SINS OF STAPLES INC.
The Horror and the Hope
By Leonard C. Faucher
Introduction: This is a condensed short story of an on-line article written earlier entitled “The Carnage of Staples Inc”,identifying the hope of one of this Superstore’s victims.
Several years after Lynn Crocker was prevented to enter the Fuller State Hospital in Attleboro, Massachusetts in 2001, this mother of four died at the age of 41. Ten years earlier, mycorrupt family and greedy franchise owners aided the secret acquisition of my 26 store OfficeLand franchise chain by the ruthless founders of Staples Inc. Resigning my employment as a teacher in Needham, Massachusetts, I worked tirelessly to develop the first office products franchise chain in the country. These new and modern office supply computer stores were located in all New England states and their continued growth would have given me the financial strength to, again, be able to have contact with my two beautiful daughters.
My siblings and mother already had a covert motive for helping Staples Inc. take over my franchise chain. For years, I had joint custody of my two daughters, Lisa and Kim, until they became young teenagers. After suffering through shock therapy in her second marriage, my ex-wife and mother of my daughters married a third time to Jon Gilbert. Informing me that her new husband came from a very wealthy family, she wanted me to allow my daughters to be adopted by him and I said absolutely no! After being denied my visiting rights with my daughters, forseveral years I vigorously battled with my ex-wife in Court. Finally, my attorney arranged a compromise permitting my daughters to use the last name of their new step father but still have regular contact with me. However, since 1982, despite many letters and even paying the cost of a private investigator,I’ve never been allowed any contact with the girls I very much loved. Attempting to earn a great amount of money for legal expenses became my primary reason for leaving education and entering the business world. To my surprise, it was not until the year 2010, that I learned that my entire family took cash bribes offered to each of them by my ex-wife and her husband. My corrupt family’s loyalty to me, the oldest son in our family, was compromised by their own greed and jealousy which I never suspected. Of course, now I realize why they all asked me for jobs at OfficeLand. My family also knew that a successful OfficeLand franchise chain, which was close to happening, would give me immense financial resources and allow me to take back my daughters. Because of their alliance with my ex-wife, they couldn’t let that happen. It was why they secretly conspired with my arch-competitor, Staples Inc., and in the process, rewarded themselves with even more money than their earlier scheme.
The success of the secret acquisition of OfficeLand Inc. was personally managed by the founders of Staples Inc. They were the late Tom Stemberg and their first major investor, Mitt Romney via his new investment company, Bain Capital. It was Mitt Romney’s personal attorney, Jeff Stein at Hale and Dorr of Boston, who also represented Staples Inc. Stein simultaneously represented my company, OfficeLand Inc. It was Jeff Stein and Romney that created the legal maze for the charlatan acquisition. However, beyond the ruthless business deal that
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significantly benefitted Staples Inc., there was a personal attack on one of my franchise owners. In 1990, Lynn Crocker purchased the very last OfficeLand franchise just before the secret acquisition. Unlike the other franchise owners, she did not know of the conspiracy as she had still been in training with me. The attack by Staples Inc. on Lynn was horrific. However, it would be her children who also would bear the brunt of her attack many years later.
