By Jacinthia Jones
February 15, 2005
Memphis Mayor Willie Herenton filed a petition Monday to establish parentage for his 41/2 -month-old son.
The petition is the first legal step toward establishing parental rights for a biological parent whose child was born out of wedlock.
An unwed parent can ask the courts to establish child support payments, set visitation rights or even require the child to carry the father's last name.
A court hearing date has not yet been set.
Public interest in the matter has swirled ever since the 64-year-old Herenton, who is divorced with three adult children, announced that he was a new father.
Then last week, the baby's 31-year-old mother, Claudine Marsh, who is single, also went public, saying that Herenton had only seen his child twice.
Herenton's attorney, Mitch Moskovitz, said the mayor filed the petition to "preserve and protect his right to parent the child."
Additionally, Herenton wants a court order to reflect the amount of child support that he is paying, Moskovitz said.
But Monday, Marsh said she was baffled by Herenton's decision to establish parentage.
"I have no idea what this is all about," she said. "All of this filing and fighting for parental rights, I think it's all very funny.
"I've never stopped him from seeing Michael. I had to beg him to come see his son."
Marsh said she believes the mayor is just embarrassed about the situation. "I have no question that he's the father. It's obvious that he is, I'm the one who asked for the DNA tests. And if he's the father, of course he has parental rights."
A blood test performed in December confirmed parentage.
Marsh says she has filed paperwork for child support, but court officials say there's no petition for support on file.
--Jacinthia Jones: 529-2780
Filing asks lawmakers to look at senator's conduct on TennCare matter
By Richard locker and Marc Perrusquia
February 15, 2005
NASHVILLE -- A Clarksville man filed a complaint Monday against state Sen. John Ford with the Senate Ethics Committee over allegations that Ford did not properly disclose financial ties to a major TennCare contractor.
Barry Schmittou's complaint is the first sworn and notarized complaint filed with the committee since recent disclosures about the senator's personal finances.
The Tennessee Republican Party last week filed a complaint questioning whether Ford is a legal resident of the Memphis district he represents, but the panel declined to act because it did not follow Senate rules requiring complaints to be sworn and notarized.
Sen. Ron Ramsey of Blountville, chairman of the ethics committee and the Senate Republican majority leader, said Schmittou's complaint meets Senate rules and will be investigated. The state's TennCare Bureau also is reviewing the matter, and the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation is monitoring the situation.
Schmittou, 51, cited media reports disclosing that Ford received $237,000 from Managed Care Services Group 1 for unspecified services in 2002 and 2003, and that the firm had a governmental affairs consulting contract with Doral Dental.
Wisconsin-based Doral Dental won a three-year, $18 million contract in 2002 over one other bidder to provide dental coverage to about 620,000 children enrolled in the state's TennCare program.
A spokesman for Doral said the firm had a governmental affairs consulting contract with Philadelphia businessman Ronald R. Dobbins and his company, Managed Care Services Group, but terminated the contract last week after disclosures in The Commercial Appeal about links to Ford.
Using Dobbins's address, Ford formed a similarly named company in 2003, Managed Care Services Group, a limited partnership. Doral Dental says it has no independent knowledge that Ford had any involvement in their consulting contract.
Ford did not disclose his Managed Care Services income on financial interests forms that senators are required to file, both under state law and Senate rules.
Ford declined to comment on the complaint as he left the Senate chamber Monday evening. "Look, let me tell you fellows one thing: I have no comment or anything like that, period."
Schmittou also filed a complaint with the state Registry of Election Finance on Friday, over media reports indicating the senator spent money in his campaign fund on expenses associated with his daughter's wedding.
Sen. Ramsey met briefly with Schmittou Monday to receive his 33-page complaint. Unlike the letter filed last week by Tennessee GOP chairman Bob Davis, Ramsey said Schmittou's documents are a "valid, filed complaint" that will be turned over to the committee's staff lawyer and subcommittee for review. The committee will decide whether there is "probable cause" to believe Ford violated ethics rules and, if so, recommend action to the full committee.
