There are a lot of stories and rumors that float around Gadsden, AL. It is a strange place. It is hard to describe. You can easily search its history online and see all the milestones along the way but it doesn’t explain how it became such an insulated place. It is Alabama’s “Peyton Place”. It is a place where people married too young, later divorced, and then ended up married to a friend or family member’s ex… Over and over. As we now know, it is a place where a police department can be aware of and go so far as to designate an officer to keeping an assistant district attorney away from high school girls at football games, and never hold that ADA accountable for his actions.

There are lots of rumors going back over the years about Roy Moore. From stories of an illegitimate child to closet homosexuality, stories float around like ghosts, never quite solid, always just out of reach. As the stories of Mr. Moore’s past have come to light, the suspicion of an illegitimate child isn’t inconceivable. When framed in the anger filled statements and hateful remarks against homosexuality and the fact that modern psychology tells us that this behavior is often the activity of self-loathing closet homosexuals, it isn’t inconceivable to suspect he was simply using young girls to try and prove to himself that he wasn’t gay. But this is all speculation. Speculation built on his patterns of behavior over decades, but still speculation. Setting those old ghosts aside, I decided to take a look and see if any of the classic soap opera drama of the town was part of Roy and Kayla’s world. Things got a little weird, but I’ll let you judge for yourself.

Please note that all of the information and documents here are publicly available. No special access is needed to view or obtain copies. You can visit the courthouse and obtain copies for yourself.

Kayla Moore, then Kayla D. Kisor married John Charles Heald on June 5th, 1982.

Kayla D. Kisor then married Roy Stewart Moore on December 9th, 1985.

Nothing too strange about that, is there? Well, except that she used her maiden name again on her second marriage license. And there is the fact that no divorce record for John Charles Heald and Kayla shows up in Alacourt, the state wide court records system. A statewide search, all counties, no results.

Why is there no record? The reason that was given to me, on more than one occasion, was that Roy Moore was Kayla’s divorce attorney and they did not want that information known. Is that true? I have no idea, but there are potential ethics issues here. Reading through both the American Bar Association and Alabama Bar Association rules of professional conduct points to various possible ethics violations. Given what we know about Mr. Moore now and his flagrant violations against judicial verdicts and ethics rules, it doesn’t exactly take a leap of faith to conclude there is something likely wrong with the situation. Now given, lack of evidence does not equal wrong doing. And while it is entirely possible that this is the result of a mistake, this moment does not exist in a vacuum. There are patterns of behavior that inform us as to the probability of a mistake. There is a simple way to eliminate any thoughts of wrong doing here. Produce the divorce case documents.

We also know, as per Roy and Kayla, that Roy adopted Heather at this time as well, giving her his name. Like the divorce, there is no record of the adoption. Mr. Moore, did you handle the adoption as well?

It was also presented to me that both the divorce and adoption were done without due notice to the husband and father, John Charles Heald. Court ordered divorces require public notice via publication. The paper where legal notices are published for Etowah county is The Gadsden Messenger. There should be a record of the notice in their archives, right? I know that adoptions have been performed quietly under seal in the state when it could be shown that there was some extenuating circumstance. And adoption cases under seal would not show up in court records. But once again, given that the records for both the divorce and adoption are missing and that it has been stated Mr. Moore was the attorney of record in each situation, it points to the possibility of another example of questionable ethics by Mr. Moore. Given that John Charles Heald is deceased and Heather knows her adoption status, why not release those documents as well? Show the public that you didn’t begin your family based on fraudulent legal actions…

Now… Back to another level of strange.

Kayla’s ex-husband, John Charles Heald remarried in April of 1997.

This marriage lasted until John Charles Heald passed away in 2002. Kathy, his widow got remarried in 2003. Guess who she married…

Did you notice the last name? Double check it against the two licenses at the beginning of the article. Yep. You guessed it. Kathy married Kayla Moore’s brother, Zack.

Just to clarify: Kayla Moore’s ex-husband’s widow became her sister in law a year after her ex-husband and the father of her oldest daughter passed away. Heather’s(Kayla & John’s daughter)step-mom became her aunt.

Is there something more to this or is this just a matter of Kayla’s family tree has a few less forks than usual? Who knows? I realize that people’s stories rarely follow a well defined path of what society likes to portray as “normal”, but the hate and rage, especially in the name of religion, that Mr. and Mrs. Moore have put on display has brought a magnifying glass to their actions and their history.

There are more secrets floating around Alabama about Roy Moore. Bringing them to the light of day will come with the risk of putting people in danger. A known predator like Roy Moore does not stay in power for decades without someone more powerful than him wanting him there. Open secrets and not-so-open secrets, such as those about Mr. Moore are the perfect leverage for someone to use in the manipulation of a judge, a state supreme court judge, the chief justice of the state supreme court, a US Senator.

It might be time for someone to actually map out the cases Moore adjudicated, the parties involved, the verdicts, the attorneys, the firms, and see if there are any definable patterns. As we see now, there is always a trail… Even in a small town in Alabama.

#IKnowTheresMoore