why thomas is not to be at graces, official statement

[david sec]

so...here’s the deal...thomas was originally kicked out of grace because he was being an intoxicated (still not sure what he was on) asshole...plain and simple...the night in particular (although his behavior had been altered for a few days prior to that) he told me he needed to bathe himself and asked me to take $21.50 from the donation box for him, which i refused...he then asked me to plea to the “higher ups” because he “knew i could talk them into it,” which i still refused and i walked away from him talking with some girl that had come up to ask me about something else. Over the next hour he was seemingly fine with my decision, fine enough at the very least to bum 2 cigarettes from me before out of nowhere accosting me with insults and accusations which i proceeded to laugh at because he is such a pitiable individual...and becoming more pitiful by the moment with his actions....at some point later he demanded i take him to grace place which i refused simply because he was obviously abusing some substance and there was no reason to expose the sleeping individuals there to someone who could and already had flown off the handle...he then angrily stomped off yelling about how there were other people besides me with more power(it was something to this effect, it was a long time ago) who would give him permission to stay there tonight...so basically he just ended up walking to grace(i discovered later) and banging on the door ‘til someone woke to let him in and he passed out...i walked the last group of people to grace place at about 4-4:30am and realized he was sleeping there, but decided to ignore it and proceeded down to the supply room which Brian and I were still working on getting in shape from the mess it was prior to our getting there....the next morning i woke everyone and went down to the supply room...shortly later thomas came down and when i told him he couldn’t be down there (we had already started telling people that we couldn’t have people coming through until we finished organizing it due to the fact that things kept being messed up, moved around, and stolen)he proceeded to shoulder his way past me....he grabbed his donated sleeping bag(that, incidently was already about a foot and a half full of donations he had acquired for himself....yeah i watched him start with absolutely nothing and start to “acquire” donations from the beginning) and i told him not to bother coming back because he wasn’t welcome here anymore and i wouldn’t be letting him into grace anymore... he left saying something to the effect that it wasn’t my decision. I went to talk to Ted a couple of hours later and told him about the situation and he agreed with my decision and suggested i start locking the elevator...which i did...bout an hour later i was going to make a run to hq when one of the church goers coming down from upstairs told me that one of “our people” was sleeping upstairs on the second floor (this was sometime between noon-1pm)i immediately went up to see who it was...lo and behold there was thomas walking out with a smug look on his face like a first grader who just got away with something...he walked downstairs and i proceeded to let ted know that he was the one i had been talking to him about earlier(ted let me know that thomas had begged him for money and ted had given him four dollars) and proceeded to go downstairs with ted a little ways behind me...thomas was coming back from the direction of the elevator and demanded i unlock the elevator for him at which point i reminded him that he is no longer welcome here and that he needed to leave...as he started to argue ted came up behind me and also told him he wasn’t welcome here anymore. thomas then proceeded to tell ted that what i didn’t know is that there was a secret meeting that i wasn’t invited to and that i didn’t know it yet but i was “out”...at which point i told him that it really didn’t matter because he still wasn’t welcome here anymore...and ted confirmed...a couple of days later micah talked with me for a while and convinced me to give thomas a second chance...against my better judgement...from then on out things seem to go fine for a while.....although I started hearing random stories from people about thomas stealing...donations that people were bringing in or money straight from the donation jar(before we had a lockbox)...i also kept hearing about him soliciting personal cash donations from people as well as getting cash donations from people and pocketing it...hearsay, i know...but after hearing it 10-20 times a week it becomes a little more believable...meanwhile his sleeping bag “o’ donations” is steadily growing, eventually getting to be almost as tall as me and heavy to the point that i started leaving it upstairs at grace place because i could no longer easily lift it...meanwhile his behavior at grace was time consuming for those of us working here and disrespectful to the rules of the church in general (although thomas has a way of working within the gray areas)...he was constantly taking until 7:30-8:00 am to get out of the church(when everyone else would be out close to or before 7am)...even after being told not to wash in the restrooms at graces he would do it as soon as our backs were turned(and despite the fact that he’ll claim that he always cleaned up after himself, he didn’t and either darriel or i would have to do it)...on a number of occasions he was caught in the kitchen making church food...at one point he was walking around in his underwear while there were a couple of church goers there....really the list goes on but frankly he’s taken up enough of my time and i don’t want to sit here trying to remember or write down every little thing that he did to waste brian’s or my time...a couple of nights after the rules of grace place had been changed back to only 10 people allowed to sleep here a night and a list was started every night of people that were working, thomas showed up just expecting to get a place to sleep...when i told him that brian was on his way to hq to make the list and he should call him or try to catch up to him...when neither one of us could get a hold of brian , he proceded to call Kelvin to come over and try to convince me to let him stay despite the list rather than go to find brian...this resulted in a half hour conversation with kelvin about how the new rules work...besides the fact that he had already been there the last three nights since we had started only allowing ten people a night and i had expressed to everyone that the faces would be changing regularly....turned out that everything worked out fine that night, however, again, it was the wasting of my/our time and that he constantly acted like grace place owes him something(even to this day, despite the fact that he has never even shown one smidgeon of respect towards this church...or really towards