Talk:John Fund
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 |
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Biography. For more information, visit the project page. | ||
| ??? | This article has not yet received a rating on the Project's quality scale. Please rate the article and then leave a short summary here to explain the ratings and/or to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the article. [FAQ] | ||
[edit] Civil suit
From the NY Daily News [2] (and elsewhere):
- "The Wall Street Journal battened down yesterday as an awkward civil case began in Manhattan Supreme Court centered on its OpinionJournal.com columnist John Fund.
- Fund, a former WSJ editorial writer who also appears as a conservative commentator on Fox News, MSNBC and CNN, is accused of battering an ex-girlfriend.
- The bizarre story started in 1999, when Fund became involved with Morgan Pillsbury, now 38, the daughter of another former fling.
- As the romance soured, she made accusations of physical and emotional abuse. She has also blamed him for a traumatic abortion.
- In turn, Fund accused her of stealing checks and making credit-card purchases in his name totaling $38,000. He also filed a counterclaim accusing her of :witness-tampering, including contacting his employer.
- Fund told me: "This is a tragic story of a woman who has admitted under oath to having borderline personality disorder and to having made up the accusations against me."
- Pillsbury is seeking $515,000 in damages. In a colorful flourish, she also wants her "labor costs" of cleaning his apartment of "larvae … in the defendant's freezer" and "mouse droppings on the floor and substantial filth and grime," a charge pals of Fund find absurd.
- Fund was arrested and jailed in 2002 based on Pillsbury's assault complaint, although criminal charges were later dismissed."
Not sure how much of it belongs in the article, but it should be briefly mentioned.
Here is some more from the Sacramento Bee [3]:
- "When Morgan Pillsbury was a little girl in Sacramento, her mother had a boyfriend named John Fund, who was active in the local Libertarian Party. Years later, Pillsbury visited Fund, by then an editorialist for the Wall Street Journal, in New York, and Fund initiated an intimate relationship with her that apparently turned into an ugly mess over time. You know the old adage, “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned”? This Web site [www.ruthlesspeople.com] is Pillsbury’s revenge, with scurrilous content that paints Fund as a rapscallion and a rogue to boot: a flyer and cast list for “Psycho Ex-Boyfriend: the Movie”; allegations that Fund was a girlfriend-beater; transcripts of e-mails between Fund and another woman, stupidly sent from Pillsbury’s PC; and more. Although there’s a certain amount of schadenfreude to be had from reading about the mating habits of randy conservatives, you may prefer a cold shower afterward."
It seems there was a website created by this women about John Fund -- it was at ruthlesspeople.com, but now only available in archive.org -- as stated above in the Bee story, the phrase “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned” is the best description:
--Ben Houston 02:32, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
- See http://www.johnfund.com, which John Fund created at the time of the court case. (Unfortunately, the links at that page are now broken.) Some people who dislike Fund for idealogical reasons seized the opportunity to vilify him, but there was very little coverage that meets our Wikipedia:Reliable Sources standard. See also WP:BLP. Perhaps the best citable document is http://www.thenation.com/doc/20030602/alterman, in which Eric Alterman (of all people!) writes
- I did not find Pillsbury's story compelling when I first read the reports. Now, given her signed or sworn statements, I find it even less so [...].
- Long story short: she was mentally ill, by her own admission. Repeating her false accusations in Wikipedia will be actively harmful to her, especially if she has recovered her sanity.
- So anything we put in the article will need to artfully omit lots of details.
- Best wishes, CWC(talk) 05:09, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
-
- Hi Chris, the primary source I cited, NY Daily News, is respectable and so is Eric Alterman in the Nation. I am not sure what details you want to "artfully" omit. Wikipedia won't be letting the cat out of the bag on any issue here -- it is in the newspapers and on the blogs already. I'll try my hand at writing something that accurately and NPOV reflects the situation soon. Best. --Ben Houston 15:29, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
-
-
- Hi Ben. Someone else got in before you, and now I've edited it again. Here's an alternate version of the relevant paragraph, with possible additional text shown in bold:
- Fund himself was the subject of media stories in 2002-2003, after a former girlfriend accused him of physical abuse (among other things), leading to his arrest. [4] She later withdrew the allegations, acknowledging that she suffered from borderline personality disorder and had "trouble distinguishing between reality and fantasy". [5] [6]
- Should we put that text in? I left it out mainly to avoid giving the incident "WP:NPOV#Undue_weight". What do other people think? I'm sure my text has plenty of room for improvement.
- BTW, the links at http://www.johnfund.com now work. Also, that NY Daily News link is to a gossip column.
