In a landslide victory, Maureen Krueger became the first elected district attorney in Moore County history Tuesday night.

That means she gets to keep her job.

Krueger has been district attorney for the last two years since Gov. Mike Easley appointed her to the post after the General Assembly gave Moore County its own superior court district.

"I'm honored not only to be the first appointed, but also the first elected district attorney for Moore County," Krueger said.

Buoyed with bipartisan support, Krueger defeated unaffiliated candidate Tony Berk with over three-fourths of the vote and won election to a four-year term as district attorney.

According to unofficial results from the Moore County Board of Elections, Krueger won 78 percent of the vote. She won every precinct in Moore County except Taylortown and captured 29,097 votes to Berk's 8,308.

Reached at his home in Aberdeen, Berk said he had no comment on the race. Asked if he wanted to say anything to his supporters, he said, "I'll thank them later."

Berk, who was a prosecutor for 20 years in New York, had to run as an unaffiliated because he hadn't filed with either party 90 days prior to the election. Saying that he thought the district attorney race should be non-partisan anyway, he garnered over 2,300 signatures in order to get his name on the ballot.

Krueger built a huge lead in early votes. One-stop and absentee votes showed her with a 77 to 23 percent lead. Almost 50 percent of the registered voters in Moore County took advantage of one-stop voting.

Krueger said that reaching out to early voters was a key part of her strategy. Her campaign had representatives at each of the three one-stop polling places each day of the early voting period.

From studying the numbers from the primary, Krueger said it looked like one-stop voting had the chance to make a huge difference this year.

"We looked at the primary," she said, "and it looked like (one-stop voting) definitely could have an effect. You could sort of insulate yourself from an October surprise."

That's why she wanted someone every day at each of the polls.

"It's important," she said. "Every voter matters."

By the time voters went to the polls Tuesday, Krueger had already built a nearly insurmountable lead. She widened her margin by one percent on Tuesday.

Former Gov. Jim Holshouser, Sheriff Lane Carter and local Republican master fundraiser George Little are among the notables who supported Krueger.

During her first year as district attorney, Krueger convicted 100 percent of her criminal cases. She's built a reputation as being tough on crime and moving cases through the system.

One big change was allowing some lower-level felony cases to be tried in Moore County District Court to keep Superior Court from getting clogged. She has also urged the county Board of Commissioners to appoint a task force to deal with the county's small, but growing gang problem.

Krueger said she wanted to thank her supporters for their help during the campaign.

She said, "A lot of people worked very hard."

Contact Matthew Moriarty at 693-2479 or by e-mail at moriarty@thepilot.com.