Posted on 04/25/2006 2:34:48 AM PDT by abb
DURHAM - District Attorney Mike Nifong plans to reinstate misdemeanor charges against a half-dozen Duke lacrosse players, saying a March 13 party where a woman reported a rape broke the deals that the players made with prosecutors.
Nifong's decision could affect players who, before the party, had entered agreements in which prosecutors would dismiss the cases if the players performed community service and stayed out of trouble for six months or a year. Among the first to have his charges reinstated was David Evans, one of the team captains who lived at 610 N. Buchanan Blvd., the site of the party in which lacrosse players hired two women from escort services to dance. One of the women told police that she was raped by three men in a bathroom.
Two players, Collin Finnerty, 19, and Reade William Seligmann, 20, were charged last week with first-degree rape, first-degree sex offense and first-degree kidnapping. Their attorneys say the men are innocent.
On Monday, an attorney for Seligmann filed a motion seeking information that would help attack the credibility of the woman, the only person, according to the defense filing, who says a rape occurred. The motion seeks information about the woman, including criminal charges, mental and emotional problems the woman has suffered as well as social services, probation, child protective services and victim's advocacy records.
Today, Finnerty is due in a Washington court where prosecutors in an assault charge are considering whether to revoke a deferred prosecution agreement similar to those affecting other players in Durham.
According to court records, 16 players were charged in the past three years with misdemeanor charges in Durham including noise violations, public urination and alcohol violations. The deals placed the men on probation for either six months or a year.
(Excerpt) Read more at newsobserver.com ...
Big Ping
I believe he's squeezing the players, who to date have remained in a wall of silence, to talk about what happened that night under threat of jail for past offenses.
Nifong's gonna burn down the village in order to save it...
You still up?
Yep. Fishing.
He really is an SOB, isn't he?
This is going to cause a firestorm at Duke.
Yep; I took some sinus stuff early last night and slept them; now I can't get to sleep.
Thomas Sowell colmn
People who were not within 1,000 miles of Duke University have already taken sides in the case of a stripper who has accused Duke lacrosse players of rape. One TV talk show hostess went ballistic when a guest on her program raised questions about the stripper's version of what happened.
Apparently we dare not question accusations of rape when it involves the new sacred trinity of race, class, and gender.
Media irresponsibility is one thing. Irresponsibility by an agent of the law is something else -- and much more dangerous. Prosecutors are not just supposed to prosecute. They are supposed to prosecute the right people in the right way. In this case, prosecutor Michael Nifong has proceeded in the wrong way.
Having an accuser or a witness pick out the accused from a lineup is standard procedure. That procedure not only serves to identify someone to be charged with a crime, it also tests the credibility of the accuser or witness -- or it should, if the lineup is not stacked.
A lineup should include not only people suspected of a crime but also other people, so that it tests whether the accuser or witness can tell the difference, and is therefore credible. But the stripper who claimed to have been raped by members of the Duke lacrosse team was presented with a lineup consisting exclusively of photographs of members of the lacrosse team.
In other words, whoever she picked out had to be a lacrosse player and would be targeted, with no test whatever of her credibility, because there was no chance for her to pick out somebody who had no connection with the team or the university. Apparently District Attorney Nifong was no more wiling to test the accuser's credibility than was the TV talk show hostess who went ballistic, though credibility is often crucial in rape cases.
Mr. Nifong went public with his having DNA evidence collected. Then, after the DNA failed to match that of the accused, the students were arrested anyway and their bail was set at $400,000 -- in a community where a youth accused of murder had bail set at $50,000.
When a prosecutor acts like he has made up his mind and doesn't want to be confused by the facts, that is when the spirit of the lynch mob has entered the legal system. When this happens on the eve of an election for the prosecutor, it looks even uglier.
If the young men accused of rape are in fact guilty, they need to be proved guilty because they are guilty, not because an election is coming up or there is racial hype in the media or a legally stacked deck. More important, we need to know that the rule of law is there for all of us, regardless of who we are or who our accuser might be.
Even beyond this case, we are increasingly becoming a society in which some people are allowed to impose high costs on other people at little or no cost to themselves. This sets the stage for extortion, not only of money but also of legal plea-bargains extorted by ambitious prosecutors.
The stripper, for example, does not even pay the price of having her name known, while the names and pictures of the accused young men are all over the media. Even if they are acquitted, or the charges thrown out of court, this case will follow them and they will be under a cloud for the rest of their lives.
Mr. Nifong has said that he has a third person whom he may indict. If so, he has already demonstrated to that third person what he can do by disgracing the other two and putting a heavy financial burden on their families for bail and lawyers. If that third person cannot stand the disgrace or his family cannot afford the expense, that is leverage for getting him to say whatever the prosecutor wants him to say.
This case presents opportunities as well as pressures. Race hustlers are having a field day, including the inevitable Jesse Jackson.
A fellow stripper who was at the same party sees in this an opportunity -- in her own words -- to "spin this to my advantage."
The biggest opportunity that this case presents is for District Attorney Michael Nifong to win his election, even if the case falls apart later and the law is cheapened by all this.
Copyright 2006 Creators Syndicate
He sure is!
Finnerty is due in DC court today ...
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/nation/3817320.html
Collin Finnerty, 19, of Garden City, N.Y., was due in D.C. Superior Court on Tuesday for a hearing to determine whether he violated the conditions of a diversion program he entered after being charged in that case.
Finnerty and two other high school men were accused of punching Jeffrey O. Bloxgom in the face and body after he told them to "stop calling him gay and other derogatory names," last November, according to court documents.
Under the terms of the diversion program, the charges would be dismissed after Finnerty completed of 25 hours of community service. The agreement also called for Finnerty to refrain from committing any criminal offense.
"We're considering revocation of the diversion," said Channing Phillips, a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's Office.
US Attorney?? What the hell the feds got to do with this?
I just can't get over this.
I've never seen such a blatant case of harassment in my life.
Not sure, but don't the Feds play the role of the state in DC?
There's lots of innocent people getting hurt here. All because an extortion scheme went awry...
I wonder if Finnerty has completed any/all of the 25 hrs. of community service. If so, that would help him. If months have passed and he's avoided the service requirement, then he may be up the creek.
Duke stripper frantic, kin say
BY DAVE GOLDINER
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
The stripper who charges she was raped by Duke University lacrosse players is so traumatized she sometimes screams at the sight of white men in the street, a new report says.
The accuser is staying with friends and only occasionally calls relatives, amid threats from Duke supporters and white supremacists, Essence magazine reported.
"I know she feels alone," the woman's ex-husband told Essence. "She doesn't know who to trust. That's why she's running."
Meanwhile, a lawyer for one of two Duke lacrosse players charged in the rape demanded that prosecutors turn over the accuser's medical, legal and education records for use in attacking her credibility.
When the woman does call family members, she sounds frightened and refuses to let them contact her, relatives said.
"Nobody has seen her. She needs some help," the woman's aunt told the magazine. "That girl needs some professional help."
(snip)
She has considered dropping the charges, especially after DNA tests failed to implicate any of the white players, but her family urged her to stay the course.
Her mom met over the weekend with noted civil rights lawyer Willie Gary, but he has not been formally asked to get involved in the case.
http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/411936p-348317c.html
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