Gov. Pat McCrory has hired outside counsel to argue in a federal appeals court in a long-running lawsuit over hydroelectric dams on the Yadkin River. McCrory has named former N.C. Supreme Court Justice Bob Orr as lead counsel for the oral arguments assisted by K. Edward Greene, a former state appeals court judge.

 

The new attorneys are the result of a dispute with Attorney General Roy Cooper. Noelle Talley, the attorney general’s spokeswoman, said the justice department attorney who had been scheduled to deliver oral arguments had worked on the case for several years. She said the department disagreed with the decision to designate outside counsel.

 

Cooper's attorneys filed notice in federal court asking to withdraw from making oral arguments in the Alcoa Power Generating lawsuit. 

 

McCrory’s general counsel, Bob Stephens toild the Raleigh News and Observer newspaper that his office asked Cooper to assign the state’s solicitor general, John Maddry, to the case. Maddry’s job is to handle appeals and he has extensive experience.

 

The conflict is the latest example of the clash between the Republican McCrory and the Democrat Cooper over legal strategy and how far to continue appealing a number of cases. Republicans have used it to accuse Cooper of not doing his job.

 

The lawsuit involves the state’s challenge of whether Alcoa owns the riverbed on which the dams were built. A federal judge in Raleigh last year ruled the state waited too long to make that challenge. The state appealed that ruling.