By: Donald V. Watkins
Copyrighted and Published on May 15, 2022
BREAKING NEWS ---
On May 2, 2022, I received a cry for help from Taylor Lea Perkins, who is the 39-year-old daughter of perennial Alabama "dirty tricks" operator Joe Perkins: "I need your help !!!!. My dad is coming after me with everything he has to stop me from telling what I know about him." Ms. Perkins provided me with her cell phone number.
My news team at www.donaldwatkins.com made contact with Ms. Taylor Lea Perkins that same night. What she had to say about Joe Perkins shocked us. According to Ms. Perkins, Joe Perkins sexually abused her as a child. The abuse allegedly involved repeated acts of sexual intimacy, rape, and incest and occurred for many years.
Because Joe Perkins is a longtime political operative for Alabama Power Company, Georgia Power Company, the Southern Company, Auburn University, the Alabama Education Association, Congresswoman Terri Sewell (D-Birmingham), Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin, and a host of other power players in Alabama, Taylor Lea Perkins' allegations of rape and incest are expected to rock the world of Alabama politics for years to come.
Joe Perkins is currently working behind-the-scenes to get Republican Katie Britt elected to succeed U.S. Senator Richard Shelby (R-Alabama), who is retiring in January of 2023. His in-kind services have not been reported to the Federal Election Commission (FCC) by Ms. Britt, as required by federal law.
In 1992, Joe Perkins confessed to breaking federal election laws with his support of Congressional candidate Roy Johnson, who is his friend and a convicted felon. Perkins also signed an agreement with the FEC in which he pledged to forego political consulting work that was related to future federal elections.
Within Joe Perkins' sphere of power and influence, it may be hard for Ms. Perkins to secure criminal justice in the state of Alabama. After all, Joe Perkins is the hunting buddy of Sen. Shelby and Scott Coogler, the Chief U.S. District Court Judge for the Northern District of Alabama (which includes Birmingham and Tuscaloosa). Perkins also has close ties to a host of state and federal judges in the state, as well as the prosecutors who regularly appear before them.
Taylor Lea Perkins Says She Experienced Years of Childhood Sexual Abuse by Her Father
According to Ms. Taylor Lea Perkins, she was born at DCH Regional Hospital in Tuscaloosa, Alabama on December 12, 1982. Joe Perkins and his wife Debra raised Taylor in the Northport/Tuscaloosa area.
From the age of 3 or 4 to 12 or 13, Joe Perkins repeatedly molested, sexually abused, and raped his daughter, claims Ms. Perkins.
"When I was real little, it started in the shower when I showered with him. Then it happened during the night. He would put his hand over my mouth and nose to keep me from screaming," wrote Ms. Perkins.
Describing the first of her repressed memories of incest, Ms. Perkins said: "I was in the shower with him. He made me give him oral [sex] and after he finished, he praised me ... Then immediately [he] picked me up and turned my face towards the shower head and proceeded to waterboard me and say no one will believe you."
When we asked how many times did Joe Perkins have sex with her, Ms. Perkins said, "I don't know ... lots and I haven't remembered anal yet."
When we asked whether she ever became pregnant and had an abortion, Ms Perkins answered, "To my knowledge, I never became pregnant."
The Present-Day Effect of Taylor Perkins' Alleged Childhood Rape/Incest
Today, Taylor Perkins lives on the West Coast. She describes her life this way:
"I literally have no money and no community here. This is the way [Joe Perkins] intended it. Everyone I befriend, in time, something changes and I can tell he has gotten to them in some way. He has been trying to have me declared insane my whole life. He either wants me to kill myself or do something to get [me] committed or jailed ... Or something that leads to my death."
Ms. Perkins also describes the physical, emotional, and psychological toll that this alleged rape/incest experience has had on her life:
"I've been married and divorced four times and have no kids. I have never had a normal relationship with a man. It made me equate sex with love and feeling loved. The environment at my mother's was bad too. Extreme neglect in every way except physical. All of my physical needs were met. I sought a lot of 'love' externally through sex. I completely deny my needs, so that the very person I depend on for survival (parents => intimate partner) won't abandon me. I don't have a healthy love of self because it was never mirrored back to me, so I try to find it in men .... Just like my dad .... Probably subconsciously to prove to myself that I AM LOVABLE and finally prove my dad wrong. I have done a ton of work on me, but I was missing this final piece.... You wouldn't believe how tiring it is to live at this level of survival .... I'm so exhausted all the time."
When we asked who else has tried to help her deal with this sensitive subject, Ms. Perkins said:
"Just a few people since remembering [the repressed incidents of incest and rape]. I haven't been able to seek any help yet. I've just been doing the work myself. I've stopped letting the memories come, and it's been hard, but I'm too scared to let them come alone. I also read you shouldn't do too much trauma work when you aren't in a stable environment (I'm not currently) because there is a risk of retraumatization."