In his complaint, Schmittou said if the media reports are true, "there can be no doubt that Senator Ford has violated the disclosure regulations." He also wrote, "I assert that if Senator Ford is found guilty of such a brazen violation of the Senate Ethics Code, (it) should result in an immediate effort to remove Senator Ford from office."
It is the fourth complaint that Schmittou has filed with the ethics committee in the past two years: one against Ford for his remarks in a Nashville TV station undercover report about his access to Super Bowl tickets; another against Ford for sponsoring legislation to alter child support laws while his own child-support case was pending in court; and another against state Sen. Jerry Cooper, D-McMinnville, over a state loan that helped finance a sale of industrial property.
In recent years, Schmittou has filed complaints against the state for not investigating his allegations of workers' compensation fraud against a former employer who fired him after his diagnosis with cancer that has left him blind in one eye.
Meantime, the state's top law enforcement agency, the TBI, is monitoring the Ford situation, but a spokesman said it isn't ready to open a criminal probe.
"It's definitely something that is on our radar,'' said TBI spokesman Jennifer Johnson. TennCare receives federal funds, and a TBI unit is responsible for monitoring criminal law violations on behalf of the federal government.
Doral Dental's $6.3-million-a-year TennCare contract, signed in September 2002, prohibits state employees or officials from receiving wages or compensation in exchange for services.
"I want to be clear,'' said Johnson. "It's not a disinterest on our part as much as it is we're just trying to evaluate it.''
-- Marc Perrusquia: 529-2545
Ford criticizes 'white media'
NAACP sidesteps request to support his position
By Richard Locker
February 9, 2005
NASHVILLE -- In his first public remarks about the controversies surrounding him, state Sen. John Ford lashed out at "white media" in a speech Tuesday to Tennessee NAACP leaders, whom he asked to issue a statement in his defense.
Ford said he is the target of press attacks because he's successful and doesn't "kowtow" to the media, which he said never reports on his record of helping others. Instead of criticism, he said he should receive "kudos" for supporting his children and the children of others.
The Memphis Democrat was one of several state officials who addressed about 150 NAACP leaders and youth from across the state on their annual visit to the Capitol to lobby for legislative priorities.
Most of the other officials spoke about the NAACP's state policy priorities, but Ford spent time talking about news coverage. Media stories have included his attempts to alter his child-support obligations, whether he legally resides in his Memphis Senate district, and whether he properly reported consulting income on state financial disclosure forms.
"The NAACP ought to make a statement on that, you know, because when we are silent, this white media and white community, they start thinking and believing, 'Well, it's OK.' But let me tell you the danger: when you allow them to tear down any of your black leaders, they are tearing you down also," Ford said.
The senator received polite applause during his speech but there was no movement among the NAACP leaders for either a resolution or statement in support.
"That's not an issue for the NAACP," Tennessee NAACP president Gloria Sweet-Love of Brownsville said when asked later whether the group planned to grant Ford's request.
"The issues that we came to the Hill to address -- against predatory lending, against any kind of sales tax increase, for reform of TennCare, for increasing the number of minority students receiving HOPE scholarships and for simplifying the law for giving voting rights back to ex-felons -- those are the issues that we came to address and that we will be articulating."
Sweet-Love said that in private discussions as they left the chamber members "wondered why he is bringing this up. That's what people were saying as we were walking outside, because it had nothing to do with our agenda."
Ford told the NAACP leaders during his speech that "most" reporters "are not real fair and credible when it comes down to us.
"You watch this: They are totally unfair when it comes down to black people, our folks. They figure, they say, 'Well, you know most black people, they ain't got nothing; they ain't going to stand up for nobody amongst them that they feel are successful.' But let me tell you this: I am one guy that has not forgotten about you.
