In Scandal's Shadow (Newsweek Story - DukeLax)

Newsweek ^ | Jan 6, 2006 | Susannah Meadows

[abb]

an. 15, 2007 issue - Last April, Duke lacrosse star Reade Seligmann huddled with his dad at a Durham, N.C., law firm. A stripper hired to perform at a team party on March 13 claimed several players raped her. In a lineup, she'd identified three of them as her alleged assailants. Seligmann now awaited a call from the prosecutor that would tell him if he was one of the players she'd singled out. He felt certain he would be cleared. The call came. Reade, 20, was being indicted for first-degree rape, kidnapping and sexual offense. He had a strong alibi—cell-phone records would show he was busy calling his girlfriend at the time the alleged crime was taking place—but the D.A. declined to hear it. As he heard the news, Reade looked at his dad. It was the first time he'd ever seen his father cry. Then it hit him: how was he going to tell his mom? Kathy Seligmann was home in New Jersey with her three other boys. He dialed her number. "Mom," he said, "she picked me."

Just before the new year, Reade sat with NEWSWEEK for an exclusive four-hour interview, the first time any of the players has spoken in depth about the hellish months since the party that March night. Even now he gets emotional thinking about what his parents have gone through. Remembering that first call to his mother, he says, "It was like the life was sucked out of her." Before he hung up, he made her promise not to watch his arrest on TV. The next day, at home, she went to look for her 14-year-old, Ben. She found him in his room, sobbing in front of the TV. "Why are they doing this to him, Mom?" he asked.

[abb]

http://www.citizen-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll...ID=200770105071

Did we jump the gun with an April 8 editorial about the Duke lacrosse incident?

It appears we did, even though we waited more than three weeks to comment.

We made a mistake, because even after three weeks — and now nearly 10 months — people still don’t know what happened.

Near the end of the editorial, we said: “We hope to see a thorough police investigation into this matter so that the guilty — the attackers and those who covered for them — can be punished.”

Our mistake was in saying “the attackers and those who covered for them.” That phrase assumed there was a rape, even though earlier in the editorial, we referred to it as an “alleged rape.”

It now appears there may not have been a rape at all. We should have considered that possibility and not included that phrase.

Letter writers have called for an apology, and one is due. We apologize for assuming there was an attack. Many people want to blame the media for what has gone wrong with this case. The lacrosse season was cancelled, the head coach resigned, university committees were formed to study it all and demonstrations took place for weeks. Duke has come under a lot of negative scrutiny.

Much of the blame should be directed at a district attorney running for re-election. The way he held back information appears not to have a lot to do with protecting the investigation. He would undoubtedly deny anything improper about what he did.

But withholding DNA evidence that seems to exonerate the players from the most serious charges caused unnecessary harm to them and misled the public.

- snip -

[Locomotive Breath]

"management ... idiot"

Try to learn to write without repetition. :)

[maggief]

Percy Allen
A night we'll never really know about

By Percy Allen

Seattle Times NBA reporter


After more than 15 years in journalism, I still don't understand how this business operates sometimes. I don't get how some stories become national stories that warrant hourly updates from the major networks, while others barely make the tiny print in the back of the newspaper.

In Durham, N.C., for instance, the accounts of the rape accusations involving a 28-year-old African-American female stripper and three white Duke lacrosse players became one of the biggest news events in 2006 when the story broke in March.

We know the accused just as we know their accuser and the ambitious local prosecutor, Mike Nifong.

We've seen both sides on television repeatedly. We know their stories. We've seen that city and the university become divided as people take sides. We know that rape charges were dropped, but the kidnapping and sex charges remain.

Perhaps the alluring mix of athletes, alcohol, a stripper, alleged sex and violence, race and privilege has kept this story alive for so long.

Meanwhile, a similar story in the Northwest has gone largely ignored by comparison, even though it contains the same explosive elements.

This week in Portland, four Utah Jazz players accused of raping a Portland woman at a downtown hotel were cleared of any wrongdoing.

One could argue that the absence of evidence, perhaps proven by the prosecutors' decision not to pursue criminal charges, suggests that this is a non-story and it got the attention that it deserved, which is little to none.

But I'm not so sure.

(snip)

And yet, despite their missteps early in the evening, I'd like to think that Williams and Milsap were thinking about the Duke lacrosse team when they walked out of that room.

I'm hoping Brown had Price or the Vikings' fallout in mind when he decided not to get involved.

And maybe Bryant's ill-fated actions influenced Brewer in some way.

We'll never know, and this sad, little story quietly goes away as if it never happened at all.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/sonics/2003512937_allen07.html

Percy Allen missed an important point. Reade Seligann, for one, had walked away from that house.

[maggief]

Potbangers protest in from of 610 N. Buchanan March 26, 2006 at 9am Part I (& II)

(Hat tip: AcidReflux)

http://youtube.com/watch?v=ZXv_s1GQQAw

[gopheraj]

mark

[JLS]

A snide little attempt to smear all athletes, by I would guess someeone with an axe to grind. It is just as possible that:

1. The money of professional athletes attracts false charges.

2. The allure or sex with professional athletes leads to more casual sexual interactions that means more opportunity for post sexual remorse, especially when just how casually they regard the interaction become apparent.

3. The race of many professional athletes leads to more post sexual remorse when friends or family find out.

I would guess all three play a role particularly number 1.

