Roy A. Cooper
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This 2006 Duke University lacrosse team scandal is related to a current event. Information may change rapidly as the event progresses. |
Roy A. Cooper, III (born 1957) is the current North Carolina Attorney General.
Born in Nash County, North Carolina, Cooper was raised in a rural community and worked in tobacco fields during the summer as a teenager. He received the Morehead Scholarship at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and there earned a Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree.
After practicing law with his family's law firm for a number of years, Cooper was elected to the North Carolina House of Representatives in 1986 and named to the North Carolina Senate in 1991. In 1997, he was elected Democratic Majority Leader of the state Senate. He continued to practice law as the managing partner of the law firm Fields & Cooper in Rocky Mount, North Carolina.
Cooper was elected North Carolina Attorney General in November 2000 and took office on January 6, 2001; he was re-elected for a second term in 2004. Cooper was mentioned as a possible Democratic candidate for North Carolina governor, but he has decided to run for re-election as Attorney General in 2008, instead. [1] The current governor, Mike Easley, succeeded to the post of governor after serving as state attorney general.
In January 2007, when Durham District Attorney Mike Nifong asked to be recused from dealing with the Duke lacrosse team rape case, Attorney General Cooper's office assumed responsibilty for the case.
