January/February, 1997 UpdateReprinted by permission from: Pontotoc Revisited!I recently preached a sermon on David and Goliath at Victory Baptist Church in Pontotoc, Mississippi. Many readers of the William J. Murray Report will recall how involved I was in the fight to save school prayer in Pontotoc County, Mississippi. My message from the book of First Samuel was pertinent because the battle between the people of Pontotoc and their oppressors, the ACLU and the PAW, was a classic story of David and Goliath in itself. For those who have forgotten or did not receive the William J. Murray Report throughout 1995 and 1996, I will recap the Pontotoc story. About three years ago Lisa Herdahl moved to Pontotoc County. She enrolled her four children by three different fathers into the Pontotoc County schools. Almost immediately there was conflict. She wanted the children enrolled under her current last name. The school system informed Mrs. Herdahl that the children must be enrolled according to the name on their birth certificates. That event foretold the relationship between the school system of Pontotoc County and the Herdahl family. The Herdahl family had no visible means of support. They lived in what could charitably be called a shack. Most of the Herdahl children had been born in California although the family did live in Wisconsin for a short time before moving to Pontotoc. Mrs. Herdahl claimed that she and her newest husband had moved to this rural area to escape the crime and violence of metropolitan areas. Yet, Mrs. Herdahl immediately took actions to change Pontotoc into the kind of society she claimed she moved her family away from. The Pontotoc County schools still had prayer, Bible reading and structured Bible courses. These came under attack from Mrs. Herdahl. Like my own mother, Madalyn Murray O'Hair, Mrs. Herdahl did not want anyone teaching her children Biblical morality. She wanted the prayer and Bible classes stopped and called upon the giant "religion killers" of our day, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the People For the American Way (PAW). The major goals of the ACLU and the PAW are the total destruction of all moral boundaries in America. Both organizations, for example, want to legalize prostitution and the use of drugs such as marijuana. Both organizations also want the legalization of sodomy and the institution of marriage extended to those who commit the sin of sodomy. Just as Goliath in 1Samuel 17:10 sent a challenge to the people of God, the ACLU and the PAW sent a challenge to Pontotoc. As in other cases they simply said to the people of Pontotoc, "We are so big that you cannot win. We always win, so change the way of life you have in your small rural community or we will come in and punish you." In 95% of all instances, all the ACLU has to do is make threats. School boards and small towns are so fearful of costly lawsuits that they are forced to accept the dictums of the ACLU and the big money PAW. (The PAW is headed by Norman Lear and financed by the Hollywood elite. The biggest part of PAW contributions come from Hollywood homosexuals. Their last president died of AIDS.) Something happened in Pontotoc. In Pontotoc the ACLU and the PAW met up with their David. The people of Pontotoc would not back down. From average citizen to Congressman to Senator the people fought the ACLU and the PAW. I spoke at rallies in Pontotoc on several occasions. At one point I and Rev. Doug Jones led a procession of hundreds of cars from Pontotoc to Memphis, Tennessee where several Presidential candidates were speaking. Tens of thousands of dollars were raised by the people of Pontotoc. Ladies such as Pat Mounce and others worked hard on committees to battle the aggression of the ACLU and the PAW. When the smoke cleared the ACLU and the PAW did not get what they wanted. They wanted all prayer out of the schools. They wanted the Bibles removed from the schools. They wanted all Bible classes to stop in the schools. Because the people of Pontotoc fought, the Bible classes are still in the schools and there are still Bible reading and prayer before school in the gymnasium. The ACLU and the PAW did manage to stop the prayer by the kids over the intercom in the morning, but that is about all. The Goliaths of the ACLU and the PAW met defeat. After suffering this shameful defeat, the ACLU is suing the people of Pontotoc for $278,000,00. WHAT? Yes, the ACLU wants to people of this little rural county to pay their "expenses". What expenses do they want? They want paid thousands of dollars for all the times they came to hear me speak at rallies to defend school prayer. They want paid for listening to the news on TV and radio. They want their hotel bills paid and their $25.00 breakfast bills and their $100.00 dinners all to be paid for by the people of this impoverished county they attacked. The big shame of the ACLU and the PAW is that they are a bunch of liars, thieves and frauds. You see, they have already been paid. During this battle they sent fund raising letters to homosexuals and other perverts to raise money. They told these perverts in the fund raising letters that they needed money to kick the Bible and morality out of the schools of Pontotoc. During their fund raising campaign the ACLU and the PAW raised many hundreds of thousands of dollars to fight on behalf of the Herdahl family and for "separation of church and state". What happened to the money the ACLU and the PAW raised? How was it used? How was it spent? Since the ACLU and the PAW had already raised this money in fund raising letters, why do they now sue the people of Pontotoc? Because the ACLU and the PAW are a bunch of lying thieves who suck the blood of