Anyone who was hoping to hear anything out of the Guilford County Sheriff’s Department regarding this week’s resignation of the department’s executive administrative assistant or the department’s spokesman should not hold their breath.

On Monday, July 15, former spokesman Max Benbassat said the department would put out a statement regarding the resignation of Executive Administrative Assistant Catherine Netter – however, a few hours later Benbassat himself resigned.

On Tuesday, July 16, James Secor, the attorney for the Sheriff’s Department, sent an email to the Rhino Times regarding an article on the resignations.  That article stated, “Benbassat also said that he’d been in meetings all morning on Monday and added that he expected the department to offer a statement on Netter’s departure, perhaps by the end of the day.”

Secor wrote in his email that, despite Benbassat’s statement, in fact there would be no statement coming due to state legal statutes.

“With respect to the highlighted portion of the quote above, and as you know, N.C. Gen. Stat. §153A-98 protects the privacy and confidentiality of most personnel information regarding both current and former employees,” he wrote in an email.

Secor sent in his email an excerpt of North Carolina law that states that the employment information that is public record is “Date and type of each promotion, demotion, transfer, suspension, separation or other change in position classification with that county.”

He added, “In accordance with the statutory provision above, the only statement the Sheriff’s Office will provide is that ‘Ms. Netter submitted her resignation on Thursday, July 11, 2019.  That resignation was accepted by Sheriff [Danny] Rogers on Friday, July 12, 2019 and was effective yesterday, July 15, 2019.’”