Meltdown: Andy2K, Matrix, and Sloppy Joe
Sloppy Joe appears to not have had strong internal controls or high-end security to protect himself or his clients even though he was paid millions.
Andrew “Andy2K” Campbell, the illustrious attorney who represents embattled law firm Balch and Bingham, also represents Matrix, the obscure political consulting firm, and its founder Joe Perkins.
Andy2K picked up his nickname after he donated $2,000 to Judge Carole Smitherman, the Queen of the secretive Star Chamber, at the height of the Newsome Conspiracy Case, just weeks before he became lead counsel for Balch. Smitherman was the presiding judge.
While the Newsome Conspiracy Case has exhausted all state legal remedies, a federal civil RICO will be filed against Balch and others after more indictments are handed down.
Andy2K was also involved in his own bitter law firm divorce in 2018. His former partners and owners at Campbell Guinn alleged that Andy2K “failed to comply with operating agreements….has failed to distribute funds due and has further failed to provide an accounting thereof,” according to a lawsuit filed against him in August of 2018.
The law firm collapsed and the lawsuit was finally settled in 2019.
Now in 2022, the new and improved Campbell Partners is center stage of the theatrics of the Matrix Meltdown.
Last week, the firm dispatched a laughable demand letter to donaldwatkins.com after the news site/blog posted two “non-existent” contracts between Perkins’ entities and Alabama Power. The contracts were worth over $2.5 million, required no invoicing, and could never be publicly disclosed.
Cason M. Kirby, a partner at Campbell Partners, alleged that the contracts had been “stolen” and contained “trade secrets.” He demanded that the documents be immediately removed.
Donald V. Watkins in essence told Andy2K’s firm to pound sand.
The publication of those contracts is causing a firestorm. Alabama Power CEO Mark A. Crosswhite is allegedly furious and now observers believe his own future at Alabama Power and parent company Southern Company is in doubt.
But Andy2K’s firm wasn’t done dispatching demand letters.
The Energy and Policy Institute ran a post on the two “non-existent” contracts and alluded to the North Birmingham Bribery Scandal and the ongoing Florida “ghost candidates” investigation.
Kirby dispatched a letter on behalf of Matrix to the EPI (click here to read) that showed unequivocally that the Matrix Meltdown is spiraling out of control.
Using half-baked wording, Kirby writes, “Neither [Joe] Perkins nor anyone at Matrix was involved in the planning or formation of any strategy related to the potential superfund site [in the North Birmingham Bribery Scandal].”
While Matrix may not have been involved in planning or strategy, Matrix was involved in an AstroTurf mail drop in North Birmingham to discourage poor African-American families from having their toxic and contaminated property tested by the EPA.
Is that not morally reprehensible in itself?
At Day 10 of the federal criminal trial in 2018, then-CEO Jeff Pitts testified that Matrix “helped send out th[e] letters purporting to be [from] the ‘grass roots’ group Get Smart Tarrant. Which was really an arm of Balch and Drummond,” according to Pulitzer-Prize winning journalist John Archibald.
Most interesting is Kirby’s very defensive comments on the multiple stories out of Florida regarding “ghost candidates” and an ongoing criminal probe.
He writes, “Matrix has sued Mr. Pitts and the other former employees because, while employed by Matrix, they conducted secret, off-the-books communications campaigns that were not authorized by Matrix or [Joe] Perkins. Neither…Perkins nor any Matrix employee provided legitimate services to or had any direct or indirect involvement in any of the Florida ghost candidate campaigns.”
Zealous state and federal investigators could possibly use Kirby’s own words against his client.
Why would Andy2K’s firm send out these worthless demand letters that only add fuel to the never-ending fire?
Is Joe Perkins’ ego really that bruised? Or is Alabama Power or Crosswhite demanding Perkins clean up his sloppy mess?
The sloppiness was revealed a month after Perkins won a $1.5 million defamation case against Donald V. Watkins.
Handwritten notes allegedly written by Perkins related to an alleged smear campaign that targeted Donald Watkins were released on donaldwatkins.com.
The document shed light on the alleged “dirty tricks” and smear tactics, including branding Watkins as “Desperate, Deranged Donald” or “Donald the Dodger.”
Now Perkins most important client, Alabama Power, has been exposed with the publication of the two “non-existent” contracts.
How in the hell do handwritten notes and never-to-be-revealed contracts land in the hands of an adversary?
Sloppy Joe appears to not have had strong internal controls or high-end security to protect himself or his clients even though he was paid millions.
Encryption, Sloppy Joe, encryption!
Alabama Power’s problem of having secret contracts that disbursed millions while investors, regulators, and consumers were left in the dark appears to now have become a significant Matrix problem.
And why would Andy2K’s partner Cason M. Kirby so passionately write and dispatch these truly worthless demand letters?
Maybe because his wife Madolyn Kirby has worked at Matrix longer than they have been married.
