Easley wrong on N&O

Gov. Mike Easley said our report on how the state monitors probationers was a "hatchet job."

He's wrong. Here's why.

Among our findings was that since 2000 in North Carolina, 580 people on probation had been convicted of killing intentionally.

We focused on the period since 2000 and requested data from the Correction Department going back to that year. It's a logical breaking point. Neither Easley, who declined to be interviewed before the series ran, nor anyone else in his administration mentioned earlier numbers before we published. Now he is selectively picking numbers to claim great improvement.

The number of probationers convicted of intentional killing generally fell in the late 1990s. In 2000, it was 64. Easley took office in January 2001. Since then, the number has gone up and down, averaging 66 a year.

There are two ways to look at these numbers. You could say those killings, on average, have risen slightly since Gov. Jim Hunt's last year. Or you could say those killings have declined under Easley to 66 a year (from 77 a year during Hunt's last six years).

Easley told the Greensboro News & Record: "The genesis of the story was: Huge explosion in probationers' killings." But we didn't say those killings had risen.

Easley is trying to obscure the true issue. Our series presented ample evidence that probationers are not being monitored as they should be. Outgoing Correction Secretary Theodis Beck, who was appointed by Easley, said he had some issues with the series.

But he wrote on Dec. 14: "Many of the points raised by The N&O series on probation are valid -- probation caseloads are high, vacancies and turnover problems persist and many offenders were not properly supervised."

Yet Easley says only that sentencing laws are to blame and that our report was a hatchet job.

He also said: "When some young lady gets brutally murdered by a couple probationers who murdered somebody else, it's now the probation officers' fault."

The "some young lady" was Eve Carson, the UNC-Chapel Hill student body president who was killed in March. Two men are charged. Each was on probation for convictions for breaking and entering and related charges.

The probation officer in charge of keeping track of one of the men never met with him. The other suspect had no contact with his probation officer for a year.

Robert Guy, head of the state's probation system, said the handling of the Carson case was "a flat-out embarrassment." But Easley doesn't think so.

To its credit, the Easley administration now says it will release reports that show how well probationers are supervised.

When a probationer is accused of a serious crime, probation managers must submit a report, which evaluates whether the officer and supervisor met various standards.

Correction officials declined to let us see those files. Now they say they will release them. We'll let you know what they show.

Easley also questioned our timing, saying we were out to get Beck, who was retiring.

In the spring, after problems were revealed in the Carson case and another involving Duke graduate student Abhijit Mahato, we dug deeper. We reported for months. We published as soon as we double-checked each fact.

In short, we took action.

Easley, on the other hand, has been more interested in deflecting blame than acknowledging there are serious problems to be fixed.