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RALEIGH — N.C. State fired former first lady Mary Easley from her $170,000-a-year job Monday as newly released documents indicated her husband was involved in her hiring.

The termination of Easley’s contract capped months of questions about the job, including some raised by federal investigators, and came after resignations of top university officials. Earlier Monday, N.C. State Chancellor James Oblinger announced he was stepping down.

UNC system President Erskine Bowles said the decision was vital to the school.

“I believe we now have to move forward. To do that, we have to do everything we can to bring sunlight to this issue,” Bowles said. “I have therefore fully supported the board of trustees’ recommendation that we terminate our relationship with Mrs. Easley.”

A lawyer representing the Easleys had no immediate comment.

The trustees’ motion reads: “This board terminates Mary Easley’s contract on the grounds that (first) the duties for which we hired her no longer exist and (secondly) it is in the best interests of N.C. State University to eliminate her contract.”

Bowles said it wasn’t clear how much it would cost the university to get out of the contract or when she would work her last day. “That will have to go through the process,” he said of the latter. When asked for details of the process, he said: “I don’t know.”

Earlier in the day, e-mails between school officials and a senior adviser to former Gov. Mike Easley were made public,  showing the Democratic governor served as an intermediary between his wife and N.C. State.

The messages among Chancellor Oblinger; former trustees Chairman  McQueen Campbell, who resigned in May; and the governor’s senior adviser for fiscal affairs do not mention the job Mary Easley had running a school speaker’s series and leading a public safety center. They also do not state explicitly who initiated talk of hiring Mary Easley.

The first mention of it is in an e-mail from the governor’s senior aide, Dan Gerlach, to the then-chairman of the school’s board of trustees, Campbell.

Both Bowles and Bob Jordan, chairman of the school’s board of trustees, said they had not uncovered any criminal wrongdoing.

The communications, requested by federal investigators looking into the hiring, shed light on the steps taken for Mary Easley to get the job and included talk of how much she would be paid.

An April 2005 e-mail from then-board Chairman Campbell to Oblinger reads: “Just chatted with the Gov and he plans to talk to her this afternoon and will call me back after he has had this conversation. I will be in touch when he calls. Thanks again for your help.”

A day later, Campbell again wrote to Oblinger, saying, “The Gov called me back today and Mary is interested and would like to meet with you as soon as possible.

UNCG’s chancellor,  Linda Brady, served as the dean of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences at N.C. State when Mary Easley’s teaching role was expanded.

“I can tell you flat out that I felt under no pressure to do anything for Mary Easley that we wouldn’t have done for anyone else with her qualifications,” Brady said Monday.

Easley had been an adjunct professor at the school since 1994, Brady said, and had been given excellent reviews.

Brady said she met with Easley in 2005 and discussed her taking on further courses, something not unusual for successful adjunct faculty.

Easley went on to teach further classes on a per-class basis, Brady said. She was paid through the College of Humanities and Social Sciences until May 2005, when she began being paid by the office of the provost.

Investigations into the Easleys include federal subpoenas requesting information about trips taken by the family during Mike Easley’s two terms in office and about Mary Easley’s job. In all, three university officials, including N.C. State Provost Larry Nielsen, have resigned amid scrutiny over Mary Easley’s hiring.

Easley had said she didn’t plan to resign, despite requests to do so from Oblinger, Bowles and Jordan.

Before the school announced that Mary Easley lost her job, her attorney, Marvin Schiller, said he hadn’t reviewed the e-mails and had no immediate response. Wade Byrd, an attorney representing both Easleys, said there’s no question in his mind that the Easleys have been ethical.

Oblinger said nothing improper was done when Mary Easley was hired. “The hiring of Mary Easley and her treatment as a university employee involved no impropriety and no coercion,” Oblinger said in his statement Monday.

Staff writer Joe Killian contributed to this report.