Pubdate: Wed, 17 Oct 2001 Source: Sanford Herald, The (NC) Copyright: The Sanford Herald 2001 Contact: http://www.sanfordherald.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1577 Author: Sara Griffitt Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/corrupt.htm (Corruption) http://www.mapinc.org/areas/North+Carolina CHATHAM DEPUTY'S ATTORNEY WANTS WITNESS TO TALK PITTSBORO - The attorney for former Chatham County sheriff's deputy Dan Phillips plans to file a motion to compel testimony of at least one potential witness in a lawsuit filed by Phillips earlier this year. Chapel Hill-based attorney Alan McSurely filed the lawsuit on Phillips' behalf in early February after Phillips was fired from the sheriff's department in mid-January. The lawsuit names Sheriff Ike Gray as defendant and alleges that Phillips was fired after he was asked to take a lie detector test about the origins of a tape containing racist statements about black students allegedly made by former Chatham Central High School Principal William "Buddy" Fowler. Phillips, who worked as a student resource officer at the school for several months in 1999 and 2000, states in the lawsuit that he told members of the sheriff's department only if the person who alleged that Phillips made the tape would also take a lie detector test. Phillips has denied making the tape. According to the suit, Phillips was also not allowed to report racial incidents that he witnessed at the school to U.S. Department of Education Office of Civil Rights (OCR) investigators. The OCR investigators were in Chatham County looking into a complaint filed by members of Correcting Racial Injustice for Success In Society (CRISIS) against the school system in mid-1999. The complaint alleged, among other things, that the district was biased against minorities in discipline matters and that the district had a low number of minority faculty members. The school system received OCR's recommendations last December, and was not penalized. CRISIS petitioned in February to reopen the OCR case after Phillips' lawsuit was filed. Soon after Phillips filed the lawsuit, Gray's attorney filed a motion to move the case to a federal court in Greensboro. McSurely filed an opposing motion on April 4 to keep the case in Chatham County Superior Court. On Sept. 27, a federal judge ruled that the case should be heard in Chatham County. McSurely said depositions have been taken from Chatham County Superintendent Larry Mabe, Board of Education Chairman Jack Wilkie, Chief Deputy Randy Keck, Chatham County Commissioner Rick Givens, Phillips and Gray regarding the suit. McSurely said he decided to file a motion to compel testimony after at least one person being deposed was instructed by an attorney not to answer some questions. "There are two themes in this case. First, that tape of the principal and the missing marijuana from the sheriff's department," McSurely said. "We are saying that Phillips was unfairly targeted in both of these cases, even though he played only a tangential role in both of these very volatile, political issues, because he upset various political figures in the county." The "missing marijuana" involves a drug bust near Siler City in 1999 that netted nearly 5,000 pounds of marijuana. The marijuana was stored in a two-and-a-half ton army surplus truck at the sheriff's department pending burial in a landfill. When deputies drove the truck to the landfill in September, 2000, they discovered a large portion of the marijuana was missing. The remaining marijuana was buried, but it turned up missing several weeks later. The FBI has investigating the case and a spokesman has stated that they do have suspects in the case. The motion to compel testimony could be filed as early as next week, McSurely said. - --- MAP posted-by: Richard Lake