Posted on 07/28/2006 4:52:22 AM PDT by abb
DURHAM -- Raleigh police have charged two Durham Police Department officers in connection with an incident that occurred July 20 outside a Glenwood Avenue sports bar.
The officers, Gary Powell Lee, 38, of 3588 Copper Creek Lane, Franklinton, and Scott Christian Tanner, 33, of 2516 Hiking Trail, Raleigh, both face counts of simple assault. Conviction on the misdemeanor carries with it, for someone with no prior offenses on their record, the possibility of a maximum 30-day jail sentence and a $1,000 fine.
Lee and Tanner are accused of assaulting Rene Dennis Thomas, a cook who works at Blinco's Sports Restaurant and Bar, 6711 Glenwood Ave., Raleigh. The charges stem from a parking-lot altercation that occurred late on July 20 as five current and two former Durham Police Department officers were leaving a going-away party for a departing officer.
A criminal summons issued Thursday alleged that Lee, a member of the department's Special Operations Division, tried to strike Thomas and tackled him, causing the cook to fall to the ground. A second summons alleged that Tanner, a motorcycle officer who works in the department's Traffic Services Unit, kicked Thomas in the head.
Thomas has told television reporters that as many as six men participated in the assault, which began with an exchange of racial slurs. But Raleigh Police Department spokesman Jim Sughrue said detectives in that city don't intend to charge anyone else in connection with the incident, or add later to the charges they've already filed.
"It's been extensively investigated, and we're confident that the responsible individuals have been charged," Sughrue said.
But Lee and Tanner -- and three of their colleagues -- could still face sanctions from the Durham Police Department. An internal investigation is continuing and should conclude in two to three weeks, Police Chief Steve Chalmers said at a news conference Thursday.
The Durham probe is focusing on a wider range of issues that include the alleged use of racial slurs. "The alleged conduct is something that is certainly deplorable to us, and something we don't want to be consistent in the way we operate and conduct ourselves," Chalmers said. "The entire allegation is disturbing."
Lee and Tanner had previously been restricted to administrative duties, and remain so. The other three officers in the case -- Sgt. Mark Gottlieb, Officer Richard Clayton and Officer James Griffin -- had also been restricted but on Thursday were allowed to resume their normal duties.
The decision doesn't mean the three have been cleared, but does indicate that based on "the facts we've already uncovered ... there's no reason we can't put these officers back on full duty," Chalmers said.
Asked later if that meant the three had played only a minor role in the incident, Chalmers said, "At least we can say it wasn't a major role."
All of the officers have the right to a lawyer's help, and two, Gottlieb and Lee, have retained the Durham firm of Clayton Myrick McClanahan & Coulter to represent them as the internal investigation and criminal case unfold.
A lawyer there, Allen Mason, confirmed Thursday that senior partner Jerry Clayton had spoken to Gottlieb and that another of his colleagues, former Assistant District Attorney Freda Black, had spoken to Lee.
One of the two former Durham officers involved in the case, James Kennedy, has also retained Clayton's firm and has talked with Mason. Kennedy is a former motorcycle officer who left the department late last year. The other former Durham officer who was present remains unidentified.
Asked if the lawyers and their clients would speak up to offer their version of what happened, Mason said there's "not a chance in the world" of that happening outside formal channels.
"We're not Duke lacrosse lawyers," Mason said alluding to the year's most highly publicized Durham Police Department case, one that Gottlieb and Richard Clayton, who's no relation to lawyer Jerry Clayton, have both worked on. "We don't practice that way. We don't comment about pending cases, we don't do interviews, we don't make statements."
The Raleigh charges were notable for the fact that they didn't address what Thomas has said was the first act of the confrontation, a move by one of the men involved to poke him in the shoulder with a finger. The charge against Lee addressed an act Thomas alleged was committed immediately afterward by a second man, and the charge against Tanner addressed something that happened after Thomas fell to the ground.
The shoulder poke was likely a criminal act under North Carolina law, given court decisions that have held "the merest unauthorized touching of another [person] is an assault," said Barry Winston, a criminal-defense lawyer in Chapel Hill.
A judge "who strictly interprets the law would, I suspect, hold that North Carolina law requires him to convict someone who walks up to someone and in an antagonistic fashion pokes that person with his finger," although that's "not what the average person thinks of as assault," Winston said.
Raleigh detectives filed Thursday's charges after consulting prosecutors in Wake County District Attorney Colon Willoughby's office, a move Sughrue said is standard in officer-involved cases. The spokesman declined to say why there wasn't a charge addressing the alleged shoulder-poke.
"Based on the investigation of the case, and facts present, it was determined that these two charges were the appropriate charges to bring," Sughrue said.
Thomas was surprised Thursday to hear that the charges involved the officers they did. "Lee and Tanner? Huh. OK. Check that again and call me back," he said before cutting off a brief interview. "I don't think you have the right guys."