In 1991, the same year of the secret acquisition by Staples Inc., and a year after Lynn Crocker opened her new OfficeLand store in Sanford, Maine, Lynn came to me asking for help. Not knowing how or why, she explained that her husband had closed her successful store. She also told me of taking much verbal and physical abuse from her husband. As the result, she filed for divorce and was awarded joint custody of her four children. Her plea for my help came at the exact time my once very sedate and relatively affluent life became turbulent and disastrous. Erroneously believing that it was the bad economy in 1989 that slowed down my franchise growth, my Hale & Dorr attorney,Jeff Stein, helped me plan a merger with a public company. However, that endeavor immediately came to a halt after my franchises were advised by my Merger and Acquisition attorney, David Sharpe, to stop paying their essential royalties to OfficeLand Inc. I had just moved from Shrewsbury, MA to a new executive home in Londonderry, NH in order to bring my wife closer to her family in nearby Manchester. This move was to help save our fragile marriage. However, I didn’t realize that my wife was also involved with my family’s plot which began years earlier. From my son, years after, I learned that my family had convinced my wife that I was having an affair with a potential employee that lived in Florida which was an absolute lie. After we moved to Londonderry, my bi-polar wife shockingly filed for divorce and bankruptcy at the same time. I found out that she used very expensive Philadelphia lawyers to do so. Through my Manchester lawyer, Jennifer Rood, I was able to convince the Court to not place me into bankruptcy. Years later, I discovered that my ex-wife also had withdrawn herown motion for bankruptcy. I owed very little money to anyone and the only reason for her efforts to place me in bankruptcy was to prevent me from ever franchising again. Out of money from payments to lawyers, my family members and even my mother refused to allow me to temporarily live with her. Thisforced me to live in an old warehouse as a homeless person. I well –remember one winter evening thinking to myself as to how a man who was a teacher with a Masters Degree, never drank or did drugs, could find himself in such a terrible mess. I only had my car and a trunk full of possessions to my name. From the high of being selected as New Hampshire’s Business Person of the year, and being written about in Success Magazine, it was unfathomable that I was absolutely broke and homeless all in one year. The only person I could talk to was Lynn Crocker who had moved to Manchester from her home in Wells, Maine. However, she was as equally confused about her life as I was. Fortunately, a wonderful mentor also came into my life. He was Dr. Basil Henriques of Lynn. He gave me cash and the mental strength to start over again in return for helping him in a business that he was starting.
Desperate for any employment, I took a job with an office supply company out of Boston who asked me to open a new office in South Portland, Maine. Lynn agreed to join me and return to
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Maine, which was also closer to where her husband lived and shared custodial responsibilities. In getting to know Lynn, webegan living together in a rented home in York Beach. During that time, I also began to really enjoy all Lynn’s four children. Lynn also got a new sales job covering southern Maine for another Boston based office supply company. Not long after we were in York Beach, Lynn had another Court battle with her ex-husband. This time he retained a very prominent and expensive lawyer from Kennebunk. To my surprise Lynn lost custody of all her four children. This event sent her into extreme depression. In my opinion, the Court’s decision made no sense as she was a wonderful and caring mother. This horrible finding added to aprevious psychological damage for Lynn resulting in immense depression. Shortly after the Court’s decision, Lynn regretfullyinformed me that, for the “good of her kids”, she decided to return to her abusive ex-husband.
Having moved back to Massachusetts, it was only a few months later that I was told by her sister that Lynn needed my help as she had committed herself to the Biddeford State Hospital. This was a mental health institution for the most severe of Maine residents. The history of Lynn’s personal life was equally horrendous and complicated her decision making process. A year or two after we met, she told me that she had been the subject of incest by her father since the death of her mother when she was ten years old. After she told me, I made an appointment for Lynn to see a psychiatrist in Biddeford. While he counseled Lynn, he also told me that her mental illness was so bad that “…she would never be able to have a normal relationship with any man”. In Biddeford, I was reluctant to remove her from her hospital. However, she expressed immense fear of her nearby husband taking control over her life. After begging me to sign her out of Biddeford, I agreed. It then became my goal to have her admitted to a Massachusetts state hospital. Because I had also been a certified Special Needs teacher in Massachusetts, I was aware that Massachusetts had the finest quality mental health care in the country. Unfortunately, I was in complete denial about my family’s involvement in the conspiracy and their on-going effort of keeping Lynn from being in contact with me. It was a very cold evening that we left Biddeford for Massachusetts.
