Autopsy Photos Turn up on eBay Proving that practically anything can be found on eBay, a Tampa, Florida, man recently auctioned off a set of crime scene and autopsy photos related to the 1993 West Memphis 3 murders. Ken Karnig's pictures, ranging from an aerial view of the crime scene to autopsy photos of the victims, were listed on eBay on July 7th. The auction ended on July 12th. The opening bid was $24.95, and at press time on Tuesday the items had attracted four bids, the highest for $32. The Flyer sent an e-mail to Karnig, who goes by the eBay handle "supernaught," requesting additional information and asking about the legality of the photos. Karnig responded immediately in an e-mail message, saying he had "obtained them and they are legal, you must be 18 years old to purchase them. They were obtained before either of the 2 HBO Paradise Lost documentaries and before this movement to get the 3 convicted overturned. Thanks!" Additionally, Karnig sent the Flyer a jpeg of an autopsy photo of Christopher Byers, one of the victims. According to the Pulaski County, Arkansas, medical examiner's office, which conducted the initial autopsy of Byers and the other victims, the photo is authentic. Additionally, Jim Clark, a medical examiner in that office, says that such photos can be legally procured. "They're not public record from here. But once the case is closed it becomes public information that anyone can get," says Clark-- Rebekah Gleaves Hunt-Phelan Home Remains on Market For sale -- again Since early March, when owner Bill Day announced plans to sell the Hunt-Phelan Home, some Memphians have voiced concern about the future of the historic structure on Beale Street. After the property failed to bring a high enough bid at an auction held in May, Day enlisted the services of real estate agent Nick French in hopes of finding a buyer. After much whispering and speculation, an organization identified as Genesis Entertainment Group, the exact nature of whose business remains unknown, announced it would purchase the home for $3 million. But the sale didn't go through. "For ethical reasons, I cannot go into the principles of a transaction," says French. Then, Opera Memphis showed some interest in the property. The group hoped to house its business offices in the home and construct additional buildings on the surrounding land to use for the opera. Just as soon as they appeared on the scene, though, the people at Opera Memphis changed their minds. "After consulting with our board and architects, we decided against it," says Opera Memphis executive director Steve Aiken. "We thought we'd probably irritate more people by altering [the property]." So for now, Hunt-Phelan is still up for grabs. The asking price for the house is $2.2 million and the historic Freedman's school building on the property is listed at $800,000 -- or $3 million for both. "We've got several lookers right now, but no offers on the table," says French. "All of the lookers are serious lookers, but we don't have anything until we have a contract and money." Bill Day could not be reached for comment. -- Rebekah Gleaves Update: Hiring Deputies with Criminal Records The Flyer has obtained more information about one of the 10 Shelby County Sheriff's deputies with criminal histories hired last year. Trevis Matthews, dishonorably discharged from the military for missing 43 drills and two training sessions, also failed his firearms acuity test, according to spokesperson Dana Keeton with the POST commission (Police Officers Standards and Training), a statewide certifying board that grants hiring waivers to officers with criminal records. POST had a record on Matthews because he was given a waiver for his dishonorable discharge. Firearms skill requirements are dictated by individual departments. The Shelby County test consists of day and night shooting exercises, including moving-object targets. Neil Shea, head of department training, says very few candidates fail the test. Matthews was hired as a deputy jailer and now works at 201 Poplar with his mother, Jacqueline Matthews. Department legal advisor Don Strother says that the failure to pass a firearms test is not important when a prospective deputy is going to be placed in the jail because jailers do not carry guns. However, Shea says deputy jailers receive occasional "rudimentary, basic" self-defense training. Such training might have prevented the July 5th botched security raid on the jail, when two academy students were ordered to pose as computer repairmen, evade security guards and metal detectors, brandish fake Uzis, and orchestrate a phony hostage take-over. One student took the exercise too far by making a female guard plead for her life while he held a toy gun to her head. The incident comes during a criminal probe of 11 jailers suspended amid allegations of inmate abuse. Department brass are keeping details of the internal investigation under wraps. In more POST news, there is no record of waiver requests for Jeremy Drewery or Bobby Anderson Jr., who pled guilty to passing bad checks before they were hired as deputies. The Sheriff's Department is required by Tennessee law to request waivers before hiring any officer who has pled guilty or been convicted of a felony. The hiring of deputies with criminal histories is not a subject District Attorney Bill Gibbons seems willing to tackle. The prosecutor has also declined to indict the eight men in the department who bought their jobs in a cash-for-badges scheme last year. All eight deputies still hold their jobs. But this week the DA announced that Sheriff's Deputy Waymon Joyner was indicted for the rape of a child. Joyner was fired from the department and has retained Leslie Ballin as his attorney. -- Ashley Fantz New MLGW Chairman Awarded $125,000 TVA Study Call it a $125,000 conflict of interest and