the innocent of our land. The "leaders" of these organizations receive salaries and expenses running into the hundreds of thousands of dollars each year. They live in mansions and drive fine cars while those they "help," like the Herdahl family, live in an un-insulated shack. The ACLU and the PAW must be exposed for the bloodsuckers they are. In Pontotoc the ACLU and the PAW were knocked to the ground by the little people just as was Goliath of Biblical days. Now it is time to take the sword of truth and chop off the head of these monsters. That truth resides in the lawsuit these groups brought against the people of Pontotoc. Where is the media to expose the spending habits and the double standard of the ACLU and the PAW? The ACLU and the PAW lied and cheated the perverts who financed this case. They told the perverts that the Herdahl case was being paid for by their contributions. Will those contributions be paid back if the ACLU receives more than $250,000.00 from this impoverished county? NO! The money will go to pay for more big salaries and fat expense accounts. The battle in Pontotoc continues and you can help. Please write a letter to the editor of your local newspaper and tell the people in your community about the double standard of the ACLU. Tell the people of your community how the ACLU raises money to "defend people free of charge" and then sues others to pay those bills a second time. Please send copies of those letters to me. Meanwhile what has happened to the Herdahl family? Have they benefited from the "help" they received from the ACLU and the PAW? Neither organization ever gave this family a dime to help them live. They are as poor now as they were then. The Herdahl family has been able to move from the shack that leaned to one side to an older mobile home. The kids still receive many of their clothes from the families that the ACLU and the PAW have sued. One Herdahl child lost part of her foot to a lawnmower accident. Members of the committee to defend the school prayer, were the people there to help the family when the accident occurred. The ACLU and the PAW, who have probably raised hundreds of thousands or perhaps millions of dollars using the Herdahls' name, did not give a dime to help the injured child. As of the writing of this article all of the Herdahl children are enrolled in the Bible class at the Pontotoc County schools that the ACLU and the PAW fought to have stopped. I ask for your continued prayers for the Herdahl children. I understand them and their pain because their situation is not that much different from the one in which I grew up. The people of Pontotoc continue to need your help. Any gift you can give to help the people of Pontotoc fight their legal battle will help. Send your gift to: Pontotoc Citizens For School Prayer, P.O. Box 343, Ecru, MS 38841. The Continuing Saga of the Missing AtheistsAnyone not knowing about my missing family members would have to have lived in a cave for the last year and a half. In September of 1995 my mother, Madalyn Murray O'Hair, vanished after leaving a typewritten note on her headquarters door telling her staff they had been laid off. My brother, Jon, and my oldest daughter, Robin vanished with her. In essence three generations of my family disappeared. Since that time stories have appeared in both the print media and on TV worldwide concerning their status as missing persons. ABC, CBS, NBC and FOX have carried prime time news stories about the disappearances. Several TV news magazines have also carried reports. Despite this coverage from September of 1995 to August of 1996 no trace of the three missing people turned up. Oddly enough, no one close to them filed a missing persons' report. This at first led me to believe that the atheist group knew where they were. Anyone can file a missing person's report. Anyone means anyone such as a business associate, neighbor or friend. I believed that the man who claimed to be her office manager, "Spike" Tyson, would have filed the report. Mr. Tyson did not file a missing persons' report. Instead, he moved into her $225,000.00 home in Austin, Texas and is now sleeping in her bed. Ms. Ellen Johnson then claimed to be the new president of the organization. In her takeover she tossed at least one man off the Board of Directors without so much as a letter. This is unusual in that it is the Board of Directors that hires and fires the President, not vise versa. Ms. Johnson did not file a missing persons' report either. She did move to get her name on all the bank accounts and to take over the actual possession of the atheist group's assets, including, I have been told by media sources, more than $1,000,000 in a New Zealand bank account. I didn't file a missing persons' report because my mother had not spoken to me for almost 20 years. I did not think it was my place to get involved when those closest to her, such as Mr. Tyson and Ms. Johnson, did not deem a police report necessary. Nearly one year passed and the media pressure on me became unbearable. Newsmen called almost every day asking why I did not, as the only next of kin to the three missing people, file a police report. Some suggested I was callus and mean. On the contrary, I knew that the atheists would accuse me of wanting to "steal" their money. In fact, Ellen Johnson made several comments to the press that if I got involved I would be doing so for greed. On the first anniversary of my mother's, brother's and daughter's disappearance, I filed a missing persons report with the Austin Police Department because no one else had. I had come to the conclusion that a number of people needed closure, including all of my mother's supporters, and my other children, whose grandmother