If I recall correctly, part of the tragedy in Hakeem's death was that he was being housed in what some deemed a sub-standard facility-- especially for the nature of his injury and care required in part because of a delay in a secondary settlement negotiated by AM, and where his first settlement wasn't spent on Hakeem but by another family member.
Wasn't this a unique situation where Hakeem's primary caregiver was in an accident and used Hakeem's monies while AM was working on the caregiver's claim?
I don't think there was anything nefarious between the family, and Hakeem consented to the monies disbursed to another but you should always first secure your own oxygen mask or you won't be around to help others.
And it is ridiculous to blame every death on AM! I don't believe AM was responsible for the unplugged ventilator but I do believe he had a duty of care owed first to Hakeem and the caregiver should have been referred to a different attorney. As my dear dad would say, "don't borrow trouble."
Seems to me the AM was always borrowing trouble. MOO
Do you have a link about Hakeem's mother using his money? Because I have not seen that. From what I can find, in every account, even those from the Pickney family's new lawyer Justin Bamberg, the family received no money until after the settlement happened on Oct 7--which is why they had him in a substandard nursing home 2 hours away. The plan was to transfer him to a closer, better facility, but they didn't get the chance to do so because he died days after the settlement.
Pamela Pinckney hired the South Carolina lawyer after a car wreck in 2009 and again after her son, who was paralyzed in the crash, died. About $1 million was stolen, she says.
www.nbcnews.com
Hakeem's mother, sister, and cousin were all injured in the car wreck that caused him to end up as a paraplegic. His mother, Pamela, was referred to Alex, who came to her bedside in hospital. He was retained as a lawyer to go against the tire manufacturer. Additionally, Pamela said her son needed a conservator because she knew she would be unable to do so while she was recovering herself, so Alex offered up Russell Lafitte.
This article details the little tricks and twists Alex pulled--claiming Hakeem still lived in Hampton so the case could be tried there (when Hakeem was not considered to live in Hampton due to the amount of time he was in the nursing home), claiming to one insurance company that Hakeem was still alive right after he died (in order to insure they still received that part of the settlement), etc:
What Allegedly Happened In Hakeem Pinckney Case …
I was a sign language interpreter who worked with Deaf high school students, so I have some insight into Hakeem's ability to understand the legal documents that he signed. His family stated that in the nursing home, his only means of understanding others (who did not use ASL) communicating with him was 1) lipreading, 2) a person writing on a whiteboard, 3) showing him a document. I can guarantee that Alex didn't hire an ASL interpreter to come along to correctly, completely, and clearly explain those documents. I've read the documents that he signed--while brief, they both contain language (guardian ad litem, conservator, etc) that Hakeem (at his age and his level of education from a state school of the Deaf) would have been entirely unfamiliar with if he was presented with that information either by having him read it himself or by lipreading Alex reading it/trying to explain it. If he was lipreading, there is the additional challenge that even skilled lipreaders in optimal conditions (good lighting, the speaker actually moves their mouth clearly without exaggeration, etc, a familiar topic) can only figure out about 30-40% of what is being said. If his mom or another family member who could sign was there, the chances of them being able to accurately convey and explain what was in those documents to an acceptable standard for such important legal documents is pretty darned small. Most family members who sign have pretty basic skills, and even those family members who are acceptably fluent have never had to explain the concept of GAL, conservator, and being of sound mind and body in English much less than in ASL. I do not mean to make it sound like Hakeem was being tricked, but I'll gamble three fingers on my dominant hand that he did not fully understand the documents he signed and did it because his basic understanding is that his mom said it was a good idea.
Poor, black, Deaf, and Dad's out of the picture because he left ages ago and is schizophrenic. A perfect profile for the kind of person Alex has power over and can easily take advantage of.
I'm not saying Alex killed him/had him killed by unplugging his ventilator. I am saying that given all the twists, turns, and seemingly improbable things that have happened in all the events related to Alex and his family, if suddenly information came out in court that Alex bribed one of the workers at the nursing home to "accidentally" unplug the ventilator, I wouldn't even be shocked. Hakeem dying when he did right after the settlement made Russell and Alex have to pull a lot of fast and illegal moves to insure they didn't lose out on money, so it wouldn't have been to their advantage. I do not believe that Hakeem's death was caused by anything plain old garden variety negligence. But would a plot like that seem much crazier than anything else in this whole Murdaugh saga that is wilder than a 1999 made for TV movie on Lifetime?
www.fitsnews.com