Franketta Guinn will likely disagree. The influential Memphis businesswoman, who was appointed as the new chairman of the board for Memphis Light, Gas and Water last week, accepted that six-figure amount from the Tennessee Valley Authority for an eight-month-long study on minority business development in the Memphis area. Guinn, through her management consulting business, Monguinn Enterprises Consulting Practice (MECP), signed the contract in March. It will run through November. The Flyer obtained a copy of the contract, which calls for Guinn to submit various proposals suggesting ways for TVA to improve its relations with small woman- and minority-owned businesses. One of the contract clauses asserts that the contractor "has no undisclosed financial or other interest that would conflict with or affect the full and faithful performance of services." TVA's contract with Guinn, as well as similar contracts the federal agency made with board members of utility companies in other cities, has come under fire recently. The contracts have been regarded by some as a way for TVA to hold onto its major distributors at a time when deregulation of the electric business is imminent. Deregulation will allow private power producers to compete with TVA for the independent distributor's business. Currently the distributors are allowed to purchase power only from TVA. TVA provides power for a seven-state region. Last year the agency sold more than $6 billion in electricity to its distributors. Of the 159 utilities that purchase TVA power, MLGW ranks first, having sold nearly $650 million in power and provided service to nearly 900,000 Memphians. A written statement from Mark Medford, TVA's customer service and marketing executive vice president, further defends the agency hiring Guinn for the study. "The fact that Franketta is a member of the Memphis Light, Gas and Water distributor board of directors is not that unusual. In fact, most if not all members of distributor boards are community, business, or government leaders," says Medford. Guinn -- who was responsible for an election drive called 10,000 Women for Herenton in last year's mayoral election and who was unsuccessfully nominated in 1999 for a position on the TVA board by Representative Harold Ford Jr. -- also does not consider this contract to be a conflict of interest. In a story in the Knoxville News-Sentinel, Guinn said, "TVA is not one of the things that comes before us. It never has, and I have been on the board for nine years." Guinn would not speculate on whether the contract could pose a future conflict of interest, but did say, "I act on what the relationship is now." MLGW's contract with TVA stipulates that the utility would have to give TVA 10 years' notice before switching providers. Guinn, as chairman of the board, would, however, be in a position to influence that decision should deregulation occur. According to TVA spokesman John Moulton, Guinn had MLGW president Herman Morris and an MLGW attorney approve the contract before it was signed. Other MLGW officials have been made aware of the contract. "That contract was competitively bid and she [Guinn] let everyone know she was bidding on it," says Moulton. "She's very qualified and was selected based on her track record. Four people competed for the contract and she submitted the best proposal. So, no, we don't see any one problem with it. There's definitely no conflict of interest from TVA's point of view." A similar contract TVA made with Tom Jackson, a board member for Nashville Electric Service, caused Nashville Mayor Bill Purcell to schedule a meeting with Jackson, asking him to either end the contract or risk losing his position on the board. Jackson's public relations and events-planning firm, Tom Jackson & Associates, was paid $100,000 to study TVA meetings and events so that they might be conducted more efficiently. Jackson recently terminated his contract with TVA. Similarly, TVA is being criticized for paying Elaine Chao $10,000 in speaking fees for a speech on leadership and cultural differences. Chao is married to U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell, who has been one of TVA's toughest congressional critics. As the former director of the Peace Corps and deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of Transportation, Chao certainly has the credentials to command such a speaking fee. However, some critics argued that TVA may have been trying to influence McConnell through his wife. Guinn did not return repeated calls left by the Flyer. -- Rebekah Gleaves Wanted: Calipari-Type for U of M President Members of a search committee looking for a new president for the University of Memphis hadn't met five minutes Monday to discuss desired characteristics of the new leader before the man with the initials J.C. came up for discussion. No, not the Bible's J.C., although his name popped up, too. It was John Calipari, of course, Memphis' new men's basketball coach who has wooed the city with a combination of charm and hustle. "That's exactly what we need," said state Sen. Steve Cohen. "It needs to be a young person who will stay for a while; someone who will fight to make a name for himself. We need someone who will make this university rock." About a dozen committee members met with Charles Knapp, a headhunter with the Atlanta-based search firm Heidrick and Struggles and former president of the University of Georgia, to voice what they are looking for in a replacement for V. Lane Rawlins, who left last month to become president of Washington State University. The new president will have to schmooze Nashville lawmakers, roll up his sleeves with local folks, hang out with students, work side-by-side with faculty, and connect with the business community. He must have excellent people skills, even better fund-raising skills, and it