"And I'm going to be honest with you: If it wasn't for things that really need to be done that very few others are doing, that have the courage and conviction to do it and the intelligence to do it and make a difference, I wouldn't stick around one day. I could move to Florida and live the good life but I don't choose to do that because a lot of our folks are not living the good life. Somebody has to make the sacrifice and put up with it."
Ford said the media singles out black people like him for criticism but does not give him credit for his successes.
"They never talk about that, you know, because I don't kowtow to them. Trust me, if you ever see me kowtowing to them, that's the day I'm going to quit. I'm not going to kowtow to any of them because of these old egregious things and everything like that, and criticism about me spending time with my children.
"It's really kind of nutty. I should be getting kudos for doing what I do, for supporting them to the extent that I do. Instead I get criticism. It doesn't make any sense at all. I know a lot of black people that won't even support their own children, and I support all of mine beyond a normal standard of living and I get criticized for doing so.
"I mean that's really egregious and it's very insensitive and it really doesn't make any kind of sense."
Contact Nashville Bureau chief Richard Locker at (615) 255-4923.
Ford Jr.: It's 'his life, not mine'
Uncle responsible for own choices, he says
By Richard Locker
February 8, 2005
NASHVILLE -- Rep. Harold Ford Jr. said his uncle, state Sen. John Ford, is responsible for the personal choices that have landed him in headlines but said he hopes Tennesseans will distinguish between the two Fords of Memphis as he runs for the U.S. Senate.
"I wish I could pick my family, and if I could, I'd share that recipe with everybody else," the congressman said here Monday night. "My uncle lives his life and I live mine. I'm proud to say that at 34 years old, I've never used a drug in my life, I've never been arrested.
"Again, I love him but that's his life, not mine."
Meanwhile, the state Senate's top Republican leader vowed Monday night that if ethics complaints are filed against John Ford in the Senate, "they will be pursued and won't be swept under the carpet."
Republican Majority Leader Ron Ramsey, also the new chairman of the Senate Ethics Committee, said any citizen or legislator can file an ethics complaint against a senator. Tennessee Republican Party chairman Bob Davis said on Jan. 27 that he planned to file "in the next couple of days" an ethics complaint questioning whether John Ford is a legal resident of his Senate District 29 in Memphis, but Ramsey said no complaint has been received.
Ramsey said whether Ford is in violation of Senate district residency laws "will be very difficult to prove" because case law on the issue is confusing. Ford says his legal residence is 12 South Parkway W., his family's funeral home, and not the two houses outside the Senate district that he testified in a Juvenile Court deposition he shares with two women and the children he has fathered with them.
Ramsey also said he is aware of, but had not read, a report in The Commercial Appeal Sunday that raised questions about whether John Ford had properly reported, on state financial disclosure forms, the sources of $237,000 he made from a business partnership in 2002 and 2003.
"If there's a complaint on that, we'll act at that time," said Ramsey, R-Blountville.
As press reports about John Ford's personal life mount, there has been increasing speculation about the impact on the Democratic bid for the U.S. Senate next year of his nephew, Congressman Ford. After a speech to the Tennessee Credit Union League here Monday, the congressman responded to reporters' questions about the matter and whether opponents might try to link him to his uncle in the minds of voters.
Said Harold Ford Jr.: "There may be some of that, but the reality is, my uncle has created a lot of this -- I mean some of the personal choices. I love my uncle; I'm not here to beat up on my uncle. I believe people will be able to separate the two.
"He'll have to answer questions about his personal life. I don't blame anybody. The press didn't make him go to court and do what he did. And the press didn't make him make some of the choices he's made.
"I think the main thing is, in my city over the last eight years, I've worked mightily and I think made great strides in creating a persona, political persona, independent of anyone. ... Am I different than my Dad (former congressman Harold Ford Sr.)? Sure. Am I different than my uncle? Very. Will voters be able to separate that? I'm going to work over the next year and several months to get them to know me and get them to know the kind of politics that I would bring to the United States Senate and kind of approach I would bring."
Contact Nashville Bureau chief Richard Locker at (615) 255-4923.
