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It's one thing to be Suzy Orman when you have a stable job & a million bucks in the bank, it's another thing entirely to be jobless with no savings & have kids that need stuff right now.
Yup, doesn't really matter if Suzy Orman goes out and blows $1,000 on eating out and TV. If you don't have a job and are responsible for kids blowing $1,000 is completely different.
My question is......why would she need a trust fund for the kids when they need the money NOW for shelter and food?
Let the future worry about the future.
Also, lots of tv's do not work without cable.
I tried the dtv and it STILL did not work
She was not required to put all of the donations into a trust fund. She agreed to the terms for her release, and after she was out of jail, she reneged.
As long as she is taking care of the kids and keeping a roof over their heads then I'm okay with that. I'm sure she knows this money will run out soon and is still out there looking for a job. And if people chose to send money to help her, then it's not much we can say about it.
She was not required to put all of the donations into a trust fund. She agreed to the terms for her release, and after she was out of jail, she reneged.
There is no trust fund in existence currently.
Approximately $114,000 was collected on her behalf to make her bail & provide for her legal defense against the 8yr felony charges she was facing.
The crowdfunding site deducted $10k in fees
Her bail was $10k
Her lawyers prolly charged a fairly hefty retainer for her defense (ever hired a lawyer to defend multiple felony charges? Might be $10 -$20k )
She secured housing (might have had to pre-pay her rent with no job!)
Has been paying sitters & other normal bills for several months now..
And she tells the news she still has $72,000.
She also tells the press the trust the prosecutor was trying to force her to fund would give her kids $0 if they chose not to attend college.
She still doesn't have a job. The very public smear campaign engineered against her by the prosecutor may well be part of the reason for that.
Would you bury most all of your remaining funds in a "lockbox" you can't access with no job? Especially when you're still fighting a legal battle to get your kids back?
The issues here are still the same as they were when she was initially charged. The state of Arizona really doesn't provide any substantial support for a homeless family, but they'll gladly pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to incarcerate mom & make her two kids into wards of the state.
Arizona voters (and prosecutors) are really bad at math - even at $30k per year the taxpayers would be on the hook for $240,000 to lock this woman up for eight years, plus quite likely at least another $30k per year to care for her children while she's in one of our handy (for profit) private prisons. With inflation, the taxpayers are in for a cool half a million bucks on the low side, all because this woman had the "nerve" to order cable tv after getting out of jail.
Tell me again who it is that's "irresponsible"????
Approximately $114,000 was collected on her behalf to make her bail & provide for her legal defense against the 8yr felony charges she was facing.
The crowdfunding site deducted $10k in fees
Her bail was $10k
Her lawyers prolly charged a fairly hefty retainer for her defense (ever hired a lawyer to defend multiple felony charges? Might be $10 -$20k )
She secured housing (might have had to pre-pay her rent with no job!)
Has been paying sitters & other normal bills for several months now..
And she tells the news she still has $72,000.
She also tells the press the trust the prosecutor was trying to force her to fund would give her kids $0 if they chose not to attend college.
She still doesn't have a job. The very public smear campaign engineered against her by the prosecutor may well be part of the reason for that.
Would you bury most all of your remaining funds in a "lockbox" you can't access with no job? Especially when you're still fighting a legal battle to get your kids back?
The issues here are still the same as they were when she was initially charged. The state of Arizona really doesn't provide any substantial support for a homeless family, but they'll gladly pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to incarcerate mom & make her two kids into wards of the state.
Arizona voters (and prosecutors) are really bad at math - even at $30k per year the taxpayers would be on the hook for $240,000 to lock this woman up for eight years, plus quite likely at least another $30k per year to care for her children while she's in one of our handy (for profit) private prisons. With inflation, the taxpayers are in for a cool half a million bucks on the low side, all because this woman had the "nerve" to order cable tv after getting out of jail.
Tell me again who it is that's "irresponsible"????
If she didn't like the deal, she should not have accepted it. The court was willing to work with her by lowering the amount of money to be set aside for the trust fund, and she is still reneging. Should we let law breakers off the hook because it costs money to house them in jail? Basically she fell down the sewer and came up with a gold watch, but that still wasn't enough for her. Her children are the victims in this situation, and the mother should not become enriched for breaking the law.
If she didn't like the deal, she should not have accepted it. The court was willing to work with her by lowering the amount of money to be set aside for the trust fund, and she is still reneging. Should we let law breakers off the hook because it costs money to house them in jail? Basically she fell down the sewer and came up with a gold watch, but that still wasn't enough for her. Her children are the victims in this situation, and the mother should not become enriched for breaking the law.
This was never about "law breakers", it was about a politician (prosecutor) making a name for himself & getting some TV face time by smearing a woman in the press. Press release #1 claimed she left the kids for an hour and a half. Then the story changes to 45 minutes & btw she's homeless & very repentant. Then public opinion shifts against the prosecutor & it's obvious this entire situation isn't about a "lazy" or "careless" woman, and the charges aren't going to stick.
Then, this "deal" is announced & we have no information showing she knew the full details of what the prosecutor was requiring. Lawyers frequently discuss settlements & possible bargains in vague terms. Agreeing in general terms & later objecting to *specific* terms when you actually see them isn't "reneging", it's negotiating in good faith.
Issuing a press release about the status of those confidential negotiations is acting in bad faith. Smearing her name in the press *again* for issues that have nothing to do with the original charges is acting in bad faith.
A few days ago, she gets smeared in the press *again* by the prosecutor, who frankly has *no* business whatsoever complaining about how funds collected for her legal defense & bail are spent. The funds weren't collected or solicited with the purpose of creating a trust for her children. No one is alleging these kids are currently being "abused".
Being poor isn't a crime. Making bad financial decisions isn't a crime - if it was, every major banker in the US would be in jail.
Watching the two-minute blurb on the teevee news (which is basically just a sensationalized press release from the prosecutor) isn't being "informed"..
Her only error in this was in trying to placate the prosecutor - if she had a really good lawyer, they'ed have told him to pound sand & bring her case before a jury. No jury would convict based on the facts as they were presented originally, which *is* the why & how she collected over $100k in donations from over 4,000 people in just a few days. By trying to settle the issue, she left an opening for a sleazy prosecutor to smear her in the press again & quite likely poison the pool of potential jurors with their irrelevant horse-**** press releases.
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