Posted on 04/22/2006 2:45:35 AM PDT by abb
Defense lawyers and legal experts say District Attorney Mike Nifong may have crossed ethical lines in public comments about rape allegations involving Duke University lacrosse players, potentially prejudicing jurors and setting off a media maelstrom.
Nifong says that he has done nothing wrong, though he has ceased talking with reporters about allegations made by an escort service dancer hired to perform at a March 13 team party. He would speak only about his handling of the case Friday.
"In terms of what I said, no, I wouldn't say I regret anything I've said," Nifong said. "I think what I have learned, basically, is that if you cooperate with the media out of a sense of duty to public truth, you make yourself a victim."
Local observers were hard-pressed this week to remember a case with so much back-and-forth between the prosecution and defense playing out in a 24-hour news cycle. It has some suggesting a judge should step in with a gag order.
Defense attorneys for the lacrosse players say it is their clients who have been victimized by Nifong, and they blunt criticism of their own extensive public comments by saying they are just attempting to limit the damage. Some also said photos, ATM receipts and other evidence they claim exonerates the two team members arrested Tuesday were given to the media only after Nifong refused to look at them.
In its ethical rules, the N.C. State Bar orders lawyers to refrain from statements outside the courtroom that they know might have "a substantial likelihood of materially prejudicing" legal proceedings. But once one side talks to the press, ethics rules say the other side can make statements "a reasonable lawyer" would believe are required to protect a client from bad publicity.
(Excerpt) Read more at newsobserver.com ...
That's what it says, although the "photograph" is odd.
You are correct, it does say K-Y Jelly Photograph, but I'm wondering if the ID number(of the photo) was just left off by accident.
"....to intimidate her into being quiet."
I suspect THAT will never come to psss! She stupidly views her mouth as her biggest asset.
Howlin Ping --
Have you read this?
Seized items from LAX house.
The way that I am reading it is that #30 is the K-Y Jelly Bottle Photograph.
I read it the same way---
Just wondering if the ID # was left off the seized item list of a photograph.
and a bottle of K-Y jelly.
If a "dancer" shows up with KY, then the question MUST be asked....what ELSE did her bag of tools and props contain? (A dildo large enough to bring forth oohs and ahhs from the audience? Big enough to cause oral and anal trauma, as well?
(sorry to be so graphic)
No idea.
Hope you are well!
Nifong was hoping to skate until the primary May 2. He may not make it. Let's see what the N&O has for the Sunday paper tomorrow morning. We may begin to see columns and editorials early next week to the effect that Nifong "may need to look at his case and reevaluate the wisdom of pressing the prosecution."
The DBM has to figure out how to unstick themselves from this tarbaby. Nifong's on his own, IMHO....
The March 16 search warrant specified "items to be seized" from the residence, including any DNA evidence available. Police collected laptop computers, cameras, cell phones, a bath rug, five fingernails, a bottle of KY Jelly and $160 of $400 allegedly stolen from the victim, among other things.
So the nurse's report says "signs of trauma on her body?" And "bruises on her neck and shoulders" is what "she claims" - is that from the nurse's report or what the AV told police? What crappy reporting.
If ABC has a source who has seen the nurse's report, why didn't they describe the genital injuries? Could it be because they are merely, as Nifong once described, "swelling and pain?"
"I think what I have learned, basically, is that if you cooperate with the media out of a sense of duty to public truth, you make yourself a victim."
/////////////////////////////////////////////
Oh no! Another victim. the prosecutor must be a democrat running for reelection. And all he did was pander to his constituents by railroading some rich white kids through a bogus arrest without any factual evidence, and use the media as a tool to that end. He's such a victim. I feel his pain.
We haven't solved this yet and could use your help.
You have been pretty humorous yourself and as always; jrabbit cracks me up.
I still cannot get the mental picture out of my head of that woman loping around on 1 six inch, ugly as hell shoe for at least 30 minutes....yeah, I'll bet they all wanted her.
Nothing in that article about a seized photo. I guess it's one of the "other seized items".
Rev. Peterson is the example of a wise man, who happens to be black, yet the black community is so enthralled by the Jackasson and Shrlington that Rev. Peterson is ignored by the majority of his race. Thankfully, his wisdom is well suited to any race and I find his comments on a vast array of subjects to be insightful and are much valued by me. And most at FR.
Updated: 6:12 p.m. ET April 22, 2006
DURHAM, N.C. - Several Duke University alumni questioned the school’s president Saturday about suspending two lacrosse players charged with raping a stripper at a team party, with one saying his alma mater is guilty of “a tremendous rush to judgment.”
“It was convenient to throw the lacrosse team overboard along with their coach,” said Joe Baden, a 1970 Duke graduate from Raleigh.
Baden was among about a half dozen alumni to question President Richard Brodhead during a forum held as part of a weekend of class reunions. During a talk about the school’s strategic plan, Brodhead stopped the program for a half hour to specifically take questions from the crowd of nearly 100 about the lacrosse team and the rape allegations.
Duke has not confirmed it suspended the two players charged with rape, although the university has said the school’s practice is to issue an interim suspension when a student is charged with a felony or when the student’s presence on the campus may create an unsafe situation.
“We really asked ourselves, on the matter of interim suspension, ’How do we do these things?”’ Brodhead told a questioner. “The custom of this place, I assure you it is the custom of many places, on indictment for a felony ... that’s the way to go with it and that’s the way we did it this time.”
Sophomores Reade Seligmann, of Essex Fells, N.J., and Collin Finnerty, of Garden City, N.Y., were charged this past week with first-degree rape, sexual assault and kidnapping. Authorities believe they were two of the three white men who a 27-year-old black single mother says raped her at a March 13 lacrosse team party.
Both quickly posted a $400,000 bond, and attorneys for the two players and other team members continue to strongly proclaim their innocence. Meanwhile, District Attorney Mike Nifong has said he hopes to charge a third person, whom he has yet to identify with certainty.
The allegations led Brodhead to cancel the lacrosse season and accept the resignation of the team’s coach. Baden wondered whether Brodhead would have done the same if men’s basketball coach Mike Krzyzewski, who has won three national titles and is considering among the best in the game, was at the center of the scandal.
“Would he have shut down the basketball team if precisely the same allegation was made by precisely the same person,” Baden said. “I don’t think they would have.”
Kent Bishop, who said he lettered in lacrosse in 1960, asked Brodhead about lifting Seligmann’s suspension, citing a timeline offered by the defense team they have said indicates the player did not have enough time to participate in the 30-minute assault described by the accuser before leaving the party.
“I think that would simply be Duke following the rule of law and more importantly, supporting a student apparently, or maybe obviously, falsely accused,” Bishop said.
Brodhead replied, “If these students are guilty of what they’ve been charged with, they’re guilty of something abhorrent. If they’re innocent of what they’ve been charged with, then it is abhorrent that they should have been held guilty for it in the press.”
Seligmann and Finnerty are apparently the second and third members of the team to be suspended from Duke. Earlier this month, the school suspended sophomore Ryan McFadyen, 19, of Mendham, N.J., after authorities investigating the rape allegations released a search warrant for his dorm room that included a vulgar and graphic e-mail sent from his Duke account, which Brodhead called “sickening and repulsive.”
Duke said federal law prohibits the school from discussing individual students, but confirmed McFadyen’s suspension after he signed a waiver allowing the university to comment.
She picked out Reade Seligmann as the attacker who forced her to perform oral sex and Collin Finnerty as the second man to rape and sodomize her.
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