Judge refuses to revive defamation lawsuit linked to NC casino opposition
A state judge who previously dismissed a defamation case that has revealed secret moves to legalize casinos in North Carolina rejected an effort to remove him from the case, and said he would report the attorneys involved to the NC State Bar for disciplinary proceedings.
In a hearing Friday afternoon, Special Superior Court Judge Hoyt Tessener denied any bias in the case involving a hotly contested Rockingham County commissioner race, and said he found no legitimate claim that candidate Craig Travis had been defamed.
He sided with the defendants’ attorneys who said in court that they viewed Travis’ lawsuit as a frivolous attempt to revisit the state legislature’s failed effort in 2023 to land three casinos in Rockingham, Anson and Nash counties. State Senate leader Phil Berger of Rockingham County sought the legislation, and his son Kevin is a Rockingham commissioner who voted to rezone property that would have been developed for a casino.
Records obtained by the lawyers bringing the defamation suit reveal moves the Cordish Companies of Baltimore and its advocates made in Anson and in the legislature. The News & Observer obtained those records from Anson County in a public records request.
Travis, a former county commissioner and a casino opponent, had narrowly lost a Republican primary election against Kevin Berger last year that would have put him back on the board. He claimed Berger, two other commissioners on the board last year, a Rockingham GOP leader and two political groups had defamed him during his campaign, in which his opposition to casinos was prominent.
Tessener dismissed the lawsuit after a hearing on April 23, writing in a brief order that Travis lacked a valid claim.
In court Friday, Tessener said the majority of the facts laid out in the complaint had to do with issues linked to the failed 2023 effort to legalize casinos in this state and not Travis’ claims that he was defamed. He also noted that Travis’ attorneys did not raise issues about his impartiality, which he defended, until after his decision.
“I do not have any relationships with any of the parties, I do not even know them,” Tessener said.
He sparred with two of Travis’ attorneys – Kimberly Bryan and Alicia Jurney – throughout Friday’s hearing in Wake County Superior Court.
The road to Friday’s hearing
Tessener took over Travis’ case on April 23, hours after Superior Court Judge Robby Hicks recused himself just before the hearing began. Hicks had used The Differentiators, a prominent consulting firm, to administer his successful judicial campaign in 2022. The firm had been subpoenaed by Travis’ attorneys.
Travis’ attorneys in a court filing said Tessener had conflicts that he should have considered before dismissing the case. They contend that he is too closely tied with one defendant in the case: GOPAC, a national political group that supports Republican candidates.
“The important thing is for people to have confidence in the judicial system,” Jurney said in court.
Former House Speaker Tim Moore appointed Tessener a judge in 2023, the year the Republican-led state legislature put language into the massive state budget bill to give legislative leaders the power to create and appoint 10 Special Superior Court positions, a job previously filled by the governor.
From 2015 to 2023, Moore sat on a GOPAC advisory board, Travis’ attorneys said. Berger remains on the board, after taking a seat in 2020.
Travis’ attorneys also pointed to the judge’s campaign contributions to Moore and Berger as evidence of a conflict. Tessener had made donations totaling $17,000 to Moore’s legislative campaigns, much of it after 2014, and $6,600 to his congressional campaign, state and federal election records show. He gave $1,000 to state Sen. Phil Berger’s campaign in 2017.
But Moore and Phil Berger were not defendants in the case, and GOPAC’s advisory board includes nearly every Republican state legislative leader across the country, said Ellis Boyle, an attorney for two of the defendants.
Tessener has also made donations to several prominent Democrats over the years, including Secretary of State Elaine Marshall and former state appellate Judge Lucy Inman, Boyle said.
“You can’t divine any bias or partiality from that,” Boyle said.