[JLS]

Actually Peter Lange Duke Provost comes across quite well in Pot Bangers Part 2 or Part II [they are the same.] I would credit him for:

1. Being willing to come out and meet the protesters.

2. Constantly reminding them that there was an on going investigation and legal process.

3. Using that little word "if" as in "This is an extremely serious crime if it happened." Other things he says are "we don't know what the facts."

BTW, Lange was also the guy who took apart faculty member Houston Baker's pathetic letter of late March in his response:

http://dukenews.duke.edu/mmedia/features/lacrosse_incident/lange_baker.html

It seems to me that Duke is in the middle of a crisis and Brohead has been a disaster. Many under Brodhead have been disasters. But Lange, the second highest ranking nonmedical academic at Duke has been pretty solid, when dealing with protesters at his house and faculty rush to judgements. I don't know if Lange ever buckled under the pressure, but if not, and maybe even if he did only a little, he is certainly someone right on campus, who understands the crisis Duke is in who could tommorrow replace Brohead. He sounds like a guy who could provide Duke some seriously needed leadership.

[SkyPilot]

My father lives in North Carolina.

I went to visit him last fall, and the Duke "rape" case came up. We were visiting his friends house at the time. One man said he knew Mick Nifong. The man said Nifong was "not the demon some are making him out to be."

I turned and asked the man:

"Can you tell me, what is his religious affiliation, you know, his faith?"

I asked the question out of general curiosity. I had hoped the answer could give me some insight to Nifong's character.

The guy got angry. His brow furled, he paused for a long time, and asked me:

"Why would you ask such a personal question?"

I thought about that. Faith is personal, but I wasn't asking this particular man if he or Nifong believed in Buddha, Muhammad, or Jim Jones. Nor did I ask the guy if Nifong had a relationship with Jesus Christ, or if he was a Druid.

I simply asked about Nifong's religion. This guy said he knew him. Almost all members of Congress post their faith on their websites!

Why was this such a terrible thing to ask.

I dropped it.

The other men in the room quickly switched the conversation to something else.

I thought about it later, and it occurred to me why he got upset.

Neither that guy (who is probably friends with him) or DA Nifong have a real faith in God, and that is probably why he got angry.

When the haughty and corrupt are confronted by a Power greater than their selves, fear is kindled. Then it turns to anger.

[muawiyah]

You've really not understood a thing have you.

[muawiyah]

So, how many Duke students "vote" in Durham?

[muawiyah]

Then, just make sure you don't do anything to embarrass us. I, in fact, live just yards from "tidewater". Many of my ancestors were among the earliest settlers in the vicinity of Jamestown (for one place) and all up and down the James, the Northern Neck, the Potomac, the Valley ~ and I live in a house that sits on land that has a title that runs back to early Colonial Virginia.

When you visit National Airport you have to walk by the "site" of an ancestral mansion.

So there!

[Locomotive Breath]

I'm reasonably sure the extended Nifong clan attends Duke Memorial United Methodist Church. Mike seems to have missed a few sermons. He went to law school at UNC. He seems to have missed a few classes.

[Roberts]

It'll be interesting to see if the Duke defendants file suit against Nifong if/when charges or dropped or they are acquitted. Nifong would be forced to disclose everything he knew and had (or didn't have) in his possession at each stage of this fiasco process. THAT is the only way these boys will ever clear their names.

[Howlin]

But I think it was her newly-found "people" who told her who to pick.

How else could you explain managing to pick the three richest guys on the team?

[SkyPilot]

Thanks for that information.

I felt bad afterwords that I didn't press the issue with that man. I thought I acted cowardly by not confronting him directly, but I didn't want to embarrass my father.

[AmishDude]

Were they the three richest? I know they were rich and one was the richest. I wish the full transcript of her IDing were online. I just got the sense that when she made the final IDs (she had several sessions) she knew who she wanted.

[Howlin]

It is my understanding that not only their names, but pictures of their homes and their father's business associates were all over the internet during the "pot banging" time, and that made it easier for her to pick the right "door," if you will.

Do you want a transcript, or the video of the ID? I'm thinking I saw a link to that around here somewhere.

[AmishDude]

Howlin, I know a lot of info was out about them at pot banging time and that's why I suspect that she knew whom to pick. I've been looking for the full transcript and I can't find it. All I can find are media reports talking about it and I got the impression that, at that time, the transcript was only made available to media people.

[CFC__VRWC]

How else could you explain managing to pick the three richest guys on the team?

Which was actually a very dumb move on her and her "peoples" part, and probably reflected them looking ahead to a civil trial and a huge payoff there. However, by picking the rich kids, they picked the ones who could best lawyer up and shred the criminal "case" right in front of the DBM. If they'd picked the poor kids on the team, they'd have been stuck with lesser legal talent, if not public defenders, and those kids might well be having to cop pleas.

OTOH, Nifong's abuses of power were so blatant and extreme that it's possible that even a public defender in his first year out of law school could have gotten these players cleared.

[Crawdad]

From Liestoppers:

Plea bargain in the works for first-degree murder suspect.

--Legal concessions apparently are in store for a first-degree murder suspect who reportedly drove his victim to the hospital at high speed, then prayed for his survival.

The District Attorney's Office already has offered Dontae Daevon Jones a plea bargain for the drastically reduced charge of voluntary manslaughter. If the dead man's mother agrees, the charge could be further downgraded to involuntary manslaughter, defense lawyer Lisa Williams said Friday.--

More at:



http://www.heraldsun.com/durham/4-806363.cfm