Executives at the old Beacon Mutual Insurance Co. played politics in a number of ways, a state report alleged yesterday — attempting to “buy votes” at the State House, offering preferential treatment to companies connected to one lawmaker, hiring a state representative to do collection work, making questionable payments to a prominent political operative and orchestrating possibly illegal contributions to the U.S. Senate campaign of Sheldon Whitehouse.

Leaders of the “new” Beacon, which has fired top management and replaced most of its board since scandal engulfed the company last year, say that they have broken with those practices, and referred several political matters from the old regime to criminal investigators.

The FBI and the U.S. Attorney’s office, which have been conducting a wide-ranging State House corruption probe dubbed Operation Dollar Bill, are also looking at some of Beacon’s political practices, spokesmen for the state police and attorney general confirmed yesterday.

Much of the political activity covered in the state’s examination of Beacon occurred in 2005, when Beacon was lobbying hard for legislation at the Rhode Island State House.

That year, Beacon paid lawyer and state Rep. Robert E. Flaherty, D-Warwick, $25,000 to help the workers’ compensation insurer collect delinquent insurance premiums totaling more than $500,000 from two companies.

But the companies, which were represented by the brother and law partner of state Rep. John J. DeSimone, D-Providence, never paid the money. Instead, Beacon management wrote off the debt and reinstated the insurance policy of one of the companies.

“Beacon personnel we spoke with indicated that both of these transactions were politically motivated and were agreed to in order to ‘buy votes,’ ” said the Department of Business Regulation report.

Flaherty, the former House Judiciary chairman, told The Journal yesterday that he did not recall details of his work, including the fact that the debt had been written off, but he confirmed that he was hired to help Beacon with collections. Although the DBR report says that he voted in favor of Beacon legislation, Flaherty said that he has no recollection of doing so, given the volume of legislation that comes onto the House floor, and that he took “delicate and deliberate steps to avoid any conflict” by not participating in any Beacon legislation.

The report also said that Flaherty told Beacon last year he had no documentation for his work.

“No one we interviewed could explain what the representative’s law firm did to earn its $25,000 fee,” said the report. “The Beacon employee responsible for managing collections was unaware.”

Flaherty told The Journal last night that he has no documentation because he was paid a “set fee.”

DeSimone said that his brother and law partner, Thomas DeSimone, represented the two companies, S&P Temporary Help Services and Tri State Enterprises, where another brother, Anthony DeSimone, is an executive. But he said he had no involvement in the cases, other than what his brother told him.

“I was on the other side — I was against Beacon,” said DeSimone. “No one ever approached me.”

Yesterday’s DBR report also questioned Beacon’s relationship with Guy Dufault, a prominent Democratic Party operative and State House lobbyist.

From 2002 to 2006, the report said, Beacon paid Dufault’s firm, Cornerstone Communications, $720,000 for marketing and political consulting — including $93,000 that auditors found was “not adequately supported, or the benefit to Beacon was not clear.” Among those expenditures — $21,000 for a public-information campaign with state labor officials and insurance agents that “no one” at Beacon could recall and $34,000 for agent “focus groups” and $27,000 for safety videos of questionable value.

AFTER DUFAULT made controversial remarks about Governor Carcieri’s alleged girlfriends in 2005, and Beacon severed its relationship with him, the insurer hired a new consultant, Checkmate Consulting Group, run by Dufault’s son, Brad, who had worked at Cornerstone Communications. Checkmate Consulting, incorporated by Flaherty, was paid $11,000 until last spring, when Solomon was fired and his successor ended the relationship. Flaherty said he didn’t know Beacon was a Checkmate client.

The report also focused on efforts by Beacon’s then-CEO, Joseph A. Solomon, to solicit campaign contributions for Whitehouse’s Senate campaign. From May 27, 2005, to June 30, 2005, the report says, 14 Beacon employees, board members and related consultants gave $15,600 to Whitehouse.

“Based on discussions with several of the donors, Solomon offered to personally reimburse them for their donations, and two employees told us that they accepted his offer and were reimbursed,” the report said.

Reimbursing contributions is illegal. A Beacon spokesman said last night that the company learned of the contributions last summer, and referred the matter to the Federal Elections Commission and the Rhode Island State Police.

During the same period, the state’s auditors also found e-mails among Whitehouse, Dufault and Beacon executives discussing pending Beacon legislation at the Rhode Island State House. As an aide to then-Gov. Bruce Sundlun in the early 1990s, Whitehouse had helped reform Rhode Island’s troubled workers’ compensation system, resulting in the creation of Beacon.

The e-mails “appeared to provide the candidate with possible material for a commentary in favor of the Beacon-proposed legislation,” the report says. Whitehouse e-mailed Solomon that Dufault “said he’d draft something for me to look at, and I’m not sure what your key issues are. There is the ‘lowest rates’ issue, the out of state business issue … the board changes … and the general great job done point. I need some focus.”

Beacon later asked Whitehouse to hold off, and no commentary was published.

Whitehouse told The Journal last night that he had asked Solomon to organize a fundraiser, but that Solomon instead collected checks. Whitehouse said it was “unfortunate” — and he was unaware — that any donors had been reimbursed.

The report also says that Solomon told Beacon’s human resources director in 2005 to hire an unpromising job candidate — one who had been referred by an unidentified state senator. The candidate was hired, and the senator voted for Beacon legislation.

WHEN BEACON employees objected to Solomon’s decision to reinstate S&P Temporary Help Services, and write off $289,000 in debt, they were told that it was “a political matter,” the report says. A Beacon executive said that S&P’s lawyer’s brother — John DeSimone, who mounted an unsuccessful challenge for House speaker — led “a dissenting group of Democrats” against the Beacon legislation.

The report also questioned whether a decision to discontinue collection efforts of $229,000 owed by a janitorial-services company was “politically motivated.” That company, Tri State Enterprises, based in North Providence, was also represented by Thomas DeSimone and employed his other brother, says John DeSimone.

John DeSimone said that the money was not written off, and that there is a pending lawsuit by Beacon to recover the money, which involves a dispute over whether Tri State uses employees or independent contractors. A Beacon spokesman said that the insurer’s new leadership revived the collection efforts last year, and also referred the prior management’s handling of both companies to the authorities.

mstanton@projo.com