Questions Raised About Firing
JEFFERSON CITY (AP) - A former attorney for Governor Blunt claims he was fired after raising questions about e-mail deletions in the governor's office. But Blunt's administration claims Scott Eckersley was let go for poor performance and misusing state resources. Eckersley was a deputy legal counsel who was fired in late September. That came shortly after Blunt and his staff acknowledged they routinely delete some e-mails, rather than retaining them as public records. Eckersley now says he was fired for pointing out that the governor's office was not following its own policies for handling records requests. But Blunt's administration says Eckersley was fired for poor performance, tardiness and doing private sector work on state time, among other things.