160-Year-Old Documents Intentionally Destroyed in Franklin County, N.C.

Re:160-Year-Old Documents Intentionally Destroyed in Frankli... by dded on Tuesday January 07, 2014 @08:37AM (#7017183)

Another, of course speculative, motivation may have been that the destroyed records could have thrown existing land ownership into legal doubt.

EDIT: The article speculates a cover-up. I'm speculating a make-this-messy-problem-go-away action, perhaps by someone who'd have to deal with the mess as opposed to someone who'd be embarrassed by it. On the other hand, I'm not denying that it's a cover-up.

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Re:160-Year-Old Documents Intentionally Destroyed in Frankli... by Major_Grooves on Tuesday January 07, 2014 @09:13AM (#7017350)

Isn't that what the article itself speculates?

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Re:160-Year-Old Documents Intentionally Destroyed in Frankli... by bbllee on Tuesday January 07, 2014 @09:36AM (#7017481)

The article focuses on the potential harm to one or more prominent families' reputations; as you deduce, this kind of evidence would not only harm reputations but may also complicate land ownership.

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Re:160-Year-Old Documents Intentionally Destroyed in Frankli... by mandlar on Tuesday January 07, 2014 @09:15AM (#7017354)

"My suspicion is that in and amongst all those now destroyed records, was a paper trail associated with one or more now-prominent, politically connected NC families that found its wealth and success through theft, intimidation, and outrageous corruption."

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Re:160-Year-Old Documents Intentionally Destroyed in Frankli... by username42 on Tuesday January 07, 2014 @09:23AM (#7017396)

Or some documents about alien first contacts.

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