The cook did not elaborate, and did not return a call placed to his cell phone late Thursday afternoon.
The Raleigh department's decision to issue a criminal summons for each of the officers, rather than an arrest warrant, saved Lee and Tanner an appearance before a magistrate and possibly the need to post bail to avoid detention. Sughrue said the officers didn't receive any special treatment.
"That is very typically the way a simple assault case is handled," he said. "That's very consistent with the way we'd handle the same case if the suspects had not been law enforcement officers."
Also routine was the Raleigh department's decision to assign detectives from its own internal-affairs unit to work the case. No matter what agency they work for, when police are "suspect in a case in Raleigh, the case is investigated by internal affairs," Sughrue said.
Elected officials said they're watching how the criminal case plays out.
Mayor Bill Bell said the allegations, if true, are unfortunate. "If in fact it did happen, I'd hope they'd be prosecuted to the fullest extent," he said.
City Councilman Eugene Brown agreed. "It's always problematic when you have those hired and paid for enforcing the law breaking the law," he said. "I want to withhold judgment, but so far, this is just embarrassing."
Lee has worked for the department since 1999. Tanner joined the force in 1997, and was recently the beneficiary of a department-organized fundraiser intended to help him and another officer pay for cancer treatments. He suffers from Hodgkin's
To those familar with NC politics--did Jim Hunt and Mike Easley have any political relationship?
(BTW-isn't Hunt dead? He was Gov when we left Eden)
Of course! Easley was Attorney General under Governor Jim Hunt.
I'm trying to line up the players at the state level..It's kinda hard. Haven't lived in NC in years. Had to make sure I was right on this one.
Holshouser was Gov when we Lived in Monroe and then Hunt.
Martin was Gov when we left Eden for Syracuse, but I don't even remember him. But I had a toddler and an infant. Don't remember much except I didn't sleep too much, LOL!.
Lacrosse case may get single judge
By John Stevenson : The Herald-Sun. Jul 28, 2006 : 9:41 pm ET
DURHAM -- The Duke lacrosse rape case likely will get an "exceptional" designation from the state Supreme Court that would be the first of its kind for a criminal issue in Durham, officials said Friday.
The designation, which must be approved by the chief justice of the state's highest court, could speed the case by providing one judge to handle every detail from now until the end of a trial.
With only one judge making all the decisions, consistency and efficiency would be vastly improved, officials predict.
"I think it's a great idea," lawyer Bill Cotter said Friday. -cut-
If the "exceptional" designation comes, those involved in the lacrosse matter would come up with the names of three possible judges and submit them to the Supreme Court chief justice, who would select one of them.
***Durham's senior judge, Orlando F. Hudson, agreed Friday that the idea is a good one -- largely because a trial of the lacrosse case could set a longevity record for local criminal proceedings, possibly lasting even longer than the five months it took to try murder suspect Michael Peterson in 2003.***
Hudson said the lacrosse case has three defendants rather than just one, and that they might be on the witness stand seemingly endlessly if they choose to testify.
In addition, extensive publicity and racial issues surrounding the lacrosse incident might cause jury selection to drag out for weeks, Hudson said.
The three indicted lacrosse players are white. The accuser is black.
It took a month and half to seat a jury for the Peterson trial.
According to Hudson, an "exceptional" designation might cause a trial to occur even sooner than the early 2007 time frame mentioned by District Attorney Mike Nifong.
http://www.heraldsun.com/durham/4-756704.html
Important considerations for local leaders will be the effect of an earlier, long-drawn-out trial on Duke's highly
visible Basketball season, and maximum exposure during Spring network TV ratings sweeps.
I guess I should maybe mention what I am trying to do with these names and articles.
Nifong's presser :
http://www.newsobserver.com/102/story/465647.html
"....He said that during his primary campaign earlier this year, Cheek and two men who eventually backed Cheek's petition drive -- Ed Pope and Roland Leary -- visited him to give campaign advice. Nifong said he did not take the advice. He said that later he thought that Pope, a state juvenile justice official, and Leary, a former sheriff, wanted to control the district attorney.
"I realized that their concern had not been with the concept of a small group of people owning the District Attorney's Office but with the concept of it being owned by someone other than them," he said.
Cheek, Pope and Leary could not be reached Friday...."
The DCABC board was recently in the news in connection with an allegation of nepotism. Someone linked the article on one of these threads in the last week or so.
Might have been one of abb's finds.
What was it Nifong said???
April 13, 2006
WRAL
At a forum early Wednesday evening, the three candidates for Durham County district attorney fielded questions about law, morality and the community. But all roads seemed to lead back to an ongoing rape investigation involving an exotic dancer and Duke University's men's lacrosse team, and the nationwide attention focused on Nifong and his handling of the case. "The reason that I took this case is because this case says something about Durham that I’m not going to let be said," said Nifong. "I'm not going to allow Durham's view in the minds of the world to be a bunch of lacrosse players at Duke raping a black girl from Durham."
