What Happened at Duke? - Newsweek
May 1, 2006 issue
Posted on 04/23/2006 8:52:59 AM PDT by TexKat
DURHAM -- Results from the second round of DNA tests in connection with the Duke lacrosse rape investigation will not likely be available before May 15, District Attorney Mike Nifong said Saturday.
Nifong also denied an allegation by some defense attorneys that the second exotic dancer at the March 13 party where the rape allegedly occurred received special treatment from Nifong's office so she'd cooperate with the prosecutor.
Kim Roberts, 31, was arrested March 22 -- eight days after the lacrosse party -- on a probation violation from a 2001 conviction for embezzling $25,000.
The same day a grand jury indicted lacrosse players Reade Seligmann and Collin Finnerty, a judge agreed to a change so that Roberts would no longer have to pay a 15 percent fee to a bonding agent. Nifong signed a document saying he would not oppose the change.
Soon after the rape allegation was made, Roberts told defense attorneys that she doubted the story of her colleague who told police she was dragged into a bathroom and raped. But in an interview last week with the Associated Press, Roberts said she thinks some players -- she's not sure which ones -- are guilty.
"It seems she is receiving very favorable financial treatment [from prosecutors] for what she is now saying," said Bill Thomas, a defense attorney for one of the lacrosse players who has not been indicted.
Nifong said Saturday that wasn't his motive in agreeing to change Roberts' bond from secured to unsecured.
"It's consistent with local bonding policy," Nifong said, when asked why he supported the change.
Nifong, who faces two challengers in the May 2 Democratic primary, attended a meet-and-greet with supporters Saturday at Joe & Jo's Downtown Restaurant and Pub, where he fielded a few questions from The Herald-Sun.
Nifong ordered the second round of DNA tests from a private lab after initial tests by the SBI crime lab in Raleigh failed to find DNA from any of 46 lacrosse players tested on or in the accuser, nor any of her DNA in the bathroom in which she said she was raped, sodomized, beaten and strangled for 30 minutes by three men.
Some defense attorneys had said they expected the new DNA test results last week.
LOL!
Ha.....the DA doesn't trust his own state labs....btw is this the hair DNA?
Interesting letter to the editor in the N&O
http://www.newsobserver.com/580/story/431291.html
Piling on the news
A rape is taking place in Durham. We know a tragedy took place on the night of March 13. We don't know the exact nature yet. Some say we never will. The wheels of justice turn slowly.
But an ugly violation of the public mind is unfolding every day in its wake. A "rape" of sorts. Layers upon layers of paid prognosticators in debt to deadlines and advertisers from the local personality to the national append their lame opinions and weak observations. Agendas and academic templates hang on the case like the proverbial cheap suit.
Since this local story is not quite large enough to carry the weight of all the baggage, it is a little easier to document what is wrong with most of what passes for news today. The news itself becomes a spectator sport with journalistic "athletes" performing "newsquest" for the highest score, while the actual story is obscured.
The worst part is that the actual story becomes damaged by the sport of newsquest. Too many careers; so many ambitions; too few tragic stories.
Charles "Chuck" Hucks Jr.
Cary
It's the first mention I've seen of Kim admitting that she told the players she called the cops. "I called the cops, you dumb*ss*s."
"Called" Past tense.
Now I'm confused. Weren't the police there 2 minutes after she called 911?
I don't know if it is hair mystery-ak. Has it been determined for sure that it is hair that is being tested Howlin?
My, my. On the cover, no less...
Oh lawd, Kim's lawyer is giving Nifong fashion advice! LOL
LabCorp is not testing hair.
LOL What a pathetic grubber he is...
How about this gem of a graf:
"Strutting lacrosse players are a distinctive and familiar breed on elite campuses along the Eastern Seaboard. Because the game until recently was played mostly at prep schools and in upper-middle-class communities on New York's Long Island and outside Baltimore, the players tend to be at once macho and entitled, a sometimes unfortunate combination. They can often be seen driving in SUVs with LAX decals, their dirty-white college ball caps turned around, a pinch of Skoal in their mouths."
