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A North Carolina sheriff who was caught on tape calling his Black colleagues "b*****ds" said he was still running for reelection hours after he resigned from his position, per local station WECT.
On Monday (October 24), Jody Greene resigned from his post as Columbus County Sheriff just as a petition was being heard in a local courtroom to remove him from office.
However, by submitting his resignation before being potentially removed by the county, Greene is free to continue his reelection campaign. In a Facebook post hours after he stepped down, Greene made it clear that he was moving forward with his run for office.
“There are two weeks left before the election, early voting is in progress, and there is a move afoot to usurp the votes of law-abiding citizens,” Greene wrote Monday.
“I cannot afford to spend the next week fighting in a courtroom while we are in the middle of an election to preserve our freedom. I’m still running for Sheriff of Columbus County in the November 8, 2022 election. I am running to make Columbus County better and safer for all our citizens,” he continued.
Sammy Hinson, chairman of the Columbus County Republican Party, told WECT that the organization will continue to support his bid despite widespread calls for him to step down and an ongoing criminal probe by the North Carolina Bureau of Investigation.
“We have no plans to ask him to withdraw his candidacy,” Hinson said. “Our plans are for him to win and win big. The voters will decide based upon his performance as sheriff, not special interest groups from outside our county with an agenda.”
Greene's long-awaited resignation comes after WECT released audio of his 6.5-minute call with former Captain Jason Soles.
“I’m sick of these Black b*****ds. I’m going to clean house and be done with it,” Greene said to Soles during a call in February 2019.
The conversation came shortly after Greene narrowly defeated the previous sheriff Lewis Hatcher, who is Black. Soles was temporarily appointed as the acting sheriff while election officials investigated a complaint regarding whether Greene was eligible for the position.
Greene believed that the Black deputies in the department were loyal to Hatcher and had leaked information about him.
In the phone call, Greene suggested that disloyal Black deputies be fired.
“Every Black that I know, you need to fire him to start with, he’s a snake,” Greene said to Soles.
Several Black officers in leadership positions were later demoted or fired, according to reports.
Soles, who recorded the conversation, is now running against Greene in the upcoming election. While Greene has claimed that the recording was altered, the local chapter of the NAACP, the American Civil Liberties Union, and even the county’s Republican District Attorney Jon David all urged him to resign. After resisting resignation calls, Greene was suspended by a superior court judge earlier this month.
David said his office will take action if Greene is reelected.
“These allegations speak through time and are disqualifying to anyone seeking to hold the high office of sheriff,” David said in a statement Monday. “My office would have an ethical obligation to file, and will file, a new Petition to remove Greene from that term of office based on the allegations alleged in the current Petition to Remove.”
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