Blind Side's Michael Oher had a conservatorship? What?

[Imzadi]

I remember reading that they couldn't adopt him in their state because he was legally an adult. No idea if that

Yes, according to TMZ, in that state, once a person turns 18 he is legally an adult and cannot be adopted.

 

[Imzadi]

i dunno, this just feels like one of those situations where someone 'gets in the ear' of someone else. i don't know what oher's current financial situation is but it seems like a misguided money grab. ALL the parties involved with the movie say that there was very little financial compensation to the family (including oher) b/c they did not write the source material.

Yes, Michael Oher was sadly misinformed and he didn't do any research on his own. The Tuohys didn't get a lot for the movie. They also state they have all the financials to prove what everyone got.

Even writers don't receive big payouts for writing movies. That's what the writers strike was about.

 

[LuvOrlando]

Yes, according to TMZ, in that state, once a person turns 18 he is legally an adult and cannot be adopted.

TMZ is just flat out wrong, at least in the US. I know someone adopted as an adult by her best friends parents because her adoptive parents were monsters. This was in NJ if I am remembering properly. They adopted her to make sure she felt loved and wanted & it worked. She accepted adoption as soon as she got out of HS & went to college with her new name

https://www.legalzoom.com/articles/can-you-legally-adopt-an-adult

"Why adopt an adult?​

Adoption is the same legal process whether the individual is a child or an adult. The court issues a new birth certificate for the adopted individual and any existing legal relationships with biological or custodial parents are severed. The adopted adult can change his or her last name, also called a surname change, and all adoption records will be sealed."

 

[Imzadi]

TMZ is just flat out wrong, at least in the US. I know someone adopted as an adult by her best friends parents because her adoptive parents were monsters. This was in NJ if I am remembering properly. They adopted her to make sure she felt loved and wanted & it worked. She accepted adoption as soon as she got out of HS & went to college with her new name

This is from the TMZ article, in Seah Tuohy's words:

"Tuohy told the Daily Memphian he never tricked Oher into getting into a conservatorship ... and he certainly didn't make millions off of it either.​

​

Instead, Tuohy said the whole ordeal went down because the NCAA told him if Oher wanted to attend Ole Miss -- he'd have to be considered part of the family due to Touhy's status as a "booster" at the school.​

​

"I sat Michael down and told him, 'If you're planning to go to Ole Miss -- or even considering Ole Miss -- we think you have to be part of the family,'" Tuohy said. "'This would do that, legally.'"​

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He continued, "We contacted lawyers who had told us that we couldn't adopt over the age of 18; the only thing we could do was to have a conservatorship. We were so concerned it was on the up-and-up that we made sure the biological mother came to court."​

​

Tuohy then said he'd "of course" end the conservatorship if that's what Oher wanted."​

​

https://www.tmz.com/2023/08/14/sean...ing-says-family-made-no-money-off-blind-side/​

 

[NotUrsula]

If the reason for the conservatorship was his eligibility at Ole Miss, then they should have terminated it when he left college. That it was allowed to remain in effect for so long is bizarre.

 

[bcla]

I am not either but how is this faster than adoption? It just seems off

I looked up the typical adoption times in Tennessee, and they say at least 12 months for a child, but as an adult it's likely different. A conservatorship can be done within weeks, especially with consent.

 

[bcla]

If the reason for the conservatorship was his eligibility at Ole Miss, then they should have terminated it when he left college. That it was allowed to remain in effect for so long is bizarre.

What does it really matter though? It takes time and expense to dissolve it. There was no indication that they ever used it to interfere with any contract that Oher entered.

 

[Imzadi]

If the reason for the conservatorship was his eligibility at Ole Miss, then they should have terminated it when he left college. That it was allowed to remain in effect for so long is bizarre.

I think they all just forgot about it. It was used to get him into college smoothly. It wasn't like it was a problem until recently, and only a problem for Michael. It's not like it impacted his life in any way. They weren't even in real contact with each other for quite a while. Whether it was because he drifted away during college and due to being away for his football career, or due to how he felt he was portrayed in the book & movie is unclear.

He even got married recently. If his conservatorship was anything like Britney Spears, he wouldn't have been able to do that without the Tuohys' permission. But, they weren't a part of that decision.

