The documents show Easley used a secret e-mail account with a clandestine address - the name of fictional private investigator Nick Danger spelled backwards.
Sherri Johnson, a former Easley communications director, said the governor had the e-mail account that he used for state business.
The e-mail address, '"kcinregnad," was the reverse of the name of a fictional detective dreamed up by a comedy troupe in the 1960's. The idea apparently had something to do with a learning disability. Easley has been rumored for years to have dyslexia.
Johnson told media attorneys, "The governor wrote backwards. I mean, when he wrote, he wrote backwards."
The John Locke Foundation publishes the Carolina Journal. It's one of several media outlets that are party to a lawsuit filed against the Easley administration after an official in one of the Governor's cabinet departments - Debbie Crane - claimed the Governor's office told public information officers to routinely delete e-mails. She was later fired.
"In open records requests we filed over time we didn't receive private e-mails from Mike Easley," said Rick Henderson with the Carolina Journal.
In her deposition, Cari Boyce, a former communications director for Easley, said the governor was the only state official she knew of that used a private e-mail address to conduct state business.
Easley officials also testified they were instructed to use the phone for sensitive issues rather than e-mail so there would be no record.
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