Blindsided: A heart-warming tale turns sour as former NFL player Michael Oher sues legal guardians
The Blind Side, an Oscar-winning film released in 2009, follows the life of Michael Oher and brings his story to life on the big screen. Oher’s journey to reach the NFL has been unlike any other. From a young age, Oher has bounced around foster homes, and was enrolled in 11 different schools over the first 9 years of his education.
Oher then met Sean and Leigh Tuohy. The Tuohys were a wealthy family in the area, whose kids attended the same school, and they had witnessed first-hand the struggles Oher was going through. To help him out, the Tuohys initially offered support in the form of giving Oher lunch money and buying him new clothes. As the relationship developed, the Tuohys eventually decided to let Oher move in with them, and even paid for private tutors to help Oher increase his GPA so he could play college football. This helped Oher get into the University of Mississippi, which subsequently propelled him to a long career in the NFL.
What seemed like a beautiful story took a dark turn a few weeks ago. When Oher turned 18, the Tuohys asked him to sign a document which he believed, and the movie portrayed to be, adoption papers. However, his ‘adoption’ is now the subject of today’s legal scrutiny. As it turns out, Oher was misled and he had instead agreed to be placed under a conservatorship. As a result, Oher has sued the Tuohys, seeking an injunction to stop the Tuohys from profiting off of his personal name and image, and to ultimately end the conservatorship.
Conservatorship
A conservatorship is a special arrangement where one party (conservator) has complete control over another party’s (conservatee) financial decision and resources. This is a fiduciary relationship, where the conservator must act honestly, for the best interest of the conservatee, and avoid conflicts of interest. The purpose of a conservatorship is to manage personal and financial decisions for individuals who are incapable of taking care of their own affairs. This is reflected under the Tennessee Code, where it is explicitly stated that a conservator is not to be appointed unless there is ‘clear and convincing evidence’ that a person is ‘fully or partially disabled’.
Curiously, the appointment of the Tuohys as conservators for Oher is seemingly contradictory to the Code above. It is unclear in the present case what evidence there is, or ever was, of Oher suffering from any form of disability.
While a conservatorship is an American legal concept, equivalent laws do exist in Australia that function in a similar way. Specifically in Victoria, a person can apply to the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (VCAT) to become an administrator, giving them the power to make legal and financial decisions for another person.
For those interested, please see the following link for information regarding the Victorian legislation in this area: https://www.legalaid.vic.gov.au/guardianship-and-administration-orders.
Image Rights
The conservatorship also grants the Tuohys control over a range of Oher’s intellectual property rights, including his image rights. This is what allowed the Tuohys to enter an agreement with Twentieth Century Fox to turn Oher’s life story into a movie, which reportedly netted them $225,000 each in profit, with none of that going to Oher.
The intellectual property rights of an athlete, especially his image rights to be used in commercial opportunities, is extremely valuable. In the NFL, top athletes will frequently make millions each year in endorsement deals alone. For reference, Peyton Manning, who was a marquee player in the NFL during Oher’s prime, made over $25 million a year on endorsements alone.
Being in a conservatorship throughout his career means that Oher has lacked the capacity to pursue any commercial opportunities independently, and has evidently been neglected when profits generated by a film about his life was divided. Unsurprisingly, Oher has requested the Tuohys provide all financial records pertaining to his life and career, in order to determine any potential compensatory damages.
Conclusion
Beyond the potential breaches of fiduciary duties and profiting off a dramatised version of Oher’s life, the Tuohys’ conduct in misleading an 18-year-old to enter a conservatorship is also a textbook example of the exertion of undue influence and unconscionable conduct.
With Oher bringing his suit against the Tuohys only a few weeks ago, this saga is just beginning. Keep an eye on this space, as there will undoubtedly be new twists and turns to come in the following weeks and months, with documents being unearthed and new narratives beginning to form.
References
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/26/opinion/i-have-a-pretty-good-idea-why-michael-oher-is-angry.html
https://www.robinsonandhenry.com/colorado/probate/conservatorships-and-breach-of-fiduciary-duty/
https://theathletic.com/4785411/2023/08/18/michael-oher-tuohys-blind-side-timeline/
https://au.news.yahoo.com/michael-oher-conservatorship-unlike-legal-141712383.html
https://law.justia.com/codes/tennessee/2021/title-34/chapter-1/section-34-1-126/
https://www.gobankingrates.com/net-worth/sports/15-nfl-players-make-money-endorsements/
https://www.legalaid.vic.gov.au/guardianship-and-administration-orders
https://mdlaw.com.au/news-insights/guardianship-laws-victoria/