A top state Division of Motor Vehicles official announced today that he is retiring.
The announcement by John Robinson comes two weeks after two members of his staff were placed on investigatory leave as part of a probe into the hiring of his longtime friend, reports Dan Kane.
Robinson, 59, will retire June 14 after working for the DMV for nearly 22 years. He is paid nearly $108,000 annually.
As director of the DMV's License and Theft Bureau, Robinson oversees roughly 200 employees. The bureau investigates theft and fraud involving vehicles and drivers, and it also runs the emissions inspections program.
DMV Commissioner Bill Gore said Robinson's retirement had nothing to do with an incident in which Robinson's childhood friend won a job as an emissions specialist last year. The friend, a former purchasing clerk for Progress Energy, won the job over a longtime State Highway Patrol mechanic who has been teaching mechanics to do emissions inspections for roughly a decade.
Read more after the jump.
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A News & Observer report of the hiring prompted an SBI investigation that led to the bureau's deputy director, Jimmy Edwards, and its Charlotte district supervisor, Purnell Sowell, being placed on investigatory leave.
Wake County District Attorney Colon Willoughby said a key DMV witness had refused to cooperate with the investigation, but declined to name that person.
Gore said Robinson is an "extremely honorable man" who decided to "accelerate" his retirement date. Early this year, Gore had said that Robinson was contemplating retiring.
"I've not asked him to retire; I've not put any pressure on him," Gore said.
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Re: DMV official retires
same things happens in DHHS. Cherry, O' Berry, Special Care Center and Caswell is full of those type hires for the better positions. In the 90's, George G., then the Director of Dobbs School (a youth detention center) was charged with a DWI at the beach, had an open container of alcohol and a 15 year old female runaway in his truck. He was not fired but allowed to "resign" after the story ran twice in the Kinston Free Press. Then about a year later he shows up at Caswell Center as the Director of Personnel. He is now retired. The Center Director of Caswell Center in Kinston (prior to Mike M.'s time there) was "let go" for inappropriate use and mishandling of state funds and equipment. He was paying his wife a huge salary as a part-time secretary for a research project going on at Caswell. He later showed up at the ECU School of Medicine as the Business Director making more money than he did at Caswell. Another Center Director about 3 years ago acted inappropriately (not being courteous) with a person he didn't know was on a Human Rights board at Cherry and he botched up a what Hooker-Odom said was "going to a model MR/MI program for the state and the nation" and a merger between Cherry Hospital and O' Berry with Hooker-Odoms directions and was allowed to "retire". His assistant was promoted to the director position and not achieved anything towards the new mission that is now "specialized nursing" after it was supposed to be implemented two years ago.
The daughter of the owner of a "famous" BBQ eatery in Goldsboro had a position created for her by the Director of Cherry. She has since been promoted several times with only a Bachelor's degree over Master and Doctorate level applicants. And in addition - the jobs she has gotten were never posted per OSPA.
The Director at O' Berry created a job for a friend and somehow has managed to change positions (upward) without anyone knowing and making 68K.
So, you can understand why the system is in such a mess.