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Sunday, May 17, 2009

Brooke Shields: Tabloid took my mother out of nursing home

By Lisa Gutierrez - May 16, 2009

Brooke Shields told People magazine that a National Enquirer reporter looking for a story checked her mother out of her assisted living home on Thursday by posing as a friend.

"I intend to take every lawful action against all who were involved or who authorized this despicable act," Shields said in a statement to the mag.

Her mother, Teri Shields, is 75 and suffers from dementia.

Staff at the New Jersey assisted living center called police to help look for the elder Shields who was allowed to leave but wound up being gone for "an extended period of time."

Police found her, unharmed, talking to a freelance journalist at a restaurant near the facility. Police questioned both the journalist and a photographer working with the reporter.

Shields said in her statement to People that: "They then drove my 75-year-old mother around looking for a tabloid story. As anyone knows who has a parent who suffers from dementia or Alzheimer's, it is one of the most difficult experiences you can go through as a son or daughter. The idea that the National Enquirer took advantage of her state is reprehensible and disgusting." 

And this was the National Enquirer's response: "A freelance reporter who has known Teri Shields for more than 10 years visited her Thursday at the assisted living facility where Brooke says she moved her. Teri asked the reporter to take her out to lunch and to run some errands. The freelance reporter then got permission from the facility to do so."

The tabloid said the facility did not "contend that there had been any wrongdoing."

Police are investigating who allowed Shields' mother to leave the facility.

Source: http://www.kansascity.com

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