NFL star’s widow sues over daughter’s care
Third wife of Cowboys quarterback Meredith claims second wife failing to support disabled woman
Susan Meredith of Santa Fe — the third wife of the late Dallas Cowboys quarterback and Monday Night Football commentator Don Meredith — is involved in a court fight with his second wife, Cheryl King.
Susan Meredith this week filed a lawsuit claiming King has failed to help support a disabled daughter King had with Don Meredith. The lawsuit comes after a Santa Fe judge last month granted King’s request to reopen the probate case involving Don Meredith’s estate.
Susan Meredith’s complaint in state District Court in Santa Fe says the daughter, Heather Meredith, who was born in 1969 in Dallas, has been institutionalized since she was 18 months old and will need to remain in an institution for the rest of her life.
The complaint says Don Meredith, who moved to Santa Fe after he retired from his post-quarterbacking career as a television personality and actor, established a trust to provide for his disabled daughter’s continued care and contributed to it while he was still alive.
Following his death in Santa Fe in 2010, Meredith’s estate went through probate in Santa Fe, and Susan Meredith was made conservator of his daughter’s trust.
But according to court records, a court in Kentucky, where Heather Meredith lives, made King temporary guardian of her daughter in July 2017. And in November, state District Court Judge Raymond Ortiz of Santa Fe granted King’s petition to reopen the probate case.
King has since asked a judge to appoint Santa Fe attorney Christopher Cullen as Heather Meredith’s guardian ad litem, meaning he would represent the disabled woman’s best interests in any court proceeding. That petition is still pending. Cheryl King now lives in Comfort, Texas, according to court records. Attempts to contact her there Thursday were unsuccessful. Her Santa Fe attorney, Daniel J. Monte, could not be reached for comment after business hours Thursday.
Susan Meredith says in her complaint that after her husband’s death, she continued to supplement the trust that has paid for Heather Meredith’s care.
But, the complaint says, King “has not contributed to the support of Heather Meredith in any respect and has abrogated her parental obligation of support of her disabled child.”
In addition, the lawsuit states, King “placed Heather in various institutions, including a drug rehabilitation center, which have at various times neglected Heather’s care,” and has “only occasionally” visited her daughter.
The complaint contains a copy of a 1988 agreement from a court in Tarrant County, Texas, which appears to place the financial responsibility of caring for Heather Meredith primarily on her famous father’s shoulders.
But the complaint says “state and common law” requires that parents provide care and support for permanently disabled dependents, and it says that “it would be against public policy to release or absolve a parent of such duty.”
“As such,” the complaint says, “insofar as the Texas Order can be read to release or absolve [King] from her duty … such portion of that order is against public policy, inequitable and is void.”
Susan Meredith’s complaint was filed by Santa Fe attorney Kurt Sommer, who did not return a call seeking comment Thursday.
Heather Meredith is the youngest of two children that Don Meredith had with Cheryl “Chigger” King, who has been described in various accounts as an artist and accomplished horsewoman. Son Michael Meredith is an independent filmmaker who is working on a feature-length documentary about the 1960s Dallas Cowboys.
In a July article about the project in The Dallas Morning News, Michael Meredith told an interviewer that he was 4 when his parents separated, after which “he and his mom lived in Italy and an ashram in India. He dotted the U.S. map, living in Fort Worth (her hometown), Houston and two places his dad lived — Beverly Hills, Calif., and Santa Fe, N.M.”