Authorities on Thursday discovered the body of Mike Adams, a white University of North Carolina-Wilmington professor who had recently announced his retirement amid backlash over his comments on social media.
Adams recently called the state’s governor “Massa Cooper” and compared coronavirus restrictions to living in a “slave state.”
Lieutenant J.J. Brewer of the New Hanover County Sheriff’s Office said deputies found the body of Adams, 55, while performing a wellness check at his home on Windsong Road, according to The News & Observer of Raleigh.
Deputies were conducting a death investigation, but investigators did not release additional details about the circumstances of Adams' death. Police have not yet identified a cause of death.
Adams, a tenured sociology and criminology professor, was due to retire early on Aug. 1. He recently reached a $504,702 settlementwith the university for lost salary and lost retirement benefits.
In 2016, Adams posted an article about a student activist under the title “A ‘Queer Muslim’ Jihad,” The News & Observer of Raleigh reported.
Another controversy occurred in late May when Adams tweeted about the executive order limiting social gatherings signed by Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper during the coronavirus pandemic. Adams tweeted that he dined with six men at a six-seat table and “felt like a free man who was not living in the slave state of North Carolina.” He then wrote: “Massa Cooper, let my people go!”
The tweets, which the university denounced as “vile,” prompted more than 60,000 people to sign an online petition to get Adams fired from his job.