Not knowing where to take Lynn next, we stayed one night in a cheap motel in Portsmouth. I made a few calls to people I knew but there was no one that wanted to get involved. Finally, my 16 year old son who was living with his mother offered the home of a friend of my family in Attleboro who agreed to temporarily take her in. It was on the trip from Portsmouth to Attleboro that Lynn tried to tell me more about what happened to her store while at her ex-husband’s home but I refused to allow her to discuss business. This turned out to be a big mistake. I could see that Lynn was weak and not in very good condition. She even asked me to marry her as soon as possible. However, I knew it was only to be able to be with someone who would help her get her kids again. I explained that before she could think of marriage, she very much needed quality mental health care and be strong enough to permanently have her children. Today, these were sad moments for me to remember as she was very excited about being able to obtain the mental health care that I recommended and she very much wanted. Lynn knew she was ill and wanted to be well for her kids. We arrived in Attleboro and Lynn was exhausted. We immediately put her to bed in the makeshift basement room that was prepared
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for her. I returned to Waltham where my mother lived and was confronted by many curious questions. After a complete mental breakdown while visiting Lynn the next day, I brought her to the Sturdy Memorial Hospital also in Attleboro. Hours later, she was transferred to Corrigan State Hospital in Fall River where she remained for three months. On two occasions, I was allowed to visit her and personally meet with her doctors. I also helped them plan for “long-term” mental health care at Fuller State Hospital, also in Attleboro. While asking and obtaining limited “help” from my family, instead of facilitating her entrance to Fuller, they prevented it. As I’ve stated, in Fall River the doctorsordered and arranged for her long term mental health at Fuller. However, upon arrival she was refused to be allowed to register.Instead Lynn was taken by my family friend and kept from ever seeing me again. I am now aware that my family and their friend were working for the very powerful founders of Staples Inc. andtook full control of Lynn. Ignoring the doctors at Corrigan whowould only released her for long term care, they kidnapped her and never allowed her any mental health care…all to make sure she did not have contact with me. Had she done so, she would have undoubtedly told me what she had learned while living for two months with her ex-husband. I would have known of the conspiracy to steal my stores and would have prevented it as well. I believe that my OfficeLand stores would have been the “Ace Hardware” in the office products industry today.
Reflecting back years later, Staples Inc. was successful by preventing me from not being able to see Lynn again. Lynn also learned from her ex-husband what happened to her own OfficeLand store that she completely operated without his involvement. This was her store that she told me would pay for her kid’s college education. She never had the opportunity, herself, to go to college. Growing up in her poor Appalachian style community of Industry, Maine, she very much valued education and wanted it for all her kids. She reluctantly took me to her Central Maine home and I witnessed, myself, the tar paper shack she grew up in. She told me the stories of deer jacking, and growing pot undetected by the government. This was one of the means of income in this very poor community. In a book given to me by Lynn’s Biddeford doctor, The Beans of Egypt, Maine, by Carolyn Chute, it reinforced the typical life style of her poor neighbors and why no one reports incest in centralMaine. It is because many are products of this very devious behavior and “ …even the police are children of incest” Lynn emphasized. Of course, this activity was many years ago and, hopefully, has changed. To a suburban Boston Catholic high school graduate, her life and the afflicted “support group” around her were a complete shock to me. This event made me want to help her even more. It was her franchise that she enjoyed and worked so hard to grow that would have allowed her kids to go to college. However, her husband secretly took all the large amount of cash from her store sale to Staples inc. and left her nothing. That selfish act prevented her kids from the success she so much wanted for them. Instead, none of her children went to college….except for one.
Having sent out my October 18, 2015, article to as many people I knew, I was contacted by one of Lynn’s sons. Chris Crocker now 33 was the second oldest son and probably the most intelligent. For the past two months, I’ve had frequent contact with Chris who has had a very difficult time dealing with the realities of his life. His first e-mail to me after we talked was:
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On Wed, Jan 6, 2016 at 6:36 AM, Chris Crocker wrote:
I'm glad we had a chance to talk. I’ve been researching a lot the last few hours. I don’t really sleep much. All my life I’ve had to watch friends with parents that lovee them, and support them. I believe with all my soul that had I had my Mom I would be changing the world today. I have never found any true limitations to my capabilities, but a life alone and without support took its toll on me. My mom would be ashamed of how short ive fallen from the man I could
have been. I barely see my son because I cant afford it, and am probably ten thousand dollars in child support debt. I am behind on rent even though its only 50 a week to sleep on the floor. Imdependent on Marijuana to prevent my anxiety from killing me,and that takes nearly all my retirement every month. Im a divorced 33 year old man without a car, home, any money at all, that doesn't see or support his own kid. Ive dishonored my father publicly and disowned my family leaving me entirely alone in this world. Im not emotional about it, I just have to accept what is. Im not sure why im telling you all this. I can tell you this, I am a man of passionate conviction in anything I choose to do. After 15 years I find out my Mom didn't hate me, and in fact she was the only family that may have loved me and she is gone. Itsa lot to process, and Ill let you now how I choose to proceed. imsorry for rambling. Have a great day Len, I believe you to be a good man, and Im sorry I was led to believe otherwise. regardless of what the future holds, Im glad that you were theefor my Mom, and even if it didn't end well I thank you for trying to help her.
