March 24, 2007
by George H. Russell

Power Company Harasses Elderly Woman Dying of Cancer

For over two years my elderly parents have been fighting a powerful power company that is obsessed with desecrating the cemetery that they donated to their church.  Prior to the battle my Mother could walk over a mile a day.  Now, after facing almost unbelievable harassment including two attempts to turn off their power during very cold weather, she is relegated to lying on her couch waiting for the cancer which she attributes to a lowered immune system caused by stress, to kill her.

The power company, with the concurrence of the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) as well as The State Office of Administrative Hearings (SOAH), committed egregious acts of perjury in order to get its way.    In spite of all of the documentation presented at a three day hearing proving that the power company was lying under oath, the judge and the PUC ruled in favor of the power company and said that the company could clear-cut a swath 2.7 miles long through wildlife sanctuaries, archaeological sites, endangered species habitat, rare old-growth forest ecosystems, a Parks and Wildlife Trail, and the world's first "green family cemetery", which would desecrate two graves.

My parents made an arduous trip to the State Capital in an attempt to speak with the PUC Commissioners, but were treated with great contempt and were not allowed to say even one word during a public hearing in which the PUC rubber-stamped the destructive route as being better than an alternate route through clear-cuts, cow pastures, and monoculture plantations.

Elder abuse can be just as evil as child abuse.  To watch as State Officials ignored, and continue to ignore irrefutable evidence that the power company was lying on many levels is totally irresponsible, especially when it is driving my mother to an early grave.

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She is 91 and my father will be 96 in April.  If she lives until this Friday they will have been married 72 years.   Last week we pre-dug their graves, since my father will no doubt not live much longer after my mother's passing.  He too has suffered horribly at the hands of the power company, and the PUC.

They dedicated their life savings to protect in perpetuity, through conservation easements, some of the most ecologically significant old growth forest ecosystems in America.  This multi-million dollar gift to the future of America is now threatened with a hideously ugly 138kv transmission that will also pass through 10 acres that they had set aside as the site of an elementary school for children who now have to be bussed many miles from their community.   If the line is built there it will be unsafe to build the school there because of excessive EMF radiation.

Their last hope is that the media will take an interest in their plight and expose the corruption in the two State Agencies to the public.  Media exposure was the only reason that rampant sexual abuse of children at the Texas Youth Commission was exposed and hopefully stopped.    Now it is time to expose the elder abuse suffered by my parents because of malfeasance at the PUC and SOAH.

There is an interview of my mother on YouTube at   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUfmYwdjxMY or http://www.investigativereporter.net/

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George H. Russell [send him email] an outspoken opponent of the death penalty, is a resident of Hunstville, Texas, which is known worldwide as "The City of Death."  His work can be found at http://www.patriotnetwork.org/ and http://www.salvationnetwork.org/