Balch & Bingham Served as Backdrop in Alleged Retaliation Scheme

This morning Bill Britt of the Alabama Political Reporter dropped a bombshell:  Alabama Governor Kay Ivey covered up a medical emergency she suffered in 2015 as then-Lt. Governor and then retaliated against a trooper who was stationed bedside after she allegedly suffered a series of “mini-strokes.”

Former Alabama Law Enforcement Agency Secretary Spencer Collier confirmed the cover-up and retaliation telling the Alabama Political Reporter:

“Initially the trooper was told, ‘don’t tell anyone,’” said Collier. Later, they changed the story by admitting to altitude sickness, according to Collier.

“Chief Clark said the trooper in charge of her security detail was later told to report that Gov. Ivey was suffering from altitude sickness,” Collier recalls. “That was not the case, and the trooper obviously knew that was not the case. And, pointed that out to Chief Clark, who then told me.”

But the controversy has an interesting backdrop, the law offices of Balch & Bingham. Britt reports:

But not keeping Ivey’s secret did have consequences for [Trooper Drew] Brooks.

“I received a call from her [Ivey] one morning not long after the Colorado incident, and I mean early, like six in the morning, to meet her at Balch & Bingham in Montgomery,” Collier said. The meeting at a private law office was unusual but that Ivey frequently called him directly on security matters rather than following the proper chain of command.

“Of course I immediately was concerned and thought it was a law enforcement issue. I got up, got dressed, and met her in a private office at Balch & Bingham,” he recalled. “She wanted that particular trooper [Brooks] transferred that day, effective. She stated that it was over a breach in her security protocol. She basically accused the trooper of trying to hack into her email. So she wanted him transferred.”

Collier also said he didn’t believe Ivey’s explanation for reassigning Brooks. “I did not believe Gov. Ivey’s explanation that he attempted to access her email. Such behavior would have warranted an internal investigation, and she very clearly did not want that to happen.”

Brooks was reassigned that day by noon, according to Collier. When Brooks was transferred, his pay was automatically cut 7.5 percent.

So who was at that time Ivey’s top advisor at Balch & Bingham?

None other that former partner William B. Sellers, who was appointed in 2017 to the Alabama Supreme Court by Ivey.

What honesty. What integrity. What a joke.