The second time was a fortunate accident. Corey Horne was a retired paperworker who unfortunately needed a heart transplant. Our health insurer at the time shuddered at the projected costs involved. Luckily for the insurer, and us, Horne died naturally before any expenses were incurred. Horne’s death, combined with how easily the problem of Robbie Shuman was eliminated, stimulatedmy thinking. Eventually, I was the one who conceived the entire scheme.
Seven years after we bought the company we canceled our health insurance and workers’ compensation coverage with the respective third-party providers. We then borrowed enough money to become self-insured, creating a fund to finance medical coverage along with a reserve to provide retirement and pension benefits (which were also simultaneously internalized). Employee contributions multiplied this fund and allowed for lucrative stock investments, which eventually paid off handsomely. Overall, our self-insured fund is now solvent to hundreds of millions. But to assure continued vitality we knew that costs had to be controlled on the back side.
So the Priority program was created.
The first hired killer (who we then referred to as an “employee” but now as an “Associate”) was found through the same people who connected me with Robbie Shuman’s killer. Initially, we concentrated exclusively on retirees, eliminating people with expensive vested benefits. Almost immediately large sums of capital were realized that could be recycled back to finance front-end extensions of health insurance benefits demanded by the unions.
As we became more proficient, we expanded the program to encompass not only vested retirement benefits but the ridding of excessive health risks, what we considered to be unreasonable workers’ compensation claims, and the elimination of some particularly disastrous third-party claims against the company.
Through a series of collective bargaining sessions (and with the unwitting help of Hank Reed who repeatedly sealed the deals), we were able to fine-tune our coverage. Eventually, the Priority program not only financed itself, it paid back the original loan that led us to be self-insured and generated enormous surplus capital. Some of this surplus capital was invested back into the fund, the rest was used for expansion of our physical plants and general operating expenses.
How is it done? At first, informally. We would scrounge through our personnel records and identify potential candidates. A list would be made and placed in a precise order, hence the term “Priority.” One by one Priorities would then be eliminated. Later, as our records became computerized, so was the list. And it was here the constant flow of information we already possessed from our secondary businesses began to become important. By being self-insured we had direct access to all of our employees’ (both past and present) medical histories. The Woods County Regional Medical Center was built (and partly funded by us) on the public pretense of providing quality and convenient medical care. More importantly, the facility allowed direct access to vital medical information (and to the patients themselves), which aided tremendously in the subsequent implementation of the Priority program. The same is true of the local convalescent center.
Computerization eventually made it easier to Prioritize, especially once we developed a program that could quickly scan our payees and identify candidates based on such factors as age, health, medical history, claims history (both medical and workers’ comp), number of dependents, dependents’ medical history, and the like.
All processings of Priorities are governed by a precise set of Rules designed to lessen the possibility of exposure. Associates are required to follow Rule exactly. Mistakes are never tolerated.
How could we do this? That’s certainly a question I’ve asked myself many times over the last few years. The first time was easy. Robbie Shuman was an obnoxious braggart who caused both us and our employees nothing but trouble. I had no reservations in having him killed, and the company ran one hundred percent smoother after his death. Perhaps the lack of remorse associated with Shuman made the rest possible. It certainly didn’t hurt. Recently, Larry Hughes calculated a rough approximation and estimated that the average Priority saved the company around $260,000. Using a median of 1700 deaths (which is conservative), that would mean in excess of $440,000,000 has been generated. The actual figure is most likely even higher.
The Priority program provided an edge over the competition. Enough to allow, if needed, a five percent drop in the price of our paper (which sometimes could be enough to make a sale), or the granting of a half percent wage increase at negotiation time, or the financing of additional benefits that helped keep our work force satisfied and productive. It was a tool that, combined with careful management, eventually helped make the three shareholders multimillionaires.
But we weren’t the only ones who benefited. Jobs were generated. Billions in payroll paid. Woods County prospered. Life changed for the better. You told me that yourself. Concord suffered none of the layoffs and shutdowns all too common in the paper industry over the last twentyyears. In fact, while others closed or scaled down, we expanded.
Is it still going on? Definitely. Jon De Florio oversees the program. There are two associates who work under him, however no one, other than De Florio, knows anything about them. Also, absolutely no one within the company, other than the three owners, De Florio, and his two associates, has any knowledge of the program. To them, this is a paper company run just like any other.
Brent, the killing must stop. So I am providing you with the information and resources needed to do that. Expose the program. Stop the madness. Cowardice kept me from doing that myself. I’ve spent years forging a reputation, trying to gain a measure of respectability. I prefer to go to my grave, perhaps foolishly, thinking my life a success. But, if it’s any consolation, know that the creator fell victim to his own evil. My death was not the result of terminal cancer. I was Prioritized and processed. I assume De Florio himself handled the task. Perhaps with your help I can be the last Priority.
