Easley: Nifong broke his word

The governor called the Durham DA his worst appointment. He said Nifong promised not to run for a full term

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."

Easley, a former prosecutor, was speaking at New York University on Jan. 22 about public service. After the speech, someone in the audience asked him to rate Nifong's performance in the controversial sexual assault investigation against three former Duke University lacrosse players.

The governor said Nifong had done a poor job.

"You don't need me to tell you that," he said.

Last month, Nifong asked the state attorney general to remove him from the lacrosse case in the wake of ethics charges from the State Bar, which licenses lawyers. The bar had charged Nifong with violating rules with his early public statements about the case. Easley spoke in New York two days before the bar piled even more serious charges upon Nifong. The agency accused him of withholding evidence and then lying to cover it up.

Easley spent most of the hour-long speech, part of an annual lecture series at the law school, discussing his career as a politician. The speech was captured on an audio recording released by a university spokesman.

Nifong did not return a phone message Friday afternoon, and one of his attorneys, David Freedman, declined to comment. Easley's office did not grant requests to interview the governor.

Interim choice

In April 2005, Easley appointed then-District Attorney Jim Hardin as a judge. He picked Nifong, a career Durham prosecutor to be the interim district attorney. He chose Nifong because Hardin and former District Attorney Ron Stephens both recommended him, the governor said. Easley said he was also comfortable with the appointment because Nifong said he would not run for the office.

When Nifong did run, the campaign focused on how he had handled the lacrosse investigation.

On March 14, 2006, a woman hired to dance at a Duke University lacrosse team party told authorities she had been raped and beaten.

Three men, David Evans, 23, of Bethesda, Md., Collin Finnerty, 20, of Garden City, N.Y., and Reade Seligmann, 20, of Essex Fells, N.J., face kidnapping and sexual offense charges. The men say they are innocent and that the allegations are lies. The case is now in the hands of special prosecutors, picked by the state attorney general to take over for Nifong. The case is due back in court in May.

The case became national news after all but one member of the team were required to submit DNA samples. Days later, Nifong started talking about the case in dozens of interviews, some on live national television.

Easley criticized Nifong for his statements, in which Nifong insisted to the nation that a racially motivated gang rape had taken place and that lacrosse players were the culprits.

"That's how all this mess got started," Easley said. "He challenged the defense lawyers by talking about the case, calling the kids 'hooligans.' "

That left defense lawyers no choice but to fight back, the governor said.

'It looks bad'

"You can't comment on that except in the courtroom, and when you do, then the defense lawyers have to stand up for their client," Easley said. "Then it's on. All the rules are out the window, then you have chaos, and that's why those rules are so important and that's what you got in this case. It's chaotic. It looks bad for North Carolina. It looks bad for the DA's office. It looks bad for the criminal justice system in general."

In December, a DNA expert hired by Nifong testified in a hearing that he and the prosecutor agreed to withhold from a report test results that were favorable to the defense lawyers. Easley, a former prosecutor and attorney general, said those results should have been turned over. The governor talked about the state's open file discovery law, which the lacrosse defense attorneys have used to pry favorable evidence, such as the DNA test results, from Nifong's files.

"I do know that when you're in a case like this you disclose everything," Easley said. "We passed a law when I was attorney general that you disclose all the evidence in the file in these cases prior to trial."

The law was passed in 2004, when Easley was governor. As attorney general, Easley opposed a 1996 law opening files for death row inmates, the first step toward the current law. His office fought the law at the legislature and then challenged it in court, until the state Supreme Court upheld the law in 1998.