Deal investigation didn’t require subpoenas, head of ethics… | www.myajc.com

State ethics commission director Holly LaBerge testified Wednesday that it wasn’t necessary to subpoena records in an investigation into Gov. Nathan Deal’s campaign because his attorney would give them voluntarily.

LaBerge’s testimony came as the trial of former commission director Stacey Kalberman’s whistleblower lawsuit entered its third day. Kalberman claims she was forced from office for aggressively investigating Deal’s 2010 campaign and that Laberge was handpicked by Deal’s staff to replace her.

The subpoenas are key to the case, as Kalberman and her top deputy, Sherilyn Streicker, were both out of a job barely a month after presenting draft subpoenas to the commission for approval.

Also Wednesday, former ethics Commissioner Kent Alexander seemed to surprise Kalberman’s lawyers by testifying that he believed the commission faced a real budget crisis in spring 2011. That crisis was the reason former commission Chairman Patrick Millsaps cited as the need to cut Kalberman’s salary by 30 percent and eliminate Streicker’s job. Kalberman has said that the budget was sound and that Millsaps and others really wanted to force her out over the Deal investigation.

“That’s what it was, it was a budgetary decision,” Alexander said.

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