Mark A. Crosswhite, the disgraced ex-Chairman and CEO of Alabama Power who was ousted in November, demanded the creation of the money laundering entity called the Alliance for Jobs and the Economy (AJE) in the the North Birmingham Bribery Scandal, according to an explosive report published yesterday on DonaldWatkins.com.
The explosive report includes an email exchange between Matthew W. Bowden, the former Senior Vice President and General Counsel at Alabama Power and Steven G. McKinney, the former Balch & Bingham partner who was indicted and later acquitted during the North Birmingham Bribery Trial.
DonaldWatkins.com writes:
[AJE] was an Alabama Power Company-inspired creation.
McKinney explained to Bowden that AJE was the entity that former Alabama Power CEO Mark Crosswhite “preferred” to deal with the company’s North Birmingham Superfund cleanup problem in 2015.
In his March 18, 2015 email, McKinney told Bowden that AJE is the “special purpose 501-c-6 entity Mark [Crosswhite] preferred over having BBA [Birmingham Business Alliance] respond to EPA’s expanded Superfund theories and GASP’s Toxic City campaign. The Alliance for Jobs and the Economy.”
The AJE was set up to launder over $360,000 in bribes to former State Representative Oliver Robinson who was sentenced to 33 months in federal prison for his corrupt acts.
We, the CDLU, have learned that the email exchange, among thousands of documents, was provided to the U.S. Department of Justice under subpoena during the criminal investigation of North Birmingham but disgraced ex-U.S. Attorney Jay E. Town allegedly buried it, ignored it.
Town, who was photographed slamming back cocktails with Crosswhite at the Moon Shine Lounge allegedly at the height of the criminal trial, allegedly consented to a secret deal to keep Alabama Power “unmentionable” during the North Birmingham Bribery Trial.
Mark White, a white-collar criminal attorney and Crosswhite’s most-trusted advisor, was at the trial every day, according to courthouse observers. Others allege that any mention of Alabama Power had to be cleared by White.
Now with this new explosive report, at a minimum, Crosswhite should have been called as a witness at the North Birmingham Bribery Trial.
Instead, Crosswhite appears to have been protected by Town.
We have been consistently told since October of 2021 that Crosswhite and Alabama Power are under investigation for alleged criminal obstruction of justice.
In February’s earnings call, the Chairman and CEO of Southern Company, Tom Fanning, stated that Crosswhite resigned because “he had some issues he wanted to deal with.”
What are these issues?
A potential criminal indictment? Obstruction of justice? Racketeering?
