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|  | JANUARY 20, 2006
By Brian Grow Richard Scrushy's "Amen Corner"While facing charges of corporate fraud, the HealthSouth CEO cultivated influential black church leaders, many of whom were in court to see him acquittedNew details are coming to light about Richard Scrushy's financial ties to African-American pastors who supported the former CEO of HealthSouth Corp. during his successful courtroom defense here last year against criminal charges of accounting fraud at the chain of rehabilitation hospitals. One of Scrushy's former supporters, Pastor Herman Henderson of Believers Temple Church, now alleges that he was hired by Scrushy to organize black pastors to attend the trial in federal court in Birmingham and provide public relations services. These services allegedly included writing favorable articles placed in The Birmingham Times, a local newspaper serving the black community. In a group interview with BusinessWeek Online, Scrushy, his wife Leslie, and pastors from five local churches denied these allegations. Scrushy and his supporters said their relationship is based purely on their common Christian calling. The former CEO denied having entered into any contract with Henderson for PR work. Scrushy says Henderson is trying to extort money from him -- an accusation Henderson denies. TV SHOW. The controversy comes as Scrushy prepares for his next trial, scheduled to start this spring, on charges that he bribed former Alabama Governor Donald Siegelman in exchange for influence over a state hospital-regulatory body. Scrushy has pled not guilty. It isn't a secret that as Birmingham-based HealthSouth became enmeshed in controversy, Scrushy, the company's founder, cultivated ties with the city's African-American churches and clergy. After the company was raided by federal investigators in March, 2003, he began attending the predominantly black Guiding Light Church. Not long after he was indicted in November, 2003, Scrushy and his wife launched an evangelical Christian talk show on a local cable station. During his trial on charges of leading a $2.7 billion accounting fraud last year, Scrushy was often joined at each day's proceedings by a group of pastors, many of them black, who became widely known as Scrushy's Amen Corner. MEN OF THE CLOTH. In 2003, Internal Revenue Service records show that Scrushy's charitable foundation gave Guiding Light $1 million. The next year, as his trial date approached, the records show that the foundation donated more than $700,000 to religious groups, some of whose leaders joined the courthouse Amen Corner. The foundation's 2005 IRS records are not yet available. Scrushy was acquitted last June by a jury of seven black and five white members. Bishop Jim Lowe, the leader of Guiding Light Church, which has benefited the most from Scrushy's donations, attended the six-month trial about once a week, but he said in a separate interview: "Scrushy never offered me any money to do any services for him." Henderson, the 47-year-old pastor of Believers Temple Church, alleges that Scrushy hired him to win over the black community in Birmingham. Henderson says Scrushy last April also hired the Lewis Group, a public relations firm run by entrepreneur Jesse J. Lewis, as a conduit for funds paid to Henderson for organizing a prayer vigil, printing flyers, and arranging meetings with black leaders. "A LOT OF STORIES." It isn't disputed that Henderson's assistant, Audrey Lewis, (who is not related to Jesse Lewis) wrote articles reviewed by Scrushy, which were placed in The Birmingham Times. The newspaper is edited by Jesse Lewis' son, James E. Lewis, Sr. Documents obtained by BusinessWeek Online show that the Lewis Group wrote three checks worth a total of $11,000 to Henderson and his assistant. Henderson has demanded an additional $150,000 from Scrushy -- money the pastor says he is owed for past services. "We did a lot of the PR work and wrote a lot of stories," Henderson said in a separate interview. Scrushy acknowledged in the interview that his foundation had donated at least $15,000 to Henderson's church, but he said the money was for a building project and a Hurricane Katrina relief effort. Scrushy denied that he had any financial relationship with Henderson related to the trial. TALE OF THE TAPE. To prove his case, Scrushy played taped phone calls from last July which he alleges show Henderson admitting that he was never asked to do any work. But audio tape of the phone calls was muffled. Without the aid of a written transcript, the calls seemed inconclusive on this point. "He stalked us wherever we showed up," Scrushy said of Henderson. Scrushy said in the interview that he repeatedly told Henderson that they had no agreement. Scrushy said that on Apr. 7, 2004, he turned down an unsolicited contract from the Lewis Group to organize a prayer vigil -- with much of the work to be outsourced to Herman Henderson. Scrushy said he acted based on advice from his lead attorney, Donald Watkins. A note from Watkins on a copy of the contract reviewed by BusinessWeek Online says, "There is too much of chance that the government will use this event to ask for a mistrial." "COMMUNITY RELATIONS." But three weeks later, Scrushy agreed to pay $20,000 to the Lewis Group for "marketing and public relations as discussed," according to a letter obtained by BusinessWeek Online. Scrushy said he did review for accuracy "a few" of the articles written by Audrey Lewis and published in The Birmingham Times. Jesse Lewis of the Lewis Group declined to comment on Henderson's allegations. Scrushy spokesman Charlie Russell acknowledged that last spring he gave Audrey Lewis $2,500 to attend a funeral in Detroit. In exchange, she agreed to provide "community relations" in Birmingham after a verdict in the Scrushy trial, according to a copy of a May 24, 2005, contract obtained by BusinessWeek Online. JUROR DISMISSED. In a related development last week, a newly released transcript of an Apr. 19, 2005, off-the-record courtroom conversation involving the federal judge and lawyers in Scrushy's trial revealed that a complaint from a member of predominantly black Mt. Joy Baptist Church in Birmingham triggered an FBI investigation into alleged jury tampering. Judge Karen Bowdre dismissed an alternate juror who attended Mt. Joy Baptist after it was discovered that Scrushy had donated $5,000 to the church. There was no finding of wrongdoing. Scrushy said in the BusinessWeek Online interview that he donates to many churches and has preached in more than 50 in the last year. "We're just good people," he said. "We're givers."  Grow is a correspondent in BusinessWeek's Atlanta bureau
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