Heads and tales: The Dick stops here

Innocent until proven wealthy: Reporter Jay Reeves has the talker of today: A columnist published in a black-owned newspaper claims Healthsouth founder Richard Scrushy paid her $11,000 to write favorable pieces. The check came to her the same day Scrushy hired a PR agency owned by the founder of the newspaper. The PR firm also cut a check to the columnist’s preacher, one of the black clergy present at Scrushy’s fraud trial. Scrushy denies any knowledge of the payoffs. If the allegations are true, then Scrushy should run for mayor, because he’s been a bigger friend to the black community than Richard Arrington or Bernard Kincaid put together and could win in a landslide. (Thanks to Mike for the tip.)
• Writer: Scrushy Bought Sympathetic Stories [Associated Press]

Speaking of trainwrecks: Our pal Jenny Bone Miller has a report on Wednesday afternoon’s train collision in Lincoln, forcing the evacuation of 500 because one burning train had sodium cyanide. Three railroad workers and one resident were injured. “The wrecked trains blocked the escape route of about 52 residents in 30 homes along Lomar Drive. Emergency management officials ordered those residents to take shelter in their homes, closing doors and windows and turning off ventilation systems.” The Federal Railroad Administration has piles of stats, such as different causes for Norfolk Southern accidents from the last 10 years.
• Trains crash near Lincoln [Anniston Star]

Log in, tune up, drop off: Bands interested in playing at this summer’s City Stages now have an online option for “auditioning.” The three-day downtown music festival is taking submissions through April 15 via Sonicbids, which handles electronic press kits for musicians and bookings for other festivals such as North Carolina’s popular MerleFest. But will it even be called “Vines & Waldrep City Stages 2006” after the title sponsor pulled a classic rocker move and broke up after its first headlining gig?
• Submit Your Band For Vines & Waldrep City Stages 2006 (press release) [City Stages]

Also:

• Protestors seek to preserve Saks location from reverting to dirt pile
• Bar patron accepts free drink, yet fails to ‘loosen up’
• ‘Real World: Birmingham’ turns out to be seven strangers stuck in elevator

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Posted: Thursday, January 19, 2006, 2:48 pm, in Headlines.
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