Rielle Hunter Born Lisa Druck in Fort Lauderdale
Druck showed Burns how to slice an extension cord, attach one end with a clip into the horse's ear and the other into its rectum, then plug the cord into an outlet.
Former presidential hopeful John Edwards' mistress grew up in Florida with a dad who once found himself in the FBI's sights.
Born Lisa Druck in Fort Lauderdale, Rielle Hunter didn't leave much of a footprint there. Or on the Central Florida community of Ocala, where she went to high school. Or Tampa, where she went to college.
Her father, however, did leave a legacy in this state. An ugly one.
Quoting an FBI informant shortly after James Druck's death in 1990, Sports Illustrated named him a figure in a frightening 1980s trend that many in Florida's horsey set, including in Wellington, would rather forget: the killing of show horses and ponies for insurance dough!
A long-time Ocala resident, James Druck was a lawyer who worked mostly for insurance companies.
Yet according to informant Tommy "The Sandman" Burns, a stable hand at Druck's stables through the early 1980s, Druck taught him how to electrocute horses so that insurers would believe the animals died of disease. Starting with his own.
Burns told S.I. that Druck paid him to put down his brilliant jumper, Henry the Hawk. For that, and $115,000 from Henry's policy, Druck showed Burns how to slice an extension cord, attach one end with a clip into the horse's ear and the other into its rectum, then plug the cord into an outlet.
"You better get out of the way," Burns said. "They go down immediately. It's a sick thing . . ."
Burns went on to kill at least 20 more horses until he was arrested in Florida - and sentenced to a year in jail.
Burns' most famous "hit?" He was hired by Wellington cellphone heir George Lindemann Jr. to electrocute his champion jumper Charisma for a $250,000 policy in 1990. Multi-millionaire Lindemann served 33 months in prison.
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/localne.../0812jose.html
Originally Posted by Gingersnap