- Cheers, CWC(talk) 18:23, 25 July 2006 (UTC)
- Hi Ben. Someone else got in before you, and now I've edited it again. Here's an alternate version of the relevant paragraph, with possible additional text shown in bold:
-
[edit] Caution needed
Searching the web for information about the court case shows that someone claiming to be the mother of the woman who sued Fund is energetically putting articles attacking him on every website she can get to. And, of course, she can get to this one, where an AOL-based anon has been adding an anti-Fund POV to this article. Coincidence?
The court case was settled in July, when she refused to drop her suit, Fund previously dropped his countersuit. Fund's victim claims not to have severely damaged Fund's career with her truthful allegations, which Funds cohorts even Eric Alterman dismisses. I have not found any Reliable Source who gives any credence to her claims; we do have Reliable Sources who agree that she (1) has no mental illness and (2) has denied being an admitted perjurer.
Response to above paragraph: 1.) Morgan did NOT "drop" the case or claims. the case is properly listed as "settled" in NY the unified Courts web site.
1a.) However Fund has breached the "Settlement Agreement" by:
i.) Not returning all of the plaintiffs belongings;
ii.) Taking down his johnfund.com website;
iii.) Reposting all of slanderous material and associated links on this website (which the original "John Fund" has been email to Pillsbury's counsel) and others;
iv.) Continuing to threaten, harass, malign, and defame Morgan Pillsbury Gell and her new family, Jay Gell & Sons by providing funding and false information to Gell’s family to negatively affect that relationship.
As to the second part of "reliable sources" mentioned above. personal friends of John Fund regardless of which otherwise credible publication they may work for or have interest in are NOT credible when the proffer as "evidence" of "(1) has a serious mental illness and (2) is an admitted perjurer." As to #1: 1. Alterman refusing to even examine Pillsbury’s contradictory evidence, 2. The FACT that Pillsbury “sworn” statement was made under direct threat of physical harm and she was escorted by Fund with force and against her free will to the notary to sign the “evidence”, and; 3. The assault on Ms. Pillsbury occurred AFTER such document was signed in reference to the first beating and assault charges in New Jersey. 4. Fund thinks the document gave him a get out of jail free card for the second beating in New York, and any future character beatings like Fund is engaged in at present. 5. Additionally Pillsbury, now Gell has Definitive Clinical Proof and Confirmation she has never had any, or suffered from “Borderline Personality Disorder” which was originally pulled form her own uneducated self diagnosis of some depression and spoken in general terms and not medical terms was taken out of context as if she had in fact been diagnosed by a professional but rather superimposed upon her by Funds force of threat and violence in an effort to conceal his own narcissistic problems.
As to #2;
1. The claim is the “admission” was made in a sworn deposition in a court record is false and easily verifiable by checking with the clerk of court in Santa Barbra or the case filings online. 2. Again as Fund has a flair for taking statements out of context this was in an unsigned deposition during Pillsbury’s mothers (Melinda’s) divorce. And when examining the audio tape version of the transcripts it is very clear the statement about “lie all the time” was made with the utmost sarcasm and no where in such unofficial deposition does Pillsbury admit to ever committing “perjury”. 3. Additionally, and finally the suspect deposition was provided to Fund by the opposing party to the deposition, Craig Franklin who was paying the child support for Fund’s child, Justin. Any and all disputes should be directed to Jay Gell jayegell_01@yahoo.com / 704-865-2352 and supporting evidence can be found at www.coops-roost.com
I've edited the article to fix the stuff about this poor woman. I made several other changes such as adding ISBNs, including a quote about the U.S. electoral system and changing the paragraph boundaries.
BTW, if the ex-girlfriend reads this: take your meds. Just do it. You have an illness that cannot be cured, only treated. (So do I.) You need those meds. (And you can tell who your genuine friends are: they're the ones who try to get you to keep taking those meds.)BTW! my wife has no metal illnes and you are asking for a slander suit, Jay Gell. retract it now!
CWC(talk) 20:10, 3 August 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Ghostwriting
After user Ricky81682 has reformatted the article to use <ref>s (thanks, Ricky81682!) I took another look at http://www.caslon.com.au/ghostingnote.htm and realised that its sole mention of John Fund is in a quote. So I found the source of that quote (an (IMO) excellent NYT Books essay by Joe Queenan) and replaced the ref to Caslon's essay with a ref to the Queenan essay.
I've also changed the link to http://www.thenation.com/doc/20030602/alterman to the new style. However, I couldn't see how to cite http://www.americanpolitics.com/20020221nypd072.jpg, which is an image of the NYPD "Domestic Incident Report" involving Fund, so I just deleted it. Anyone who knows how to cite it is welcome to put it back.
![[4]](http://www.americanpolitics.com/20020221nypd072.jpg){kind=link}