4/4/19 Minutes
Submitted by Tommy Fulton, Contributing Editor
Call to Order: The meeting was called to order by Ernest Ladd.
Jay Turner gave the invocation, followed by Tommy Blankenship with a song and the Pledge of Allegiance.
Introduction of Guests & Visitors: Jeff Zoghby introduced our guests along with visiting Rotarians.
Student Guest: Jeff Luther introduced Dylan Stallworth, from Vigor High School as our Student of the Week.
Announcements: Mobile West – Mobile Bay Charity Golf Classic – April 24.
Rotary Club of Mobile donated $500.00 to the Lee County Tornado Relief Effort.
Program: Suntrease Williams-Maynard introduced Richard Moore – U. S. Attorney. His topic was “The Hardest Question You Never Ask – How Am I Doing?”
Richard Moore was part of the first wave of President Trump’s nominees for U. S. Attorney. He had previously been hired by Jeff Sessions.
Mr. Moore’s primary duties include prosecuting federal crimes/offenses in our district. He has been especially effective in bringing more cases of firearm violations than any other district in the U. S., per capita. He laments the fact that so many of those convicted offenders return to the streets to quickly.
His office also handles bankruptcy, drug cases and money laundering. One of his most infamous cases was the “Couch/Ruan pill mill” prosecution. Dr. Couch and Dr. Ruan were sentenced to 240 months and 252 months for mis-prescribing opioids.
Mr. Moore described the conditions in Alabama’s prisons as “barbaric” and in violation of the 8th Amendment. The prisons are understaffed and gang-ridden. This has led to the outcome that our inmates are much more likely to commit more crimes after being released.
Mr. Moore’s said that his office presented an honorary “Chair” to Jeff Sessions. He has great admiration for Jeff and says he is one of the most respected men by his peers in the country. “Jeff had done more to promote President Trump’s agenda than any other Cabinet member”, said Moore. Major crime came down under Sessions because of the idea that, “If you take the worst of the worst off of the streets, crime will go down.”
Mr. Moore then discussed his awakening after taking his 360° review. He brought his staff of 105 into a meeting, read his report to them, and then asked for the painful truth. Those painful lessons led him to three goals.
1) Mutual Respect for each other.
2) Trust in competency and character
3) Accountablility
This is when he learned to ask the question, “How Am I Doing?”
After a question and answer session, Ernest Ladd thanked U. S. Attorney Moore for his presentation and presented a certificate to him, noting that a donation in his honor had been made to the Rotary International Foundation.
The meeting was adjourned at 1:00 pm.