this movement)....it was around this time i met grace....grace is a lovely woman who was, for a time, donating a minimum of $75 to $100 worth of materials to occupy chicago...thomas procedeed to make sure he was always the first one she talked to and more importantly make sure that he was always the first to receive her donations....which he would immediately go through and take the items he wanted for himself...anyone who has spent any time at hq recognizes that thomas does this regularly with anyone he sees bringing donations...grace however quickly realized what was going on and started bringing her donations directly to grace place and now also works with us in the supply room as part of the organizational committee...at this point having to deal with some thomas issue at least once a day literally EVERY DAY since i let him back into grace I was more or less fed up with him...the amount of times i was prepared to tell him not to come back and talked out of it is ridiculous (which, by the way, i discussed with ted on a semi regular basis when needing to vent my frustration at the amount of time i have to waste dealing with his bullshit)...so comes the morning where i get a call from police impound telling me that i have an hour to find a place to have all the personal property from the first occupation attempt that the police had in impound...the sergeant i’m talking to proceeds to tell me it fills a 9’x18’ trailer piled about 3’ high....sounds fun right...so the police wouldn’t deliver it to grace place because they deemed it inaccessible for them(and frankly we didn’t have the room for it here anyway)...so, thomas had been, for about a week, talking about this storage area he had gotten access to for the movement on michigan and jackson(which i have since been told he simply made up anyway and seeing as it never came up again i can only assume that this is true)....when i called him and explained the situation and that i had a limited time to figure this out and needed to talk to the people/peoples who were supposedly allowing us to use this space, at which point he told me that, “He was the only one allowed to talk to them, and he was busy until 11am (an hour after my deadline to find a place)...I told him that he was worthless to me then an i was done with him....it was at this point that he was definitively not allowed back at grace place...despite this, i still have had to deal with “thomas issues” constantly since this...first he proceeded to call damn near everyone in the movement who pitied him to have them beg me to let him back in....after about an hour of explaining the situation they have all, one by one, come to understand my position and accept why i won’t allow him in anymore...he has on multiple occasions tried to weasel his way back into grace place, the first time coming to a teach in at which point i informed Kelvin that he was no longer welcome here and that i didn’t expect to see him again...the second time he showed up with five donors and thinking i would allow him in with them...but i simply informed them that he wasn’t allowed in the building and proceeded to let them know why....the third time was 2 saturdays ago in the morning(when the homeless are being fed) with donations which he put into the elevator and sent down and then took off before i could confront him...on his third attempt doing this i was waiting upstairs and told him AGAIN that he is not welcome here and not to come back(at which point he told me it wasn’t my decision...unfortunately what he doesn’t realize is that i have been in constant communication with ted the entire time i’ve been working in the supply room and he never thought he should have been allowed back in the first place)...most recently he showed up at the direct action meeting the other day thinking(i can only imagine) that i wouldn’t out him in front of 40 some fellow occupiers...but i had no problem doing that...so again i will reiterate...he has no respect for grace place...but that’s not all...he also, in my opinion, has no respect for the movement...as i said before he is constantly trying to solicit personal donations...other times just begging for money from donors...and apparently didn’t stay with the donation box when it was stolen(so his story goes now) because he wasn’t ”allowed at grace place”....despite the fact that both before and after the incident he has seemed to have no qualms about coming in despite his status here...
....so in conclusion, i’ve been told a lot of people think this is a personal issue i have with thomas....HELL YES its a personal issue...as i’ve pointed out in the last three pages he has been nothing but a constant pain in the ass since i first took over the supply room...i went out of my way to try and help him as i do with everyone in the movement who asks for my help...at one point i loaned the guy one of only five t-shirts i had when i arrived in chicago(which, incidentally, i never got back )...on numerous occasions i went down to the supply room 3-4 times in the morning to get various toiletries for him(when most people will ask for whatever they need all at once)....he’s rammed me with his shoulder when he didn’t like that he wasn’t allowed in the supply room(and just to be clear, he is one of the 2 primary people that made it so no one was allowed in the supply room because every time he was down there things would disappear if we turned our back on him...or we’d have to clean up the mess he’d leave in the bathroom)....it goes on, but frankly, i’m sick of talking about it...i’ve told this to more than a dozen people and am simply sick and tired of dealing with crybaby thomas issues...he’s also said i’m a racist...funny stuff seeing as i’m friends(actually friends with and not a pity case for) a whole lot of people in this movement of a variety of races...i don’t care what color or nationality someone is...i just can’t stand pathological liars, thieves, or crybabies.....thomas just happens to be all three...furthermore ted doesn’t want him here and hasn’t since the first time he was removed...THE ONLY reason thomas was allowed back into the church was because i told ted we should give him a second chance...my bad...i won’t make that mistake again...so basically the point should be moot...however....still....weeks later...i’m still being forced to deal with this pathetic individuals pleas for pity from whomever is sucker enough to listen to him...but i’m sincerely hoping that by writing this statement you will all finally leave me alone about it...i don’t need conflict resolution because i’ve already resolved the conflict(unless of course conflict resolution would like to start telling everyone who asks me why thomas isn’t allowed here exactly why for me...that would be great)...but what would really be great is if the few people who are supporting him actually got a clue...regardless, i’m finished with this nonsense...

-Seth