Posted on 10/30/2006 3:04:46 AM PST by abb
Somebody tell me again why it is that Duke students are expected to help support poor people in Durham.
"Sherwood was at the party the night of March 13, but left early."
Hmmmm...the story has been changed since abb copied it here. No mention of staying through the dance in abb's copy, but it's there now.
Sherwood was at the party the night of March 13, but left early.
"It was kind of boring to be quite honest," he said. "We were just sitting around. And there was nothing to it. It was very boring. I was itching to get out of there, because it was -- I'd rather be going to sleep personally to tell you the truth."
-The above is now the below.-
Sherwood was at the party the night of March 13, and stayed through the dance, but then left with other underclassmen, he said.
"It was kind of boring to be quite honest," he said. "We were just sitting around. And there was nothing to it. It was very boring. I was itching to get out of there, because it was. I'd rather be going to sleep personally to tell you the truth."
http://abclocal.go.com/wtvd/story?section=triangle&id=4712335
Article as it originally appeared.
There is so much wrong with that statement,,,does he see himself as some kind of leader of social change? Who would elect this guy as a D.A.? Is he looking for underlying issues or evidence? We know what he's supposed to be doing, does he?
The Anybody But Liefong people should cadge that statement and run an ad with it quoted next to a job description for the position of DA and the oath of office, which includes an oath to obey the law.
I thought just that he was there was big news, even if he left before the strippers arrived late. If he stayed through the dance that will limit Nifong time window and he may well have observed Finnerty or Seligmann leaving.
A huge bombshell would be if he left with Finnerty. I don't think we have heard who Finnerty left with. Not wanting to subject a teammate to racial solidarity pressure would be a very good reason why Finnerty has held his alibi witnesses so close to the vest. [Of course what happened to the cab driver would be another excellent reason.]
Former Social Worker. Former Social Worker. Former Social Worker.
Besides he feels their pain, whoever they are!!
Was Nifong a social worker?
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/LegalCenter/story?id=2618327&page=1
Duke Students Campaign Against Rape Case Prosecutor
University Group Encourages Student Vote Against Durham District Attorney
By HANNA SIEGEL
DURHAM, N.C., Oct. 31, 2006 — - Just days after filing charges against three Duke University lacrosse players for rape, Mike Nifong won the Democratic primary for district attorney of Durham County.
No one could say for sure how much the controversial case had contributed to Nifong's victory, but in a community long plagued by tensions between the haves -- particularly privileged Duke students -- and the have-nots, the candidate's willingness to take on the elite university did not hurt.
In the months since the primary, defense attorneys have presented evidence that appears to cast doubt on the strength of Nifong's claims against the Duke players. And some Duke students have developed a clever strategy to fight back.
They have formed Duke Students for an Ethical Durham to encourage students to fulfill their civic obligations, to register and vote in Durham County.
Founded in August, the group launched a voter registration drive, and by the first day of school, group members were campaigning all over campus.
They set up tables where people could register, took out ads in Duke's daily newspaper, the Chronicle, and enlisted liaisons from Duke athletic teams to advocate their cause in the locker rooms. Duke Students for an Ethical Durham is also trying to get nonvoters registered. As one of DSED's leaders, Charlotte native Christiane Regelbrugge, explained, "There are so many students who contribute so much to this community but don't vote here, and I think there is a big disconnect there."
Despite widespread skepticism that DSED is biased against the lacrosse team, group representatives say they just want due process and fair treatment for both the players and all Durham residents.
The group has endorsed one of Nifong's opponents, Lewis Cheek, an attorney and Durham's county commissioner, who is not campaigning and will not accept the job if elected but who wants to put an alternative candidate on the ballot.
Although Cheek has said publicly he doesn't want the DA job, he has criticized Nifong's handling of the Duke lacrosse case. His name on the ballot will give voters a chance to potentially deny Nifong a majority vote, thereby allowing North Carolina governor Mike Easley to appoint a district attorney himself. This is, coincidentally, how Nifong initially earned his position last year.
The other choice is Durham's Republican county chairman and write-in candidate, Steve Monks. A poll released Oct. 25, in the Raleigh News & Observer indicated Nifong currently has 46 percent of potential votes against Cheek's 28 percent and Monks' 2 percent.
While DSED doesn't oppose Monks, it believes Cheek has the better chance of denying Nifong a majority vote.
This past May, Nifong defeated his main opponent, Freda Black, with 45.2 percent of the vote, eradicating the need for a second primary.
