January 30, 2006 -- ALOOF & ABSENT ISIAH 'HASN'T BEEN A GOOD DAD': SON
BLOOMFIELD HILLS, Mich. — Isiah Thomas' secret love child broke his silence yesterday — revealing how his famous Knicks-boss dad has never once tried to contact him, and even ignored recent messages he left with his secretary.
Marc Edward Thomas Dones, 19, told The Post that he couldn't care less about the embattled Knicks president, who stands accused of sexually harassing a former team executive.
"I don't care about what's going on with him now — that's his concern," the aspiring writer told The Post yesterday while walking his dogs outside his suburban Detroit home. "Our lives are separate. He lives his and I live mine."
"He hasn't been a good dad to me. He's never returned my calls — that's just him."
Dones, whose arched eyebrows and high forehead make him the spitting image of his dad, said he'd left at least three messages for Thomas in the past month in hopes of speaking to the absent pop before his birthday Feb. 6.
"I rang because, you know, I'm turning 20," Dones said. "I think I deserve two words from him — 'hi' and 'goodbye,' something like that."
Last week, former Knicks executive Anucha Browne Sanders, 43, filed a scathing federal lawsuit against Thomas, accusing him of calling her crude names and asking for sex.
Sanders says she was fired from her job as VP for the team's marketing and business operations after she rebuffed his romantic advances in the sensational lawsuit.
The Post revealed Sunday that Thomas had a love child more than 19 years ago after a reported two-month affair with another woman while he was engaged to be married.
A spokesman for Madison Square Garden yesterday said Thomas did not wish to comment on his son's allegations, or the sexual-harassment or paternity suits.
Yesterday, Dones described how his mom, Jenni, whose last name he took, was a strong single parent who provided all the support he needed.
His mother had made sure he knew about his father as soon as he was old enough to understand.
"She's a strong woman," he said. "She told me as soon as I was cognizant. I've learned to live with it. My friends know and don't care. Those that care aren't my friends."
Jenni Dones never married and has lived with her son in a two-story town house abutting a golf course.
The woman filed a paternity suit against Thomas when she was six months pregnant in December 1985, just four months after the then-Pistons star married his wife, Lynn Kendall.
"I think they went out for a couple of months while he was engaged," Dones said. "I don't know if my mother knew about [Kendall]."
Thomas — who has two children with Kendall — settled the suit in 1987, agreeing to pay about $52,000 and provide $2,764.78 a month until Dones turned 18.
At that age, he was supposed to receive a lump-sum payment of $100,000.
Dones said he had gotten used to his absent father's fame after spending a lifetime reading about him — and his other family — in the press.
"I read about him and his kids, and I don't even think that they really know about me," he said.
He said Thomas' family had not even acknowledged him when they lived nearby.
"I suppose it hurts to see how he's treating them and how he's treating me," he said. "I am just as much his child as his other kids are."
While Dones' half-brother, Josh Thomas, 17, rushed to his father's defense over the sexual-harassment claims, Dones had no such words of comfort.
"I think he should just be a good dad," said Dones.
He said he has taken a different path from his sports-hero dad.
"We're different people," he said. "We have different lives. I'm a writer. I'm not into sports. The concept of pushing a ball around is foreign to me."
Dones said he had deferred his university plans until fall but hoped to be accepted to the University of Michigan.
"I've traveled a lot and don't plan to live in Michigan for the rest of my life," he said. "Who knows where I'll end up?"
Dones said he was trying to get work at a library, so he could be around books.
In the future, he hopes his memoir will be on those shelves. The determined author already has an agent in New York for the tell-all tale that would include details of his father's refusal to acknowledge him.
In the meantime, the aspiring author says he has penned many poems. One is dedicated to his high-school boyfriend, Ethan.
"I like poetry because it's free," Isiah Thomas once said. "You are not restricted or confined in any way."
His estranged son, however, pointed out yesterday that poetry doesn't pay the bills.
When asked what was the one thing he would say to the dad he has known only through the news, Dones yesterday declined to answer.
"What I have to say to him I'm not going to say through someone else," he said. "He's never been a part of my life. My mother and I are strong people. There's no reason to be upset about it."
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