The Fall of the House of Zeus (62 page)

2
Zach’s temporary …
Interviews with Zach Scruggs, Lowry Lomax.

3
Joey Langston …
Motion for Downward Departure, filed by Robert H. Norman, assistant U.S. attorney, in U.S. District Court, Northern District of Mississippi, Nov. 13, 2008.

4
Patterson walked …
Transcript of sentencing of Steve Patterson, U.S. District Court, Northern District of Mississippi, Feb. 13, 2009.

5
He had …
Interview with confidential source.

6
Prosecutors praised …
Transcript of sentencing of Tim Balducci, U.S. District Court, Northern District of Mississippi, Feb. 13, 2009.

7
After fourteen years …
“Friends Reflect on the Legacy of Robert Khayat,”
University of Mississippi Lawyer
(Spring/Summer 2008).

8
Wilson v. Scruggs … “Scruggs Hit with Another Lawsuit,” Holbrook Mohr, Associated Press,
Commercial Appeal
, Jan. 14, 2009.

9
Wilson finally settled …
Interviews with Zach Scruggs, confidential sources; conversation with Roberts Wilson, 2010.

10
In 2009
,
Grady Tollison …
Email from Tollison Law Firm to members of the Southeastern Region of the American Board of Trial Advocates (SEABOTA), April 15, 2009.

11
In his most …
Prepared speech at Council on Litigation Management annual conference, Phoenix, Arizona, delivered by U.S. attorney Jim Greenlee, March 12, 2009.

12
Back home …
“Newly Renovated Courthouse Packed for Judge Investiture,” Alyssa Schnugg,
Oxford Eagle
, May 18, 2009.

13
In court …
Order dismissing contempt in
U.S.A. v. Richard F. Scruggs and the Scruggs Law Firm
, issued by U.S. District Judge Roger Vinson, U.S. District Court, Northern District of Alabama, Feb. 29, 2008.

14
Undeterred …
“Judge Fines Scruggs, Rigsby Sisters,” Anita Lee,
Sun Herald
, June 6, 2008.

15
In July 2009 …
Order vacating judgment of contempt against
Richard F. Scruggs, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, July 21, 2009.

16
His case …
Report by U.S. House Judiciary Committee, April 2008.

17
Minor filed …
Order reversing three counts of Paul Minor’s conviction, issued by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, Dec. 11, 2009.

18
But earlier …
Interview with Bill Minor; “Paul Minor Is Not Allowed to Attend His Wife’s Funeral,”
OpEdNews.com
. April 20, 2009.

19
Karl Rove …
Transcript of interview with Karl C. Rove by the staff of the U.S. House Judiciary Committee, July 7, 2009.

20
Scruggs asked …
Interview with Diane Scruggs.

21
Two months …
Letter from Dick Scruggs to Curtis Wilkie, Oct. 30, 2008.

22
“I got promoted …
Letter from Scruggs to Wilkie, June 18, 2009.

23
His first instinct …
Interview with Dick Scruggs; plea agreement in
U.S.A. v. Richard F. Scruggs
, filed in U.S. District Court, Northern District of Mississippi, Feb. 9, 2009.

24
He told …
Transcript of sentencing of Dick Scruggs, U.S. District Court, Northern District of Mississippi, Feb. 10, 2009.

25
While he …
Interview with Dick Scruggs.

26
The prosecutors …
Interviews with confidential sources.

27
One of the most …
Interviews with Dick Scruggs, confidential sources; letter from Scruggs to Wilkie, June 25, 2009.

28
Even as he …
Transcript of sentencing of Scruggs, U.S. District Court, Northern District of Mississippi, June 27, 2008.

29
He spent …
Interview with Diane Scruggs.

30
In the fall of 2009 …
Letter from Scruggs to Wilkie.

31
Diane was capable …
Interview with Diane Scruggs.

32
At the end …
“Hinds Judge’s Plea Calls for 18 Months,” Jerry Mitchell,
Clarion-Ledger
, July 31, 2009.

33
The sentence …
Transcript of sentencing of Bobby DeLaughter, U.S. District Court, Northern District of Mississippi, Nov. 13, 2009.

34
But there was …
“This Is Over,” Patsy R. Brumfield,
Northeast
Mississippi Daily Journal
, July 31, 2009.

35
In January …
“Indicted Agent’s History Shows Feud with U.S. Attorney’s Office,” Patsy R. Brumfield,
Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal
, Jan. 15, 2010.

36
Neilson’s fellow agents …
Interviews with confidential sources.

37
A week after …
“US Attorney Set to Retire,” Alyssa Schnugg,
Oxford Eagle
, Jan. 21, 2010.

38
The money is wired …
Interview with Rex Deloach.

39
Bainberry is not …
Email from Kenneth J. Schrad, director, Division of Information Resources, State Corporation Commission, Richmond, Virginia, to Wilkie. Aug. 18, 2009.

D
ick Scruggs is my friend.

So are many other characters with roles on all sides of the political, civil, and criminal conflicts in this story.

John Hailman, who triggered the investigation against Scruggs, shared an office suite with me at the Overby Center for Southern Journalism and Politics at Ole Miss following his retirement from the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

On the same campus, fifty years earlier, Robert Khayat was my platoon sergeant in Army ROTC. He has been a pal ever since.

