Posted on 08/15/2006 2:41:50 PM PDT by abb
DURHAM, N.C. -- A cab driver who has supported an alibi offered by one of the three Duke lacrosse players charged with rape had his own court appearance Tuesday for a larceny charge.
Moezeldin Elmostafa, 37, appeared briefly before a Durham County District Court judge who set a trial date of Aug. 29. Prosecutors also changed the charge against Elmostafa to aiding and abetting misdemeanor larcency.
Elmostafa was arrested in May after he surfaced as a potential alibi witness for Reade Seligmann, one of three players charged with raping a woman at an off-campus party the night of March 13.
The 2003 warrant accused Elmostafa of stealing five purses worth about $250 from a Durham department store. Elmostafa denies the charge, and has said he helped store security locate a woman after he picked her up from the store and drove her home. The woman later pleaded guilty to larceny.
Durham prosecutors said in May the warrant for Elmostafa's arrest was discovered in a routine background check of witnesses in the Duke lacrosse case.
Mostafa has said Seligmann, of Essex Fells, N.J., called for a ride at 12:14 a.m. on March 14, and was picked up five minutes later. The defense has argued those times help establish that Seligmann left the party without having enough time to participate in the 30-minute assault described by the accuser. Seligmann's attorney has also presented cell phone, ATM and dorm keycard records to help establish that timeline.
(Excerpt) Read more at dwb.newsobserver.com ...
I think most people have a general understanding of how DNA works, or certainly should have after all the high-profile cases that have been solved through DNA, but that may not include Durhamites.
Based on the conflicting media stories about Karr, it's difficult to know yet what drives him, but I agree with you that he wants to seem guilty. If he isn't guilty, this has to be among the most bizarre false confessions ever to occur, even when considering how deeply he wants to insinuate himself into the case. Have you heard any of the tapes of his conversation with that snitch for the Sonoma County Sheriff's office from several years ago? Blood-chilling.
Finally, here's some fresh reporting on the Fresno rape case...
Two-Year Schools Run Into Troubles
http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-troubled24aug24,0,3484930.story?coll=la-home-headlines
VERSIONS - a sampling
The AV tells Shelton NO ONE (ZERO) forced her to have sex.
The AV tells Gwendolyn Sutton that she had dance with 3 other women at the Party and that Kim takes her into the bathroom and 5 guys assaulted her in the bathroom with Kim there too.
She tells the SANE nurse at Duke in a narrative interview that she was assaulted by 2 men. One assualted her 2 ways and the other 1 way (anally). As far as other other physical contact - she claims to only have been grabbed.
She tells a Nurse at Duke that Kim wanted to have sex with her and Brett. She runs out of the house - and Kim and Brett carry her back in while she fights. Kim tries to make her drink MORE.
She specifically denied to 2 Doctors that she was HIT or physically beaten.
She tells the nurse that while she was assaulted (anally, vaginally, and orally) the men are using racial and sexual slurs. They threatened to kill her at this point. She says one attacker, Matt, is getting married the next day.
And, of course, there are more versions, but you get the idea.
_
I can't figure out who is supposed to be "Bret", who is supposed to be "Matt" and who is supposed to be "Adam" either. One of the blogs, John in Carolina or Johnsville I think, said "Adam" is Collin, but I don't know how he figured that out and he may be just guessing.
I think it makes more "sense", if you could call it that, if "Adam" is Dave because the accuser says "Adam" and Kim helped her get dressed and it seems like "Adam" was around the longest. I think Dave actually did help the accuser to the car since she was basically falling down all over the place outside his house.
Frankly, the whole thing is so all over the map that I can understand why the defense lawyers are confused. It's like an episode of the Twilight Zone.
Chemerinsky is a leftwing legal "scholar." Hugh Hewitt has him on from time to time to debate the left's side. I'm not surprised he hasn't spoken out for the three boys.
--- -- FRESNO FOOTBALL ARTICLE
Wow, read that article and you'll be struck by the difference in tone and treatment. It has a scholarly, research type of tone. Where's the emotion that was in the Duke LAX reporting?
Where's the outrage? This is an 11 year old girl.
Race is not mentioned anywhere.
There is no - absolutely no - discussion of the the motivation or thought process behind the alleged crime. Remember all the talk of how the Duke Players thought that they were above the law - and much of the speculation was about how they viewed the woman - less than a person, one Talk show shrink said. The whole how did these Monsters come to be discussion is not there. Where's the comparison to predators roaming in wild packs looking for victims?
This is the usual Media treatment - notice how the entire Judgement aspect is left out of the equation.
