Coulter Has Problems in Palm Beach.....

monmouth

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Mon Nov-26-07 07:31 AM
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Coulter Has Problems in Palm Beach.....

www.pbpost.com

Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

Monday, November 26, 2007

PALM BEACH — Conservative columnist Ann Coulter is nationally notorious for vitriolic broadsides, but she has been unnerved by invective she received at her Palm Beach home.

So much so that she got the county property appraiser to remove her name from public records identifying where she lives. In doing so, she won an exemption from public disclosure of her address, allowed by law for victims of stalkers or harassment.

Coulter, 45, has called Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards a homosexual slur and said she wished he would be killed by terrorists. She once said that President Clinton "could be a lunatic" and wrote of a group of widows of men killed in the World Trade Center that she had "never seen people enjoying their husbands' deaths so much."

So maybe it came as no surprise when somebody delivered a greeting card to her home in March that read in part: "You self-aggrandizing ... sociopath!! The only thing left after a nuclear war are you and cockroaches."

Her house is one of 2,674 properties in Palm Beach County whose owners are confidential in property appraiser records. Homeowners must complete an affidavit stating why they should be exempt from the state's public records law.

Florida law allows people in occupations where harm could come to them - judges, prosecutors, police officers, firefighters and child abuse investigators, for example - to remain anonymous in those records.

Also allowed an exemption from public disclosure are victims of domestic violence, aggravated stalking, harassment and aggravated battery. Coulter cited the victim proviso to get an exemption, but her application is not public record. Unlike the occupational exemption, this one expires after five years.

A person who receives an exemption must submit another affidavit requesting confidentiality every time he relocates.

Coulter, a lawyer and author, paid $1.8 million for her two-story home on a quiet street between The Breakers hotel and Worth Avenue in March 2005. Police have received a trickle of phone calls from or regarding her home since. Two of them generated police reports.

In June 2006, Coulter received several nonthreatening but antagonistic phone messages from an Alameda, Calif., man she did not know.

"Hey Ann, now that you've moved to Florida and you're in your 40s, did you know that you can join the Florida National Guard?" the man, later identified as Brian Hatoff, 58, said in one message.

"Oh, I forgot, you and your rotund buddy down the street (an apparent allusion to radio commentator Rush Limbaugh) and the vice president, you're all registered chicken hawks. You love war until you have to put your own ass on the line. I don't call that patriotism. I call it cowardice."

Coulter told police the calls were made to an unpublished phone number that only a few people knew.

After issuing a subpoena for phone records, Palm Beach police traced the calls to Hatoff.

"He admitted to making the calls and was adamant they were not threatening in nature," Detective Allen Dicks wrote in his report. "He had no explanation as to why he called Ms. Coulter."

Dicks said Hatoff found Coulter's unlisted phone number on the Internet. He promised not to call again. Apparently he didn't.

But other problems ensued. Somebody called 911 from Coulter's home on July 2, 2006, but hung up. A neighbor called in December to report a man sleeping in his car in front of Coulter's house. It turned out he was working on a job site.

Police driving by in January said Coulter was in violation of a town ordinance requiring that her house number be visible from the street. In another drive-by in June, they found her in violation of water restrictions.

The month of March, however, was the most vexing for Coulter, who did not return a phone message asking for comment.

The evening of March 25 she heard somebody screaming from a then-vacant lot next door: "Ann Coulter is a big (expletive)." Coulter called police, then went downstairs and locked a door.

When police arrived, the person was gone. Coulter opted not to file a report. But police placed a "special watch" on her home.

Coulter called again a few days later. She had checked her mailbox and found an apparently hand-delivered pink and white envelope inside. It read, "Ann Coulter!!" Below her name was a cupid heart with an arrow drawn through it.

A mash note from an admirer? Hardly. On the greeting card inside was written: "Go (expletive) yourself."

That was followed by the nuclear war-and-cockroaches sentiment, and this: "Stay out of bright lights with no makeup, you are so ugly. ... You are quite pitiable."

After an initial call to police, Coulter visited the department and handed over the card and envelope. She provided her own finger and palm prints for comparison with any lifted from the stationery. Three days later, Carl Nathan Lawson, 42, who had been a guest at Coulter's house, also went to the police department and provided his finger and palm prints for the same purpose.

When the card and envelope were tested at a lab, however, no latent fingerprints of any value were developed. The case remains unsolved.

Coulter's presence in Palm Beach has drawn attention before.

She made headlines after allegedly voting in the wrong precinct in the town council election in February 2006. A poll worker said he tried to tell Coulter on election day that she had to change the address on her registration to avoid voting in the wrong place. But he said she dashed out of the precinct before he could do so and then she voted at the wrong precinct. No charges were brought.

The Florida Commission on Ethics is investigating, and a ruling is expected soon.