Posted on 10/01/2002 6:34:33 AM PDT by GailA
Toogood reportedly fled Memphis doctor's office without paying bill
By Clay Bailey bailey@gomemphis.com October 1, 2002
Five years before appearing on a surveillance tape beating her daughter, Madelyne Toogood was listed as a suspect in a Memphis police report after bolting from a local pediatrician's office without paying.
The report, filed in connection with the March 25, 1997, incident, states that Toogood, who listed a nonexistent Frayser address, left Dr. Hubert Dellinger's office without paying $255 for treatment of three children.
Dellinger's office never received payment.
But Dellinger's employees recognized Madelyne Toogood about a week ago amid national publicity after a televised tape showed her beating her 4-year-old daughter, Martha, in the parking lot of a Mishawaka, Ind., shopping center.
Toogood, who surrendered after the surveillance tape showed the 30-second assault on the girl, was charged with battery to a child in the Sept. 13 incident.
Dellinger's episode marked the second report in a week linking Toogood to the Mid-South.
Authorities are investigating a possible fraud case against the woman related to her registration of a vehicle in Shelby County last year.
Dellinger is part of the Pedicatric and Adolescent Medicine of East Memphis office at 6248 Poplar, just east of Ridgeway.
A woman, identified as Toogood, came into Dellinger's office on March 25, 1997 with three boys - listed as Henry, Shawn and John - seeking treatment for "common infections," Dellinger said Monday.
He said the office staff asked the woman to fill out a new patient form. The first effort was so vague, they asked her to fill out a second one in more detail.
She gave her name as Madelyne Toogood and the father's name as John Toogood. Both match the names of the parents of the 4-year-old victim in Mishawaka.
There is little else consistent between the two forms.
In one she lists her address as 1509 Dena Drive and in the other as 1009 Dina, with different Zip Codes for each.
There is a Dena in the Redwood Estate Mobile Home Park off Thomas, north of Watkins. Garland Moore, who has lived in the mobile home park about 15 years, said Monday that his wife, Renia, recalled the Toogoods living in about five trailers in the park.
"They were here at one time," Garland Moore said, "but we didn't let them stay very long. They were a nuisance to people."
After treatment by Dellinger, the doctor said the antsy Toogood bolted out the front door and into a white Chevrolet pickup with New Jersey tags.
In her haste to skip out, Toogood almost ran over one of his employees who chased her into the parking lot, Dellinger said, and when employees tried to track down Toogood, they discovered the telephone numbers and addresses were fake, along with other pertinent information on the form.
Dellinger said once they discovered the array of false information, they did not pursue the case civilly to recover payment. "It wasn't worth going that route," he said. "We turned it over to the authorities, and chalked it off to experience."
The Commercial Appeal was unable to contact Toogood for comment.
- Clay Bailey: 529-2393
Isn't that a long way down Poplar to be considered in Memphis? Or is it just on the wrong side of the street?
But you can't "shoplift" services, can you now?
And -- if frogs had wings, they wouldn't bump their little green asses on the ground.
Don't forget to pick up the National Enquirer when you stop by the convenience store for cigarettes and beer.
Oddly enough, E. Pluribus Unum, people will discuss topics of THEIR choice without consulting YOU.
If payment is demanded upon completion of services, do you doubt that the nurses could have held this gypsy until the police arrived?
I don't know that the police could have done much, except scare the absolute hell out of her, which their mere presence would have done. Cops to gypsies are like crosses to a vampire.
By doing so they would expose themselves to a tort action for false imprisonment --- not too smart and I wouldn't recommend.
Holding a shoplifter when you have physical evidence that they left the store without paying is another matter, because then its clear that the criminal had no intention of paying for the goods, the Corpus delecti of a crime is present, so the imprisonment is legal under notions of citizen arrest.
In the doctor's office example, however, MOST PEOPLE either pay by insurance or by check after invoice by mail, notwithstanding what any sign says in the doctor's office. So it follows that someone who leaves the office without paying is not demoinstrating clear corpus delecti of a crime. Therefore to hold them is, arguably, a false imprisonment,
They shouldn't.
No it ain't. It's victims of horrendous crimes who are ignored. The little crimes with faces of people you are itching to hate are the ones you are most interested in. Forget the politically-correct mass murders. Hand me my Enquirer.
We would be concerned about NOTHING else.
Correction. The media would be concerned about NOTHING else.
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