AOL's dirty dealings are all in the past, right? With the SEC filing charges against eight former AOL Time Warner execs for their roles in inflating AOL's online ad revenue between 2000 and 2002, that's no doubt what present management would like you to think. Former head of business affairs David Colburn, former controller James MacGuidwin, and two others agreed to settlements and will pay back all ill-gotten gains with interest. The four others — former division CFOs John Michael Kelly and Joseph Ripp, executive Steven Rindner, and accountant Mark Wovsaniker — will contest the SEC's charges. The charges stem from an investigation the Washington Post began in 2002, which revealed that as it merged with Time Warner, AOL's business-affairs group completed a series of unconventional deals in order to boost its online ad sales numbers. In July 2002, the Post reported:

With its takeover of Time Warner Inc. imminent, AOL sought to maintain its breakneck growth in advertising and commerce revenue. AOL converted legal disputes into ad deals. It negotiated a shift in revenue from one division to another, bolstering its online business. It sold ads on behalf of online auction giant eBay Inc., booking the sale of eBay's ads as AOL's own revenue. AOL bartered ads for computer equipment in a deal with Sun Microsystems Inc. AOL counted stock rights as ad and commerce revenue in a deal with a Las Vegas firm called PurchasePro.com Inc.

The man in charge of those shady dealings was the former head of the business affairs unit, David Colburn. Colburn led a tight group of executives who bullied advertisers into deals on uncomfortable terms. The Golf Channel, for instance, never secured its place on Time Warner Cable until it agreed to advertise itself over AOL.

None of the eight of the executives charged today remain with the company, now named Time Warner. Two of Colburn's most diligent henchmen, however, still do. Ron Grant, as AOL's COO, is reassembling a central dealmaking group akin to Colburn's business-affairs unit. Grant and Lynda Clarizio, the new head of AOL's advertising-sales group, Platform A, were recently praised by former executive Myer Berlow for having been "trained in Business Affairs." Some remember Berlow as being part of the problem.