Conrad and Lady Black: Dancing on the Edge in 2012, the case was described as a "$2.5-million suit" and Bower said, "How can a convicted fraudster find a jury who will say that his reputation has been damaged by a book that says he's a fraudster?" A passing reference in the book to the British businessman, pornographer, and publisher Richard Desmond led to Desmond unsuccessfully suing Bower for libel in 2009. Desmond argued that the description in the book that he was "ground into the dust" when he had published an apology after Black had threatened to sue for libel had weakened his reputation. Notes References Conrad and
Cynthia Bower the two merged. In July 2006, Bower became Chief Executive of the NHS West Midlands, a major regional Strategic Health Authority which included responsibility for Stafford Hospital. NHSWM rejected the noted high death rates as a statistical blip. Bower later admitted that the situation at Stafford "wasn’t on my radar." In July 2009, the then Labour Government set up the Care Quality Commission (CQC) to replace three other quangos. Bower was appointed Chief Executive, on a salary of £195,000, The CQC oversees the NHS, social care and mental health, mandated to register and oversee 20,000 hospitals, care homes and clinics.