The former NFL player who served as the basis for the film "The Blind Side" asserts that Sean and Leigh Anne Tuohy never legally adopted him and instead misled him into giving up the right to use his name in commercial transactions once he reached 18.
The Tuohys are accused of using their conservatorship to enrich themselves and their biological children by collecting millions of dollars in royalties from the 2009 Warner Bros. film starring Sandra Bullock and Tim McGraw, according to a 14-page petition filed in Shelby County, Tennessee, probate court, according to ESPN.
According to the legal document, "Co-Conservators Leigh Anne Tuohy and Sean Tuohy have enriched themselves on the lie of Michael's adoption at the expense of their Ward, the undersigned Michael Oher."In February 2023, "Michael Oher (shown below) learned that the Conservatorship to which he consented on the basis that doing so would make him a member of the Tuohy family, in fact provided him with no familial relationship with the Tuohys, to his chagrin and embarrassment."Oher would have retained the ability to manage his own finances as a member of the family if he had been formally adopted, but a conservatorship granted the Tuohys that right.
The film, which is based on the Michael Lewis book of the same name, follows the tale of Oher, a young man from a difficult background who eventually made it to the NFL with the Tuohy family's assistance.
With more than $300 million in box office revenue, Sandra Bullock's portrayal of the Tuohy matriarch won her numerous honors.After an award-filled collegiate career at Ole Miss that resulted in the offensive tackle being selected in the first round of the 2009 NFL Draft, Oher, now 37, played for the Ravens, Titans, and Panthers throughout the course of an eight-year NFL career.
In addition to an accounting of the money they allegedly previously made off his name, a fair part of the earnings, and punitive damages, he requests that the court terminate the Tuohys' conservatorship and issue an injunction prohibiting them from utilizing his name and likeness.
Since at least August of 2004, Conservators have allowed Michael, specifically, and the public, generally, to believe that Conservators adopted Michael and have used that untruth to gain financial advantages for themselves and the foundations which they own or which they exercise control,” the petition says. “All monies made in said manner should in all conscience and equity be disgorged and paid over to the said ward, Michael Oher.”“People look at me, and they take things away from me because of a movie,” he said in 2015. “They don’t really see the skills and the kind of player I am. That’s why I get downgraded so much, because of something off the field.“This stuff, calling me a bust, people saying if I can play or not … that has nothing to do with football. It’s something else off the field. That’s why I don’t like that movie.
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