North Carolina Department of Transportation Ferry Division Director Jerry Gaskill, who was indicted by a federal grand jury on Jan. 18 for illegal activities associated with the state’s efforts to establish a passenger ferry service across Currituck Sound, made his initial appearance Tuesday in federal court in Raleigh. His attorney, Thomas Manning, accompanied him.

The court session was brief. Magistrate Judge E. S. Swearingen read a brief summary of the charges and told Gaskill, 63, of Cedar Island, that it was necessary for him to surrender his passport and transfer any firearms from his residence to that of a neighbor or friend.

Gaskill then signed a form agreeing to those terms. Gaskill will be called back to court within the next few weeks to enter a plea. Prior to the start of the court session Gaskill refused to answer any questions from Carolina Journal about the charges.

He is charged with conspiracy to violate the Clean Water Act and the Rivers and Harbor Act, actual violations of both acts, and with making material false statements about those activities.

The indictment alleges that Gaskill and others agreed in January 2004 to force Ferry Division workboats into the Corolla basin in order to create a deeper channel, knowing that no permits had been obtained for such an activity. The indictment then alleges that on May 6 and 7, 2004 Gaskill and others actually carried out that operation to “prop wash” the channel. The indictment further alleges that on June 25, 2004 Gaskill signed a written false statement claiming the creation of the channel was unintentional and submitted that statement to the United States Army Corps of Engineers.

If convicted of all charges, Gaskill could receive a maximum sentence of 14 years. Four other Ferry Division Employees, Billy R. Moore, Herbert F. O’Neal, Douglas A. Bateman, and Stephen G. Smith have recently pleaded guilty to charges in connection with the dredging incident.

Previous stories by Carolina Journal revealed the new ferry service faced several obstacles. Plans for the project were initiated soon after the Currituck County Board of Commissioners asked state Sen. Marc Basnight in July 2002 to help establish a ferry service to transport about 40 school children from the Outer Banks to the mainland. Although proponents of the ferry said it was needed for school children, documents suggest that the service was intended to transport resort workers and tourists. Students had been attending Dare County schools on the Outer Banks.

The 2002 budget bill ordered DOT to do a feasibility study. Gaskill conducted a study and submitted it to the General Assembly in May 2003. The proposed route would be about 12 miles across the shallow Currituck Sound from the Currituck community to the Corolla community.

“The proposed ferry service is feasible, assuming the appropriate permits can be obtained,” Gaskill concluded in the study. But he failed to address two previous unsuccessful attempts by Currituck County to obtain a dredging permit for the very shallow Corolla location. State and federal environmental agencies had ruled that the area was a sensitive marine habitat that needed to be protected. At the time of the illegal dredging, neither DOT nor Currituck County had applied for a permit.

The 49-person, 50-foot pontoon boat ordered for service was delivered in August 2004 to the State Shipyard in Manns Harbor. The Virginian-Pilot recently reported that the Coast Guard ruled that the boat is not fit to run across the sound and DOT is considering upgrading the boat or selling it.

Noe’s Memo

Many of the questions about the state’s efforts to establish the ferry service cannot be answered because Danny Noe, 59, a key state employee who was involved in the purchase of the boat, was found dead April 15, 2005. When his body was found, Noe’s hands were tied behind his back and a plastic bag was tied over his head. The Carteret County Sheriff’s Department has indicated that the manner of death was suicide, but neither the department nor the local district attorney has issued a final report.

CJ met with Noe in July of 2004, two months after the illegal dredging activity occurred. Subsequent to that meeting Noe prepared a written account for CJ of what he knew or believed to be true about the about the dredging incident.

In his account, received by fax from a friend of Noe’s on July 26, 2004, Noe described how he was brought into the discussions about the proposed service sometime in early 2003. He wrote that the thrust of the conversations with Jerry Gaskill and Ferry division business officer Charlie Utz “was the need for some way to transport workers to the Corolla area to help with domestic duties in the Condos and Hotels in the area.” [Read Noe’s memo]

He wrote that transporting school children was eventually brought up later. “I believe the school board issue is valid but it was also a very handy excuse,” he wrote. Noe also wrote that Gaskill commented many times that Marc Basnight wanted the boat and “it was going to happen no matter what the Secretary [Lyndo Tippett] felt about it.” He wrote that there was a “lot of friction between” Basnight and Tippett. “Tippet was totally against it according to Gaskill but it didn’t matter because Marc wanted it,” he wrote in the memo to CJ.

Noe explained that his role was to locate a shallow draft boat that would be suitable for the service. “The original boat contract completion date was supposed to be May of 2004. This start date would have made the boat available for summer worker schedules but had nothing to do with the school kids relevant to start dates,” he wrote.

Noe also claimed he had reported the illegal dredging. “I called the federal Water Quality people in Washington, NC sometime during the last part of the Week of May 17, 04 to report that I suspected the Ferry Division dredge crews were engaged in illegal activities in the same area,” he wrote. He wrote that he had seen the dredge tender Buxton, Jr. on the lift at the State Shipyard and noticed that both propellers and shafts were severely damaged.

He speculated that Bill Moore told Jerry Gaskill he could take care of the problem of the shallow basin and Gaskill agreed. He wrote that the two men had ignored the rules on other occasions. One of Gaskill’s sayings is ”better to ask forgiveness than permission,” he wrote.

Don Carrington is executive editor of Carolina Journal.