Obama's grandmother passes away.

[MrFun]

HUH?

[Q Classic]

Was this was before Phelps almost got raped by the gay? Or was this before he almost contracted the gay?

[The Emperor Fabulous]

Before he was disbarred and surrendered his law license, Fred Phelps gained a reputation as a sharp, competent civil rights attorney whose eloquent and fiery orations mesmerized juries.

"You always had to be ready for him," a veteran lawyer in Topeka said.

Phelps was considered a gifted and skilled trial lawyer, one of the best in eastern Kansas.

His prominent cases:

• One of Phelps' most notable cases was won on behalf of Evelyn Rene Johnson, a black school girl who sued Topeka Unified School District 501, alleging she received an inferior education in Topeka schools.

In an out-of-court settlement, Johnson received $19,500 from the school board in U.S. District Court late in 1978. Johnson received $8,907 in a trust, and Phelps received the rest as fees. The case, which had been sealed by a federal judge at the request of the school board's insurance company, became public in April 1979. Filed in 1973, the suit alleged the school hadn't fully implemented mandates by the U.S. Supreme Court in Brown vs. Board of the Education of Topeka. Johnson, 10 when the case was filed, had been a student at Parkdale Elementary School.

• In August 1979, Phelps filed a class-action lawsuit on behalf of Carla Michelle Miller, then 11 and a student at Lafayette Elementary School, charging that USD 501 discriminated against blacks and other minorities. Phelps filed the class-action suit in U.S. District Court.

Phelps contended economically disadvantaged black students were being forced to remain in predominantly black schools in an environment generating a feeling of "inferiority as to their status in the community, thus affecting their hearts and minds in a way unlikely ever to be undone."

The case was dismissed in U.S. District Court, and the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with the dismissal.

• After police and sheriff's deputies raided the Jordan-Patterson American Legion Post, 811 S.E. 15th, on June 28, 1979, Phelps filed suit, representing several clients.

Shawnee County sheriff's deputies, aided by Topeka police officers, were seeking drug dealers when they raided the predominantly black club. About 20 people were arrested, including five for concealed weapons and two for marijuana possession. No felony convictions resulted from the raid.

During the raid, 50 to 60 female patrons were strip-searched. Customers in the club filed 20 lawsuits in state and federal courts alleging bar patrons were illegally strip-searched, detained, and treated in a threatening and abusive manner because they were black. At least two clients represented by Phelps' family law firm received settlements of $8,000 from the city and county commissions before the suits were to go to trial.

Civil rights awards

Phelps won several honors for his work on civil rights cases.

In 1986, Phelps received two civil rights awards, the Omaha Mayor's Special Recognition Award and an award by the Greater Kansas City Chapter of Blacks in Government.

In 1987, Phelps received an award from the Bonner Springs branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People for his "undauntedness" and his "steely determination for justice during his tenure as a civil rights attorney."

Then he lost his license and went crazy:

But, in Phelps' campaign against homosexuals and others in Topeka, he seems to contradict himself again.

Consider some faxes he transmitted in the past four years. A fax issued by Westboro Baptist Church with Phelps' name on the heading, reads: "... BLACK BULLIES BEAT WHITE KIDS AND WOMEN."

And on Jan. 11, 1993, a fax, sent out under the Westboro Baptist Church heading labels a local black lawyer as an "INCOMPETENT BLACK WHORE" and "BLACK TRASH."

A fax dated May 22, 1992, called a black politician a "BLACK THUG," a "CRIMINAL" and a "HOLLIGAN".

He also sued President Reagan for sending an ambassador to the Vatican, because (and this is a de-LIC-ious quote):

In the suit, Phelps described himself as a Primitive or Old School Baptist, "who, with other patriots, has a vested religious interest in the separation of church and state since the days of this republic when the first amendment was drafted by John Leland, another Primitive Baptist preacher."

[MrFun]

wow

[The Emperor Fabulous]

Yeah. Syphilis sucks.