Accused of Using Racial Slurs, State Senate Candidate Sues for Defamation, Wiretapping

Former Superior Court Judge Jerry Tillett sued his former daughter-in-law, her new husband, a website publisher, and a social media antagonist for defamation on Wednesday. The lawsuit, filed in Dare County, attempts to rebut accusations of racism that have threatened to derail his state Senate campaign.  

Tillett, 68, is one of four Republicans vying in the March 3 primary in the 1st District, which spans several northeastern counties. Early voting starts on February 12.   

R. Daniel Boyce, Tillett’s attorney, did not immediately respond to requests for comment. 

As The Assembly previously reported, Dare County resident Richard Burrus posted a 23-second audio clip on Facebook in December that seemed to capture a conversation between two men and a woman inside a car. During the conversation, the two men used the N-word and joked about shooting a Black man. Burrus wrote that one of the voices belonged to Tillett, which the candidate has denied. 

In his complaint, Tillett said Burrus “has consistently shared false statements” about him on Facebook, including that he has “engaged in illicit drug use, extramarital affairs, inappropriate conduct with minors, and other such conduct to be proven at trial.” 

In November, for example, Tillett posted a Thanksgiving Day speech on his campaign’s Facebook page, to which Burrus responded, “Cocaine and 2 underage girls in Greenville.” In other posts, Burrus called Tillett an “old, drunk, dirty judge” and “insinuated” that Tillett was “coked up,” Tillett’s complaint says. 

Beyond that, the complaint provides few specifics about Burrus’ allegedly defamatory comments. 

The complaint offers more details on Burrus’ criminal history, including convictions for threatening his parents and a county employee. It also points out that he currently faces cyberstalking and stalking charges—without noting that Tillett and a family attorney pressed those charges in January, citing unspecified Facebook posts Burrus allegedly made in May 2025, seven months earlier. 

Reached by phone on Friday, Burrus said that some remarks attributed to him in Tillett’s complaint were taken out of context. He also denied the complaint’s allegation that he had posted under false names like “Katherine Gallop” and “Johnny Rivera.” 

“Those are other people that do not like Jerry, I guess,” Burrus said. 

Tillett’s complaint faults Burrus for sharing a December 23 article about the recording from the right-wing website National File. Tillett did not sue National File or the article’s author, Ethan Fowler, but rather the website’s publisher, Noel Fritsch. 

National File is incorporated in Wyoming; if it were a defendant, the case would likely be sent to federal court. Fritsch, however, is a resident of Moore County.

The complaint says that, in the article, Fritsch accused Tillett of using drugs, having an extramarital affair, and using racial slurs. “All these allegations are patently false,” the complaint says. 

National File’s more salacious allegations are based on a sprawling, but unverified, civil rights complaint reportedly filed with the U.S. Department of Justice from a man Tillett jailed for 30 days over a probation violation in 2025.

Asked to comment on Tillett’s suit, Fritsch called Tillett “the most corrupt official to ever hold office in Dare County.” 

“The good people of northeast North Carolina have better sense than to send this racist dwarf to Raleigh to represent them in the state Senate,” Fritsch added. 

Tillett’s suit also accuses Briana Daniels, who was previously married to his son, Jeremy, and her new husband, Theodore Daniels, of publishing “to one or more persons false and defamatory statements by asserting that [Tillett’s] voice was the one making racial statements” in the recording. The complaint does not say where, when, or to whom the alleged statements were made. 

Tillett accuses the couple of violating state and federal wiretapping laws by allegedly recording the conversation and distributing the audio file, though it offers no evidence to support this claim. 

The State Bureau of Investigation assessed the recording in December, after Tillett complained to District Attorney Jeff Cruden. Agents quickly determined that there was no evidence of wiretapping. North Carolina is a one-party consent state, meaning that any participant in a conversation can record it. 

The Assembly obtained the recording in December from a source who is not named in Tillett’s lawsuit. A reporter later spoke to the person who claimed to have recorded the conversation in 2016. That person—who asked for anonymity, citing a fear of retribution—said the three voices in the audio belonged to Tillett, his wife, and Jeremy Tillett.

The person provided The Assembly with a longer version of the recording, which begins with the 23-second clip Burrus posted and continues for another minute; it includes the person’s voice in the conversation. (The person also sent The Assembly a video showing the recording being played from the Voice Memo app on an iPhone; the app indicated that the recording was made on April 1, 2016.)  

If the person who recorded the conversation was a participant, it was not illegally recorded.  

In a statement, Theodore Daniels—who goes by Teddy and is a Republican candidate for Dare County sheriff—told The Assembly that “neither me nor my wife illegally recorded anyone or posted anything to any platforms, nor did either one of us comment on the recording on social media.” 

Teddy Daniels said the lawsuit was evidence that his sheriff campaign’s “anti-corruption platform” had “ruffled the right feathers.” (When Teddy Daniels ran for lieutenant governor of Pennsylvania in 2022, Rolling Stone reported that three women, including his ex-wife, had accused him of abusive behavior. He denied the allegations.)

Briana Daniels has been embroiled in a legal battle with Jeremy Tillett for years. According to court records, Jeremy Tillett has claimed she owes him thousands of dollars for the use of a second residence and other debts. In other litigation, Jeremy Tillett has alleged that the Danielses have defamed him. Through her attorney, Briana Daniels has denied Jeremy Tillett’s allegations. 

Through his attorneys, Jerry Tillett has insisted that the recording does not capture him using the N-word. Tillett’s attorneys previously told The Assembly that unnamed experts had indicated that the audio had been manipulated, that there were multiple versions circulating online, and that the recording contained more than two male voices. 

They did not provide evidence to support those claims, and Tillett’s defamation suit does not repeat them. 

Instead, it asserts that the defendants claimed he used the slur on the recording despite knowing that he had not. 

To win, Tillett will have to prove that. 

Amanda Martin, supervising attorney at Duke University’s First Amendment Center, said that defamation is the publication of false and damaging statements as fact that cause a plaintiff injury. 

But public officials like Tillett “also must prove that the defendant knew the statements were false or that the defendant entertained serious doubts about the truth or falsity,” Martin said.