RECOVERED HISTORY: EDWARDS' GIRLFRIEND AND DEAD HORSES

Fred Hiers, Ocola Star-Banner, FL - Before she was former Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards' mistress, before she was Rielle Hunter, before she was the face splashed on national television networks, she was the teenage equestrienne Lisa Druck of Ocala. . . Hunter's father, James D. Druck, a successful Ocala lawyer representing insurance companies during the 1980s, was implicated in a scam that involved a local man, Tommy "The Sandman" Burns, who electrocuted horses for their owners to collect the insurance money. One of Burns' first victims was the show horse Lisa Druck rode, Henry the Hawk.

Burns said in a 1992 Sports Illustrated interview that James Druck showed him how to electrocute Lisa's horse using a stripped extension cord and a wall socket. Burns said Druck showed him the scam so Druck could collect $150,000 in insurance. Burns' arrest in 1991 drew national attention. Druck died of cancer in the Tampa area in 1992. . .

By 1982, James Druck and his wife, Gwen, bought Eagle Nest Farm on County Road 225-A and moved there. That same year, they divorced after nearly 21 years of marriage. In addition to Lisa, they had three other daughters, Roxanne Rae, Jennifer Ann and Melissa Sue.

As part of the divorce settlement, James Druck got custody of the two minor children, Melissa Sue and Jennifer Ann. Lisa Druck was about to turn 18 in two months.

Later in 1982, James Druck married for a second time, but the marriage was annulled after 22 days.

About the time Lisa Druck's horse died, Burns had already earned the nickname "Sandman," a term horse owners gave him because when he showed up at horse shows, invariably a horse would mysteriously die. . .

Burns' choice of execution was electrocution because many veterinarians would wrongly determine the cause of death to be colic. That became a problem for Burns in 1991 when one horse owner couldn't get an animal insured for colic, so the owner asked Burns to break the horse's leg instead.

So, on the night of Feb. 2, 1991, Burns held the horse while his accomplice Arlie swung a crowbar into one of the animal's rear legs. The animal ran into the night screaming, falling onto its broken, dangling leg. The animal was euthanized when a veterinarian was called by the horse's owner.

The two men were sentenced in Alachua County Circuit Court. Both pleaded guilty or no contest to animal cruelty and insurance fraud and received jail sentences, according to Sun file stories.

NY Times, 1993 - Tommy Burns isn't the first person to kill horses for the insurance. Terry McVey, the president of Equine Adjusters, which investigates insurance claims in the horse business, said that as many as 5 percent of the claims he investigates -- and, he estimates, those industrywide -- were questionable. . .

It seems like a lifetime since that rainy night just outside of Gainesville, Fla., on Feb. 2, 1991, when Mr. Burns and his assistant, Harlow Arlie, broke a horse's right leg with a crowbar. Mr. Burns held the horse, Streetwise, while Mr. Arlie swung the crowbar, slamming it into the slender leg. In its pain and horror the horse broke free and ran frantically through the stable, with Mr. Burns and Mr. Arlie chasing it, their voices full of mock concern.

A few minutes later, they called a vet to come and put the animal out of its misery. The story for the insurance company had been scripted: the horse fell and broke its leg in the rain.

As Mr. Burns and his partner drove away, they were surrounded by local officials who had been following them, apparently after being tipped off by the F.B.I. With a shotgun pointed at his head and a snarling police dog nipping at his heels, Mr. Burns was arrested. . .

When he killed with electricity, he attached one of the alligator clips to a horse's ear and the other to its anus. He would plug the extension cord into an outlet and then step back as the horse dropped dead with a heavy thud.

"When these millionaires get tired of them," Mr. Burns said, "they throw the horses away like broken toys."

He says the horses died too fast to feel any pain. Knowing that makes him feel better, he says. His heart, he says, is not made of stone. Whenever he killed a horse, he had to get drunk first. "My motive for killing horses was to make money," he said. "For the owners it was just rotten cheapness at its worst.". . .