At 10:23 AM, September 20, 2006, Anonymous said... -excerpt from FODU site.
"The real issues here are:
1) a troubled woman with a difficult past who couldn't face the increasingly swift downward trajectory her life was taking and chose to accuse three innocent people of a heinous crime rather than looking at her own drinking, drug use and unfortunate choice of sexual lifestyle as the real crisis in her life;
2) institutional irresponsibility on the part of Duke University, in particular by its colossally unimpressive current president, Richard Brodhead, for ignoring discontent within the Durham community caused by its pushing 25% of its students off-campus to fend for themselves with local law enforcement; and, last but certainly not least,
3) local political corruption on a spectacular, theatrical scale unmatched by anything I can recall seeing in the last 40 years. This is truly the big story to come out of this whole debacle, and will be the fodder of debate, articles, books and movies for years to come. The actions of DA Nifong, of certain members of the judiciary in their failure to hold the DA and his investigators and their own court staff accountable to the rule of law, of certain members of the Durham Police Department, like Gottlieb, Chalmers and company, who utterly failed to comply with recognized police procedures in a criminal investigation, but instead affirmatively obstructed them, and of local government officials like Messrs. Bell and Baker, to name a few, who have been complicit in the police misconduct in this case, all under the watchful eye of a local media that seems not to have a clear idea of their mandate to provide a consistent, objective account of what has been going on in the case, taken together represent for me, an attorney of 25 years' standing, a pathetic low in the annals of American jurisprudence."
http://friendsofdukeuniversity.blogspot.com/2006/05/general-topics-open.html
* Nice summation of the affair courtesy of the FODU site. Durhamites have wallowed in the cesspool for so long, they have lost the smell of Right. The stench now permeates the Gothic walls of Duke. The city should be declared an environmental disaster area.
At 11:21 PM, September 20, 2006, Anonymous said... more from FODU- very pertinant-
Today's H-S Editorial Meeting.
I also filed a complaint with the Attorney General about Nifong's use of public resources to conduct his investigations of emailers.
It's illegal of course.
* * *
Taking a page from the Bob Ashley playbook, Mike Nifong and his wife have apparently been conducting background investigations of anyone who sends Mr. Nifong email that is critical of his job performance.
It is of course a replay for Nifong when he investigated all of the signers of the Check petition several months ago.
Only problem is that Mr Nifong and his wife Cy Gurney, also a state employee, have apparently been using state resources, databases, computers and time on the job to assemble their enemies list.
At least when Bob Ashley does his google searches, he is just a non-government weasel doing the bidding of the town's elite.
The Nifong's illegal behavior follows close on Mayor Bill Bell's use of cease-and-desist letters from his lawyers in an attempt to quash criticism of his real estate double-dealing.
We are now seeing the ossified Durham elites cracking under the strain of public scrutiny.
It is clear that the Durham power structure (and the Herald-Sun) had hoped to use race-baiting and class envy in the Duke case to gain political cover for their corrupt and incompetent leadership
That has failed.
And as the dump burns and murderers roam the streets, Bill Bell, Patrick Baker, Mike Nifong and the city council have been revealed for what they are.
Petty, corrupt, and incompetant tyrants who abuse their public offices for their own self-preservation.
http://friendsofdukeuniversity.blogspot.com/2006/05/general-topics-open.html
* Thanks to FODU site.