Posted on 05/27/2006 5:24:47 AM PDT by Mr. Brightside
Lacrosse defense: Stories changed
By John Stevenson : The Herald-Sun
jstevenson@heraldsun.com
May 26, 2006 : 10:20 pm ET
DURHAM -- Two weeks before identifying lacrosse player David Evans with "90 percent" certainty in a police photo lineup as one of her attackers, the accuser in the Duke rape case failed to pick him out in an earlier photo lineup, according to a defense motion filed Friday.
The motion hammered yet again at the prosecution, saying among other things that the accuser changed her story at least twice during the initial investigation, that the nurse who examined her in the emergency room was in training, and that police investigators failed to document their activities as required by law.
Many details in the motion, based largely on nearly 1,300 pages of documentation compiled by District Attorney Mike Nifong, were not previously made public, including a copy of police Sgt. J.C. Shelton's report detailing his dealings with the accuser in the hours immediately after the alleged assault.
Nifong said Friday he was "not going to comment on anything at all about this." A spokeswoman also said the Durham Police Department would have no comment, referring a series of questions to Nifong.
According to the motion, filed by Evans' lawyers Joe Cheshire and Brad Bannon, the exotic dancer viewed a police photo lineup on April 4 -- over three weeks after the alleged rape in mid-March -- and said Evans "looks like one of the guys who assaulted me sort of." Asked to elaborate, the woman said she was 90-percent sure but that the person who assaulted her had a mustache.
Defense lawyers have previously said Evans had no mustache on the night of the alleged crime, if he ever had one.
But when the dancer was shown a photo array containing Evans' picture on March 21, much closer to the time of the alleged assault, she failed to identify him in any way, the new motion says.
The motion includes a copy of the photo of Evans shown to the accuser, along with a written instruction form used in the lineup. Apparently affixed to the form is a Post-It note, in what appears to be the investigator's writing, saying, "Did not pick any."
"Thus, eight days after the alleged assault, and two weeks before the April 4 identification procedures in which she selected the Defendant with 90% certainty if he had a mustache, the complainant viewed a picture of the Defendant in this case and did not identify him as one of her alleged assailants," the motion states.
According to the motion, during the March 21 lineup and another one on March 16, the photos were divided into groups. It couldn't be determined from the filing whether either of the two other defendants, Reade Seligmann and Collin Finnerty, were in the group in which the accuser failed to identify any assailants.
Seligmann's and Finnerty's defense attorneys could not be contacted Friday afternoon to determine whether the accuser had identified either of the men in any earlier lineup.
Friday's defense motion also said there was no report about the earlier photo lineups included in the documents Nifong gave defense lawyers. But the April 4 session in which she identified the three suspects was videotaped, and both the video and a written transcript of the session were included in the material given to the defense teams.
The motion uses the apparent discrepancy in record-keeping as one example to suggest the defense hasn't yet been given all police records related to the case, even though Nifong said in a court filing May 18 that the state's "entire file" had been handed over.
"Multiple law enforcement officers who participated in investigative activities in this case did not record their activities as required by law, or they did not turn those records over to the Durham County District Attorney's Office as required by law, or the District Attorney's Office did not turn them over to the Defendant as required by law," the motion argues. It goes on to ask a judge to issue a series of orders ensuring that all records of the investigation are given to the defense.
Included with the motion, the handwritten report by Shelton, the Durham police sergeant, provides far greater detail than anything previously in the public record about the accuser's demeanor and statements on the night in question. Shelton was the first officer to arrive at the house where the lacrosse party took place at 610 N. Buchanan Blvd. the night of March 13.
Police went to the home after an unidentified woman told a 911 operator that she was driving by when men began calling her racial slurs.
In fact, the woman, Kim Roberts, was an exotic dancer hired to perform with the accuser at the party. Roberts has since acknowledged contacting a New York publicity firm trying to capitalize on her involvement in the case.
According to Shelton's narrative:
-- Shelton left 610 N. Buchanan after finding no one home. A neighbor told him a "rowdy" party had recently broken up.
-- A few minutes later, police were called to the Kroger on Hillsborough Road because a woman wouldn't get out of another woman's car. Again, Shelton was nearby and was first on the scene.
-- The owner of the car told Shelton that she had been driving down Buchanan Boulevard and saw the other woman -- now in her passenger seat -- walking along the street and that a group of white men at 610 N. Buchanan Blvd. were yelling racial slurs at her, so she offered her a ride to safety. (In fact, though, the car owner was Roberts, the second dancer.)
-- The woman in the passenger seat was "wearing a see-through red outfit, with no undergarments and one white high-heel shoe." She appeared unconscious, so Shelton got an ammonia capsule from his car. In response to the capsule, the woman began "mouth breathing, which is a sign that she was not really unconscious," Shelton wrote.
-- Shelton said he tried to pull the woman from the car, but that she grabbed the emergency brake handle to keep from being pulled out. He finally got her out and she collapsed on the ground.
-- Because the woman wouldn't tell officers her name or where she lived, they decided to take her to the Durham Access Center, a mental health and substance abuse facility. There, the woman said she had been raped at 610 N. Buchanan. So Shelton directed that she be transferred to Duke University Hospital's emergency room.
