Thinking his ex-wife’s going-away package was too sweet, newly elected Council member Myers Edward “Feller” Brown has filed a motion to set aside their divorce settlement. In an affidavit, Brown, 54, says he had been taking a blend of prescription drugs that rendered him “foggy,” “impaired,” and unable to understand the terms of the settlement—all the while Brown was successfully campaigning for Old Hickory’s 11th District seat.
Well known among Metro’s infamously inbred courthouse crowd, Brown, a prominent auctioneer, coasted to an easy victory in August’s elections. Two months earlier, however, he was sweating out a dicey divorce from his wife of 17 years, Sara, who was represented by attorney Rose Palermo, one of the top divorce lawyers in town. The pair flirted briefly with reconciliation before launching into a series of wild (and unsubstantiated) accusations. According to court papers, Sara Brown alleged that her husband stored guns all over the house, including one by his chair, and refused to lend her even one of his three cars and two trucks. He charged that his wife can get “out of control” when she drinks wine with her Prozac.
On the morning of the divorce trial, however, the two avoided what could have been a nasty courtroom showdown when their attorneys eked out a settlement. Sara Brown received nearly 60 percent of the couple’s $678,467 of marital property, plus $1,500 a month in alimony payments.
A judge in Franklin will hear Brown’s motion to set aside the final divorce decree. Judge Hamilton Gayden, who had presided over the earlier settlement, recently recused himself from hearing the case, claiming that Brown’s status as a Metro Council member created an inherent conflict of interest. (The Council votes on budget items that affect Metro’s judges.) During the original divorce trial, Domestic Relations Judge Muriel Robinson recused herself as well because she and her well-connected family are friends with Brown. Judge Marietta Shipley also passed on the case.
Feller Brown didn’t return repeated phone calls for comment, but his nearly five-page affidavit vividly explains why he thinks the courts should chuck his divorce agreement.
Leading up to the trial, Brown daily took three capsules of Paxil for his anxiety, three capsules of Xanax, which treats depression, along with two Tylenol and two Bufferin later during the day. In his affidavit, Brown says the cumulative effect of the medication on his mental state was “devastating.” He states that he had trouble concentrating and doesn’t remember the particulars of his conversations with his lawyer, long-time divorce attorney Robert Jackson.
Brown acknowledges that the trial transcript shows he testified that he believed the settlement was “appropriate.” But he says that while he might not have appeared to be impaired, he “certainly felt impaired.” In the affidavit, he says that had he been thinking clearly that day, he never would have agreed to such a “grossly inequitable” division of marital property, nor would he have consented to pay permanent alimony. (According to the terms of the settlement, Brown can stop making alimony payments only if his ex-wife remarries.)
A pharmacist stated in another affidavit that it’s certainly possible that the Council member was impaired. Friends of Brown also stated in affidavits that he seemed out of sorts on the day of the trial. “I noticed that Mr. Brown was not acting like himself that day,” stated Annette Wheeler, identified as a close family friend. “He just did not seem like Feller.”
Later that day, Wheeler and other friends—including Karen Rooker, who works in the Circuit Court Clerk’s office—took Brown to lunch. Brown’s sister, Anna Brown Alexander, remarked in an affidavit that during the meal, Brown was not himself. She states, “I will never forget how he looked that day.”
Before the settlement, Brown asked a friend, Council member Earl Campbell, to testify on his behalf. But Campbell, who worked part-time for Brown’s auctioneer company for more than 20 years, refused. He was a friend of Sara Brown too, and he didn’t want to choose sides in the dispute. Campbell says that soon afterward, Brown fired him. “He said, ‘If you were my friend you would have been out there testifying,’ ” Campbell recalls. “I said, ‘If you were my friend, you would not get me to testify.’ ”
The Scene couldn’t reach Sara Brown, but according to her sister, Helen Wilsford, she just wants to move on with her life. “My sister is ready for this all to be over,” says Wilsford, who lives in South Carolina. “She thought it was a fair settlement and in fact she would have liked more.”
Ironically, she may end up getting just that. According to an attorney familiar with the case, there’s no guarantee that Brown can win more favorable terms if he succeeds in setting aside his divorce settlement. That might leave the Council member from Old Hickory feeling foggy and impaired all over again.
