A governor hamstrung by a scandal that erupts when a fired employee goes public about the administration's policy of deleting sensitive e-mail messages in violation of the state's sunshine laws.

Sound familiar?

Gov. Mike Easley may want to study the recent experience of Missouri Gov. Matt Blunt, who announced in January that he would not seek re-election in part because of a furor over deleted e-mail messages by his office.

Hammered by the media and his political opponents, the first-term Republican pledged $2 million in reserve funding to buy and maintain a new system to archive all government e-mail messages for 7 years.

There's even a Web site created by the Missouri Democratic Party, www.bluntdocumentdestroyer.com, where visitors play a game to stop the beleaguered governor from deleting public records.

"It touched off a controversy because of concerns about what was being deleted and whether they were public records needed for posterity," said Jo Mannies, a political columnist for the St. Louis-Post Dispatch. "We requested copies of e-mails from the governor's office only to be told no e-mails existed. That's when things started snowballing."

Missouri is one of several states where officials have struggled with the ethical and technical issues of preserving government e-mail to adhere to public records laws that were drafted originally to deal with paper records.

In Texas, Gov. Rick Perry, a Republican, is under fire for his administration's policy of deleting e-mail files after seven days. Campaign pledges of government transparency by Democrat Ted Strickland of Ohio have been tested by voluminous requests for e-mail messages. In Virginia, the office of Gov. Tim Kaine electronically archives e-mail.

Courts in Arkansas, Texas and Arizona have recently ruled against public officials who sought to keep their e-mail private. Legislatures in Iowa, Maine, Vermont and other states have recently taken steps to order the retention of government e-mail.

Avoiding publicity

The Missouri governor's troubles with e-mail messages began in September, after Blunt fired his deputy legal counsel, Scott Eckersley. The lawyer then sued, alleging that he was fired after advising the governor and his top advisers that it was illegal for them to destroy potentially embarrassing e-mail messages after a scandal with the state highway patrol.

Missouri's public records law, like North Carolina's statutes, makes no distinction between e-mail and the paper records retained and archived for public access.

In his suit, Eckersley recounted 2007 meetings where the governor's chief legal counsel and chief of staff told staff members that "all e-mail should be deleted" and to "make sure they have deleted their e-mail in both the inbox and trash files to ensure they did not have to be turned over to the press or the public."

The governor's office responded by calling the whistleblower a liar and claiming he was fired for incompetence. It also accused Eckersley of drug use and viewing pornography on his work computer, an accusation later shown to be untrue.

The e-mail story was amplified by the media, political bloggers and Democrats angling to win back the governor's mansion. Blunt's chief of staff eventually resigned, and his chief legal counsel moved to another job.

Eckersley's account is remarkably similar to that of North Carolina's Debbie Crane. She was fired last month as the chief spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Human Services after a series in The News & Observer reported on the Easley administration's failed overhaul of the state's mental-health system.

Crane recounted meetings where the Democratic governor's press secretary ordered state press officials to delete "the second you e-mail them anything, to kill it, then kill it again out of your trash so it doesn't exist."

In response, a spokesman for Easley called Crane "dishonest, untruthful and insubordinate" -- a description later discounted by the state DHHS secretary. Notes taken by other public information officers in the same meetings attended by Crane appear to back her claims.

Earlier this week, 10 North Carolina news organizations, including The N&O, sued Easley over his administration's deletion of e-mail, which they say violates the state's public records law.

The governor has appointed a special commission to review his administration's e-mail retention policy, which allows government employees to delete messages "when they no longer have reference value to the sender or receiver." The group is scheduled to hold its third meeting this morning.

Mannies, the St. Louis columnist, said she and others in the "Show-Me State" likely will be watching to see how the Tar Heel e-mail tussle shakes out.

"Deleting e-mails is like burning boxes of documents or letters," she said. "I mean, that's history."

(News researcher Peggy Neal and The Associated Press contributed to this report.)