Bad DJ

I've seen and heard enough tales of scams in my lifetime that I've become almost numb to them. But to me, this story rates up there with the televangelists who bilk senior citizens out of their retirement savings:

Their voices choked by anger and tears, victims of radio personality Todd Kelly yesterday accused him of betraying them and the community by faking Lou Gehrig's disease and spending more than $120,000 raised for research on himself.

"Todd didn't kill anyone -- what he did was worse," one of his friends and former colleagues, Chrissie Sizemore, said before U.S. District Judge Joseph McKinley Jr. sentenced Todd Edward Smith to seven years in prison.



"He used his friends and the community like suckers to fund his own rock-star lifestyle," Sizemore said, "to pay for trips and drinking and partying."

[...]

Smith duped friends, fellow church members and the media when he announced that he had ALS, a progressive and incurable neuromuscular disease that eventually paralyzes those it afflicts, leaving them unable to eat or breathe.

"I'm not going to lie -- it's pretty rough," he told The Courier-Journal for a story about his "wonderful life all but doomed to a premature end."

On the Web site for his foundation, he promised that "over 80 cents of every dollar you give goes straight to scientific research."

Ramping up the sympathy, he later announced he had cancer in both legs and that eventually he would have to have them amputated.

But ALS patients and their families started to notice that Smith's illness didn't seem to be progressing, and media began to raise questions about whether Smith was really ill.

There was a time in my life that I considered a career in radio, which is what I suppose caused this story to have an impact with me. All media personalities are in a sense keepers of the public trust. But the one-to-one aspect of radio listening makes for a special bond between the DJ and his or her audience. The best disc jockeys understand this well; nearly all of them can recall listening to a particular DJ growing up whose impact was so powerful that it inspired them to make radio their career. A master radio personality can truly make you feel as though they are having a conversation directly with you, and that you and the DJ are the only ones involved. Todd Smith betrayed that trust, that special bond his listeners shared with him, which is what makes his actions especially heinous.

In addition, frauds such as Smith make it that much harder for organizations who are genuinely involved in research and treatment of debilitating diseases such as ALS to raise money. Smith's actions may cost someone actually suffering from ALS needed care and treatment. The judge could have sentenced Todd Smith to 80 years in prison; as it stands, the seven-year sentence Smith received seems a bit too light.

http://drsardonicus.blogspot.com/2007/12/bad-dj.html

7 years?

Ex-DJ gets 7 years for scam
Smith's victims recount betrayal

By Andrew Wolfsonand Jason Riley
The Courier-Journal



Their voices choked by anger and tears, victims of radio personality Todd Kelly yesterday accused him of betraying them and the community by faking Lou Gehrig's disease and spending more than $120,000 raised for research on himself.

"Todd didn't kill anyone -- what he did was worse," one of his friends and former colleagues, Chrissie Sizemore, said before U.S. District Judge Joseph McKinley Jr. sentenced Todd Edward Smith to seven years in prison.



"He used his friends and the community like suckers to fund his own rock-star lifestyle," Sizemore said, "to pay for trips and drinking and partying."

In an impassioned speech, WAVE-TV anchor Dawne Gee said Smith, known as Todd Kelly on the radio, exploited her "name and reputation" to plead for money on the air, telling how much his legs were hurting and how his illness was progressing.

"You owe us all an explanation," Gee, in tears, shouted at Smith, who lowered his head but showed no emotion.

Smith, the former promotions director of WDJX who announced in 2001 that he had amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, read a statement apologizing for his actions and saying he would try to atone.

But McKinley, imposing the 84-month sentence recommended in a plea bargain, said, "I don't think there is anything you can ever do to right this wrong."

McKinley said he considered ordering Smith to listen each day of his sentence to an audiotape of his victims' tearful statements, but the judge said he worried "that wouldn't have any effect on you at all."

McKinley said the worst thing about Smith's scheme was the "chilling effect it has had on fundraising by legitimate charitable organizations."

Mari Bacon, executive director of the ALS Association's Kentucky chapter, said Smith stole from real patients "their dignity, their empathy and money that could have been used for their leg braces and wheelchairs."

Celeste Mullenex, who was diagnosed with the paralyzing disease four years ago and can barely speak, testified from her wheelchair that Smith "mocked" people who are truly suffering from the illness and "stole compassion from the community."

Smith's friends told how they were shattered when he told them he'd been diagnosed with ALS.

"We would sit together and cry for hours," said Joellen Embry, a friend who worked with him at Radio One and said he would call on the weekends with increasingly depressing news about his prognosis.

"Nobody has the right to make me cry, and he made me cry for four years," she said.

Sizemore recalled how Smith came to the funeral of her husband, who died at age 29 of heart disease, and said, "I guess I'm next."

She said she was so affected by Smith's plight that in her husband's obituary, she asked mourners to donate to Smith's ALS foundation, called the Todd Kelly Foundation, in her husband's memory.

Turning to Smith, she said: "You are a cold, calculating man. After today, I will never think of you again. You will rot in prison and nobody will be there for you when you get out."

Brenda Bush, who works at The Olmstead, which was host of two fundraisers for Smith's bogus charity, said he had "exploited our sense of humanity" and created a stigma that still hangs over legitimate fundraising.

She asked McKinley to impose the maximum sentence allowed under the law -- 80 years in prison and a $1.5 million fine, but he went with the term recommended in a plea bargain. Smith will also be required to pay restitution in an amount to be determined later.

He pleaded guilty in August to wire fraud, mail fraud and two counts of money laundering.

Smith duped friends, fellow church members and the media when he announced that he had ALS, a progressive and incurable neuromuscular disease that eventually paralyzes those it afflicts, leaving them unable to eat or breathe.

"I'm not going to lie -- it's pretty rough," he told The Courier-Journal for a story about his "wonderful life all but doomed to a premature end."

On the Web site for his foundation, he promised that "over 80 cents of every dollar you give goes straight to scientific research."

Ramping up the sympathy, he later announced he had cancer in both legs and that eventually he would have to have them amputated.

But ALS patients and their families started to notice that Smith's illness didn't seem to be progressing, and media began to raise questions about whether Smith was really ill.

Kentucky State Police and later the FBI started investigations, and Smith was indicted in state court in May 2006 and in federal court in February. Also yesterday, Smith's mother, Sybil Smith, pleaded guilty to theft in Jefferson Circuit Court. She was sentenced to two years of court probation.

She was treasurer of the Todd Kelly Foundation between 2002 and 2005.

Sybil Smith pleaded guilty to 11 counts of misdemeanor theft through an Alford plea, meaning she maintained her innocence but acknowledged there was enough evidence for a conviction.

She was sentenced to two years in prison that will be conditionally discharged as long as she follows the terms of a sentence she has pending in federal court.

In March, Sybil Smith pleaded guilty in federal court to knowing about the fraud and failing to report it, a misdemeanor for which she agreed to one year's probation. She will be sentenced in federal court on Jan. 3.

Sybil Smith declined to comment after her court hearing.

David Mejia, Sybil Smith's attorney, said her relationship with her son and his foundation "unfortunately" led to the charges against her.

Assistant Commonwealth's Attorney John Balliet said prosecutors could not find that Sybil Smith stole money from the foundation, but that she set up the foundation and its financial records and was "in on it from the beginning."

"We always recognized the main actor in this case was the son," Balliet said. But "the mother knew a lot."

Reporter Andrew Wolfson can be reached at awolfson@courier-journal.com or (502) 582-7189. Reporter Jason Riley can be reached at jriley@courier-journal.com or (502) 582-4727.
http://www.courier-journal.com/apps/...WS01/712110386