DSED has turned in approximately 1,250 Duke student registration forms to Durham County's voter registration office, bringing the number of registered Duke students, according to DSED, to about 2,500.
Considering the 143,457 registered voters at the Durham County voter registration office for the Nov. 7 elections, Duke's 2,500 participants could potentially make a difference, depending on how tight the election is.
DSED promises no protests or action of any kind if Nifong wins; all it wants is to raise awareness and increase voter participation in Durham.
According to Regelbrugge, "Our goal is not for Duke students to receive special treatment but for all Durham residents to be treated fairly."
When contacted, Nifong's office said it "does not know anything about [DSED]" and "cannot comment on any kind of politics."
I am aware that you [KC Johnson] perceive that, at best, I am delusional to believe that I have a chance given the results of the recent WRAL/N&O survey which basically dismissed my campaign. This presupposes that the survey I introduced at my press conference is not valid. If it is valid, I would respectfully suggest you all need to start reassessing your position. Even if it is not, the WRAL/N&O poll shows that the Cheek camp is WAY underestimating the degree to which Durham voters find the "Vote Cheek Recall Nifong", Governor-Replaces-Nifong option undesirable.
http://durhamwonderland.blogspot.com/2006/10/sunday-roundup.html
The Monks email is at 5:56 PM, near the bottom of the replies.
Just damn
http://writ.news.findlaw.com/commentary/20061031_spilbor.html
The D.A.'s Admitted Failure To Personally Question The Accuser In The Duke Rape Scandal: Why, At Trial, It May Be A Boon To The Defense
By JONNA SPILBOR
----
Tuesday, Oct. 31, 2006
Last April, notoriously, three former Duke University lacrosse players were indicted. The indictment charged them with brutally raping a stripper during an off-campus team party. I've covered developments in the case in a series of columns for this site - on April 14, April 28, May 19, and June 30.
In these columns, I've argued that the publicly-available evidence relating to the case not only fails to support the prosecution's case, but severely undermines it. I've concluded, accordingly, that Durham D.A. Mike Nifong should drop the case.
In this column, I'll briefly recap that evidence, and consider the most recent development in the case: The October 27 revelation, during a court hearing, that D.A. Nifong has yet even to interview the accuser herself about the facts of the case!
Voters assessing Nifong on November 7 - when he is up for re-election - should surely consider this important new information carefully. Questions had already been raised about Nifong's judgment in going forward with this case; now, questions about his basic competence are also arising.
Importantly, you don't have to be pro-defense here to be troubled about Nifong. Far from it. Even supposing the accuser is somehow telling the truth (a supposition the publicly-available evidence makes very unlikely), the D.A. has done her a disservice - for, as I will explain, his failure to interview her about the facts will provide powerful fodder for the defense at trial.
The Evidence So Far: Serious Discrepancies with the Accuser's Claims
From the very start, the procedure by which the defendants were identified by the accuser was unconstitutional: The photos displayed to the accuser were only of Duke lacrosse players. Instead, the photos of players plainly should have been mixed with many photos of same-age, same-race males who were strangers to the accuser.
After the tainted identification, things got even dicier: DNA evidence failed to inculpate the two defendants the faulty identification process had initially yielded, or the third defendant added later. Digital photos taken at a party established a timeline inconsistent with the accuser's story. And two of the three defendants offered objectively-verifiable alibi evidence. Meanwhile, even the accuser's fellow stripper proclaimed the accusations a "crock." And as I detailed in my May 19 column, further DNA evidence also proved unconvincing.
So where was the prosecution's case? It had to lie with the accuser and her testimony. Maybe she could resolve the seeming discrepancies in the evidence?
Or, maybe not - for it turned out that her own various statements suffered from serious discrepancies, too. She had made a series of conflicting statements to police and medical personnel. And a police report indicated the accuser was "passed out drunk" and in "no distress" in the minutes following the time she said the attack had occurred.
The New Revelation: No Statements By the Accuser to the D.A.
Finally, just when it appeared the case against these three young men could not possibly get any weaker, it did. As noted above, the D.A. admitted - in the face of yet another defense request to obtain all statements made by the accuser to the D.A. - that no such statements exist.
According to the D.A, the only case-related conversation he's had with the accuser was a quick telephone conversation regarding her use of the drug "Ecstasy" on the night of the alleged rape. According to Nifong, "She said, 'I've never taken Ecstasy.' That was the extent of the conversation because that's all I had to know." Nifong continued, "I understand the answer may not be the answer they want but it's the true answer. That's all I can give [the defense]."