My Prior Experience Helping Child Rape/Incest Victims Suggests that Taylor Lea Perkins is Telling the Truth
Taylor Lea Perkins is the fourth alleged victim of childhood rape and incest that I have helped during my 48-year legal career. The first three victims were the three young daughters of a powerful Montgomery police lieutenant in the 1980s. Their father raped all three of them when they turned 13.
Like Taylor Perkins, these young girls coped with their rape and incest for many years believing that it was a form of fatherly love. As they got older, they knew that it was wrong and unlawful. Eventually, the girls reported the rape and incest to then-Montgomery district attorney Jimmy Evans, who was a staunch advocate for child victims of rape and incest. Evans indicted, tried, and convicted this powerful child molester.
All of the signs that these three molested girls exhibited as they grew older are now exhibited by Taylor Lea Perkins. These signs include: (a) the repressed memories of the incest that eventually come back to haunt them at a conscious level, (b) the perpetual fear of retribution from their powerful father, (c) their well-founded sense that other family members will not believe them if they report this incest, and (d) their loss of self-esteem after being raped by their father. There are no adequate words to describe a father who steals his young daughter's happiness and joy by raping her.
What is particularly troublesome in Taylor Perkins' case is the fact that Tuscaloosa County law enforcement officials have a heartbreaking reputation for failing to protect the rights of women and children rape victims. The 2015 rape case involving 19-year-old University of Alabama honors student Megan Rondini showed the world that Tuscaloosa County Sheriff's deputies and local prosecutors would not properly investigate and prosecute a powerful local white man for raping an innocent college student. Instead, these law enforcement officials formed a protective shield around the designated rape suspect. As a result, Megan Rondini committed suicide.
I do not know any law enforcement official in Tuscaloosa County, Alabama that I would trust to properly and thoroughly investigate Taylor Perkins' allegations of childhood incest and rape by Joe Perkins. They are all beholden to Joe Perkins. They are also well-aware of Perkins' seemingly unlimited ability to tap into Alabama Power Company's massive financial coffers, without invoicing and with CEO Mark Crosswhite's blessing, for any purpose he so desires.
The U.S. Attorney's Office in Birmingham is no place to turn for help in Ms. Perkins' case because its "Criminal Chief" is Lloyd Peeples. Mr. Peeples expressed his hostile views towards women when he served as an editor of his university newspaper. When Peeples headed the office's day-to-day operations as the First Assistant United States Attorney from 2017 to 2020, the office had an abysmal record of stopping child sex trafficking in Alabama. This simply was not a priority for Peeples, who is a Donald Trump-era Department of Justice "holdover" official.
What is worse, the U.S. Attorney's office in Birmingham is effectively controlled by Alabama Power Company, which has demonstrated its longstanding ability to "fix" federal criminal cases involving the company's senior management executives. The public witnessed this occurrence happen twice -- once in 1980 with the "Coal Fraud Trial" and again in 2018 with the "North Birmingham Bribery Trial."
No law enforcement agent or judicial official has ever been held accountable for "fixing" criminal cases in the Birmingham federal courthouse. Because Alabama is run by an old white male oligarchy that has very little respect for women, this situation is not likely to change in the near future.
Epilogue
Alabama is a state where an accused child molester almost won a U.S. Senate seat in the 2016 general election. Former Alabama Supreme Court Justice Roy Moore, who was the Republican nominee in the race for the open Senate seat that year, lost the statewide election by only 2,000 votes, despite the fact that (a) multiple women publicly accused Judge Moore of molesting them when they were young girls and he was a popular young state prosecutor, and (b) Moore had been removed from the state's Supreme Court (twice) because he violated federal court orders and his judicial cannons of ethics.
At www.donaldwatkins.com, we take Taylor Lea Perkins' allegations of incest and rape very seriously. We have heard Ms. Perkins' cry for help and we are committed to helping her get the support she needs. Part of this support is justice in the criminal court system.
To Taylor Lea Perkins, we say this: Suicide is NOT the answer. True holistic love is. You are NOT alone anymore. We will NOT abandon you. We will work through your trauma together. Nobody can bully us or cause us to stand down in the pursuit of justice for you. We are willing to pay any price to protect the sanctity of your womanhood and restore your dignity as a human being. If your allegations of rape and incest are true, which we believe they are, then you have survived one of the most horrific ordeals that a father can inflicted upon his young daughter.
We have a long and documented track record of standing up for women and children from all walks of life who have been sexually abused by family members, friends, and others. We have never backed down in the face of threats from rapists or child molesters, no matter who they were.
We are committed to Taylor Lea Perkins' survival, her full recovery as a reported victim of incest and rape, and the prospect of helping her enjoy a happy life that is free of shame, pain, blame, and loneliness.
The sun always shines on the other side of midnight and we will make sure that Taylor Lea Perkins gets to bask in the warm glow of this sunshine. She is now loved for all of the right reasons.
[Author's Note: I was not able to reach Joe Perkins for comment about the subject of this article prior to its publication. Mr. Perkins is welcome to publish his response to Ms. Taylor Lea Perkins' allegations on my social media platforms.]
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