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http://www.heraldsun.com/durham/4-763651.html
Brodhead urges 'Double Dimes' class to embrace opportunities
By GREGORY PHILLIPS, The Herald-Sun
August 23, 2006 7:19 pm
DURHAM -- Duke President Richard Brodhead encouraged incoming freshmen Tuesday to take full advantage of the opportunities before them, but within a framework of tolerance and understanding.
During his first public comments of the new academic year, Brodhead addressed the class of 2010 -- the "Double Dimes," as Brodhead said they've already begun calling themselves -- during convocation at Duke Chapel.
"This is your place," Brodhead said. "Help yourself to all its chances and riches. Come here with the intention of being transformed. Welcome to Duke."
Brodhead referred to the lacrosse case controversy that has dogged the university for five months only as a "great trouble."
Beyond hoping once again for a speedy and fair resolution to the legal charges, he also called for the freshmen's help in addressing the larger questions he said were raised about "responsible student behavior and the boundaries of acceptable conduct."
"Not a single one of these questions is unique to Duke, but we are not free to ignore them and in working them through, in discovering how an animated, wonderful, high-spirited world can be made compatible with the requirements of respect and responsibility," Brodhead said.
"We're going to need your partnership. We're going to need the best exercise of your thoughtful intelligence. If you get some experience here of collectively learning how to visualize and enact a good society, you will have learned a form of intelligence of incalculable value for your later life."
Brodhead's remarks seemed to go over well with freshmen for whom the lacrosse case is something that happened before they graduated from high school.
"I thought he did a good job of bringing up the lacrosse thing without harping on it," said freshman Bryan Fox of Raleigh.
As for the rest of Brodhead's speech, Fox called it inspiring but said he was "still trying to sort it out." He said he appreciated the president highlighting the opportunity college affords to shed the divisive elements of high school culture.
"When you think about it, you're not alone," Fox said. "There's going to be something in the middle you can find for yourself."
Making the most of attending Duke is about fully engaging, Brodhead said.
Getting an education "requires that, in the presence of difference, you be willing patiently to teach those who don't yet understand where you are, not to write them off as hopeless or unforgivable and patiently to learn when the needy one is yourself."
Before students left Duke Chapel to sign the university's community standard -- a pledge to act responsibly, honorably and with integrity -- they heard from Jonathan Schatz, chairman of the university's honor council. He told them to embrace the college experience and let it challenge their preconceptions.
"College is a place where your world can be turned on its head," Schatz said. "And if you're lucky, it will be."
There was a lot to take in for freshmen barely into their orientation week, let alone their college experience proper.
"It was a little bit overwhelming," admitted Malen Oberg of Haddonfield, N.J. "That I'm actually a part of this school, it's important."
Andrea Matthews of Grand Rapids, Mich., called the speech "very practical" and said she came to Duke with a determination to try lots of different things. Her mother Leslie applauded Brodhead's comments.
"I think it was great that he encouraged students to begin a new identity, break with the culture of high school and become the person they're going to be," she said.
Some parents took the opportunity to be elsewhere on campus while the crowds were gone.
"We shopped," said Scott Morrison of Bethesda, Md. "The bookstore was empty. It was great."
URL for this article: http://www.heraldsun.com/durham/4-763651.html
http://www.newsobserver.com/100/story/478431.html
Students welcomed and warned to behave
http://www.renewamerica.us/columns/gaynor/060823
Duke case lessons should be learned and NOT forgotten
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/local/states/california/northern_california/15343804.htm
Lacrosse builds western support for East Coast sport
BS. The defense lawyers are coordinating their strategy.
The obvious suspicions were that they had something to hide or needed time to create a plausible alibi.
More BS. No one here took it that way. The only ones who believed that were the potbangers. And note that they didn't give a fig about Reade's alibi.
The reality is that they too were innocent, and they (or their lawyers) feared that releasing details would give the prosecution additional time to harass innocent witnesses and perhaps do even worse.
So why have you been publicly second guessing the defense strategy in column after column? Why not write to the defense lawyers privately, and present your arguments as to how they can better defend the players?
Friends of Duke University should learn that the Duke Three need supporters, not apologists reading from an approved script.
Friends of Duke University does not need to take any advice from this guy.
That said, both fundamental fairness and the helpful of acknowledging a problem in order to solve it instead of denying reality require acknowledgement that the men's lacrosse team party was a shameful affair.
Good gawd, has that not been run into the ground enough?
David Evans hosted and hired the strippers. Parties at strip clubs may be tax-deductible, but the choice of "entertainment" (regardless of color or race) is deplorable on moral grounds. The lacrosse players who skipped the party were fortunate to do so. If underclassmen did not know strippers were coming, they should have left as soon as they came and then they would not have any blame. An honor graduate of an elite Catholic high school attending such a party surely should have left. A girlfriend who had graduated from an elite Catholic high school and was attending a Catholic college deserved at least that much respect.
