Reports of Dick Cheney's shooting of a hunting partner over the weekend have been sketchy at best, and a little late in coming. But what is being lost in the whole mess is just who is Harry Whittington?
Whittington, a Texas lawyer and loyal Bush Republican (read major contributor) was also at one time the head of the Texas Funeral Service Commission.
The TFSC is supposed to oversee the funeral business in Texas, keeping them honest and protecting the citizens of the great state of Texas. But under George Bush's watch, it became another of the many Bush Family Crime protection rackets.
Anybody remember Funeralgate? Or how about Formaldegate?
Back in 1999, it seems as though the largest Funeral Home corporation in Texas (and fast becoming largest in the US), Service Corporation International's (SCI) funeral homes were being investigated for bad practices in the embalming of the deceased (an outsourcing thing don't ya know). TFSC's lead investigator, Eliza May, found numerous violations and brought $455,000 in fines against SCI.
Well, as we all know, one just doesn't do that to FOB (Friends of Bush). Robert Waltrip, head of SCI and long-time Bush family contributor, made a trip to the Governor's offices to speak with Joe Allebaugh, then Bush's Chief of Staff (yup, that Joe Allebaugh, later to become head of Fema) to try and squash the investigation. While there, Bush just happened to stop by...
"According to Johnnie B. Rogers, a folksy lobbyist who now serves as SCI's lawyer, on April 15 he and Waltrip dropped off a letter at the governor's office demanding a halt to the investigation. Rogers told Newsweek that....Bush popped his head in and spotted Waltrip. 'Hey Bobby, are those people still messing with you?' Bush said, according to Rogers. When Waltrip said they were, Rogers recalled that the governor turned to him and said, 'Hey, Johnnie B. Are you taking care of him?' 'I'm doing my best, Governor,' Rogers said he replied." Michael Isikoff, Newsweek, 8/9/99
Well, surprise, surprise, Eliza May got fired. Except she didn't shut up, she sued,
At the heart of May's lawsuit is the appearance of influence buying. The suit claims Bush and a handful of state legislators sprang to SCI's defense because the funeral company gave tens of thousands of dollars in campaign contributions to the politicians. The suit delineates the many connections between Bush and SCI's chief executive officer, Robert Waltrip, who has known the Bush family for three decades. His company's political action committee gave Bush $35,000 for his 1998 campaign, and Waltrip gave Bush $10,000 for his 1994 race. Waltrip also serves as a trustee for former president George Bush's presidential library in College Station, and S.C.I. donated more than $100,000 toward the construction of the library. Given those connections, the lawsuit claims that any suggestion that Bush would not have intervened on Waltrip's behalf is "highly unlikely on its face."
So what does this have to do with Whittington? After all, the lawsuit was before he was head of the commission. Well, as incestuous as all things are when you talk about the Bush Crime Family, it seems that Whittington, appointed in 1999 at the height of the entire mess, was at the helm at the time the May's lawsuit and the case against SCI were settled.
The commission and SCI were now working on the same side - and their position was not pro-consumer. The "Funeral rule" in Texas, which required that funeral homes disclose if they are outsourcing embalming procedures to the families of the deceased, became a real problem for SCI. When a judge ruled in favor of one plaintiff who sued SCI for lack of disclosure in the embalming of his son's body, SCI was afraid of more suits. The TFCS complied by filing an amicus curiae brief that was intended to help SCI escape from what could have been an enormously expensive class-action lawsuit.
The TFSC and the funeral giant took a legal position that supported the status quo in the funeral industry - and prevents consumers from seeing how much profit funeral homes are making on certain services, like embalming. Harry Whittington, the longtime chairman of the TFSC, contended that the agency intervened in the lawsuit because it "was in the interest of the industry and the consumer."
So what did happen to the $450,000 in fines? In 2000, under the TFSC's new executive director, Chet Robbins, the agency agreed to let SCI pay administrative penalties of just $21,000 to settle the allegations.
As for May's suit, the state and SCI settled with May to receive $210,000. SCI was to pay about $55,000 and the state was to pay the rest. Funny how these things work, huh?
And another interesting side note, remember the scandal in Florida a few years back? One where the company was throwing bodies into the words rather than bury them with dignity? Where they sometimes put multiple bodies in graves? Guess who the company was? Yup, SCI. As a matter of fact, what made the case even more sordid was this...
Peter Hartmann, 45, was found dead late Wednesday in the garage of his parents' Boca Raton home, apparently from carbon monoxide poisoning. A car was running, police said, and the garage was full of smoke.
Hartmann was the general manager of the Menorah Gardens Cemetery chain that had come under fire for allegedly digging up bodies without notifying their relatives and, in some cases, losing the remains of the deceased.
Menorah Gardens is operated by Service Corporation International, one of the country's largest providers of funeral and cemetery services.
I remember following all of this back then. Hartmann was just another in a series of mysterious suicides that took place during Funeralgate, the Enron collapse, and various other sordid dealings with the Bush Family.
Whether Texas, Florida, or more recently, our own federal Government, it just goes to show it's not what you know, but who you know, that gets you ahead in this world. Well, especially if you know the Bushes!
Foir more on the whole funeral mess go
here