Tuohy family lawyers say Michael Oher knew he was in conservatorship and wrote about it in 2011

The legal team for the family featured in "The Blind Side" is speaking out, saying that former NFL player Michael Oher has known for years he was not legally adopted and instead under a conservatorship.

Oher, now 37, claimed in a new court petition obtained by NBC News that the Tuohys had told him he was being adopted in 2004 but instead he signed a petition for a conservatorship under them.

Their story, with the adoption arc as a central plot point, was featured in the 2009 movie "The Blind Side," starring Sandra Bullock and Tim McGraw as Sean and Leigh Ann Tuohy.

The petition states that the movie, which made over $309 million worldwide at the box office, according to Box Office Mojo, paid the Tuohys and their now-adult birth children each $225,000, plus 2.5% of the movie’s defined net proceeds. The petition alleges that Oher earned nothing.

The petition claims that the Tuohys “have enriched themselves at the expense" of Oher. Court documents show Oher says in February 2023, “to his chagrin and embarrassment” he learned that the “Conservatorship to which he consented on the basis that doing so would make him a member of the Tuohy family, in fact provided him no familial relationship with the Tuohys.”

Oher's petition also seeks to end the Tuohys’ conservatorship and to stop them from using his name, image and likeness. He also wants a full accounting of the money the Tuohys have earned as his conservators, and to have the couple pay him his share of the profits as well as unspecified “compensatory and punitive damages.”

Oher also claimed in his petition that the couple used their legal power as conservators to negotiate a business deal with Twentieth Century Fox for the film and have continued to misrepresent themselves as his adoptive parents to promote their foundation, the Making it Happen Foundation, and Leigh Anne Tuohy’s profile as an author and motivational speaker.

On Aug. 15, the Tuohy family's California-based lawyer, Marty Singer, said in a statement that Oher's petition was a "shakedown" for money, conveniently timed to the release of the former football player's new book.

Following Singer’s statement on Aug. 15, Oher’s attorney Don Barrett gave the following comment to NBC News:

“We try cases in the courtroom based on the facts. We have confidence in our judicial system and in our client Michael Oher. We believe that justice will be served in the courtroom, and we hope to get there quickly.”

Then, on Aug. 16, two Tennessee-based lawyers the Tuohy family hired — Steve Farese and Randall Fishman — spoke to local media from Memphis.

"This lawsuit, this petition, was built around an alleged fact that Mr. Oher did not know that he was not the adoptive son, but rather there was a conservatorship," Fishman said. "He alleges he just found that out in February of 2023. Fact of the matter is, he wrote a book in 2011. In 2011, he acknowledged in that book on three separate occasions in that book, that there was in fact a conservatorship."

Oher wrote about the conservatorship in his 2011 book

TODAY viewed the book Fishman referenced — "I Beat The Odds: From Homelessness, to The Blind Side, and Beyond," which was published in 2011 and co-authored by Don Yaeger — and Oher had written about the paperwork he signed on that fateful day.

"It kind of felt like a formality, as I’d been a part of the family for more than a year at that point," he wrote in the book. "Since I was already over the age of eighteen and considered an adult by the state of Tennessee, Sean and Leigh Anne would be named as my 'legal conservators.' They explained to me that it means pretty much the exact same thing as 'adoptive parents,' but that the laws were just written in a way that took my age into account. Honestly, I didn’t care what it was called. I was just happy that no one could argue that we weren’t legally what we already knew was real: We were a family."

Oher wrote that the morning was a "joyful" time for him — they'd all gone out to brunch to celebrate afterward and his biological mother had been there and "supportive of the whole thing."

"My mother was going to be at the hearing to agree that she supported the decision to have the Tuohys listed as my next of kin and legal conservators," Oher wrote, adding that the "court hearing was quick — probably only about fifteen or twenty minutes, beginning to end. My mother was supportive of the whole thing and there wasn’t a whole lot of emotion all around because it was just a matter of formalizing the way we’d all been living for the past year."

