Fired from my job and kept in debtors prison

I was fired on October 1, 2004 from my job at Inland Southern Management Corp as a Property Manager of shopping centers in the Atlanta metro area due to my arrest in Judge Grubbs courtroom at the October 1, 2004 hearing.  I was working there since December 26, 2003 and earning $42,500 per year.   I was held in jail from October 1, 2004 until Judge Grubbs filed her Order describing my contempt charges on October 19, 2004.  See my other posts on my contempt charges over child support and the sale of my marital home the Doral Property.

According to the Gallaher v Breaux Court of Appeals of Georgia case, Judge Grubbs was reversed on her contempt order placing Mr. Gallaher in contempt because of the following:

(1) But we find that the trial court erred in failing to release Gallaher from incarceration based upon the evidence at the hearing on the motion for reconsideration, which clearly established that Gallaher lacked the ability to purge himself. Id.

Nor did the trial court properly direct Gallaher to a work release program. Under OCGA § 15-1-4 (c), “[w]hen a person who is gainfully  [*7]  employed violates an order of the court granting . . . child support” is found to be in contempt, he may be sentenced “to a term of confinement in a diversion center and participation in a diversion program . . . .” The trial court chose not to apply this provision in its original contempt order. Instead, Gallaher was incarcerated and apparently lost his job. Therefore, he was able to establish his present inability to pay entitling him to release from incarceration, without reference to any current income or any consideration of whether that income would have given him the ability to pay. (2) Once Gallaher established his inability to pay, the trial court had no authority to continue his incarceration and thus no authority to confine him in a diversion center or to place him in a work release program under OCGA § 15-1-4 (c). n2

Both Gallaher and I were incarcerated by Judge Grubbs for contempt. Due to the incarceration we both lost our jobs, which established our inability to pay, and we were both entitled to release from incarceration.  Gallaher and I also had 100% of our wages garnished (in Judge Grubbs orders of contempt) while at  Cobb County Work Release. The sheriff’s deputies at the Cobb County Work Release program were always concerned if I could pay for bus fare and/or gas to get to work, food, toiletries  etc. and offered me cash on several occasions.    

Please see the entire Gallaher V Breaux Court of Appeals of Georgia case below:

In November 2006, after my release from over 18 months of incarceration, I fled to Kentucky to live on my husband’s farm he inherited from his great grandfather.  I was hired as a Regional Property Manager of shopping centers in Kentucky for Developers Diversified Realty, in Beachwood Ohio.  They had me train up at their headquarters in Ohio for a week; I was issued a cell phone and a computer and went out to meet with tenants at the different shopping centers in Kentucky. I had worked there a little over three weeks when I was called on the phone by Paul Villani (the Director of Property Management who hired me) who indicated I was fired due to my incarceration while at Inland Southern Management.  I had passed the background check since there was and still is no record of my incarceration on my FBI report, and was hired even though I had disclosed I had contempt charges in a civil divorce case. 

It had recently been announced that Developers Diversified Realty Trust was purchasing one of the largest shopping center portfolios in the past 2 years from Inland Retail Real Estate Trust Inc (where I formerly worked from Dec 03 until my incarceration at the October 1, 2004 hearing). See the articles involving the purchase of the Inland portfolio by Developers Diversified Realty Trust below:

http://ir.ddr.com/releasedetail.cfm?releaseid=367461 and

http://retailtrafficmag.com/businessdeals/retail_ddrs_sunshine_deal/

My firing occurred just after I sent a notice to Judge Grubbs that I would not appear in her courtroom for a compliance hearing in November 2006 due to my new job as a regional property manager. 

I was released from jail on October 6, 2006 but had compliance hearings scheduled before Judge Grubbs just a few weeks after my release.  My father suffered a massive heart attack requiring a pacemaker mainly due to my continued requests for money to pay attorneys to represent me after my release from over eighteen months of incarceration.

I hired my former bankruptcy attorney David Miller to appear for me in Judge Grubbs courtroom for this compliance hearing in November 2006.  David Miller filed a Notice of Bankruptcy Discharge and Motion to Strike Judgment Entered For Lack of Subject Matter Jurisdiction and a second Motion in Response to my ex-husband Bruce Ailion’s filing (Bruce, a lawyer was representing himself). Please see my next post on my bankruptcy for more information.

A few years later I checked the 2006 State of Georgia Ethics Financial Disclosure Statement filing by Judge Grubbs below and saw she had purchased Developers Diversified REIT Realty Corp stock in 2006.  Judge Grubbs filing does not indicate how many shares of Developers Diversified Realty Trust stock she purchased. 

Judge Grubbs did not list Developers Diversified REIT Realty Corp on her 2005 State of Georgia Ethics Financial Disclosure Statement filing below, so she purchased  the stock in 2006.