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| Site of crash involving Burt Newsome |
An order to destroy Birmingham-area lawyer Burt Newsome came from the top of Southern Company subsidiary Alabama Power, according to a report today from banbalch.com. K.B. Forbes, publisher of the blog and CEO of its parent organization -- the CDLU public charity and advocacy group -- reports that the revelation points squarely at former Alabama Power CEO Mark Crosswhite.
A reasonable person might ask: Does Crosswhite see himself as a glorified "Godfather," summoning the services of his No. 1 hit man, Luca Brasi? Unlike the story of Vito Corleone in The Godfather, this is not fictional, and it raises many questions, including this one: Should Crosswhite and close associates be the subject of an immediate criminal investigation? From where we sit, the answer is yes. Writes Forbes:
Escalating a highly-anticipated civil RICO lawsuit, a high-level source who was once part of the inner-circle of disgraced ex-Alabama Power CEO Mark A. Crosswhite alleges that the order to destroy innocent victim Burt Newsome came from the top.
Crosswhite allegedly was doing a favor for an elite Mountain Brook friend who falsely blamed Newsome for financial woes after a successful collection effort was made on behalf of a financial institution that Newsome represented.
The allegations confirm what we wrote last December:
The alleged Alabama Power/Southern Company criminal enterprise was not only involved in intimidating, smearing, and destroying perceived enemies of Alabama Power, but also to allegedly help friends of friends or distant acquaintances retaliate or seek revenge that had no corporate purpose whatsoever.
The expenditures against Newsome make no sense and have no fiduciary purpose for the wholly owned subsidiary of a publicly traded company, Southern Company.
The agents of doom were allegedly embattled law firm Balch & Bingham and the obscure political consulting firm Matrix, founded by the Oompa Loompa of Alabama politics, the diminutive Joe Perkins, both of whom have earned millions a year from Alabama Power.
The demand to destroy Newsome included using the color of authority.
Columbiana Police Chief Jeffrey Bowers, the cop-son of former Alabama Power Vice President of Environmental Affairs Willard L. Bowers, allegedly was told in 2013 to “hide in wait” for Newsome who had a scheduled court appearance in Columbiana, the county seat of Shelby County, sources claim.
Bowers, then a police officer, participated in the staged arrest of Newsome in May of 2013. (In 2019, a nervous Bowers foolishly claimed that he had only “held” Newsome for sheriff deputies.)
The mugshot of Newsome was then sent to bankers via email the following Saturday afternoon by a Balch & Bingham partner in an alleged attempt to defame and cripple Newsome’s reputation and law practice.
The same mugshot was used in 2020 by Matrix operatives on a smear website against Newsome and us, the CDLU, that was paid for by Alabama Power falsely claiming and implying that Newsome was arrested for rape.
Less than a month after the website went live, Newsome was hit head-on in a horrific vehicle crash.
Questions still swirl around the crash, which left Newsome with a severely broken right leg and other injuries. Writes Forbes:
Was that near-death collision attempted murder?
This past January, we published an extensive post with graphics and photos about how inaccurate the accident report was and how a state trooper appeared to have been waiting to report a fatality.
We wrote in January:
The ongoing investigation has not only found that the accident report was severely inaccurate and at times false, there is now solid evidence of connections between the state trooper and a known business associate of Mark White, the most trusted advisor of disgraced ex-CEO of Alabama Power, Mark A. Crosswhite.
We have since learned from investigators that the state trooper allegedly lived across the street from the business associate of Mark White. The street is narrow, practically one lane, and on trash day, the neighbors may have spoken face to face.
Investigators claim the business associate was allegedly affiliated with White and Stover Innovations, LLC, now defunct. Mark White was a principal member of the LLC, listed by his legal first name John.
The company, dissolved in 2014, provided internet and software support to Mark White’s law firm, White, Arnold & Dowd, the same firm involved in that “phony-baloney” investigation at Southern Company.
Southern Company last month told The Wall Street Journal that the utility has “moved on” from scandal after conducting that half-baked internal investigation which concluded with no conclusion.
However, the smear website that they paid for, defaming Newsome and us, the CDLU, is still up and live.
Southern Company spent more than $40,000 in a seven-week period creating and publicizing the site. Zeke Smith, vice president of external affairs at Alabama Power, approved the expenditures that had no corporate purpose whatsoever.
A number of factors add up to create a highly disturbing scenario, and here is another question: Has one of Alabama's most respected companies been run like a branch of the Mafia? Writes Forbes:
With Southern Company acknowledging that clandestine surveillance operations were conducted by the company, documents confirming that hundreds of thousands of dollars were spent in less than two months on a campaign of fear and intimidation against Newsome and the CDLU, and a reliable source now claiming that orders to “destroy Newsome” came from the top, the alleged act of attempted murder against Newsome can no longer be dismissed.
Southern Company’s insidious, egregious, and immoral misconduct using vendors like Balch, Matrix, and White apparently hasn’t changed.
Instead of distancing themselves, or firing the unholy trinity, Southern Company continues to pay White and the agents of doom millions.
Chris Womack, the CEO of Southern Company, is now boiling in hot water for not leading the company in a new, ethical direction.
Womack, like Jim Kerr, the former chief compliance officer and general counsel at Southern Company, appears to be covering up the alleged misdeeds and criminal misconduct of Crosswhite and others.
While Southern foolishly claims that it has “moved on,” news about the call to “destroy Newsome” comes coincidentally as Newsome is “moving forward.”
Newsome has recently hired a major and seasoned civil RICO law firm that will fund a massive legal effort against the utility.
Southern Company for years looked the other way and allowed its most profitable subsidiary Alabama Power, and its “unholy” vendors to run free, like outlaws in the Wild West.
Why?
Because Alabama Power’s excessive profits helped pay for the billion-dollar cost overruns and chronic delays at two Southern Company boondoggles: The Vogtle Nuclear Power Plant in Georgia and the Kemper Plant in Mississippi.
The effort to destroy Newsome utterly backfired.
Mark A. Crosswhite resigned in disgrace last November.
Balch & Bingham has lost as much as $100 million in fees in the aggregate since 2017.
No longer feared or respected, Matrix and its founder, “Sloppy Joe” Perkins, appear to have imploded, lost major clients, and become the laughing stock of the chattering class.
The nail in Matrix’s coffin came from Florida Power and Light, which declared, “We regret ever having associated ourselves with [Matrix.]”
Regrets.
Does Southern Company have any or just too many?
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