I was especially puzzled that Carolyn Morello, Anthony Morello's widow, was among the et als suing Church Mutual. I wondered if there might be some death benefit they felt she was entitled to following Morello's sudden demise early in 2013, but that wouldn't explain the presence of Langley Brandt among the et als, since Mrs Brandt, while a prominent member of the dissident faction, is not on the squatter vestry.
My informants made things plain: the et als have pledged personal assets to pay their legal bills. However, they believe Church Mutual should pay those bills instead. It's that simple. Thus the lawsuit. The et als, Langley Brandt, Marilyn Bush, Patrick Omeirs, and Carolyn Morello, are an odd lot: Mmes Bush and Brandt are in fact well off (although their pledges to the parish did not reflect that when I was briefly treasurer), so the legal bills would probably not affect their lifeatyles directly, although they would certainly deplete their estates.
Patrick Omeirs, on the other hand, is a sometime actor who once appeared in an episode of Dynasty, and he is not in that league. Anthony Morello lived in a mobile home. That either would pledge personal assets to pay substantial legal bills is much more puzzling. My informants, however, say that Carolyn Morello appears among the plaintiffs because Morello's estate (consisting mainly of a mobile home), which passed to her, is encumbered by legal bills.
Church Mutual has presumably refused to pay these bills, thus the lawsuit. My informants, who are familiar with the insurance policy, say that in any case, the policy covers only legal expenses, such as filing fees or court reporters, and not lawyers' fees. In addition, there is a fairly low cap on this amount. (My wife, a retired attorney, has estimated that the squatters could have been responsible for half a million dollars or more in their own attorneys' fees, but this would not be covered under the Church Mutual policy.) My informants, shaking their heads, say that the cost of filing the suit against Church Mutual would exceed the amount the squatters could expect to gain if they won.
Church Mutual presumably refused to pay any amount in the first place based on a position that the Bush-ACA appointed vestry is neither the policyholder nor the insured, which is the elected vestry. They are now fighting the lawsuit on the basis that the Bush-ACA group does not have standing to sue. We will hear more about the standing issue in tomorrow's post. However, the fact that the Bush group filed suit at all suggests they are expecting to have their attorneys' bills reimbursed as well, however unrealistic this may be.
This information confirms my current theory of the case: Morello, Bush, Brandt, Omeirs, and the ACA expected a quick, trouble-free resolution and seizure of the parish beginning with the temporary restraining order in May 2012. My wife is of the opinion that Morello, Bush, Brandt, and Omeirs pledged personal assets to pay Lancaster and Anastasia because if they encumbered parish property, this would complicate a sale, which they expected to take place quickly following an easy seizure. Morello and Bush, however, later found that the elected vestry had itself pledged parish assets to pay their own attorneys (which they were entitled, and indeed obligated, to do) and went ballistic once they heard about it -- this was one more unexpected complication in their scheme.
Plainly by the summer of 2013, the ACA and the alternate-universe vestry had recognized that things weren't going as they'd expected and fell back on a clear Plan B, which was to try to get Church Mutual to clean up their mess. But even by late 2012, Strawn and Marsh were trying to distance themselves from the plan, putting Morello in full charge -- he had skin in the game, after all. Given his state of health, this probably killed him.
