Brown Tells His Side of Prison Term, Katrina Fallout and More

Former Louisiana Insurance Commissioner Jim Brown has had an interesting last few years to say the least.

Brown was sent to a federal prison for six months back in 2003 after a trial for reportedly lying to an FBI agent. He was acquitted of charges related to fixing the liquidation of Louisiana-based Cascade Insurance Co. on terms that were positive to its owner. Brown notes to this day that his lawyers asked for the FBI agent’s notes to be brought into evidence that would state the former commissioner’s side of the story, but a judge refused that request.

Brown, who wrote a book about his events and also has his own Web site (www.jimbrownla.com) that talks about a number of insurance issues, recently spoke with Insurance Journal Online Editor Dave Thomas.

The two covered Brown’s prison term, the fallout from Hurricane Katrina, and much more. Below are excerpts from the interview. To listen to the full interview, visit www.insurancejournal.com/broadcasts/audio

Insurance Journal: Tell us about your background for those not familiar with you.

Jim Brown: I was the longest serving elected official in Louisiana. Oh, some 30 years in public life, including 12 years as insurance commissioner. I had a big mess to clean up here and I shut down some 50 insurance companies. I tried to change the regulatory structure here and had good success in doing so. Unfortunately, there was a major effort by the federal government to go after our former governor. They stumbled across an insurance problem they thought was a problem…turned out to be nothing at all. When all was said and done, I was charged with about 57 counts of insurance fraud. All those charges were thrown out and I was finally convicted of giving false statements to the FBI. An FBI agent came to see me for a 15-minute conversation and he’d written 15 pages of extensive notes and I never saw those notes. I knew that what was in those notes was not what was in his testimony. Obviously, there was an effort to get this Governor Edwards. I was told repeatedly that if I just would tell them something on Edwards, all my problems would go away. Well, I never got the notes, I got convicted and had to serve six months in a federal penitentiary in Louisiana. After I finished up my time, the notes were made public. In fact, one of the juror’s called a press conference to say what had happened was outrageous and I was obviously innocent. I’m still trying to move towards an appeal of the whole process. The evidence is very clear I was telling the truth. It didn’t dampen my time to serve because I couldn’t serve any longer as insurance commissioner. (Brown went on to write a book ‘Justice Denied’ about his experiences).

IJ: What was it like for you writing the book?

JB: It is a lot about my life in politics, heavy on insurance. It also tells about my trial and all that I went through to clear my name. It was a real labor of love. I wrote it over several years that I could not be insurance commissioner….. I’m pleased with the response to the book and it may spark a second book in me about a variety of issues that are spin-offs of my insurance experience.

IJ: You obviously have your hands on what’s going on with the needs of the people in Louisiana following Katrina. Do you feel people are having their needs met?

JB: It is devastating in terms of what has happened down here. I know the rest of the country has heard a lot about it. What happens after the disaster struck and the water receded, the cleanup begins and people go on to their other priorities and don’t pay much attention to what is happening. I’m in New Orleans once or twice a week and you see mile after mile of areas completely devastated and not one house can be rebuilt… Out of that big story comes the thousands of individual stories of people who have lost everything… They don’t have any way to rebuild and either had insurance they can’t get, were underinsured or even had no insurance… The recovery has been extremely slow.