Family of missing woman seeking damages in court

April 11, 2011
by TONY BURBECK / NewsChannel 36

SHELBY, N.C. -- The family of a missing Cleveland County woman wants at least $750,000 in compensatory damages.

A judge hearing the case Monday said the family is entitled to pain and suffering as well, but that judge did not rule or award dollar amounts.

Mouy Tang had a hard life. She was a refugee from Cambodia who escaped violence and starvation along with her brother Tong.

"We all miss Mouy very much,” he said.

She also battled severe schizophrenia and diabetes. Tang ended up at Unique Living, an adult care operation in Fallston, where a fee of $1,000 per month was supposed to buy her healthcare and safety.

On September 3, 2008, she walked away, never to be seen or heard from again.

"They didn't care about supervision,” said Tang family attorney Neal Rodgers. “They cared about earning the money and once they earned the money they allowed these mentally impaired patients to basically fend for themselves.”

That's the crux of Rodgers’ negligence claim against Gary Jacobs and Jacobs Enterprises LLC, who Rodgers says ran the day-to-day operations at Unique Living when Tang disappeared.

"Yeah, she was free to move in and out, but she should not have been leaving the facility, opening the doors and walking out without supervision,” Rodgers said.

The doors Rodgers refers to are doors that Jacobs had promised to repair, according to testimony from Cleveland County DSS employees on Monday.

They say he promised a state of the art facility. What patients and employees got was one problem after another. The water and electricity was shut off and a refrigerator was repossessed.

"We were there at least a couple times a week,” testified Rebecca Johnson with Cleveland County DSS.

She says she pushed for the state to shut Unique Living down. The state did shut it down a week after Tang’s disappearance.

Tang's family says Jacobs should pay up for damages, emotional distress and unfair trade practices.

"To have things happen to her the way it happened is just devastating to the family."

When it comes to defending Jacobs, his LLC and Unique Living there are two empty chairs in the courtroom.

Mouy Tang was never found. Given her diabetes problem, her doctor says Tang would have gone into diabetic shock within hours since she did not have her medication. The family attorney thinks Tang may have walked into the woods and died.