But last week things took an ugly new direction. Dorris’s adopted daughter Madeline, 21, has flied a Civil suit against his estate, claiming thaf she, too, was sexually abused as a child and asking for monetary damages. The complaint also alleges that Erdrich knew, or should have known, about the abuse and failed to prevent it. In a separate action, Madeline’s lawyers are contesting the will that excluded her, her adopted brother Jeffrey, 24, and Erdrich from an estate worth more than $2 million. Newsweek has learned that Jeffrey, who has made allegations of physical abuse in the past, is also in contact with a Minneapolis attorney. In an interview with NEWSWEEK, Erdrich tried to smooth over the conflicts. “I care about Madeline, and I hope we will find a way for her to be part of our family.” But the old question was back: what had gone on in their family?
Dorris and Erdrich met at Dartmouth, where he founded the Native American Studies program and she wrote “Love Medicine,” which won the 1984 National Book Critics Circle Award. Dorris won the same award for his 1989 nonfiction book “The Broken Cord,” about Abel’s fetal alcohol syndrome. The literary world marveled at their seemingly harmonious personal and professional collaboration. Understandably, they tried to keep private Dorris’s chronic depression and Jeffrey’s two trials in 1994 and 1995 for extorting money from and threatening his adoptive parents. (Neither resulted in conviction.)
This latest flare-up appeared to be triggered by Dorris’s eight-page will, made public last week. Erdrich had contacted the adopted children, both unemployed and living in Denver, and read the will over the phone. Most of Dorris’s estate was put into a private trust; the beneficiaries are his mother, his two aunts and his and Erdrich’s three biological daughters-but not Erdrich herself or the adopted children. The will also left personal belongings to such friends as actors Jimmy Smits, Kathy Bates and Carrie Fisher, and $50,000 and a Subaru Outback to his assistant, Sandi Campbell. Madeline’s lawyers plan to argue that the will was revised a month before Dorris’s death, when he was severely depressed after his separation from Erdrich. Dorris’s executor, attorney Neil Meyer, calls the petition “meritless.”
Madeline Dorris’s other suit raises more disturbing questions. Her attorney, Jeffrey Anderson, alleges that the author “physically, sexually and emotionally” abused his client as a young woman, while Erdrich did nothing about it. Dorris’s lawyer denies Madeline’s allegations; and so does Erdrich–though she pointedly addresses only the accusations against herself. People close to the family note that both Madeline and Jeffrey have had troubles with the law and problems with substance abuse; they wonder if the children are being manipulated by lawyers who smell an opportunity. “It’s interesting to watch the vultures circle the carrion of Michael Dorris,” says one of his old associates.
Still, months of accusations and rumors have worn down everybody involved. Dorris’s friends are now noticeably less passionate in his defense. Some privately say they’re unsettled by reports of the apparently upbeat author’s drinking and depression, and by rumors of concealed homosexual affairs. When asked point-blank about these rumors, Erdrich simply says, “The be-all of our relationship is that I loved him, he loved me and we had children, and that’s how it is.” She’s more categorical in denying other rumors. “Have you heard the one about how I’ve been offered a lot of money to write a book about this?” But she adds that she’s been appointed Dorris’s literary executor and will go through his manuscripts to see what might be publishable. “He trusted me with his work and his children,” she says. “And I’m going to do the best I can with them both.”