was missing. The immediate response came from the atheists that I had filed the report to "grab" property. The individual making the claim against me, "Spike" Tyson, was living in my mother's home. He, of course, had no desire that she be found,dead or alive. Either way he would have to move out of the house in which he was, in fact, a squatter. Ellen Johnson had no desire to hold a legal meeting of the Board of Directors and explain her actions either. Sometime during 1996, tax returns were filed with the IRS by Ms. Johnson or her staff accusing my brother of taking over $600,000.00 from the accounts of the atheist groups before "leaving". The returns said he withdrew the money "about" the time he vanished and she believed the funds were in his possession. Ms. Johnson must not have known that the Form 990's filed by tax exempt organizations are a matter of public record. John McCormick, a San Antonio Light reporter broke the story on December 8th. The fact that Jon Murray had been accused of taking the money in the tax return raised more questions. If the new leaders of the atheist groups thought $600,000 had been stolen, why didn't they report the theft to the police? Further, why would my brother take $600,000 from a U.S. account and leave more than $1,000,000 in the New Zealand account for Ms. Johnson's benefit? At today's rates $600,000 would generate an income of about $3,000 per month or about $1,000 per month per missing person. In Austin the three lived extravagant lifestyles. Some say they spent upward of $10,000.00 per month on themselves. Why take such a drastic cut and increase living costs by moving out of a house that had no mortgage payments? For what purpose? There is also the issue of the Mercedes Benz my brother allegedly sold in San Antonio, Texas shortly after the three vanished. An ad was placed in a San Antonio paper to sell the expensive car for $15,000. That was far less than it was worth. The phone number was a cell phone and when the car was sold the actual transaction took place from a bar well known for drug activity. The individual who identified himself as Jon Murray refused to go into the bank to sign off the title. He claimed he did not want to be seen because he was selling the car fast because of a divorce. My brother had never married. At virtually every turn it appears that those who took over my family's property made it difficult for the police to find them. The atheists also made false or misleading statements to members of the media. For example: Ms. Johnson told one reporter that the man in San Antonio who had purchased Jon Murray's car had told her he did not want contacted by the media again. When the reporter tried to verify this the man told him he did not know who Ellen Johnson was and had never talked to her. There is also the matter of my daughter's Porsche. It was found by the Austin Police abandoned at the airport. It had been towed to a storage lot by the airport parking agency for lack of payment. Interestingly the airline tickets the three had purchased to go to New York to "protest" the arrival of the Pope were never used. If her ticket was not used, what was her car doing at the airport? Mr. "Spike" Tyson said that the three had last been seen on September 4th when they left a typed note on the door telling "all" employees they were laid off until further notice. Mr. Tyson read the note and proceeded to enter the building and then take over possession of the home the three shared. Does this sound like a novel? For many years I said that I believed the end of the Murray-O'Hairs would be bizarre. My mother lived in a fantasy world of desire and control. She wrote for the porno magazine, Hustler and hired numerous convicted felons to work for her including pedophiles and murderers. She hired the felons who were on parol because of the control issue. A convict on parol is like butter in the hand of an employer. Do something wrong and it is back to jail they go. One convicted murderer who worked for her had stolen tens of thousands of dollars from her. He was convicted of this crime just prior to the disappearances. Whatever happened, it was stranger than any novelist could imagine. I can tell you this. The day I filed the missing persons' report I felt in my spirit someone say, "Thank you for caring." What are the police doing? Nothing. The case was assigned to Detective Steven Baker, who works in the juvenile run-a-way section. I believe this was the first missing persons' case he had in which adults were involved. When I and members of the media called him to give him new information he never returned the calls. Perhaps you have been taken aback by the type of cars driven and the amounts of money the atheists had in the bank. I can assure you there is more money to be found, or as the case may be, not be found. Then there are the cars. Porsche is one of the most expensive sports cars made. A Mercedes Benz does not come cheap. I drive a 1988 Ford Bronco II that needs a paint job bad. I have scraped off the rust and sprayed over the worn places with a can of auto paint I bought at Walmart. The little truck is nine years old and has over 130,000 miles on it. It gets me back and forth just fine. My wife drives a Mercury that will celebrate its fifth birthday this year and has more than 80,000 miles on it. I could have stayed in Austin and shared the wealth of my atheist family and had a Mercedes to drive as well, but I traded all that for something far more valuable. I have my faith in Jesus Christ and the assurance of eternal life with Him. I have the joy of that faith and the realization one day soon I will have the privilege of kneeling before the King of Kings. William J. Murray |