Chapter 8 - THE STANTON MONEY
The Stanton issue sounded catastrophic.
It was serious.
But again, the details mattered.
The restricted Stanton fund paid campaign-production costs, and its terms expressly prohibited staged hardship imagery involving minors without proper consent.
Eric had signed a broad photo release.
Was that proper consent?
Legally, perhaps for some uses.
But the Stanton agreement required:
specific guardian consent to staged hardship depiction.
Eric had never signed that.
Rachel certainly had not.
So the campaign cost allocation violated the donor restriction.
The Stantons suspended future installments and demanded an independent investigation.
Evelyn eventually admitted approving Lily as stand-in imagery, editing Case Fourteen, and pushing staff to preserve campaign momentum.
She denied directing grant fraud or intending to harm Lily.
On the marks, she gave a statement through counsel that contradicted Lily’s account.
That issue stayed with child-safety authorities and prosecutors.
No need to collapse it into the charity audit.
Then Evelyn gave her best argument.
Winter Promise’s annual unrestricted donations had fallen 23% before the emotional-story campaign.
After the new campaign style:
coat donations rose,
food contributions rose,
corporate sponsorship rose.
Real families received more help.
She believed donor attention required emotional clarity.
She said:
“If I showed people spreadsheets, children went cold.”
The board chair responded:
“So you made one child look cold who wasn’t.”
Silence.
That was the moral center.
Then Eric received a separate letter from the foundation’s insurer.
Eric also faced scrutiny for copying private family records onto a flash drive and using Lily to carry it.
“I was trying to expose this.”
“You still used a six-year-old as your courier.”
He closed his eyes.
“Yes.”
His attorney arranged immediate surrender of the original drive to investigators.
Then Rachel opened the folded envelope Lily had carried.
Until then, everyone had focused on the phone and drive.
The envelope contained three pages.
First:
a handwritten note from Eric.
Rachel, if anything happens, give this to counsel.
Second:
a list of system passwords.
Already obsolete.
Third:
a signed document.
Not from Eric.
From Evelyn.
Title:
MINOR STORY PARTICIPATION ACKNOWLEDGMENT.
Child:
Lily Carter.
Guardian signature:
Rachel Carter.
Rachel stared.
May you like
The signature looked like hers.
She had never signed that form.
