Former HealthSouth CEO Richard Scrushy and others have been ordered to turn over records and documents related to a bank account which lawyers say the convicted executive was using to hide millions.

In a seven-page order filed Tuesday in Jefferson County Circuit Court, John England Jr., acting as special master in the case, also issued an injunction against any money being transferred out of the account in question.

The ruling came after lawyers representing the plaintiffs in a 2009 civil verdict contended that Scrushy has been hiding money that could be used to pay some of the more than $2.87 billion in damages he still owes as result of the HealthSouth scandal.

Scrushy, the once powerful executive, was originally acquitted in 2005 of conspiracy, securities fraud, mail fraud and other charges.

Prosecutors said Scrushy directed high-level employees to falsify the books for Birmingham’s HealthSouth when its earnings didn’t meet Wall Street expectations. About $2.7 billion was at issue, overstated in financial reports from 1996 through 2002.

Scrushy was again tried in federal court – this time for bribery involving ex-Gov. Don Siegelman. Scrushy was accused of bribing Siegelman with $500,000 in exchange for a seat on the Certificate of Need Review Board, the state agency with oversight over HealthSouth.

In 2007 Scrushy was sentenced to nearly seven years in prison. While serving his sentence in a Texas prison, a civil court found him liable for the HeathSouth fraud.

He was ordered to pay $2.87 billion in damages. After serving about five years of his sentence, Scrushy was released from prison. He currently lives in Texas.

According to England’s order, Scrushy contends he is unemployed and has no assets other than Social Security. However, lawyers for the plaintiffs owed damages say he is conducting business through other entities owned by friends and family.

Plaintiff lawyers say Scrushy controls a bank account in the name of Eddie Briskett, a man currently serving time in the Alabama Department of Corrections for various convictions, including property theft, burglary, assault and intimidating a witness, according to the ADOC website.

According to the ruling, Scrushy has “exchanged thousands of text messages” with a number associated with Briskett, and written checks totaling $7.3 million on the account, including two checks to himself totaling $3 million.

However. those checks were never deposited in any account previously disclosed by Scrushy, the order states.

In addition, England mentioned a 2020 letter to the Alabama Bureau of Pardons and Paroles by an associate of Scrushy, explaining that Briskett has an investment portfolio of about $7.1 million.

“The evidence presented suggests that Mr. Scrushy may have an interest in the account or in some or all of the proceeds of the account,” the order reads. “At minimum, it appears that Mr. Scrushy or someone acting in concert with him opened the account in Briskett’s name and that Mr. Scrushy has control of the account.”