A law firm that investigated Danny Ferry said it found no evidence that his comments on a conference call about Luol Deng were "motivated by racial, ethnic, or country of origination bias or animus," and that Ferry repeated comments that were not his own, according to documents obtained by ESPN.

On the call, which occurred June 6, 2014, Ferry characterized Deng as a player who "has a little African in him," and added, "He's like a guy who would have a nice store out front and sell you counterfeit stuff out of the back." Ferry has maintained he was reading from a scouting report prepared by a third party.

A settlement to buy Ferry out of the remaining three years of his contract and a formalization of his departure was approved by the Hawks' board of managers Friday, with the Atlanta-based limited partners dissenting.