 

[bcla]

I think they all just forgot about it. It was used to get him into college smoothly. It wasn't like it was a problem until recently, and only a problem for Michael. It's not like it impacted his life in any way. They weren't even in real contact with each other for quite a while. Whether it was because he drifted away during college and due to being away for his football career, or due to how he felt he was portrayed in the book & movie is unclear.

He even got married recently. If his conservatorship was anything like Britney Spears, he wouldn't have been able to do that without the Tuohys' permission. But, they weren't a part of that decision.

Oher has been asking for money. Some speculation has been that he might point to the conservatorship as a sign that his right had been violated, regardless of whether or not it ever really affected him.

 

[DCLMP]

What does it really matter though? It takes time and expense to dissolve it. There was no indication that they ever used it to interfere with any contract that Oher entered.

It doesn’t seem like Michael would have had much of a life or a NFL career without the Touhy’s. It’s odd twenty years later he’s all butt hurt over the whole thing.

 

[bcla]

It doesn’t seem like Michael would have had much of a life or a NFL career without the Touhy’s. It’s odd twenty years later he’s all butt hurt over the whole thing.

Huh? he was considered a five-star college recruit while he was in foster care system and before he moved in with the Tuohys. He clearly had the talent for the NFL.

I certainly don't buy that the Tuohys somehow abused their relationship for their own selfish purposes. However, it's a stretch to say that he wouldn't have had much of a life without the Tuohys. I think what they did was admirable, but Michael Oher clearly had talent and was likely to have played football at an SEC program.

The speculation is that he misspent his NFL earnings and was looking at the Tuohys as a way out of that.

 

[Imzadi]

FYI: Probate judges in Tennessee are ELECTED to their position. And yes, the judge who ended Michael Oher's conservatorship, Shelby County Probate Court Judge Kathleen Gomes was re-elected to her position last August 2022. And like all elected officials, when given a high profile case where people are going to keep an eye on what the judge does and says and whether they are worthy for another term when their current term is up, she certainly made all the national news outlets, publicly letting people know she has something to say on Michael Oher's case:

"In ending the arrangement, Shelby County Probate Court Judge Kathleen Gomes expressed dismay that the conservatorship was ever permitted. She said she had never seen in her 43-year career a conservatorship agreement reached with someone who was not disabled and that the conservatorship should have ended long ago.​

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“I cannot believe it got done,” the judge said.​

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Other news articles, including ESPN quoted in the OP also state:

"[Judge] Gomes said she was not dismissing the case. Oher has asked that the Tuohys provide a financial accounting of money that might have come to them as part of the agreement, claiming they used his name, image and likeness to enrich themselves and lied to him that the agreement meant the Tuohys were adopting him."​

Isn't that a great probate judge? Wouldn't you want to re-elect her to keep an eye on other conservatorships?


BTW, the CA judge who ended Britney Spears conservatorship was also elected. The public pressure by the "Free Britney" movement and the media scrutiny on him to end Britney's conservatorship was so great, he didn't even bother to interview even ONE medical expert, not any from her past - and she's had many, nor even appointed a new medical expert to evaluate her, before making his decision to summarily end her conservatorship.

IF Britney has schizophrenia, as many suspect, which starts in a person's twenties, it gets worse with passing years, not better. (One of the reasons why her conservatorship was ongoing for so long.) Her judge didn't do her any favors by not stipulating she needs to remain under some type of medical care. One of the symptoms of schizophrenia is that most never believe they have a mental illness. Just that everyone around them thinks they are mentally ill. So they do not take nor stay on meds. Not all judges, especially in the public eye and needing to act in ways the public may want for them to be re-elected, may be thinking only of what's best for the people they are presiding over.

Heck, even Miracle on 34th St taught us that judges sometimes have to take other things into consideration to remain a judge.

 

[DCLMP]

Huh? he was considered a five-star college recruit while he was in foster care system and before he moved in with the Tuohys. He clearly had the talent for the NFL.

I certainly don't buy that the Tuohys somehow abused their relationship for their own selfish purposes. However, it's a stretch to say that he wouldn't have had much of a life without the Tuohys. I think what they did was admirable, but Michael Oher clearly had talent and was likely to have played football at an SEC program.

The speculation is that he misspent his NFL earnings and was looking at the Tuohys as a way out of that.