You will need to corroborate what I am telling you. What you may or may not know is that Hank Reed has one of our Priority lists. He obtained it by accident when he had one of our employees search our e-files. That searching was expected. In fact, Hamilton Lee intentionally planted a memo containing false information designed to misdirect Hank during the negotiations. But through a stroke of luck Reed obtained the Priority list the board approved for processing at its May and June meetings.
Be aware Lee and Hughes know of my contacts with you and Hank. They also know I am attempting to stop them.
They have even read an early version of this narrative. De Florio will surely be sent after you both. Precisely when is hard to predict, but he will come. De Florio has the capability to maintain constant physical and electronic surveillance of your activities (phones, offices, and homes). He is good at what he does, but you have an edge he has never contended with before.
You know he’s coming.
I recently executed a codicil to my will that leaves everything I have to a trust. I have placed you in sole control of that trust. My estate is worth between $240 and $300 million and includes cash, stocks, bonds, businesses, and real estate. What it does not include is my interest in Southern Republic. Per our shareholders agreement, at death, my one third interest immediately passed to Lee and Hughes.
My instructions (as detailed in the will) are to liquidate everything I have and distribute the money to as many families of past Priorities as can be located. In order to do that you need to know their identities. Certainly, not every past employee who pressed a claim against the company, or reached retirement age, or incurred a medical bill was killed. In fact, only a small percentage of the tens of thousands who’ve worked for the company were ever Prioritized. Who are all these people? It’s impossible now to say. No records were kept. Only in the last few years did I start keeping an informal tally, but even that is incomplete. Appendix D is a partial list of names which can serve as a good starting point.
One final thing. If you manage to get Lee and Hughes prosecuted please do not let the government seize the company or shut it down. They will surely try. Fight forcontrol. Fight for employee ownership and a share for the families of those Prioritized. Keep the company going so Concord can survive. Maybe then some good can come from this monstrous evil. I have made a special provision in the will that gives you the express power to use my wealth to achieve that purpose.
It’s okay to hate me. Who could blame you? If it’s any comfort (and if you believe) I’m surely burning in hell, the devil my eternal companion. I deserve nothing less. I’ve spent a lifetime using people for profit. Your own hiring was another selfish act, designed to provide us a direct line into Reed’s innermost thoughts, one we could make use of, if need be. I’m ashamed again to say that was my idea, too. Yet, after I came to meet you, I realized you were a man who could be trusted with what I have left. You have a chance to right the wrong. To turn something evil into something good. Perhaps God truly does work in mysterious ways.
Survive, and tell the tale.
Brent closed his eyes and sucked in a few deep breaths.
Then he scanned the narrative again.
His stomach started to churn, a wave of nausea rising in his throat. He now knew what the list Hank had found meant. Southern Republic had engaged in organized murder simply to keep the company competitive and the bottom line in the black. It was too incredible even to fathom. Yet here it was, in the deathbed confession of one of the company’s founders, the man who supposedly conceived the whole idea.
The sickening feeling that swept through him was rapidly tempered by anger. He’d obviously been used. Hired for no other purpose than a means to keep an eye on Hank. A conduit for information. But there was something else. Something even more horrible. He almost didn’t want to look. Yet he had to. He scrolledback up and read the words again. Only in the last few years did I start keeping an informal tally, but even that is incomplete. Appendix D is a partial list of names which can serve as a good starting point.
Something about what happened two years ago had always bothered him. His father had been in and out of Brooks Creek hundreds of times. How could he havemisjudged the clearance of low overhanging branches, as the police so easily concluded? Lingering doubts had never allowed him to fully believe the death as accidental. But he’d dismissed those doubts and finally accepted the sad reality. After all, tragic, inexplicable things sometimes rob the living of loved ones. Like car wrecks, plane crashes, or being struck by lightning, boating accidents do happen.
Or do they?
He scrolled to where the narrative stopped, bypassing Appendixes A, B, and C, each long lists of land and businesses broken down in three subparts titledLEE,HUGHES, andBOZIN. Appendix D was ominously titledPARTIAL LIST OF PRIORITIES FOR PAST FIVE YEARS.He glided through the names, listed chronologically by the approximate date of death and manner. He knew many of them. Fathers of childhood friends. Neighbors. Acquaintances. Clients. He didn’t want to look. But as the names moved up the screen there appeared, with a date for August, two years ago—
