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Publisher Stripped & Humiliated

MUDCAT FALLS -- The stage is set for a Calabash County courtroom showdown in what is certainly one of the most egregious cases of sports fraud since Rozi Ruiz faked the winning of the Boston Marathon, when Publisher Playboy Sonny Sticklefurter squares off against the Special Olympics Committee over his refusal to return a gold medal awarded to him nearly two decades ago for the Pentathlon.

Based on a story broken in this paper earlier this year which questioned Sticklefurter's status as a person with "intellectual disabilities," the SOC unanimously decided to strip him of his Olympic titles, medals and awards and declare him competent.

But in papers filed with the court, the disgraced publisher and wannabee athlete disputes their finding, citing the fact that just prior to competing in the 1988 Special Olympics a jury had cleared him of manslaughter charges based on his plea of being not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect.

The Special Olympics is an international nonprofit organization dedicated to empowering individuals with intellectual disabilities to become physically fit, productive and respected members of society through sports training and competition. Special Olympics offers children and adults with intellectual disabilities year-round training and competition in 30 Olympic-type summer and winter sports.

Although family, friends and colleagues have strongly urged him to return the medal and let what has become an unseemly public relations disaster fade away, Sticklefurter, who claims to be one thirty-second Hunkpapa, insists he is being discriminated against as a minority and delcares himself to a modern day Jim Thorpe.

Native American born Thorpe, named the greatest athlete of the first half of the twentieth century by the Associated Press (AP) in 1950, and ranked third on the AP list of athletes of the century in 1999, was stripped of his Olympic Gold Medal won in 1912 for the Pentathlon. After his professional sports career ended Thorpe lived in abject poverty. He worked several odd jobs, struggled with alcoholism, and lived out the last years of his life in failing health. In 1983, thirty years after his death, his medals were restored.

Some legal scholars and experts have speculated that Sticklefurter's statements might be a clever ruse to demonstrate a delusionally diminished mental capacity in a final desperate attempt to win the trial and retain his awards.

Unable to even find a trial lawyer willing to take his loathsome case, Sticklefurter has been forced to represent himself in the proceedings.




©2006 MFTHPPPGT




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