RALEIGH — Little has been known about an SBI investigation into the Rockingham County district attorney’s office until a search warrant became public Tuesday morning.
The 25-page warrant, which was sealed for 90 days starting March 8, gives lengthy details of a district attorney’s wife who allegedly collected $48,000 in pay from the state while enrolled full time in a nursing program.
Since July 25, 2016, the offices of former Rockingham County District Attorney Craig Blitzer and former Person/Caswell District Attorney Wallace Bradsher have faced scrutiny by the State Bureau of Investigation after both men were accused of putting each other’s wives on their payrolls, resulting in more than $100,000 in combined and unearned annual salaries.
That scrutiny has been fueled by a whistleblower lawsuit filed by Debra Halbrook, a former employee in the Caswell County district attorney’s office, that alleges Bradsher fired her for reporting him to the SBI.
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The newly released search warrant paints a vivid picture of the work SBI agents did to build their case to the point where they could justify asking a judge to approve a search of Blitzer’s office.
Much of their investigation clearly was centered on the whereabouts of Blitzer’s wife, Cindy, who was working for Bradsher.
In a twist to what has previously been reported, the documents revealed that Halbrook wasn’t the first person to report their concerns to authorities.
According to the search warrant, Rockingham County Assistant District Attorney Jason Ramey spoke with SBI agents on April 6, 2016, with suspicions that his boss’s wife, Cindy Blitzer, was collecting a paycheck as an investigator in Caswell County while enrolled full time in a nursing program at South University in High Point.
The allegation sparked an investigation by SBI agents to determine whether Ramey’s concerns were valid.
Ramey did not return a call Tuesday requesting comment. Neither did Joe Zeszotarski, an attorney representing Cindy Blitzer.
Halbrook went to the SBI a little more than a month after Ramey, alleging that Blitzer had worked sparingly during her time in the Caswell County district attorney’s office.
The search warrant reveals that Halbrook had a vested interest in Blitzer’s employment because she was hired to relieve Halbrook of some of her duties. Several of Halbrook’s colleagues confirmed to SBI agents that Blitzer, who began the job on Jan. 13, 2015, worked 12 days or less during the first six months of her nearly two-year employment.
On July 29, 2016, agents gathered Blitzer’s time cards from the N.C. Administrative Office of the Courts and learned that since Jan. 1, 2015, she had recorded, with few exceptions, working eight hours a day.
According to the search warrant, however, Special Agent D.W. Mayes at one point spent 21 days monitoring the South University parking lot looking for Blitzer’s car.
He spotted it 14 out of 21 days.
Blitzer was seen as well.
Later, South University nursing professor Sandra Lynn Blackstock confirmed to SBI agents that Blitzer was a student in a 14-month nursing program. The professor added that she spent Tuesdays from 6:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. performing clinicals at Adams Farm Nursing Home.
Blackstock said Blitzer’s attendance was only affected when child care issues arose.
The search warrant yielded yet another revelation: Assistant District Attorney Spencer Morrow told SBI agents that Craig Blitzer asked him to take an online algebra class for his wife. He did so in exchange for a cake and a $50 gift card to LongHorn Steakhouse.
After Morrow completed the first-year algebra course, Cindy Blitzer began two weeks of an algebra II class before her husband asked another employee in his office, Kyle Ambrose, to finish it.
Morrow told SBI agents that those courses were completed before Cindy Blitzer’s admission into the nursing program.
The search warrant also says an office was set up for Blitzer in Rockingham where she worked for her husband as a legal assistant. Bradsher claims she worked there, despite being on his payroll. Several Rockingham employees told authorities they rarely saw her.
District Judge John “J.” Stultz — a former Caswell County chief assistant district attorney — has been under investigation for approving Blitzer’s time cards while he had the ADA job. Stultz told SBI agents that he believed she was working for Bradsher in Rockingham County.
After roughly eight months, SBI agents used this information to apply for a search warrant to raid the Rockingham County district attorney’s office and seize the computer used by Cindy Blitzer.
Agents told Judge A. Graham Shirley they felt it would take weeks of analysis to find what they were looking for, including hidden and deleted files.
Shirley granted the request March 8.
Craig Blitzer resigned as Rockingham County’s district attorney two days later.