WELCOME "STREET TALK" READERS

I see that in this week's "Street Talk" column, the Grand Rapids Business Journal staff has recommended checking us out.  In particular, they have suggested reading our "incendiary retelling of the Old Kent/Fifth Third Bank merger and the formation of Spectrum Health."  Those stories were told in a four-part series on local lawyer Charles McCallum of Warner Norcross & Judd and his involvement in the demise of Autodie, Butterworth Hospital, Amway, and Old Kent Bank.  These are the links to those articles:

     The Fixer, Part I:  The Fall of Autodie ... and the Rise of Autocam.

     The Fixer, Part II:  Bail-out by Butterworth.

     The Fixer, Part III:  The Piggy Bank.

     The Fixer, Part IV:  Pyramid Dust.

If you want to know why we think self-dealing, fiduciary breaches, bankruptcy fraud, money-laundering, bribery, and several other RICO predicate acts mark the disappearance of River City's landmark business institutions over the past dozen years, learning about the Fixer's lawyering on behalf of the area's most powerful businessmen is a good place to start.