with trial runs, but when there is so much money at stake, the plan requires time and fine tuning of intricate details along with a great deal of estate planning techniques.  It appears The NOAH Project and I became part of that plot (unknowingly) and we were the ultimate scapegoat as well as a significant distraction.  The NOAH Project was not the only dumping grounds for money he planned to recover once divorced it was just the most public.

The late afternoon of October 1st, 2003  I was notified of the end of the contributions and was asked if I wanted to stay with NOAH or go back full-time consulting with them.  Upon my choosing NOAH it appears the final details were worked out over the next six weeks and then the police were contacted.  If there had truly been a theft the police would have been contacted from the start.

The men who falsely accused me were real estate developers but also owners in the insurance agency that provided The NOAH Project's Directors' and Officers' policy (D&O), as well as the Property and Liability policies.  It was NOAH's D&O policy where one false claim was made.  The other false claim was with their own employee theft policy.  I had NEVER been their employee as I was self employed from the start of their businesses. 

The law suit relating to the D&O claim never even named me, although I was a Director and an Officer.  The law suit was filed days after the police were notified and was settled (for pennies on the dollar) approximately a year and a half before the trial, although it took some time for them to sign it as they took months working out a confidentiality clause preventing my Board members and ex-employee/officers from talking to me or anybody else about the settlement.  The main thing accomplished by saying they would settle is it stopped the computer forensics at the civil suit level.  As part of the civil suit discovery the insurance company had called for the computer that I had used so they could do forensics.  The fact that my ex-clients had my computer had been an omission on their part and came out during the depositions.  After many delay tactics the computer was turned over to the insurance company.  Just after the computer went to the insurance company and  BEFORE it underwent the forensic testing my false accusers decided to settle.  The threat of forensic testing appeared to be the catalyst for making a settlement of pennies on the dollar. 

It is thought the settlement only covered legal fees so little to no contributions were even recovered by the claim on the D&O policy.  The claim on the employee theft policy was out right turned down since it could not be proven I was ever an employee.  During the trial my ex-client admitted he received practically nothing on the insurance claims as part of his victim statement.  That statement was strategically placed after the conviction so he would never be questioned as to why his claims were not successful.  In fact I was told the insurance company settled on the D&O policy to "get rid of the bottom feeders", the insurance company knew they were lieing, it was obvious in the depositions...they just couldn't get them to go away any other way without expending a great deal more money.

The depositions relating to the civil suit were hundreds of pages long with my ex-clients and their company controller making several verifiable lies.  My trial attorney refused to investigate the lies I marked (with additional information) in the depositions, so nothing about the depositions was brought up in the trial.  In fact, placing those three depositions side by side, the answers among them were not even consistent.  They didn't agree among each other as to my job responsibilities, the date they supposedly found out about this or what they did within their own work responsibilities.  Sometimes they even changed their answers within their own deposition when a question was repeated.  Plus the false testimonies they made in my trial did not match the lies in the depositions.  But you know the old adage...people who lie cannot keep their stories straight.  My trial attorney also refused to bring up the inconsistencies between the civil case depositions and the trial testimonies.  One difference that was very obvious:  in the depositions they could "not recall" as a response to well over a hundred questions, thus they became known as the "I DON'T KNOW MEN".  In contrast,  in their trial testimonies (2 years after the depositions) they had answers to everything asked and had obviously been coached.  The choreographed performance by prosecution and state witnesses could have won Oscars.  As I sat at the defendent table I felt like I was at the movies...what was said coudn't be further from the truth and the jury bought their drama. My attorney played right into it, he could have brought out the lies,  all the inconsistencies and hundreds of questions that should have been asked were never asked.  Had he only been prepared and willing to defend me there would have been a different outcome.  It would appear my trial attorney joined the club of the I DON'T KNOW MEN.

My next blog will line out a list of the top questions that were never asked in the trial....and then, what about that computer?