I hereby apologize for setting in motion the chain of events that got Paul Finebaum sued.

(Thanks Wade, for bringing this to my attention.)

We’ve documented Richard Scrushy’s legal battles — not so much for the courtroom fireworks but instead looking at his stated goal: repairing his civic and corporate reputation. Having won an acquittal from a jury in his HealthSouth fraud trial, the founder and CEO has been keeping fairly low on the second part of Operation Renewal. For the most part, he’s even heeded the advice I laid out months ago.

Now, he has filed suit against both the Birmingham News and radio talk-show host Paul Finebaum, for separate statements and allegations he feels are false and damaging.

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (AP) — Libel suits filed by former HealthSouth CEO Richard Scrushy accuse The Birmingham News and Alabama radio personality Paul Finebaum of defaming him in reports or commentary about his relationship with a black church that he joined.

Scrushy’s wife, Leslie, is a plaintiff with her husband in the suit against Finebaum.

In both suits, Scrushy, who is white, accuses the defendants of unfairly portraying his decision in 2003 to leave his longtime church in Vestavia Hills and join the Guiding Light Church, a predominantly black church in Birmingham. Scrushy changed churches while under criminal investigation.

A November 2003 story in the News quoted a legal expert as saying that by changing churches, Scrushy was “laying the groundwork for endearing himself to African-American jurors.”

The suit claims the statement was libelous because it “made Scrushy sound like a devious hypocrite and heathen.” McPhillips said Scrushy changed churches as a result of his “own faith walk with the Lord.”

The Scrushys’ suit against Finebaum, who also is a sports columnist for the Mobile Register, cites a radio show in which Finebaum and his callers discussed who might play Leslie Scrushy in a movie about the couple.

“Who is the fakest actress in Hollywood? I mean the one with the fakest smile — that would be Mrs. Scrushy, wouldn’t it?” Finebaum said during a radio show in February.

According to the lawsuit, Finebaum “publicly described Mrs. Scrushy as plastic, as a gold digger, as a fake, as a phony, and as an air head.”

Three years ago, when the SEC was trying to clamp down on Scrushy’s assets, I was a regular contributor to Finebaum’s show. During a long segment on a slow news day, Paul asked me how the reporters stayed awake with little to do. I told him how we were already casting the Scrushy movie, and gave a few examples. (Andy Garcia as Richard Scrushy, Courtney Cox as Lesley, Samuel Jackson as Donald Watkins…)

Who would have thought it would come to this?