Former Oklahoma Insurance Commissioner Carroll Fisher Convicted
February 8, 2006 was former Oklahoma Insurance Commissioner Carroll Fisher's 66th birthday. However he did not receive the birthday present he desired from an Oklahoma County District Court jury. Instead he was convicted of one count each of embezzlement and perjury, handcuffed and led off to the Oklahoma County Jail to await sentencing on February 17th. The jury recommended that Fisher receive a one year sentence on the embezzlement count and two years on the perjury count. Following the jury's verdict, Oklahoma Attorney General Drew Edmondson, whose office prosecuted the case, announced his intention to request that the sentences run consecutively.
Fisher, who resigned as Insurance Commissioner in 2004 after he was impeached by the state House of Representatives and just before he was to face an ouster trial in the state Senate, was charged with embezzling his own state campaign funds after he deposited a $1,000 campaign check into his overdrawn personal banking account in May 2003. He was charged with perjury for never disclosing the $1,000 on his state campaign reports.
In addition to the two charges for which he was convicted, Fisher faces additional trials. One involving allegations of bribery involving a $25,000 check, about $20,000 in office furniture and $25,000 in campaign contributions from Texas businessman Gene Phillips, Phillips' family and business associates.
In yet another case, Fisher also faces trial on allegations of filing a false income tax return, failure to pay over money to the state, failure to register a charity, failure to report charitable contributions and failure to keep appropriate records of contributions.
Editor's Note: For background information on this case and on former Insurance Commissioner Carroll Fisher see this earlier Bubbaworld Report
