A year ago, Mississippi football legend Brett Favre tried to distance himself from one of the worst public embezzlement scandals in state history.
He claimed that he didn’t know the $1.1 million he had been paid for speeches authorities say he never actually gave came from funds designed to help the poorest of the poor.
He said he would pay the money back and promptly wrote a check for $500,000, with a promise to pay the rest in the coming months. The months have yet to come, however.
Favre, it should be noted, has not been accused of any criminal wrongdoing and, at this point, is not legally compelled to return the money. Nevertheless, it’s making the NFL Hall of Fame quarterback look bad to not follow through on his promise — or if he has changed his mind, to at least explain why.
Favre, who has enjoyed a favorable following in this state since his playing days at the University of Southern Mississippi and the Green Bay Packers, is seeing his image tarred by his connections to this welfare scandal.
Besides the $1.1 million he received, Favre’s investment interests or pet projects also got boosted thanks to what federal and state authorities have said is questionable or illegal spending by the organization at the center of the welfare scandal and its indicted founder, Greenwood native Nancy New.
The Mississippi Community Education Center, which received tens of millions of dollars of federal block grant funds on the premise that it would provide training and programs to help the poor escape poverty, put $5 million of that money into the construction of a new volleyball stadium at USM, a project for which Favre was raising money. And of the small fortune that New and her son, Zach New, allegedly embezzled, $2.15 million supposedly went to a Florida-based pharmaceutical company’s efforts to develop a concussion drug, a venture in which Favre has claimed to have sunk $1 million of his own money.
There’s more to come from this scandal, with criminal prosecutions and probable civil demands for repayment of misspent money in the offing. The only way that Favre can distance himself from the stink is to do what he promised: Pay all of the money he personally received back.
He can forget about scrambling away from the scandal until he does.
