Writer Says Scrushy Paid Her to Write Favorable Articles - New York Times

A writer said yesterday that Richard M. Scrushy, the former chief executive of HealthSouth, paid her through a public relations firm to produce several favorable articles for an Alabama newspaper that he reviewed before publication during his fraud trial last year. Mr. Scrushy was acquitted in June in a six-month trial there on all 36 counts against him, despite testimony from former HealthSouth executives who said he presided over a huge accounting fraud. "I sat in that courtroom for six months, and I did everything possible to advocate for his cause," Audrey Lewis, the author of the articles, said in a telephone interview.

Why does this surprise anyone? If you were fighting to stay out of jail, and you had some money, plus the smarts to seek help, wouldn't you do everything you could do to keep out of jail?

A PR firm, The Lewis Group, paid Lewis (no relation) thousands of dollars to write freelance articles to The Birmingham Times, a small but influential black newspaper.

This is just a throwback to the days when public relations counselors created front groups to steer public opinion into a more favorable position. And I doubt we've seen the end of these sorts of stunts; VNRs, Army Bloggers, and paid placements in Iraqi newspapers all come to mind. Of course, I'm being sarcastic and rightfully so. We need ethical practices that don't bring us back to the PR of the early days of propaganda. Richard Edelman explains far better than I'm currently doing here.

As for Mr. Scrushy, his public relations campaign appears to have worked. So I wonder, are these techniques something we all should shun with passion and ethical uproar, or are they just part of the working tools? Maybe some PR folks are just better at making sure they are more covert at their shenanigans than others. Or perhaps, we've finally reached the point where we're going to be embarrassed into paying attention to the ethical practice of public relations.