U.S. Magistrate Judge Charles Coody modified the conditions of former HealthSouth CEO Richard Scrushy’s pre-trial release today. Under the new conditions, Scrushy may leave the state with permission from his probation officers, but he must wear a GPS tracking device on his ankle, must give probation officers a precise itinerary for such trips and he may use only commercial air travel.

Scrushy has been out on supervised pre-sentencing release ever since a federal jury in Montgomery last year convicted him of bribing former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman.
Last month, probation officers accused Scrushy of violating the terms of his release when he took an unapproved trip on his yacht from Palm Beach to Miami, Fla. Scrushy has claimed that it was all a misunderstanding due to “mistakes and miscommunications.”

Scrushy had permission to visit Walt Disney world with his family, as well as Ocala and Palm Beach. But prosecutors said that he never had permission to travel in his yacht, Chez Soiree to Miami, where he met with his attorney Donald Watkins.

Prosecutors said that Scrushy was testing the government’s ability to track him, and that rough weather had kept Scrushy for making a break for open seas. Instead, Scrushy kept his yacht within the Intercostal Waterway.

During the hearing, it became apparent that Scrushy’s Birmingham probation officer had not been careful when setting the terms of Scrushy’s release. The probation officer, Barry Burton, testified that he thought Ocala and Palm Beach, Fla., were within a short driving distance of Scrushy’s approved hotel in Disney World. In fact, Palm Beach is two and a half hours from Orlando.

“It is clear to me that Mr. Burton is geographically challenged when it comes to Florida,” Judge Coody said.

During the hearing, Scrushy took the stand, a first for a trial in which he was himself a party. In both criminal trials, including his accounting fraud trial in 2005 and his bribery trial in 2006, Scrushy declined to take the stand in his own defense.

On the stand, Scrushy claimed he had communicated clearly to his probation officer that he intended to travel to south Florida. When asked what “south Florida meant, he said, “Everything all the way to Key West.”

In an aggressive cross-examination, Assistant United States Attorney Steve Feaga asked Scrushy if his probation officers were lying.

“I believed based on the conversation with my probation officer that I had permission to visit friends and family in south Florida,” Scrushy said.

Scrushy’s testimony was for the most part calm and controlled. He insisted that, when a probation officer had called him during the trip, he had not told her that he was in Miami because she had not asked the right questions.

“Okay, then. How do I need to ask the question?” Feaga asked Scrushy. “We seem to be having the same problem you’re having with your probation officer.”

More to come later. Check for updates.

— Kyle Whitmire