http://gambit.blogs.nytimes.com/2008...-way/#more-187

March 29, 2008
Drive to Recall Member of Chess Federation’s Board Is Under Way

By Dylan Loeb McClain



A petition has been started seeking a recall election to remove a member of
the executive board of the United States Chess Federation. The petition, which
was posted on the Internet on March 3, seeks the removal of Paul Truong from
the board because he has “neglected his fiduciary duties.”

The basis of the petition is the same one cited in a Jan. 15 letter from four
of the seven members of the board that asked him to step down.

Messages left on Mr. Truong’s home phone and cell phone on Friday evening
seeking comment were not returned.

The calls for Mr. Truong’s resignation stem from a report by Brian
Mottershead, a former systems administrator at the federation, that Mr. Truong
posted inflammatory remarks on the Internet in the names of other members of
the federation for more than two years. Two computer experts have examined Mr.
Mottershead’s report and concluded that its methodology was sound.

Two lawsuits, one by Samuel H. Sloan, and another by Gordon Roy Parker, have
been filed based on Mr. Mottershead’s report and are now pending. Both suits
name Mr. Truong and the federation, among others, as defendants.

Mr. Truong was elected last July by the membership of the federation to a
four-year term on the board. Despite the call by the board’s majority for him
to step down, the federation’s bylaws do not give the board the power to
remove him. A recall election can only be ordered by two-thirds of the
federation’s delegates. According to Bill Hall, the federation’s executive
director, there are 149 delegates — 142 who are at-large and the seven members
of the board — so the signatures of 100 delegates are needed to call an
election. Each delegate represents a state or geographic area.

Donna Alarie, president of the Greater Worcester Chess Club in Massachusetts
and a federation delegate, started the petition. Mrs. Alarie, who said she has
“10 to 15” people helping her circulate the petition, said that 41 have signed
so far, 17 have said they will sign and 16 are expected to sign after they
read the petition. Another 27 have said they will not sign. Mrs. Alarie said
that she had found the effort to organize a recall petition difficult. “I feel
like I am involved in an education process as well,” she said. “It is very
time consuming.”


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*
1. March 29th, 2008

The Times’s coverage has failed to directly address count III of Mr.
Sloan’s lawsuit:

“COUNT III

ACCUSATIONS THAT PLAINTIFF IS A CHILD MOLESTER AND A PURVEYOR OF “KIDDIE
PORN”

61. Plaintiff repeats and re-alleges each and every allegation of
Paragraphs 1 though 60 of this complaint.

62. Throughout this entire affair, defendants to this action have posted
thousands of times on the public Internet accusations that Plaintiff is a
child molester, a pornographer and a purveyor of
“kiddie porn”. This accusation is utterly false. Not only is it not true
but Sloan has never been arrested, convicted, accused, investigated, charged,
questioned or anything of that nature by any competent legal authority.
Nevertheless these accusations have been posted so many thousands of times
that the response by others is, “if
that is true, stop bothering us and call the cops”.

63. The main purveyor of these false accusations in Defendant William
Brock. Brock was banned from posting to the USCF Forums for this but he has
continued to post to other public forums the same or similar accusations,
including even on the Wikipedia Encyclopedia where he listed Sloan under the
category of “child molesters”. Nobody seems to
know why Brock keeps doing this. In this, Brock has been joined by
Polgar and Truong posting both as themselves and as the Fake Sam Sloan, by
Herbert Rodney Vaughn, by Joel Channing and by several other defendants.

64. Please note that unlike traditional print media such as newspapers
which are often thrown away and forgotten about the next day, these Internet
postings will be preserved and kept for the next one thousand years long after
all of us are dead. Even if the original posters decide to delete these
postings they will already have been picked up
and spread around the Internet. A simple search for the words Sam Sloan
child molester will return numerous postings mostly by Bill Brock. There are
so many that they can never be completely removed.

65. Plaintiff demands judgment in the amount of ten million dollars for
the allegations in this count.”

This defendant’s partial response is available at
http://www.direkickfeud.blogspot.com/

— Posted by Bill Brock - Chcago


*
2. March 29th, 2008

(This is the second of two posts: moderator, please do not approve
unless the first post has already been approved. Thank you.)

Know your plaintiffs. Here is a link to summaries of certain posts made
by the second plaintiff, Mr. Parker, on September 11, 2001:


http://groups.google.com/group/alt.s...8befb538b36f4f

The impersonations of the plaintiffs were vile and it is my opinion that
the impersonator(s) should suffer consequences.