I attended Ole Miss with several attorneys and officials who appear in the book, including Charlie Merkel, Crymes Pittman, Trent Lott, Thad Cochran, Joe Colingo, George Shaddock, and Ed Peters. I don’t remember Peters from that period, but knew the others when we were students.

Judge Neal Biggers and I graduated, several years apart, from the same small public high school in Corinth, Mississippi.

Jack Dunbar has been a close friend from the time we were young men living in Clarksdale, Mississippi, in the 1960s.

During that long-ago time when I was a reporter for
The Clarksdale Press Register
, I covered a local high school football team coached by Grady Tollison and enjoyed our postmortems following each game.

Danny Cupit and I were both antiwar delegates on a biracial Mississippi delegation seated at the 1968 National Democratic Convention in Chicago.

A few years later, as a reporter for the
News-Journal
papers in Wilmington, Delaware, I got to know a bright young New Castle County councilman named Joe Biden and wrote about his rise to the U.S. Senate in 1972.

Frank Trapp is my wife’s first cousin.

After Bobby DeLaughter successfully prosecuted Byron De La Beckwith—a trial I covered for
The Boston Globe
in 1994—I got to know him through our mutual friend, the late Willie Morris. We all wrote books that dealt with the racial transformation of Mississippi. If one finds these volumes today, an inspection of the covers will show that I provided a blurb for Bobby’s book and he did the same for mine.

The fabric of Mississippi is woven with interlocking interests. In the Scruggs case, that intimacy is especially acute for those who graduated from Ole Miss or live today in Oxford. These relationships were invaluable to me as I pursued this book. But not all of the people I’ve mentioned above chose to talk with me in connection with my work—and a couple of them quit speaking to me altogether during the course of the book project.

It’s a story, I found, where passions and personal hatreds run high.

D
uring the two years that I spent developing this book, I spoke with many old friends and made dozens of new acquaintances. I’m deeply grateful to everyone who was willing to share information and their thoughts with me.

I conducted more than two hundred interviews. In some instances, I had multiple discussions, which lasted hours, with a number of individuals who were especially generous with their time. Some of these talks were confidential. In many cases, I was free to use material given to me, but under the condition that their names not be connected with direct quotes or assertions. As a result, I’m unable to publish a complete list of sources to acknowledge. I thank all of these individuals nonetheless. Without their cooperation, the sweep of this book would not have been possible.

In my research, I acquired literally thousands of pages of documents: Old depositions. Court transcripts. Copies of email traffic. Exchanges of letters. Extensive evidence obtained by the FBI through surveillance. Critical testimony from witnesses, including information that has never been made public. Much of this was shared with me in confidence.

I’ve cited sources from many books and publications in the endnotes but should single out Michael Orey’s
Assuming the Risk
as an especially useful guide through the tobacco wars.

Dialogue in the book comes from different sources. Many of the conversations are taken directly from secretly recorded FBI wiretaps and video disks. Courtroom scenes are based on transcripts and on my notes from court sessions I attended. Some quotes come from private depositions made available to me.

In other instances I reconstructed dialogue based on the recollection of participants in conversations. In gathering material, I was struck by
how consistent these accounts were, regardless of whether the words came from defendants or prosecutors. When I had only one source, I served as my own judge in determining whether to use the language given to me.

In the end, I take full responsibility for the accuracy of these quotes and for any assertions contained in the text.

I can, at least, offer thanks to my wife, Nancy, who endured the long project and encouraged me throughout this process, and to other members of my family. My son Carter, a published author himself, offered valuable suggestions for the manuscript, while my son Stuart, daughter, Leighton, and six grandchildren provided moral support.

Many thanks, as always, to my agent, Deborah Grosvenor, who understands the publishing world far better than I.

I am very grateful to John Glusman, my editor at Harmony Books, who had faith in this project from the time he looked at my proposal in early 2008 to its completion. And to his assistant, Domenica Alioto, who ensured that every
T
was crossed properly.

Special thanks, too, to my old friend, Charles Overby, who made me a fellow at the Overby Center for Southern Journalism and Politics and provided me with a wonderful place to work; to Dawn Jeter, our invaluable office manager at the center; and to Caleb Ballew, a law student who tracked down some valuable research.

15.1
Courtesy of the Scruggs family

15.2
Courtesy of the Scruggs family

15.2a
Courtesy of the Overby Center for Southern Journalism and Politics

15.3
Bruce Newman/Oxford Eagle

15.4
Bruce Newman/Oxford Eagle

15.5
Bruce Newman Oxford Eagle

15.6
Bruce Newman/Oxford Eagle

15.6a
Courtesy of the Scruggs family

15.7
Courtesy of the Scruggs family

15.8
Greenwood Commonwealth

15.8a
Courtesy of the Scruggs family

15.8b
Bruce Newman/Oxford Eagle

CURTIS WILKIE graduated from the University of Mississippi in 1963. He was a national and foreign correspondent for the
Boston Globe
for twenty-six years. Wilkie is the author of
Dixie
and coauthor of
Arkansas Mischief.
He and his wife, Nancy, live in Oxford, where he teaches journalism and is a fellow at the Overby Center for Southern Journalism and Politics at Ole Miss.