Sen. R.C. Soles, who sits on the Senate Transportation Committee that oversees the Division of Motor Vehicles, is defending a client being sued by the agency.

DMV is suing Oak Island Mayor Johnie Vereen over $389,000 embezzled by one of Vereen's then-employees at his now-defunct license plate agency, the Star-News of Wilmington reports. The employee pleaded guilty to swindling the money last year, and Vereen did not face criminal charges.

DMV now is trying to get the money out of Vereen.

"He hasn't taken one penny," Soles, a lawyer and Tabor City Democrat, told the newspaper.

As a member of the Senate Transportation Committee, Soles helps oversee the Department of Transportation and its various appendages, including DMV.

Nearly three dozen employees at the state Division of Motor Vehicles, many who directly oversaw the agency’s $51.5 million computing contract with Verizon Business, appear to have accepted steak dinners, hockey tickets and other gifts from the company.

On some occasions, Verizon says it provided such catered meals as barbecue and deli plates to DMV employees at the agency’s Raleigh headquarters. Most of the time, the company’s sales staff and the state employees dined out, often at such pricey Triangle eateries as The Chop House, The Angus Barn and 42nd Street Oyster Bar.

Verizon provided DMV with a list last month containing the names of 62 people it says it bought things for. Of those, at least 37 are current or former state employees, while nine were consultants and private contractors working for the state. Other names on the list appear to be the spouses, boyfriends and girlfriends of the state employees.

The list was released by DMV Tuesday, following a public records request from The News & Observer and The Charlotte Observer. Dozens of employees whose names appear on the list are still on the job.

The State Bureau of Investigation is currently probing whether Verizon employees or state officials broke the law, including whether those accepting the meals and gifts then made decisions that helped the company.

DMV Commissioner Mike Robertson said Tuesday that the SBI investigation is likely to take weeks, if not longer. After that, DMV will conduct an internal investigation to determine whether personnel action is warranted.

"The fact that an employee’s name is on the list does not indicate wrongdoing," said Robertson, adding that investigators would need to confirm the meals indicated in Verizon’s records actually took place.

Nearly 4,500 licensed drivers in North Carolina have three months to prove that they are who they say they are or they will lose their licenses, the N.C. Division of Motor Vehicles said today.

DMV Commissioner Bill Gore said a first round of letters started going out to those motorists this month, giving them 60 days to respond. If they do not, they will get an additional 30 days to respond to a second letter. They'll lose their licenses if they do not respond by then, Dan Kane reports.

The verification effort follows a state audit that found roughly 27,000 licensed drivers' Social Security numbers did not match. Many of those licenses had been issued prior to 2004, when the DMV linked to a federal Social Security data base to verify a driver's identification.

Many of the licenses for the 27,000 have been expired or revoked since the audit began, auditors said. The remaining 4,454 drivers with licenses are a tiny percentage of the state's 6.3 million licensed drivers.

Bill Graham says he supports a voter ID law in North Carolina.

A spokesman for the Republican gubernatorial candidate said that the state could easily add a photo to the voter registration card that citizens already must get.

Aaron Lay told Dome that the so-called "motor voter" law—which allows people to register to vote when they get a driver's license—and the recent shortening of the registration period could make it possible for people to vote fraudulently.

He cited a recent report from the state auditor's office which found 20,000 people registered for driver's licenses with invalid Social Security numbers. The state Division of Motor Vehicles later said it only had questions about 3,500 drivers.

"Is there fraud in the system? I don't know," Lay said. "Is there a potential for it? Absolutely." 

Investigators have found nearly 1,000 vehicles misclassified as antiques.

A three-month review of the state Division of Motor Vehicles title files found roughly 900 vehicles with vintage titles from an Alabama company known for selling titles.

Misclassified vehicles can cost the state thousands of dolars because owners typically pay much lower taxes and fees.

"We have been victimized by titling services out of Alabama," said DMV Supervisor Brian Bozard.

The investigation was sparked by news that a 1937 Ford truck belonging to a friend of former Commissioner George Tatum was misclassified. (N&O)

State Rep. Pat McElraft is trying to get a DMV examiner reinstated.

The Emerald Isle Republican said in a statement Wednesday that she talked to officials with the N.C. Division of Motor Vehicles to try to persuade them to rehire Jeffrey Brown, Dan Kane reports.

Brown, 34, is the former examiner who said he was fired after raising questions about illegal immigrants obtaining drivers licenses. He is suing to get his job back.

McElraft, whose district includes Brown's home, said she thinks he was fired for bringing the illegal immigrant issue to his supervisors' attentions.

"Mr. Brown is exactly the kind of person that the North Carolina Whistleblower Act was implemented to protect," McElraft said. "I tried to get the DMV on numerous occasions to do the right thing for Mr. Brown before this lawsuit was filed. The DMV declined to make things right.

"It is unfortunate that Jeff must go to court to fix what the DMV management structure should have fixed long before things got to this point."

More after the jump.

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Today, the Eight Ball takes on The Whiteville News Reporter.

The Columbus County newspaper reported today that longtime Superior Court Judge Bill Gore Jr. abruptly resigned his seat Tuesday.

He said he has not been offered another position in state government, but that didn't stop the newspaper from reporting this rumor:

There was much speculation Wednesday that Gore would be tapped by Gov. Easley to held the state's Division of Motor Vehicles, a post vacated two weeks ago by George Tatum's resignation.

Gore, who went to N.C. Central University's law school with Easley, used to play basketball with the governor back in the day.

The Eight Ball's verdict: "As I see it, yes."