wouldn't hurt if he were a Southerner, too (according to at least one professor). "We're looking for God on a good day," summarized regent Jack Fishman, a member of the 21-member group of professors, business leaders, students, staff, and legislators picked to advise the chancellor of the Tennessee Board of Regents on the selection of Memphis' next president. The search firm will bring back the names of three finalists for the search committee in October. Far and away the biggest task for the new leader will be to raise money. "I don't care what kind of person it is, whether it's an academician or a businessperson, they've got to have an extremely successful capital campaign," said business professor Coy Jones, explaining that the leader will have to raise anywhere from $100 million to $250 million before asking for one cent from the state legislatures. "If we want this archangel to appear, we have to show that we can pull ourselves up by our bootstraps and build something great." Bill Gutzke, professor and president of the faculty senate, agreed, saying someone who can fix the school's budget woes would also go a long way in healing wounds and low morale among teachers and staff who haven't seen a decent pay raise in years. Gutzke and some of his colleagues said it's imperative for the new president to have an academic background, even perhaps a scholar who will "take the university to the next level," like the University of Tennessee at Knoxville. Other qualities the group felt are important in a leader include having an understanding of an urban system, a strong vision, a focus on research, a deep concern for staff, as well as students and faculty, an ability to delegate internal campus management to a provost and other top administrators while he or she strengthens ties with the community, businesses, and the legislature, good communication skills, the desire to promote campus life, and an understanding of the school's diversity. So how does Memphis draw someone with all these qualities? The hook lies in the university's untapped potential, said John Kelley, president of business financial services for First Tennessee Bank. "We've got 20,000 to 30,000 businesses here who are potential customers and about 50,000 alumni who so far haven't been giving a dime back to the school," he said. "This person who comes in can be known as the person who changed the state's attitude on education from one of non-support to one of full support. They'd be put on a pedestal. "We need the person who will shake 500,000 hands if he has to; someone who will get the job done come hell or high water." -- Tanuja Surpuriya

					Fly on the Wall Smell the Nobel? In the future, our children's textbooks will no doubt declare that Malmo's Postulate was the first major scientific discovery of the 21st century. In his column, "2 Tenn.-based chains do well against giants," advertising guru turned popular CA business commentator John Malmo invoked the transitive property of "consumer density" with sexy results. Clearly establishing that "convenience" is a variable, he vigorously asserted, "If a 7-Eleven is a convenience store vis-à-vis a supermarket," then "Fred's and Dollar General are convenience stores vis-à-vis Wal-Mart." That's right folks; "retail-space" is curved. Them (the sequel) According to the AP, "Mother Nature won't be much help" in the ongoing struggle against fire ants. Karen Vail, an insect specialist, was quoted saying, "We think the ants will be able to survive anywhere in Tennessee except the higher elevations." On a brighter note, scientists have released a minute South American insect which deposits its larvae in the fire ant's head causing the head to fall off. No one could confirm whether or not similar technologies can be employed to remove the head of the Shelby County Sheriff's Dept. Stupid Things to do if you are a Drug Lord On Friday, July 7th, U.S. Customs agents seized more than 1,000 pounds of prime South American "booger sugar." This massive shipment originated in Caracas, Venezuela, and came through Memphis via FedEx. The veritable ocean of "bumps" was cleverly hidden inside 475 "boxes" of "frozen shrimp," and discovered during a "routine inspection." The moral to this "story" is: when flying 1,000 pounds of "blow" out of Memphis, you can't hide it in the "shrimp." Hide it in the "Barbecue." Speak OF THE DEVIL Concerning distribution of the new Harry Potter book, David Hirschman reported in the Atlanta Constitution that "FedEx Corp. is conjuring supernatural forces in its battle with United Parcel Service." In spite of the recent gossip, Hirschman's statements were never meant to imply that FedEx Corp. has at any point entered, or ever intends to enter, into any type of contractual obligation, either real or imagined, with the Christian Devil. Had Hirschman wished to imply that FedEx Corp. was in any way attempting to awaken the sleeping, "Dragon," he would have clearly stated, "FedEx Corp. is conjuring the infernal forces in its battle with United Parcel Service." We regret any misunderstandings. The Police State Using more than one million dollars of federal money, four Crittenden County towns with a combined population of 1,337 have created a police force with a cop-to-citizen ratio four times larger than that of Memphis. Training, background checks, and physical and mental examinations have proven to be almost nonexistent. Complaints of "harassment and overzealousness" have been filed. One patrolman had been writing traffic tickets for eight months before city officials became aware that he himself had no valid license. And to top it all off, those pesky Duke boys are still at large.
		Compiled by Chris Davis Send items to: P.O. Box 1738 Memphis, TN 38101 FAX: 521-0129 e-mail: davis@memphisflyer.com.

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