There's another capital crime. Not only are they accused of using the "n" word, they drive SUV's...
Don't forget the part about Seligmann's parents owning a summer home with a tennis court and motor boat. These reporters are all about details.
Man, even Maury Povich gets faster results to his DNA tests.
Well, that makes her ex-husband a liar, too.
All sides agree that one of the partygoers called out to the women asking if they had brought any sex toys. According to defense lawyers, there was some anatomically crude banter between one of the women and the audience, but then one of the boys, holding a broom handle, yelled out, "Use this!" That was enough for Roberts; she and the other woman ended the show. A photo taken at 12:03 shows the dancers turning away; the boys no longer look happy.
I'm betting that was Miss Kim.
Finally, the women emerged and went out to Roberts's car. In a photo taken at 12:30, the other woman is standing on the back stoop, carrying what looks like a purse and a makeup bag. She appears to be smiling. At 12:37, she can be seen lying on her side on the stoop; her ankle is bleeding, her elbow is scraped and two drops of blood appear on her thigh. At 12:41, a final photo shows the woman in the front seat of Roberts's car; one of the guys appears to be helping her in.
Timeline tigthening!
The evening ended in recriminations. The defense lawyers say that Roberts mocked the boys' manhood; Roberts says the boys called her a "n-----." The neighbor heard one of the boys yell, "Hey b----, thank your grandpa for my nice cotton shirt." Roberts called 911 and complained to police that some students at 610 North Buchanan were taunting her and her friend with racial epithets. She told NEWSWEEK that she yelled out at the boys, "I called the cops, you dumbasses."
And there you have it.
Roberts said she had not collected all the money owed them for the dance, and she wondered if the other dancer was somehow hustling her.
See how close we've been?
Police also questioned Roberts. It is not clear what she told them, or whether her statement to police matches her later statements to NEWSWEEK and other media outlets. Roberts did say that, within several days of the incident, she went to James D. (Butch) Williams, a prominent local attorney, to ask his advice. She says that from the outset Williams told her that he already represented one of the Duke players. Williams asked if she believed there had been a rape, and Roberts answered no. But when Williams tried to get her to sign an affidavit, she balked. She said she later became livid when she heard that Williams had shared her story with other attorneys. Seeing Williams's face appear on a TV during her interview with NEWSWEEK, she stood up and began punching the air in anger at him. "I feel like he preyed on my naiveté," she told NEWSWEEK. "I don't want someone to play me like I'm stupid."
She best not mess with Butch Williams.
This story is all from the viewpoint of Roberts and Simeon; she was arrested March 22nd and spent 2 hours in jail, until she posted $25,000 bond. 3/30/06 she got an attorney, simeon. (I wonder if he was suggested to her by Nifong of the DPD).
Of note, Simeon is a protege of Nifong's and he's giving Nifong ADVICE about this case and how Nifong is handling it.
On April 18, when the two players were arrested and charged with rape and kidnapping and more vaguely defined sexual offenses, Seligmann's lawyer, Kirk Osborn, went to Nifong's office to try to speak to him. "I thought, 'Surely he'll talk to me'," said Osborn, who has known Nifong for 25 years. But after Osborn had waited for 20 minutes, Nifong's assistant emerged with a message, according to Osborn: "Mr. Nifong says that he saw you on TV declaring your client totally innocent, so what is there to talk about?"
This just gets more ridiculous by the day.
Howlin,
It appears that the DA is looking at the Duke lacrosse players' computers for a program called "ExitTool" which allows for time-shifting photographs. Have you heard this?
TD
Well, hell. They should be sent to the electric chair on that evidence alone!!
There's quite a few "gems" in that article; if it's true, we've been more right than we knew.
If she did, in fact, yell out she had called the cops, no wonder they all got out of there.
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