-- At Duke, the accuser told Shelton she was a stripper and had been hired to dance at 610 N. Buchanan Blvd. After their show, she said, she and the other dancer got in a car to leave, but that some of the men wanted them to go back inside. "She said at the point some of the guys from the party pulled her from the vehicle and groped her. She told me that no one forced her to have sex," Shelton wrote.
-- Shelton went outside to call his watch commander to tell him the woman had recanted her rape allegation. But then someone told him the woman told a doctor that she had been raped. Shelton called the watch commander back to tell him "she had changed her story back to being raped."
-- Shelton went back inside and asked the woman "if she had or had not been raped. She told me she did not want to talk to me anymore and then started crying and saying something about them dragging her into the bathroom."
Shelton says he left the hospital after the watch commander told him the Police Department's Criminal Investigations Division had been notified.
About 36 hours later, the woman told investigators she had been raped, sodomized, beaten and strangled by three men in the bathroom at the lacrosse party house, according to police affidavits.
The defense motion filed Friday says that, "incredibly," the information provided by Nifong contains no record about the woman's time at Durham Access Center. Nor does it contain reports by two other police officers who were involved in the situation that night, the motion complains.
In addition, Nifong provided documentation pertaining to only five of 17 sections of a Sexual Assault Exam Report, the motion adds, indicating that the exam was performed by an in-training forensic nurse.
All three defendants are free under $400,000 bonds as they await trial.
Nifong has said he hopes to try the suspects together, possibly beginning in the spring of next year.
It shouldn't be too terribly difficult for a dogged researcher to establish.
Great! I appoint...YOU to do the research!
I was stupid when I was 19.
Let me correct myself, I am now a recovering stupid person. But, I will always be stupid.
Hello, My name is Mike Nifong and I am Stupid.
At some point, it may be a long time, but at some point - the question will be who pays for Nifong's lawyer, Durham or his private backers.
Maybe Malcom Shabazz will do it for free?
Well, I never said I was dogged.
I am catching up--Grandson has his first tooth and I had to go see him, LOL!
Kim has been quiet as of late...wondering if by design or if she is a bit nervous?
Enjoy those Grandkids! Take pictures too!
It goes to show, people have really gotten their teeth into this story.
Ken, you enjoying the weekend? (maybe some beer) LOL
BTW, the "BS" comment was not directed at you or your on scene report! My guess is that the rumor is coming from the prosecution's side.
No problem. At times I wonder if detailed settlement rumors like the one I heard are put out there to cause all sides to discuss a settlement without anyone leading the charge.
I do not see this particular group of lawyers often, so I do not know when an update might be available. I will listen carefully at this week's rec league baseball games, Scout meetings and swim practice and report anything I hear of merit.
Hahahaha! Hey, someone dug up their arrest records, so maybe someone could find out in general, sentencing guidelines. Of course those are at the discrection of the judge, but they can't all be that weak...
LOL! And sniffing glue!
Your lengthy explanation does not address the simple fact that it looks as though at least 2 of these boys, (and yes, I do still consider 19 year old teenagers boys), MAY NOT HAVE EVEN BEEN AT THE PARTY!
They have been accused of a very serious crime. I share your belief that they did not commit this crime.
In other words, the poor judgment of their peers should have absolutely no bearing on them.
Thus, they do indeed illicit my sympathy.
I agree that Duke is the logical target for a lawsuit. Both the AV and the students would seem to have claims against Duke if the evidence ends up pointing their way. Right now, it seems to me that the Lax guys have been seriously slandered and deprived of their contractual rights to a good education. Duke would rather settle than be forced to accept students they don't want and allow them to play an NCAA sport in a Duke jersey.
I don't get the sue Durham idea so much. Nifong works for the state, not the city doesn't he?
The Durham police department probably hasn't been perfect, but the biggest problems seem to me to be decisions about prosecution, not investigation.
Finally, I have to say that the idea that the AV changed her story doesn't impress me. Pretty much every victim of a violent crime has a story that is hard to follow. The first investigator is often hard put to come up with sound facts on a sound timeline. 12 or 24 hours, even a couple of days if the victim is sufficiently traumatized, is not an unusual time for sorting out inconsistencies and getting to a coherent story.
The upshot of this is that early inconsistencies are not going to hurt the credibility of the AV. Her story is trashed by the investigative facts, not so much by her apparent early-hour wavering.
Nifong needs #5; and he is not going to get it.
He is so exposed to civil rights and defamation claims, it will force him into bankruptcy. He could easly face bar disciplinary action, with a somewhat lengthy suspension from practice. If so, he'd be forced out of his position.
None of the defendants used a bail bondsman. They all posted cash.
I;m just working my way through this thread, so the following may already have been disclosed, but as I understand it, Nifong made them pay the WHOLE $400K by certified check.
http://www.newsobserver.com/1185/story/440175.html
I do not have a link to this, but as I understood it, someone filed an ethics complaint against Nifong with the North Carolina Bar.
I doubt that that complaint is going to be able to be part of any settlement, if it occurs, which I hope that it does not.
I do not have a link to this, but as I understood it, someone filed an ethics complaint against Nifong with the North Carolina Bar.
I doubt that that complaint is going to be able to be part of any settlement, if it occurs, which I hope that it does not.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.