Pubdate: Thu, 19 Aug 2004
Source: Herald-Sun, The (Durham, NC)
Copyright: 2004 The Herald-Sun
Contact:  http://www.herald-sun.com
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1428
Author: Associated Press
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/coke.htm (Cocaine)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/corrupt.htm (Corruption - United States)

SBI TO INVESTIGATE AOC COCAINE ALLEGATIONS

RALEIGH, N.C. -- Attorney General Roy Cooper has requested a state 
investigation into the former top court administrator's suspected cocaine 
use in his office. "The attorney general has directed the (State Bureau of 
Investigation) to investigate the matter," Noelle Talley, a spokeswoman for 
Cooper, said Wednesday. "He felt like it needs to be looked into." Talley 
would not elaborate on the SBI's assignment or Cooper's reasons for it. 
John Kennedy was director of the state Administrative Office of the Courts 
until he resigned July 24. His boss, Chief Justice Beverly Lake Jr., said 
two agency employees last month reported to him that they saw Kennedy hide 
things on his desk, The News & Observer of Raleigh first reported 
Wednesday. Lake had an aide ask Wake County Sheriff Donnie Harrison to 
search Kennedy's office in the state Justice Building on July 22. The 
search turned up "trace amounts of cocaine," Lake said. Lake issued a 
memorandum Tuesday describing the circumstances of Kennedy's abrupt 
departure. It said Harrison's search corroborated "information about 
possible cocaine use" by Kennedy. Lake demanded Kennedy's resignation July 
23, and Kennedy resigned the next day. Kennedy, who has not been charged 
with a crime, said told the newspaper this week that he has never used cocaine.

Harrison said that he saw something suspicious in Kennedy's office but 
wouldn't say what. Wake County District Attorney Colon Willoughby said 
Wednesday that he decided not to investigate Kennedy on suspicion of 
cocaine possession largely because there wasn't any material he could have 
arranged to have tested. "There was nothing collected or gathered to be 
tested," Willoughby said in an interview. "I was under the impression that 
there was nothing that could be collected and sent off for testing.

I'm sure the sheriff would have collected it if he could have." Therefore, 
he said, he had no basis to charge Kennedy with a crime or to search his 
car or home. "I tried to make the decision based on the evidence and the 
facts as I understood them to be," he said. "I didn't think there was any 
prosecutable case." Willoughby, a friend of Kennedy, worked closely with 
him for 16 years at the Wake County Courthouse. Before going to work for 
the AOC three years ago, Kennedy was Wake County's elected clerk of courts.

Willoughby said their friendship didn't affect his judgment. "I prosecuted 
(Raleigh lawyer) Jim Blackburn, who was a friend of mine," he said. "I 
prosecuted (former state agriculture commissioner) Meg Scott Phipps, who 
was a friend.

I try to do my job based on the facts and the evidence, not based on who 
people are." Under state court rulings, a small amount of drug residue is 
enough to convict someone of cocaine possession, a felony.

But there has to be enough residue to permit chemical testing to determine 
what it is. Veteran Clinton defense lawyer Doug Parsons, a former state and 
federal prosecutor, said court rulings have said that drug dog indications 
alone are not enough evidence to support a conviction, because they can be 
unreliable. "None of us know what was or was not found," he said. "Based on 
what I read in the newspaper, it would not be prosecuted. Unquantifiable 
amounts of drugs don't have a lot of jury appeal."
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MAP posted-by: Terry Liittschwager