Wonder who is starting to really worry about Durham's image?
I respectfully disagree.
Nifong doesn't want out. Nifong WANTS this. Nifong still is swinging for the fences (a home run).
He is vindicated and becomes very famous and popular in Durham.
On the "out of Durham official," do we know that this person will be out of Durham AND won't be a Judge from the same pool or District be assigned (like Judge Stephens).
I was thinking that this State official will appoint one of the guys that's in that Durham circuit, but he will remain on the Duke case for some issues.
The Defense lawyers may have felt pressured to agree. After all, read their comments on the "Quasi-gag-order" from Titus in the day or two surrounding that order. They were happy, it won't affect them in anyway, we have no problem at all with it. 4 days later they file a motion asking that that Quasi gag-order be lifted or reversed.
The State or someone in power has way of persuading you to agree, when you realize you don't have any choice - really.
What was the alternative - Have Nifong do all the scheduling?
'Wonder who is starting to really worry about Durham's image?"
The folks who have and are investing Hundreds of millions of dollars
in the new American Tobacco complex and other downtown projects.
"I'm not going to allow Durham's view in the minds of the world to be
a bunch of lacrosse players at Duke raping a black girl from Durham."
I always thought this meant they were innocent.
Do you know who got the ball rolling on the fast trck thing?
I agree, he does want this trial..No way, no how will he drop the charges. He feels no guilt or remorse.
But I think he is feeling pressure from some sectors as to how this has gotten out of control. Just a gut feeling.(Not that he gives a damn)
I posted that once, but maybe others did too. A very qualified applicant in another County made a stink because the person selected didn't meet the qualifications of the job and, it appears, no one else was even considered.
I want to make sure no one missed this in my post 220:
A Durham County sheriff's detective wants to find out who made $1,500 in calls to phone sex lines from ABC headquarters.
I didn't read that latest article!
That is good news! If the Defense Lawyers get to select that is better than having in done in Nifong's office - that's for sure.
I wonder if this stems from charges or actions that the Defense team was going to make in regard to Nifong purposefully delaying the date in a punitive way. Maybe the Def lawyers indicated they would make a Federal request on civil rights violations or the like and this was the compromise.
It seems to me, Nifong wouldn't give up a tool, for no reason. A tool he wields in every criminal case.
Someone doesn't relinquish their normal responsibility and duties without deriving some benefit from it.
I can tell you they don't want Hardin !
and we all know Stephens.
If you search the N&O archives, you'll see that when Hardin was DA he was accused of Judge shopping and repeatedly going back to Hudson - almost exclusively - in high profile cases. And even other Judges are quoted as inferring that Hardin kept going back to Hudson BECAUSE he consistently ruled for the prosecution. There were multiple N&O articles - can't link - but they're in the arhives. A lawsuit was even brought in regard to this Judge-shopping which was essentially going back to Hudson repeatedly. The lawsuit was "settled" out of court. That Judiciary agreed to review the way cases were assigned, but it was very heated and Hardin and other Judges made Public statements on the case.
Hardin, as DA, said that he'd be an idiot NOT to utilize his option to schedule those cases where they have their best shot.
The article said plainly that North Carolina is the ONLY state in the country where Judge shopping is LEGAL.
CREDIT to JLS ,, he told me about the article(s).
So, if you read that article, you'll understand the Orlando Hudson shouldn't be chosen either.
So, what if their options are Hudson, Hardin, and Stephens?
That's BIG trouble ! But, I'm probably being too negative.
Comment from: J.W. [Visitor] 07/28/06 at 23:39
Who's the BALD COP that ABC described as the "intial Perpetrator" that did NOT get indicted?
Any explanations why the Ring-Leader and Central figure in the assault wasn't charged?
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That is the Question at this time. This is big.
Sure, the Media is overlooking it, but if someone exposes it at the National level, it could be explosive !
Mike, I read somewhere that Nifong tried his 300 felony cases in front of everyone but Hudson.
It meant they were innocent and he was race baiting in a way that would put Jesse to shame.
Do you have the link handy?
Olando Hudson is black--
Doesn't worry about the Committee.
He knows case is crap.
He does like being on TV.
My predicton it goes to him-
He will be fair. Has most respect
from public, black or white.
When working with Hardin, they
went thru a ream of hard-core
criminal cases to clear huge dockets.
They put the right people in jail,
which is very hard to do in Durham.
Nifong was only Other ADA to try in
front of Hudson. Hardin is Duke so out.
Hung or unanimous acquittal.
Durham and all its crooks will be the
ones on trial.
Another note to self:
State NAACP Leader in 2005 Melvin "Skip" Alston
Check to see if related to first husband of Travis mangum's mother.
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