Opinion ID: 752178
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Political Contributions

Text: 17 In June 1991, during a Georgia gubernatorial campaign, Jack pressured seven First American executives to attend a Zell Miller fundraiser. In fact, one executive, William Edwards, was called from vacation in the midst of home-moving and asked to attend the function. All seven executives made $500 contributions, which were then reimbursed by way of bonuses that were reported to Aetna as reimbursable salary expense. Jack testified that the contributions were purely coincidental to the bonuses, but there was no evidence that any executive who had not made a contribution received a $500 bonus at this time. When a similar scheme led to a federal indictment against another Medicare company, Jack told the worried executives that Georgia Attorney General Michael Bowers had provided First American immunity from prosecution for its actions. Bowers, who testified at trial, denied ever granting immunity to any First American-related person. 18 On two prior occasions, attempts to force lower-level employees to make campaign contributions were defeated by First American executives. In one, Jack sought to have First American's Florida employees contribute $100 apiece to the Lawton Chiles campaign, to be reimbursed by adding mileage to expense reports. Jack ultimately withdrew this request, persuaded by a Florida manager that it would get the company in trouble. Jack's demand of an Alabama manager to make campaign contributions, again to be reimbursed by padding expense reports, failed because First American's accounting department refused to approve the expense reports. 19