Indeed, Nifong told the Associated Press, "I've had conversations with [the accuser] about how she's doing. I've had conversations with [the accuser] about her seeing her kids, [but] I haven't talked with her about the facts of that night. We're not at that stage yet."
Why the Failure to Interview the Accuser Is Very Troubling
As an experienced criminal defense attorney, I can tell you that this failure to interview the accuser is rare, striking, and disturbing. It means that the D.A. failed to personally assess the accuser's credibility before filing charges against the defendant, or presenting evidence to the grand jury to obtain the indictments in the case.
A District Attorney has a duty to justice. The saying is that "the government wins when justice is done," not when it gets a "Guilty" verdict. But this D.A. failed to make sure he was, in fact, serving justice by looking his accuser in the eye, listening to her story, and assessing her credibility for himself, just as he knew a jury someday would do.
That story is extremely important here. The accuser, in her statements to police, maintains that, besides the defendants themselves, she herself was the only direct witness to the rape - which she says took place in a small bathroom, away from the rest of the party.
That means witness testimony - her testimony - will be crucial here - all the more so, because the forensic evidence seems, thus far, to be utterly lacking. The DNA evidence, as noted above, simply hasn't held up.
The Accuser's Trauma Provides No Grounds For a Six-Month Delay of the Interview
Nifong has said that the accuser was traumatized at the time he first tried to interview her. But that's no excuse for this conduct.
Nifong has said that, even in innocuous conversations, the accuser couldn't look him in the eye, and appeared on the verge of tears. And he's said that in a meeting on April 11 -- - about a week before he gave the case to the grand jury -- he and an investigator avoided discussing details of the case with the accuser because she was "too traumatized." (Attorneys bring investigators along to such meetings in part so that, if disputes arise as to what was said, the investigator - not the attorney - can become a witness in the case.)
(This raises the issue of whether the unprepared accuser appeared before the grand jury. If she didn't, and it turns out she's fabricating, it may be hard to punish her, since she hasn't yet testified under oath. And it is possible she didn't: In North Carolina, as in the federal system, a grand jury can indict on hearsay.)
But over six months have passed since April 11. Why didn't the D.A. and his investigator interview the accuser in the interim between then and now?
Let's suppose she's still too traumatized even to talk to two sympathetic people about the rape. (Remember, we're not necessarily talking about her being along with two men: The D.A. could always opt for a female investigator to accompany him, and, if necessary, could opt to delegate the interview to a female Assistant District Attorney as well.) Then the hard truth is that she may have even more difficulty in ever getting on the stand in front of a whole courtroom and jury - and that's a fact the D.A. ought to take into consideration as he decides whether, and how, to go forward in the case.
In sum, the D.A. needs to know, about the accuser, what an attorney must know about any potential witness: how she will hold up under the stress of in-court examination. Suppose that after talking to her, he still believes her story but sees that she can't bear to take the stand, or won't do well if she does. He may decide, then, that a plea may serve her interests better than the "Not Guilty" verdict that would inevitably result from her failure to testify.
How the Defense May Use the Prosecution's Delay to Its Advantage
For justice to be done, recollections must be given when the accuser's memory is fresh - and jurors know this. For this reason, the D.A.'s six-months-and-counting delay in interviewing the accuser will provide strong ammunition for the defense.
What's really going on here? One can only speculate, but it's no secret Mike Nifong is up for re-election in a week, nor is it a secret that he's made this case a platform for him to speak to the press. And one thing his failure to interview the accuser has accomplished - even as it has hurt the prosecution's case - is that it has kept that platform alive for this long.
Seems the honorable judge Sasser (who let the two Blinco's cops skate) won a tight contested election :
http://www.wral.com/politics/3891066/detail.html
Nov. 4, 2004
"RALEIGH, N.C. -- Election officials began the tedious task of looking at questionable ballots from Tuesday's election by hand on Thursday.
(snip)
"Debra Sasser is down by just 132 votes in the race for a District Court judge seat in Wake County.
"They're trying to make sure they determine intent and that's what I heard, but I just wanted to come down and see what happened just to feel that sense of comfort," Sasser said. . .
"Officials said between the mismarked ballots and the hundreds of provisional ballots in Wake County, some election results could change."
Who's watching the count of the Nifong votes?
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.