After the Tuohys’ legal team’s press conference on Aug. 16, Oher’s team sent TODAY.com the following statement:

"We continue to stand with Michael and the statement he released. We also concur with his attorney, Don Barrett, we believe that justice will be served in a courtroom where cases are based on facts."

Why the Tuohys say Oher was under a conservatorship

Fishman also said in the Aug. 16 press conference that the conservatorship had only happened to give Oher the opportunity to attend the University of Mississippi. He said that the NCAA had told them that Oher had to become "part of the family," due to Sean Tuohy being a booster for the school.

In an interview with The Daily Memphian, Sean Tuohy said that because he played basketball at Ole Miss and was an active supporter of the school, he would qualify as a "booster" under NCAA rules.

"Michael was obviously living with us for a long time, and the NCAA didn’t like that,” Tuohy said. “They said the only way Michael could go to Ole Miss was if he was actually part of the family. I sat Michael down and told him, ‘If you’re planning to go to Ole Miss — or even considering Ole Miss — we think you have to be part of the family. This would do that, legally.’ We contacted lawyers who had told us that we couldn’t adopt over the age of 18; the only thing we could do was to have a conservatorship."

TODAY.com reached out to NCAA for comment but did not immediately hear back.

Fishman explained that Oher had signed the conservatorship papers on Dec. 7, 2004. National Signing Day, the day top tier recruits announce where they have chosen to attend university, was Feb. 2, 2005, he said.

"They (the Touhy family) sought legal counsel and basically, they wanted to give him the opportunity to choose whatever he wanted to go," Fishman said, adding they did not tell Oher to attend Ole Miss but that was "his choice."

"But in order to get that done, they had to make him, as I say, part of the family," he said. "That’s the route they chose. You had a very short period of time between the time that that occurred and National Signing Day. And I think the rest is history as it relates to football."

TODAY has obtained and viewed the documents signed by Oher and the Tuohy family on Dec. 7, 2004, which state that Oher was entering a conservatorship.

Tuohys say Oher managed his own career and money

Fishman went on to say that the Tuohys had not managed Oher or his finances after college. He said Oher hired his own agents, entered his own contracts, and managed his own money. The only exception, Fishman said, was the Tuohys sent Oher his checks for the film and its residual payments.

Fishman said that while Oher was in college, he wasn’t allowed to earn money per NCAA rules, so they collected the money for him in the interim. He said that following Oher’s days at Ole Miss, they spoke with his agents and Oher suggested they “leave it like it is” — meaning, they continued to send him the money after getting the payments.

“So Michael got every dime he had come in,” Fishman said, with Farese adding, “And (the Tuohys) paid the taxes on it for him.”

Farese said that about 10 years ago, Oher and the Tuohy family became estranged. Farese said the family set up a trust fund for Oher's oldest child, MJ, and continued depositing "The Blind Side" checks there.

Oher is also father to a biological daughter, Naivi, and stepfather to a son Kobi and daughter Kierstin with his wife, Tiffany Roy.

How much the Tuohy family says they made off 'The Blind Side'

The Tuohy family's legal team estimated that, in total, each member of the family — the Tuohys, their two biological children, and Oher — made "about $100,000" each off the film.

This estimate is similar to NBC News' reporting. A source close to the Tuohys tells NBC News, the Tuohys have received approximately $700,000 total in rights, payments and profits, which was intended to be divided between the family members — Sean, Leigh Anne, their two biological children and Oher. 

The source says all of that was split five ways with Oher and adds “The Tuohys have not received millions of dollars from the movie. They have not even received $1 million from the movie.”

Farese added that the Tuohys "never needed" the money from Oher.

"Mr. Tuohy sold his company for $220 million dollars. He didn't need Mr. Oher's money," he said. "This is a sad day."

Why didn't the Tuohys dissolve Oher's conservatorship sooner?

Farese and Fishman implied that the Tuohys hadn't thought sooner to dissolve the conservatorship.

"Frankly, nobody even thought about it," Fishman said. "They would have done anything to help him had he needed them to, but he negotiated his own deals and made his own money and I think he made $34, $35 million dollars playing right tackle football."

They said if Oher wants to terminate his conservatorship, "we're ready to do so."