When reading Chris’s e-mail in his own words, readers, hopefully, will capture an underlying message. The people I have been dealing with have little regard for the psychological damage they do when they impose their thirst for money over the long-term welfare of children. In this case, it was more important to Chris’s father to unjustly steal from his family a large sum of money than to give his children a life time of security. As you can read, Chris was told that his mother never loved him when in actuality she adored all her children. Look what the lies did for Chris and, also, for his siblings who we’ve not heard from. Yes, the same applies to my two beautiful daughters. To justify my corrupt family’s theft of my franchise stores and walk away, as they have with millions of dollars, they needed to create a terrible image of me. I often ask myself, “whydon’t these mature young ladies contact me now?” The answer is obvious and much similar to what Chris experienced for many years. We know that prisoners of the worst character are able to see their children. Guilty of nothing, a business person, adjunct professor, absent of all dependencies, loves young people, and a man happily married to a very intelligent woman, I am unable to have any information or contact with the daughters I loved since 1982. Great, they’ve got my money, but in the process it isobvious that they had little consideration for the harm done to my daughters? Taking children away from any parent is especially damaging to the children. It is my belief that harming children is the greatest sin of all. Yet some in our society are so materially conscious, unsuspecting children cannot defend themselves. They become the easiest target for bad people to prey upon. For Chris Crocker, there has been little help.
Subsequent discussions with Chris revealed that all his siblings were told that their mother didn’t love them. Chris explained that even when his father had full custody of all four children,
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he showed them little attention. As the result of their mother’s motorcycle accident and death in 2001, Chris’s father represented all four children in Court and received a large “wrongful death” insurance settlement. As the result, he purchased a new swimming pool for his home. After attending two years of college which Chris paid for from serving in the army, Chris ran out of tuition money. His father offered no help. Despite years of desperation, there has been no assistance or empathy for Chris’s situation with the exception of a good family that have allowed him to remain with them instead of being on the street. There is little doubt in my
mind that all the efforts that Chris’s mother were making to improve the lives of her children were halted for only one reason…greed on the part of many.
Chris also told me that after Lynn was with me, she took a job at Towhill Office Products in Boston and remembers visiting his mother at their Boston warehouse. What Chris was unaware of was that, at the time of his visit, Towhill was completely owned by Staples Inc. You might ask how I knew that fact. It was Towhill that I also worked for in Maine while living with Lynn. I watched its closing and my departure from the company when Staples purchased the firm. This meant that, instead of being admitted to the Fuller State Hospital as the doctor at Corriganordered, Lynn became employed by Staples inc. Chris also told me that she married again to someone in Massachusetts that he did not like and divorced shortly after. Given her severe mental health disability, only long-term mental health care was prescribed by her doctor…not marriage. Eventually, she ended up living next door to her ex-husband again, in Wells. I have no doubt she would do anything to be near her children and managed to do so by working for McIsaac Office Furniture which, of course, was another Staples Inc. owned office products company. Staples Inc. controlled all Lynn Crocker’s movements, serving to make sure she had no further contact with me. Many people knew she belonged in a long term mental health facility but that would significantly compromise Staples’s very effective conspiracy. Of course, I also learned that she again re-married a third time. However, in central Maine common law marriage is as prevalent as legally being married, leaving me wondering about her last marriage to David McIntyre. He was the man that drove the motorcycle and was severely injured in the horrible accident that killed Lynn. In talking with him last year, I became aware that David and his family were kind to Lynn and, at the time of her death, arranged the burial plot for Lynn and Lynn’s unborn daughter very far up in Lincoln, Maine. I thank them for giving Lynn and her unborn daughter a resting place when no one else would help. McIntyre strangely identified Lynn as being promiscuous and being unduly violated by her ex-husband. When I asked David who the father was of Lynn’s unborn baby, he could not answer.
