BATON ROUGE – Judge Janice Clark, the mother of Council on Aging Director Tasha Clark Amar, has been assigned to hear a lawsuit her daughter filed against a family who has been interviewing with media outlets over how Amar handled their deceased family member's will.

Clark Amar filed the defamation of character lawsuit in April. The WBRZ News 2 Investigative Unit was first to report details of the lawsuit HERE. Clark Amar said she has suffered various issues – suffering from mental anguish, distress, medical and pharmaceutical expenses, inconvenience, fear and fright, embarrassment, humiliation, aggravation, loss of ability to participate in normal activities, emotional distress, pain and suffering, loss of reputation, and loss of earning capacity – following the family of Helen Plummer discussing their concerns with WBRZ.

Clark Amar was set to make nearly $120,000 over the next twenty years after being named head of Plummer's estate. Original WBRZ news stories highlighted issues with Clark Amar being the overseer of the will since Plummer was a Council on Aging attendee. Other possible problems included the attorney for the will being both involved with the Council on Aging and an employee of the organization that handled the will.

Clark Amar sued the family earlier when the family tried to block her from collecting on the estate. Clark Amar dropped the original suit after various WBRZ reports. The latest lawsuit deals with Clark Amar claiming she has been defamed by the family who continues to discuss the issue with Chief Investigator Chris Nakamoto.

The defamation lawsuit was filed at the end of April, when it was also randomly assigned to Judge Clark. Legal scholars said Friday, while it was pure coincidence it was assigned to Clark Amar's mother, Judge Clark should recuse herself – and were surprised she hadn't almost two weeks later.  When checked Friday, the Clerk of Court said it has nothing on file from Judge Clark asking for the lawsuit to be re-allotted or a letter of recusal. 

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