Some of Britney Spears' fans have turned their attention to the Star Trek actor. A group of Free Britney activists and fans of Nichols demonstrated outside the Stanley Mosk courthouse in Los Angeles last week.
Since last year, Nichols has been living under a court order. Kyle Johnson petitioned to be his mother's conservator after her former manager was accused of abusing her. Protesters think that Nichols wants to leave the arrangement.
The original Star Trek television series featured the role of Lieutenant Nyota Uhura. Dr Martin Luther King Jr persuaded her to stay on the show when she was considering leaving to pursue roles on Broadway, as she was the first Black woman to play a leading role on 1960s TV. Black female actors of the time were usually limited to playing the part of maids or other racist caricatures. She was the first female African American actor to place her handprints in front of the Chinese Theatre.
Her influence was felt on and off screen. After speaking out against the lack of diversity in the space agency, Nichols volunteered to work with the space agency making recruitment and training films, and advocated for people such as Mae Jemison to reapply after being rejected. The first black woman in space was a fan of the man.
We are going to do everything we can to make sure that there is lasting change for everyone who is trapped in this corrupt system.
The Free Nichelle campaign is being led by a producer and actor who first met Nichols. Several pictures and videos with Nichelle Nichols on her social media are proof that she is carrying out her wishes. Fawcette believes that Nichols is being abused by her son and that she does not need a conservatorship.
The court has so far declined to intervene and recently ruled that Fawcette does not have standing to lodge her complaints.
There is no question that Nichols has dementia. There were indications that former manager Bell may have been involved in getting Nichols to sign paperwork giving him power of attorney when he was hospitalized for pancreatitis. Bell's family alleges that after getting Nichols to grant him power of attorney, Bell transferred the deed on her home to himself, triggering the petition for conservatorship. Bell insists that he was helping the star get back on her feet financially, despite the fact that he first met her in 2010.
Why are fans protesting against her son when she has already been rescued from an abusive situation? According to the suit, Nichols doesn't need a conservator, just support in managing her affairs. She claims that Kyle Johnson acted against his mother's wishes by selling her home and moving her to New Mexico. Protesters are concerned that Johnson may not be an adequate caregiver for his mother, which highlights a problem not only with the system of conservatorships, but also with the lack of other options for people who may not be capable of caring for themselves.
After a mild stroke in 2015, Nichols may not have retained the cognitive facilities that she had. One year after the stroke, the Guardian's Simon Hattenstone interviewed Nichols and she seemed to have bounced back, needing only some assistance from a live-in assistant/therapist. There is no way to know if her good days outweigh her bad days, or if she is unable to care for herself. Given reports that Gilbert Bell tried to take her house in order to prevent her son from having access, brief public appearances may not be the best indicator of her capacity to care for herself.
Elder care in America is very expensive, but memory care is very expensive, costing an average of $6,935 a month for a facility that specializes in structured care. It costs an average of $54,000 a year for a trained caregiver to care for someone in- home. It's not clear if Nichols had the funds for either option after Bell's alleged financial abuses. His family believes he stole hundreds of thousands of dollars from her under the guise of being her manager. Financial exploitation is one of the most common forms of elder abuse, and a common consequence is elders who are unable to age in place.
Kyle Johnson states that the money from the sale of the house will go to his mother's care. The case will continue in New Mexico, according to Fawcette.
Assets of more than $50 billion are controlled by the people who run the cases. Laws vary from state to state, but under many systems those living under the care of a conservator have almost no rights.
The Spears case has led to the review of California's laws around conservatorship. A bill is being proposed by Brian Maienschein that would make it easier to end a conservatorship.
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