Mississippi Insurance

Given that all the effects of WorldCom’s $ 4 billion fraud began versickern humid Mississippi by the evening, the powerbrokers of the country’s capital, Jackson, knew exactly what to do: they have in their truck and led to Tico’s Steak House, a building of low arrivals back from the highway in the middle of a jungle of service stations and strip-mail to the east of the city.

The interior dark, barely illuminated by flashing neon signs of beer and watched the assumption by a huge head of Stag’s, Mississippi’s is the unofficial seat of government. Its walls are made of wood with photographs of its donors signed - judges, lawyers, the master of the country. And it was here that Bernie Ebbers, WorldCom Chief Executive April meetings, which transformed a small phone in a global society Behemoth, and a small coach basketball in a multi-millionaire Tycoon.

In Clinton, in the suburbs of Jackson, where WorldCom established its headquarters, have been rumors flying yesterday that employees were threatened with losing their retirement benefits if she spoke to the press. But Mr. Ebbers’ old friends to drink Tico’s showed no such reluctance.

“It was one of the damnedest is underway, from zero to hero. Well vultures feeding him, and it is not fair,” said Bill Chapman, an insurance executive, in a medium rare steak zurückstreifend. “People in the economy, they are doing what they have to do.”

They did not see Bernie in two months, they said, even more silent, more low-profile Chief Financial Officer Scott Sullivan, was set on fire in this week. And they did not know where he was. “Very far,” guess.

The Mississippi, Attorney General Michael Moore is a press conference today in the expectation that a criminal investigation would be discussed at WorldCom.

But Mississippi is a state of the former loyalty - Konföderierten flag still flies, despite its disturbing harmonics of racism and slavery - and somehow the feeling seemed violent accountable for the confidence that Jackson’s Elite always maintained at WorldCom and its founder.

“I do not think anyone is ready for the knife Bernie Ebbers. He was someone Mississippi was proud,” said Andy Kilpatrick, a lawyer and shareholders of WorldCom. “I have invested three or four years, $ 20 a share, the pension plan in my account. I did not sell when he went, because it is a Mississippi, and I did not sell when it is gone, because it is a Company of Mississippi. And I’ll stay until he is any way to zero. ”

And then, he says half-jokingly: “The inhabitants of the south tend to the adoption, as local people, because you do not trust the damn Yankees.

WorldCom has brought recognition, money and employment of Jackson, said another friend of Mr. Ebbers, so that there is a bundle of rare heruntergekommenen in the poorest countries of the capital in America. Mr. Ebbers the party in possession of local teams ice hockey, the Jackson Bandits, Sunday and taught at the school, a local Baptist church. It was in Jackson, Mississippi’s College, a bastion of Christian education in a city staunchly religious.

He was a celebrity in a city glamouröser before any of them. Apart from the fact that the communication said: “If I am in possession of Jackson and hell, I owned, I rent Jackson and go to live in hell.”

There was no sign of M. Ebbers, is at Brookhaven, south of Jackson - where he saw a large house well protected by the back door and the street.

The 6ft 4in Tycoon were discussed in the past, shearing its neighbours “on a lawn tractor lawn mower, a tower that was repaid with emphatischen silence yesterday. It is also a fixed point in the city’s First Baptist Church, and faithful said one resident, “It was very real for Brookhaven.

“Let everything that happens, I have not seen, but if you can see here a long time, there is only one type Plain Old nice,” said Ronnie Ross, director of the Brookhaven Country Club. “They do not realize it was something different about me.”

He did not know what they are doing these days: “I think it goes back to evaluate, never a book by its cover.”

The first whispers of the company, WorldCom was produced in a bar in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, the second largest city, where a waitress suggested the company name for the first time: Long Distance Discount. But it was too Tico’s, that small businesses has increased at a telecommunications giant with a series of aggressive acquisitions discussion.

Even Tico’s silence clients employ sound when they talk about what is simply a room - the space behind the counter and the kitchen, where a large part of Mississippi, according to reports of government is always and where Mr. Ebbers and its leaders would be used to take regularly to formulate the strategy.

Tico Hoffman, the former professional golf adorable, owns the property, hesitates around the room for visitors, but finally true. Suitable, given the magnitude of WorldCom’s ambitions, it is dominated by a world map, a whole wall.