Duke Lacrosse Accuser Made Previous Report

AP ^ | Apr 27 2006 | AARON BEARD

[Conservative Coulter Fan]

The woman who says she was raped by three members of Duke's lacrosse team also told police 10 years ago she was raped by three men, filing a 1996 complaint claiming she had been assaulted three years earlier when she was 14.

Authorities in nearby Creedmoor said Thursday that none of the men named in the decade-old report was ever charged but they didn't have details why.

A phone number for the accuser has been disconnected and her family declined to comment to The Associated Press. But relatives told Essence magazine in an online story this week that the woman declined to pursue the case out of fear for her safety.

The existence of the report surprised defense attorneys, one of whom has sought information about the accuser's past for use in attacking her credibility.

"That's the very first I've heard of that," said Bill Cotter, the attorney for indicted lacrosse player Collin Finnerty, who along with fellow Duke sophomore Reade Seligmann is charged with first-degree rape, kidnapping and sexual assault. He declined additional comment.

Attorneys for Seligmann asked the court this week to order the state to turn over the accuser's medical, legal and education records, and hold a pretrial hearing to "determine if the complaining witness is even credible enough to provide reliable testimony."

The accuser, a 27-year-old student at North Carolina Central University in Durham, told police she was hired to perform as a stripper at a March 13 party, where she was raped by three men.

According to the Creedmoor police report in August 1996, when the woman was 18, she told officers she was raped and beaten by three men "for a continual time" in 1993, when she was 14. She told police she was attacked at an "unspecified location" on a street in Creedmoor, a town 15 miles northeast of Durham.

The report lists the names of the three men, but no other details. Creedmoor police Chief Ted Pollard said Thursday he had no recollection of the report, and his staff has been unable to find any additional information about it.

Durham police Officer Brian Bishop, who interviewed the accuser in 1996 while working on the Creedmoor force, said Thursday he had a vague recollection of the report but couldn't remember any details.

When asked about the accuser's previous report of rape, Durham County District Attorney Mike Nifong declined to comment.

Before Seligmann and Finnerty were indicted, attorneys for the players pointed to the accuser's criminal history when answering questions about their clients' legal troubles. The woman pleaded guilty to several misdemeanors in 2002.

[PghBaldy]

She should say she has PTSD. She should say her memory of the earlier rape was triggered by something, and she had a flashback. Then apologies to everyone...

[dubyawhoiluv]

but how can you not if it is a minor involved, doesn't state do it to protect other citizens

[dubyawhoiluv]

I bet the national inquirer will find all of these people and the stories will flow non-stop about this nutcase, her dsyfunctional family and other accusations. Money allows people to talk and remember long forgotten occurences

[maggief]

Report involved abuse at age 14
Then-fiance of the woman who is now the accuser in the Duke case urged her to report a '93 assault


DURHAM - A sex abuse allegation the accuser in the Duke University lacrosse rape scandal made a decade ago was a claim of statutory rape.

The woman is 27 now. In 1996, she told police that three males raped her three years earlier when she was 14. The police report listed the case as a statutory rape.

One of the males was her adult boyfriend, according to the woman's ex-husband.

(snip)

On Friday, Finnerty's attorneys filed a request for evidence that investigators have collected in the case. Like a similar filing made earlier by Seligmann's attorney, the document included a request for information on any inconsistent statements made by potential witnesses.

(snip)

McNeil said that before he married the accuser in 1997, the woman told him about rape and torture at the hands of a previous boyfriend, a man who was at least seven years older than she.

The accuser was in high school when she met the man, McNeil said. He was controlling, jealous and abusive, McNeil said. He would beat her, and she would hide the bruises from her parents.

On a day in June 1993, the man offered up his young girlfriend's body to his friends, McNeil said she told him. "He let his boys take turns," McNeil said.

Police report

A report taken by a Creedmoor police officer three years later states that the "suspects did for a continual time, rape and beat the victim about her person."

McNeil said the incident left rope burns on one of the woman's wrists. She also said lit cigarettes were pushed into her skin, leaving scars on her legs and buttocks. The scars were still visible when they met, he said.

Her father told The N&O in an interview Thursday that the rape didn't happen. But the father would not know because she never told him, McNeil said.

The scars from that event were more than physical and after years of living in fear, McNeil said, he persuaded her to report the incident to police. In North Carolina there is no statute of limitations on felony charges.

The woman talked to an officer less than an hour, McNeil said. The officer said it would be difficult to pursue the case because so much time had passed, McNeil recalled. McNeil made follow-up phone calls to police but heard nothing.

(snip)

Kenneth McNeil, a Durham man who was married to the woman for 17 months, said in an interview Friday that three years after the incident, he urged her to make the report to Creedmoor police to help her overcome the trauma.