This guy is setting off my BS meter.
LOL, he does run on, doesn't he? I try not to pay attention too closely to what he writes. It's an effort to pick out worthwhile ideas amongst all the clutter...
He seems determined to keep the issue of the players' vice at the forefront. It reminds me somewhat of the snotty remarks we got from the FR vice squad early in this story.
Lol, real juvenile delinquints - peeing on the lawn and all...
| Woody Vann, Mark Simeon, Doesn't matter: seems as if this is standard MO
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| Nifong Press Release 6/19/2006 (Nifong Attacks Press!!) |
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| Posted by Protect the Bill of Rights to JLS; All On General/Chat 06/21/2006 1:23:22 PM EDT · 402 of 547 FYI (interesting facts) http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:Z6rN3UjpyxAJ:www.law.duke.edu/news/inthenews1999.html+%22durham+nc%22+%22traffic+court%22+scandal&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=1 10.19.99 The News & Observer (N.C.) 2 Durham driving cases get unusual treatment. ... Nezra Clark, with a record of 14 moving violations and a suspended license, took a chance in April 1998 when he got behind the wheel of a car. He lost. Clark was arrested for a 15th traffic violation and faced the possibility of losing his license for a year and spending 45 days in jail. Instead, Clark, 26, paid a $500 fine and walked out of the courthouse Sept. 2, 1999, with his driver's license in force. The difference between his case and thousands of others in Durham's traffic court: Clark was represented by H. Woody Vann, a lifelong friend and the campaign treasurer for Durham District Attorney Jim Hardin Jr., who personally signed off on Clark's plea agreement. ... Thomas Metzloff, a senior associate dean at Duke Law School, said when asked to review the circumstances that it was inappropriate for a lawyer to claim special privilege the way doctors do, because there is a critical difference: The legal system is a public trust administered by court officials, not a private business. "It's insulting to the public," Metzloff said. "If anything, we attorneys are not above the law -- we are a part of the legal system, and that kind of accommodation is antithetical to the rule of law." ... |
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Good catch. The CourtHouse Crowd strikes again...
"I think most people have a general understanding of how DNA works, or certainly should have after all the high-profile cases that have been solved through DNA, but that may not include Durhamites."
From what I have been reading on some of the other blogs (sympathetic to the AV), "DNA does not clear anyone of a crime", etc.; and "perhaps the reason no DNA of the players was found is because it just hasn't been found YET--the samples did not sample every square inch of the victim's body, nor every square inch of the floor of the bathroom", etc.; and, "Rapes have been proved without DNA".
Maybe a high-profile case like Jon-Benet will help some people to start to THINK, although in Durham the water seems to have affected the cognitive processes of the brain ...
More from C. Michaels at abc11 forum: Posted: 8/23/06 6:41 AM
"I said given that Nifong has yet to release anything incriminating by way of evidence, there might not be a trial. And indeed, if he has nothing to mount a credible prosecution with, then there shouldn't be one.
Since I said that, Prof. Irving Joyner of NCCU School of Law and I have spoken. He points out that after the case management phase, the defense will file various motions seeking to kick out whatever evidence they don't want to come up in trial. If judge Smith grants their motions and the state realizes that its case is gutted, then Nifong can choose right there to drop the case. Thus, no trial.
Joyner adds that in the unlikelihood of that happening and a trial proceeds next year, the state will put on its case-in-chief, and then afterwards the defense will make motion to dismiss based on the prosecution's failure to prove its case. That's fairly routine. But if Judge Smith grants that motion (and it would have to be for all three defendants), then the trial is truly over.
So those are the scenarios, according to Prof. Joyner, where a trial is at risk in this case.
Make no mistake, I want a trial, but based on Nifong's apparent lack of incriminating evidence so far, I'm wondering if a jury will ever get to deliver a verdict. If he has absolutely nothing concrete to go forward with that I know of, then he's wasting time, in my opinion. That's why I've written now two tough pieces (the second coming out this week), asking "Where's the beef?" "
http://forums.go.com/abclocal/WTVD/thread?threadID=127385
Any inkling on when W. Osborn will hold his first hearing?
"Any inkling on when W. Osborn will hold his first hearing?"
A month from the Aug. 21 cancelled hearing would put it
the week before the supposed CBS story of Sept. 24.
The week of Sept. 5-8 would drown it in 5-year 911 stories.
Do judges think in terms of news cycles? Not much help here.
I dunno either xo. I have to believe that the NC Legal Community is feeling some heat. The blogosphere is active, even if the DriveBy Media has gone mute. O'Reilly mentioned DukeLax last night, if only momentarily in the context of the JBR case. He said he was going to "get to the bottom" of all the police/district attorney stupidity and mistakes that are ongoing...
Where I come from, that's called "crawfishin"
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