Posted on 02/03/2007 4:16:51 AM PST by Locomotive Breath
Gov. Mike Easley said last month that picking Mike Nifong to be Durham's district attorney was the worst appointment of his career, and he said Nifong broke his promise not to run for the office. Easley told law students in New York that Nifong's decision to seek office in last fall's election almost prompted him to consider yanking Nifong from office.
"I almost un-appointed him when he decided to run," Easley said. "I rate that as probably the poorest appointment that I've," the governor trailed off before adding "I've made some good ones."
(Excerpt) Read more at newsobserver.com ...
I agree when he started caring when Nifong started causing him to look bad. But of course by then he could not really remove Nifong. No way in the world could the governor without the explicit authority and power try to remove a DA could try to "unappoint" a DA once this case started.
Had Easley tried to force him out, Nifong would surely have dug in and still won the election. Once Nifong grabbed on to this case it was out of everyone's else control which is why Easley said he thought about "unappointing" him when he decided to run not when this case unravelled. A governor just can not in the middle of a controversial case force a DA out of office. As some have pointed out, Easley might have him to recuse before the election.
And this is probably a good thing. We do not want governors protecting friends all the time. We do not want govenors forcing prosecutors off cases of friends. What NC needs to do is give someone the regular authority to remove cases from DAs for cause, take away the DA scheduling power and do away with grand juries completely and go to probably cause hearings.
There is a huge difference in the case of these two DAs.
The one in Oregon tried to frame insiders, ie police officers. That will get someone one the inside fighting against you.
Nifong tried to frame outsiders. It is far harder to stop a DA going after someone without an in inside the criminal justice system.
There was a great deal of information demonstrating Nifong's malfeasance in the case long before the election.
I don't believe this lying SOB Easley for a minute.
He can't now. Nifong has been elected by the PEOPLE. Easley can't overthrow a local election.
Now, isn't that just too convenient?
I saw the same signs in this as I read the story, too.
Nifong has no cover. They're hanging him out to dry and he's going to be disbarred.
Easley can file a petition to have him removed, and he should have already done it. Blabbing about how bad Nifong is in NY state doesn't cut the mustard. If there was any truth to what he was saying, he'd take action.
Yet Nifong supposedly told his campaign manager he needed three more years and some-odd months in his retirement plan. One would think Easley would be aware of that (meaning Nifong's retirement status). I would like to know if Durham County has anything built into their personnel rules that would have allowed Nifong to revert back to being an ADA had he not run for DA. I will bet there is, and if there is, I will bet Nifong is trying to negotiate doing that right now - step down as DA, become an ADA again, finish his three years, and then go. But I doubt if anybody's buying that.
I don't believe him about that at all because there was no obvious candidate with Easley's imprimatur running against Nifong in the primary. It wouldn't be Freda Black because she was in the DA's office at the time Easley appointed Nifong, so he just would have appointed her. It wasn't that black lawyer twirp - he was a loser and a nobody. And that's all there were in the primary.
Easley's full of BS. But what's important is that his remarks signaled that Nifong has nowhere to hide.
The words of Weasley are the words of a man who got splattered when someone threw a pile of .... and it hit the fan. He knows who threw it, and he's not happy about it. Nevertheless, he could have done the right thing instead of the convenient thing, but he chose the politician's way. Decisions are tough to make sometimes, and politicians would rather pass on them. In so many words, Weasley is cursing the day Nifong was born. And not because of concern for innocent men, but because Nifong made him and so many other poobahs look bad.
Considering the nature of Mr. Nifong's conduct the next step is to ask the Governor to step down.
Catching up here....doing my annual "Die Bermuda, Die!!" in the back yard.
Easley is in CYA mode -yawn... "Not my fault, he promised." No story there.
This is the story:
" he said Nifong broke his promise not to run for the office"
and
"I almost un-appointed him when he decided to run,"
When did Easley announce he was not running for office again? (not sure if it was for another term as gov or a Senate seat).
Easley knew what was going on in Durham. He knew the boys were being railroaded. If he felt so strongly about this, why did he not act on it? Especially if he had decided not to run for office.
It just does not make sense. How many times have we heard the AG is powerless to step into the Duke case? And now we find out all Easley had to do was un-appoint Nifong?
So who in Durham has the dirt on Easley?
.
* * One year into the Hoax and the last piece on the board is revealed. * *
.
BTW-before I forget. Alston (Skip) is/was a co-owner of one of those dealerships on Halloway.
IIRC, Mrs. Easley is a law professsor at NCCU.
The MSM would report this as good news: unemployment was going DOWN thanks to the great policies of our governor.
North Carolina is in play. And being shown to the world. It began early last year with numerous articles belittling the South. It's about money. Growing Bureacracies. By Any Means Necessary.
He's in his last term as governor. Rumor was he was seeking a seat in the state house. He announced he would not be seeking any office shortly after the Fong hit the fan.
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