In preventing Lynn from obtaining the mental health care she very much wanted, there was is no doubt that Staples Inc. wanted to make sure she had no contact with me. I believe that the Staples Inc. caused mental and physical harm to Lynn Crocker which led to more reckless and continued abuse while not being hospitalized.
Of course, Staples Inc. is a corporation. Behind the flaming red and white sign, however, were the founders of this ruthless company. They very much knew who I was at OfficeLand and did everything they could do to destroy me. Like war, Stemberg and Romney were indifferent to
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the human casualties they left behind as they were obsessed of expanding their business at any cost. My family and my franchise owners knew exactly what they were doing and were eagerly willing to sacrifice Lynn’s life and the future of her children in order to acquire the riches they subsequently attained.
Through my last article, I reached out to many people about Lynn. Several individuals came forward with ideas to help. To some of those people I updated them with the contact I had received from Chris. It was my wife’s suggestion that we fulfill Chris’s greatest need and that was a used car to get back and forth from a new job he was offered. Now Chris Crocker has a
full-time job. I’m in frequent contact with him and keep reminding him that his mother absolutely did love him. His attitude and ambition is in gear and his depression is lessening. He’s told me that he wants to someday finish his college education and become a lawyer. We hope he can. However, only time will tell as Chris will have three choices available to him. They are:
• Succumb to habitual behavior that has held him back.
• Choose to allow the same individuals that destroyed his mother take control of him
• Have the internal strength to maintain self-discipline and exponentially build his character and attain his goal.
Enabled by my corrupt family, this human interest story is a dramatic and despicable event caused by the founders of Staples Inc. Some people have told me that “…it’s all part of doing business”. That simply is not true for good companies and their owners. As I do, many professors teach “Business Ethics” in college. In every text book, we ask our students to be reminded of their moral responsibilities to those around them. The theft of my OfficeLand franchise stores by Staples Inc. and using my own family members to do so, crossed the line and was illegal and unethical. However, Staples Inc. also intentionally facilitated the demise of one of my franchise owners. They arranged that she lose custody of her children, prevented her from receiving life threatening mental health care, and then made sure that she could only work for them, Staples Inc. This falls far beyond unethical as I identify it as criminal andimmoral behavior on the part of Staples Inc., their founders, and their current management team. This includes their long-time CEO, Ron Sargent, who continues to cover up their hideous crime. Staples Inc. should be vilified in the court of public opinion and directly held responsible for their reckless actions. Lynn certainly paid the price of the Staples conspiracy. Now that Staples Inc. is attempting to execute a multi- billion dollar purchase of Office Depot, they should be mindful of the fact that it was Lynn‘s life and dreams of sending her children to college that was denied by Staples Inc. Her unwilling sacrifice helped Staples Inc. dominate the office products industry today. Staples Inc. owes it to her children and grand children a compensatory solution to the problem they created. Ron Sargentshould know that there is little regard today for corporate leaders and their billionaire founders to take advantage of middle-class citizens as Staples has done. Ron Sargent and the Staples Inc. Board of Directors all are aware of their founder’s fingerprints of years ago and are counting on time and their money to make it go away. Even today Sargent has demonstrated the worse possible compassion for human lives. It is why he had to setup an “Ethics Department” at Staples. Perception is not always the truth, especially at Staples Inc. For Lynn, Chris, and many others, Staples Inc. must be held accountable. Like Don Quixote, my
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reward for years of tenacity might possibly be for my daughters to realize, someday, I wasn’t the monster that they’ve been told I am.
Len Faucher was a trustee at his alma mater, The Boston Conservatory, from 2002-2007, COO of Franchise Innovators International, LLC, and presently an Adjunct Professor in Business at a Houston area college. He invites you to read evidence of his facts located on LenFaucher.blogspot.com, and his October 18, 2015 article “The Carnage Left by Staples Inc.” is available on www.BlindToCrime.com
