HUFFINGTON
10.07.12
LASKI DIFFUSION/EAST NEWS/LIAISON/GETTY IMAGES
ANGER MANAGEMENT
had used in their court battle. LaRoque, Ovaska noted in her story,
had a record of “questionable management and financial dealings.”
Shortly after Ovaska’s story
came out in August 2011, LaRoque
called a press conference to denounce her findings. He called
N.C. Policy Watch a “liberal propaganda tabloid” and claimed that
his compensation at the non-profits was commensurate with the
assets he managed.
LaRoque also said his salary at
the non-profits came from interest on loans that borrowers paid
back, not from taxpayer dollars.
Moreover, he noted, Ovaska’s article had been an act of retaliation
— the head of the NAACP’s North
Carolina chapter sat on the board
of a group affiliated with N.C. Policy Watch, which published Ovaska’s article, and Laroque pointed
out that he had once criticized the
chapter head as a racist.
LaRoque’s press conference
failed to clear his name.
A DIFFERENT PERSON
In September 2011, short ly after
the N.C. Policy Watch story came
out, state and federal authorities
subpoenaed LaRoque as part of
a joint investigation into ECDC’s
activities as a non-profit.
In July of this year, the investigation — which included the Internal
Revenue Service, the USDA, the
Federal Bureau of Investigation and
the North Carolina State Bureau of
Investigation — produced a 72-page
grand jury indictment charging LaRoque with four counts of theft and
four counts of fraud. If found guilty
on all counts, LaRoque faces 80
years in prison.
The timing of the subpoenas
led most local reporters to conclude that Ovaska’s journalism
had sparked the investigation, but
it’s possible authorities had already been looking into LaRoque
because of the defamation case.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the
Eastern District of North Carolina,
which announced the indictment,
declined to comment on the
investigation.
John Archie, Van
Braxton’s lawyer,
said he figured authorities
would jump on
LaRoque based
on what he’d
uncovered in
the discovery
process for the
defamation suit.
“We got to the point
where everybody was
fairly comfortable