Wasn’t he failing in school And living with a crackhead mother? There’s a lot of talented people that never get the opportunity for one reason or the other. I never said the Touhys gave him his talent.

 

[barkley]

If the reason for the conservatorship was his eligibility at Ole Miss, then they should have terminated it when he left college. That it was allowed to remain in effect for so long is bizarre.

What does it really matter though? It takes time and expense to dissolve it. There was no indication that they ever used it to interfere with any contract that Oher entered.

this-it appears it was only ever used for eligibility, never used for any contractual issues/purchases.

"In ending the arrangement, Shelby County Probate Court Judge Kathleen Gomes expressed dismay that the conservatorship was ever permitted. She said she had never seen in her 43-year career a conservatorship agreement reached with someone who was not disabled and that the conservatorship should have ended long ago.“I cannot believe it got done,” the judge said.

and this is telling-

this was a conservatorship agreement which means it was not done absent oher's informed consent. i can't speak to how that state handles these but in my state, even though my disabled adult son is extensivly documented as disabled to the degree he cannot handle his own personal affairs/it is clearly apparant when meeting him and interacting with him-the courts as part of the process require some form of independant and private in person meeting/counseling of the individual proposed for conservatorship to ensure that they are either capable of understanding what is being proposed and of their own free will are entering into the agreement OR are indeed incapable of understanding due to an underlying medical issue in which case the court makes the decision.

oher seems to pick and choose what he is capable of understanding-his nfl contracts, book contracts, real estate and high end automobile collection purchases but not the conservatorship or his independant contract selling off rights to his image and likeness to a major studio (which seems to be related to some proposed project some years ago that went nowhere).

 

[bcla]

Wasn’t he failing in school And living with a crackhead mother? There’s a lot of talented people that never get the opportunity for one reason or the other. I never said the Touhys gave him his talent.

He apparently hadn't lived with his mother since he was in the 7th grade. He was going in and out of foster care and finding temporary living arrangements. His big break came from Tony Henderson, who fought to get Oher into a private school.

https://archive.knoxnews.com/entert...d-the-blind-side-ep-409304077-359068091.html/​

But there was one big complication. Steven didn't want to abandon his buddy Michael Oher (pronounced "Oar"), a street kid who slept on their floor most nights. "Big Mike" was afraid to return to the bleak foster homes he knew after police tore him away from his mother, her crack pipe and her 13 children.​

​

So Henderson took both boys to Briarcrest Christian School on the rich side of town, hoping for scholarships that would make a grandmother's dream come true. School officials were impressed by Steven's grades. Coaches were impressed that Oher was 6-foot-4, weighed 340 pounds, could dunk a basketball and looked like God's gift to quarterbacks who needed a left tackle to guard their "blind side."​

 

[LuvOrlando]

So many things wrong with this story, even what is being presented as the good version isn't great because it sounds a lot like recruitment to me. If adult Oher feels something was wrong it is important to hear him out, lots of "pillars of the community" do some pretty sketch thinks literally all the time, because they don't like the word, "No."

Judging by all the laws and rules apparently colleges and sports are a very serious business and many people are willing to lie cheat and steal to get their way. Didn't we just have a parade of "America's Sweetheart" celebrities go to jail for using sports to get their kids into colleges? That mess was so big it was shocking.

Personally, I am partial to listen closely to people who complain against powerful people and systems in a David and Goliath sort of way.

Plenty of people can do the rags to riches on their own, especially through sports & entertainment.

 

[LSUmiss]

Wasn’t he failing in school And living with a crackhead mother? There’s a lot of talented people that never get the opportunity for one reason or the other. I never said the Touhys gave him his talent.

You can still be exploited especially when in a situation like that.

 

[amylevan]

So many things wrong with this story, even what is being presented as the good version isn't great because it sounds a lot like recruitment to me. If adult Oher feels something was wrong it is important to hear him out, lots of "pillars of the community" do some pretty sketch thinks literally all the time, because they don't like the word, "No."

Judging by all the laws and rules apparently colleges and sports are a very serious business and many people are willing to lie cheat and steal to get their way. Didn't we just have a parade of "America's Sweetheart" celebrities go to jail for using sports to get their kids into colleges? That mess was so big it was shocking.

Personally, I am partial to listen closely to people who complain against powerful people and systems in a David and Goliath sort of way.

