RALEIGH, N.C. – The chairman of the North Carolina State Ethics Commission is lambasting the state auditor’s office over an investigation into a fired ethics panel employee.
 
Chairman Robert Farmer skewered State Auditor Les Merritt Friday for releasing a preliminary report on the firing investigation without waiting for a lawsuit on the topic to be resolved in court. Farmer labeled that preliminary report a “sham” and said Merritt is acting with “total contempt for the rule of law.”

His comments are the latest in the spat between the two agencies over whether Merritt’s office should be conducting the investigation into a commission employee’s firing. The ethics panel has filed a lawsuit to remove the auditor from the investigation because it says the auditor has a conflict of interest.