MADISON, Wis., March 24 (UPI) -- An Indiana prosecutor resigned Thursday after admitting he had advised staging a fake attack on Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker to "discredit the unions."
Carlos F. Lam, who is active in Indiana Republican Party politics, initially denied he was the author of an e-mail uncovered by the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism. Johnson County, Ind., Prosecutor Brad Cooper told the (Franklin, Ind.) Daily Journal Lam submitted his resignation verbally Thursday.
Cooper said he got a phone call from Lam around 5 a.m. Thursday in which the deputy prosecutor "wanted to come clean, I guess, and said he is the one who sent that e-mail," the Wisconsin State Journal reported.
Lam had already turned in his resignation by the time the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism published its story on his Feb. 19 e-mail to Walker, calling the turmoil in the state capital over anti-union legislation "a good opportunity for what's called a 'false flag' operation."
"If you could employ an associate who pretends to be sympathetic to the unions' cause to physically attack you (or even use a firearm against you), you could discredit the unions," Lam said in the e-mail.
When first contacted about the e-mail, Lam said he did not send it. He acknowledged his e-mail address matched the one appearing on the e-mail to Walker but said he had been car shopping with his family at the time it was sent.
"I am flabbergasted and would never advocate for something like this, and would like everyone to be sure that that's just not me," he said.
The e-mail was sent the same day another Indiana law enforcement official tweeted a suggestion that police "use live ammunition" against protesters in the Wisconsin Capitol. That official, Jeffrey Cox, was fired from his position as deputy state attorney general.