Plenty of people can do the rags to riches on their own, especially through sports & entertainment.

He’s suing the Touhey family because he allegedly didn’t know what he was signing. I already posted upthread quotes from his book where he knew.

He allegedly threatened to release negative things about the Touhey’s if they didn’t pay him 15 million.

The situation was investigated by the NCAA back in the day because boosters can’t approach prospects. There’s some guessing that the NCAA might have backed off since he was living with them, and he could have gone anywhere else and not had to sign the conservatorship, but he chose ole miss. Hence, the outcome being a conservatorship. (And he might have been persuaded to go to ole miss, but in all the press and everything, he never indicated he was pressured. That would definitely be believable.)

He didn’t have the grades for NCAA eligibility before the Touhey family “helped” including knowing how to use online schooling to replace some of his earlier failed classes. Something he probably would not have been able to figure out on his own. Whether or not they did that for their own reasons, it still resulted in him getting to go to college which ultimately led to him being drafted in the NFL. So even if their motives were wrong, it resulted in him making it out.

I don’t know, maybe he feels hurt because he did think of them as family and they were just in it for the football. I think it’s a lot to do just to try and help your alma matar land a top LT, but what do I know.

 

[LuvOrlando]

He’s suing the Touhey family because he allegedly didn’t know what he was signing. I already posted upthread quotes from his book where he knew.

He allegedly threatened to release negative things about the Touhey’s if they didn’t pay him 15 million.

The situation was investigated by the NCAA back in the day because boosters can’t approach prospects. There’s some guessing that the NCAA might have backed off since he was living with them, and he could have gone anywhere else and not had to sign the conservatorship, but he chose ole miss. Hence, the outcome being a conservatorship. (And he might have been persuaded to go to ole miss, but in all the press and everything, he never indicated he was pressured. That would definitely be believable.)

He didn’t have the grades for NCAA eligibility before the Touhey family “helped” including knowing how to use online schooling to replace some of his earlier failed classes. Something he probably would not have been able to figure out on his own. Whether or not they did that for their own reasons, it still resulted in him getting to go to college which ultimately led to him being drafted in the NFL. So even if their motives were wrong, it resulted in him making it out.

I don’t know, maybe he feels hurt because he did think of them as family and they were just in it for the football. I think it’s a lot to do just to try and help your alma matar land a top LT, but what do I know.

Just because he used a word does not mean he fully comprehended what it means, these people totally had the upper hand with that kid at 18 and to use such a complex arrangement stinks to high heaven of ill-intent.

I guess they way I see it is, just because these people provided a benefit of some kind does not mean they are absolved of all else and get a pass. Quid pro pro is fairly basic premise of many abusive relationships so the undercurrent is more damning than redeeming, at least for me.

Whatever happened he feels wronged and if all was on the up and up no-one would have needed to go to such great lengths, whole thing is suspect.

 

[cabanafrau]

I was basically a surrogate parent for one of my kids friends and the thought never crossed my mind to create a conservatorship. This isn't a normal thing to do by anyone's standards so I don't really get brushing it off like it is an everyday behavior. I do not know a single person in this sort of relationship. It it perfectly legal to adopt an adult so why not? As for Oher, people will do lots of things in exchange for love and at only 18 when he signed the forms, with lawyer speak and likely none of his own representation I can absolutely see a young person on their own believing that conservatorship is the same as adoption for an adult. Even if they didn't sign stuff anyone talking to them could bypass Oher because they were the same as Oher and could, say, reject deals which could be just as damaging, or negotiate on his behalf.

The benefit is to have control over his portion of the money to distribute as they see fit, or claim as theirs as collateral for loans, or to direct as an investment with whom and how they see fit. Yes, they were rich but in my experience most rich people do enjoy more and seldom pass on more. Also just because they have assets doesn't mean they were liquid. A person with a 10 million dollar house and 5 million in debt with 1 million in the bank is more broke than a kid at McDonalds with a new paycheck for $100 and no debt. Lots of smoke and mirrors with big money and big lifestyles.

If it was all about love they could have just adopted him.

The math in the bolded only makes sense if the person with the home, the debt and the million dollar bank account has absolutely no other income stream or potential for same, which is possible I suppose, although seems unlikely more often than not.