I leave it to the reader, however, to determine what further damage
could have been done to the reputation of each plaintiff.

***

I believe that even if the allegations against Mr. Truong are false, he
would best fulfill his fiduciary duty towards USCF by resigning immediately.

I also believe that USCF President Bill Goichberg needs to take his
share of responsibility for USCF’s ethical failings (including USCF’s
continued noncompliance with ERISA). Mr. Goichberg’s immediate resignation
would also be appropriate.

I have cordial relations with both Mr. Truong and Mr. Goichberg, and I
wish them well.

— Posted by Bill Brock - Chcago


*
3. March 30th, 2008

Another colossal waste of money that the USCF does not have. It is also
another attempt by a few disgruntled individuals to exert influence over an
organization that serves an ever decreasing community. The US Chess Trust is
making moves to wrest scholastics from the USCF. If successful this move
coupled with the increasing costs of defending frivolous lawsuits and the
political distractions from task by disgruntled and ousted USCF politicos will
drive a stake through the heart of the USCF.
The only explanation for it might then be said “they killed it by loving
it too much”.

— Posted by Rob
*


4. March 30th, 2008

To this point, the recall effort has cost the USCF membership not a
single penny. Mrs. Alarie and other concerned USCF members have funded the
printing and mailing of the recall petition. If the petition is successful,
the USCF will be required to pay for a recall election by the membership. Mr.
Truong can spare the USCF and its members all of this by heeding the call for
his resignation from the executive board as called for by the board majority.

— Posted by Brian Lafferty


*
5. March 31st, 2008

Nolens Volens, all above comments. I rather fear that the crystal has
shattered. I must say that I do not admire the part played by NY Times in
professing obligatory and pro-forma reporting upon legal matters, then
allowing assortments of comments to occur here.

USA has just lost a very great asset to chess - perhaas the best in the
world.

If the author of this column would attend his business of respectable
journalism, perhaps he would know what goes on, rather than have his readers
attain their information from this School of Fools. Rob Mitchell has made the
only decent comment here in asserting a value.

I am a chess journalist and I do not publish such suppositions as these
- though in a few days perhaps we will all be rather more sober in assessing
what we had, and what we have lost.

Phil Innes

— Posted by Phil Innes


*
6.
April 1st, 2008

It has been announced on the Internet this morning that Susan Polgar is
resigning all her positions in chess and moving back to Hungary.

http://www.chessville.com/misc/PolgarQuits.htm

That would end the need for a recall.

The problem is that today is April Fools Day. We will have to wait until
tomorrow to find out whether this seemingly good news (good for us, bad for
the Hungarians) is a joke or not.

Sam Sloan

— Posted by Sam Sloan


*
7. April 1st, 2008

Is this part of the film documentary?

— Posted by Rob Mitchell


*
8. April 1st, 2008

It is posted on Susan Polgar’s Official Blog too, so it does not seem
that it would be a hoax.

http://susanpolgar.blogspot.com/2008/04/im-moving-back- to-hungary.html

However, I still find it to be highly likely that this is an April Fools
Day joke.

We will find out tomorrow for sure.

Sam Sloan

— Posted by Sam Sloan


*
9. April 2nd, 2008

Turns out that it was an April Fools Joke, as I suspected, and as Susan
revealed this morning at:

http://susanpolgar.blogspot.com/2008/04/april-2.html

The tip off to me was that it was posted on her blog at 1:41 AM, just
after midnight on April Fools Day, and the new name, which was to be M. I. C.
E.

While explaining that it was an April Fools Joke, Susan adds, “However,
there were some important facts in the article which will be officially
announced soon”.

We are waiting to see what those “important facts” are.

Sam Sloan

— Posted by Sam Sloan


*
10. April 2nd, 2008

Had Mr. Truong submitted a sworn deposition, and allowed access to his
ISPs as requested by the Attorneys representing the USCF,(and Mr. Truong at
the time) perhaps the majority of the members of the USCF Executive Board
would not have felt compelled to request his resignation.

BTW, that Majority of the Executive Board of the USCF, was also elected
by the Members of the USCF, which the handful of Mr. and Mrs. Truong’s
supporters seem to forget. IMHO

— Posted by Harry Payne




2008 The New York Times Company