NC elections board: Wrong sheriff serving in Columbus County

The State Board of Elections and Ethics Enforcement said Thursday that Columbus County's new sheriff shouldn't have been sworn in because there are two protests pending of election results.

Jody Greene seemed to win the race Nov. 6, beating incumbent Sheriff Lewis Hatcher by 34 votes. But he was sworn in prematurely, state board spokesman Patrick Gannon said, because there's an election protest still pending before the board.

"Sheriff Hatcher should still be serving as sheriff," Gannon said in an email.

Gannon also confirmed that state investigators traveled to Columbus County on Thursday to pick up absentee ballot envelopes, request forms and the request log, the same sort of documents investigators seized in an ongoing inquiry into the 9th Congressional Districts results.

WECT was the first to report on the Columbus County inquiry.

An attempt to reach Greene late Thursday was not successful.

The state constitution says that elected officials hold their positions until their replacements "are chosen and qualified," and Gannon said the state board told the Columbus County Board of Elections this week not to issue a certificate of election in this race.