"I wanted them to pay for what they did," said McNeil, who was then engaged to the woman.

Under state law, a 14-year-old cannot give consent to have sex with an adult who is not his or her spouse. Certain exceptions are made depending on the difference in age.

The Creedmoor Police Department did not pursue the case, and no charges were filed.

(snip)


http://www.newsobserver.com/1185/story/434044.html

[dubyawhoiluv]

well the broom had saran wrap around it so no DNA could be detected

[dubyawhoiluv]

teddy talks like he has a wad of shit in his mouth

[SirJohnBarleycorn]

at the hands of a previous boyfriend, a man who was at least seven years older than she.

When she was 14 and between freshman/sophomore years in high school her boyfriend was >= 21 y.o.?!!!

Her parents must have let her just run wild as a child, and we see the results today.

[Carolinamom]

Mcneil and Crystal were engaged when she was 16? He saw the scars on her buttocks when they met? Well, according to his remarks in this article....

[maggief]

McNeill is quite a bit older than her too.

One wonders if there is other abuse in her past. I'm not buying this version of the story.

[maggief]

The accuser was in high school when she met the man, McNeil said.

If he was at least seven years older the she would have been 10 or eleven at the time, at best.

[maggief]

Repost.

The accuser was in high school when she met the man, McNeil said.

If he was at least seven years older the she would have been 10 or eleven at the time, at best.

[dubyawhoiluv]

she was bragging to her friends how big he was and she almost couldn't handle it, yea she was raped alright. I never knew or hear of a rape victim laughing at or demonstrating for friends,police or medical personnel her attacker's penis size and he was a whore with no respect for his wife and child and he should have sweated it out for a few months, I'm sure he learned his lesson

[SirJohnBarleycorn]

Well, looking skeptically at everyone's account, my take on this is that the year of psychiatric counseling and medication (which would have been her sophomore year in H.S.) is not something the parents would make up out of thin air (although it's possible they might exaggerate the extent of it).

The next conclusion I reach is that it is highly likely SOME event triggered this year of therapy/medication.

Having a "boyfriend" so much older is not a normal relationship for a girl of that age, so I can see how the triggering event could easily have arisen out of that relationship.

Also, we know that women who become strippers and prostitutes are very often people who were sexually abused as girls, with the result that they devalue the sex act, their bodies and themselves.

Was the event something she willingly engaged in (the law, of course, presumes she cannot consent to this, which I set aside for the moment) and later regretted or for some reason was compelled to disclose to her fiance, or was she in fact beaten and raped? It's difficult to get a sense of likelihood at this poing.

In any event, there is still not enough known about this to tell whether this would help or hurt the defense if presented to a jury.

If the prior event was a false accusation of rape, then the defense could introduce the event as evidence, since that is not covered by the NC rape shield law. However, given her account and her ex-husband's account, the fact of whether it was likely rape vs. false accusation is probably not resolvable sufficiently to convince a trial judge that the event is probative of a prior false accusation. So, it now seems to me highly unlikely this event gets presented to a jury (assuming this case gets that far).

[maggief]

I think you are right.



http://www.herald-sun.com/durham/4-729678.html

Court records confirm that two of the men she named lived at the address she provided and have extensive criminal records.


http://www.herald-sun.com/granville/11-729653.html

One of the men and the stepfather of another of the men told ABC 11 Eyewitness News that they didn't know about the 1996 allegations until being asked about them by news media. Two of the three men named in the report have criminal records.


http://www.nbc17.com/news/9083147/detail.html

The former boyfriend said Friday that he had no idea he and the two others had been named in the report, and he denied the allegations.

[Jezebelle]

We've never seen a full photo of Kim's car. Maybe it has a white or light gray primered hood and/or fenders. Maybe the cabby, who's foreigner, got the names of his colors backwards. I've come across more than a few people who think "blanco" means "black" in Spanish, when in fact it means "white."

[maggief]

Another forum:


http://forums.go.com/abclocal/WTVD/forum?forumID=161

[Alia]

NOT according to the child's book "Tituba!". lol.

[Alia]

They are having a hard time keeping up with so-called facts, eh?

Peach, do you know if the Crystal's mother and father have retained lawyers?

IF not, they should. Last night FreeRepublic cut out on me, maybe down for repairs.. but I got to wondering if this family instead of being dysfunctional isn't instead being coached.

[maggief]

I wouldn't doubt that some trauma occurred. I question why the father was unaware of it.

In her teens she had relationships with at least two older men, marrying one. She also joined the Navy.

Something is amiss.

[Alia]

No, honey! Nifgong (deliberately spelled) and those "letters" just hit my very last nerve. It's so "kerry-ish": "I was raped then, but now I'm not and everyone needs to know". EEEuuu.