Posted on 04/13/2006 3:21:02 PM PDT by ghost of nixon
DURHAM, N.C. -- A woman who claims she was sexually assaulted by members of Duke University's lacrosse team was described as "just passed-out drunk" by one of the first police officers to see her, according to a recording of radio traffic released by Durham police on Thursday and obtained by The Associated Press.
The conversation between the officer and a police dispatcher took place about 1:30 a.m. March 14, about five minutes after a grocery store security guard called 911 to report a woman in the parking lot who would not get out of someone else's car.
The officer gave the dispatcher the police code for an intoxicated person and said the woman was unconscious. When asked whether she needed medical help, the officer said: "She's breathing and appears to be fine. She's not in distress. She's just passed-out drunk."
The black woman, a 27-year-old dancer and college student, told police she was sexually assaulted and beaten by three white men around midnight at an off-campus party thrown by Duke's lacrosse team. The racially charged allegations have led Duke to cancel the highly ranked team's season and accept the resignation of its coach.
No charges have been filed, but district attorney Mike Nifong has said he believes a crime was committed. Attorneys for the players have said DNA tests failed to connect any players to the alleged attack, and they have urged Nifong to drop his investigation.
The radio recordings, obtained by the AP through a records request, are the first instance in which police or anyone connected with the investigation has said the woman appeared to be intoxicated.
Defense lawyers, however, have said time-stamped photographs taken by the players show that the accuser was drunk and had already suffered some injuries when she arrived at the house for the party.
The recording is consistent with "what I have seen of the photo evidence before," attorney Kerry Sutton said. Those photos, she said, showed that she was "way beyond where you would put somebody behind the wheel of a car."
The description of the woman's medical exam -- which Nifong has said is his basis for believing a rape occurred -- does not mention her being drunk. It states only that the woman's injuries and behavior were consistent with having been raped, sexually assaulted and having suffered a traumatic experience.
The woman has told police she and another dancer hired to dance at the party arrived at 11:30 p.m. March 13. The pair reportedly left the house a short time later, fearing for their safety. The accuser told police the two were coaxed back into the house with an apology, at which point they were separated. That's when she said she was dragged into a bathroom and sexually assaulted, beaten and choked for a half-hour.
At 12:53 a.m., police received a 911 call from a woman complaining that she had been called racial slurs by white men gathered outside the home where the party took place.
The defense has said it believes the second dancer at the party made that call. The 911 call from the grocery store security guard was placed at 1:22 a.m.
In it, the caller says, "Um, the problem is ... it's a lady in somebody else's car and she will not get out of their car. She's like, she's like intoxicated, drunk or something. She's, I mean, she won't get out of the car, period."
A police spokeswoman did not immediately return a call seeking comment on the radio traffic.
The case has focused intense national scrutiny on Duke and the lacrosse players and has sparked protests on the elite private university's campus and elsewhere in Durham. The school last week canceled the highly ranked team's season and coach Mike Pressler resigned after the release of a vulgar and graphic e-mail sent by a team member shortly after the alleged assault.
Several of the defense attorneys say they expect the district attorney to ask a grand jury on Monday to issue charges in connection with allegations.
"Rest up on Sunday," Sutton said.
There has been no official word, however, on whether Nifong intends to present the allegations Monday. His next opportunity would come two weeks later.
Not really. In NC you can be railroaded by Sheriff BillyBob and any idiot that swears out a false warrant to a magistrate. The laws are really stupid here.
Only the cable scream queens still have their tongues.
The absurdity of this is illustrated by the fact that if three blacks team members were accused of rape, you wouldn't punish the whole team.
If you're asking about the trial, it should be admissable in any state because it's part of describing the condition she was in when first contacted by LE. An officer's observation as to intoxication is admissable everywhere as far as I know because they make traffic stops on drunk drivers, and their intial observations when talking to the driver are admitted. If you're asking about evidence to be presented to the GJ to establsih probable cause for indictment, it would not be something a prosecutor would want to present if he's hungry for an indictment. That would not stop the Gjurors from asking for observations from the officer, but most GJs just rubberstamp what the prosecutor wants and don't ask too many questions. I hope I'm wrong in the case of the Durham GJ.
LOL! Thanks, Howlin!
So I read that and asked myself, where is this a-hole from?
I see you are from Northern Calif. and have been here a number of years...cool.
The local custom is, though, we self-critique in a more gentle style! (The truth of the critique is no defense in breech of Southern decorum.)
Just helping you avoid slipping back into those bad old North Calif. ways. [grin]
Isn't that the truth...............LOL!
Thanks. I'll wait til I read it in writing before crediting it, but if true those lacrosse guys must have been sorely pissed -
So these white dudes pay $800 (ouch!) for two strippers, and who shows up but an overweight, beat-up, falling-down drunk, african-american woman wearing a flesh-colored body stocking under her negligee! And then they only "dance" for 4 minutes before locking themselves in the bathroom and then making a run for it! And then one of them claims she was raped, sics the cops on them and looks for a civil lawyer to go after their money!
One couldn't make this stuff up.
I'm not in the Durham area, but I sensed from what I've seen of WPTF's coverage that they tend toward conservatism, or at least rationality. Unfortunately, that will not be the station the hotheads and rabble-rousers will be listening to. Their sources will be campus outlets and the local leftwing rags and TV stations.
You'll need my bridges for all your cars. ;)
Nope. Total misuse of the system. If they find out who she is, she should be charged. Aren't there laws against that?
Gawd, I WISH some of these shrieking women lawyers (and Leo Terrell!) would do a Jamieson!!!
I know someone who was falsely accused by someone and all the accuser had to do was file a complaint with a local magistrate. It took 5 years to get the mess straightened out, and it was a scam by the accuser to get the innocent victim into a civil lawsuit. I think the District Attorney's office is corrupt, as well as some local police. I don't trust ANYONE in law enforcement in NC except for one State Trooper who attended church with me.
I've been wondering about that, too. There is this entire gap we don't have any detail on. What was the dispo of the police call to Kroger's? They had to get her out of Kim's car. I also heard somewhere that she was placed in the back of the patrol unit. Did they call her BF (pimp?) to come get her, or did they take her to the drunk tank to wait for him, or what? I THOUGHT the BF took her to the hospital. If she told the cops she was raped, why didn't they take her to the hospital?
We have a fairly accurate timeline now, I think, of everything occurring from the time they arrived until they left. We don't know where they went prior to the first 9-1-1 call or where they went after that, or what the cops did with her after they arrived at Krogers. The AP filed a FOIA to get the responding officer's report back to dispatch indicating medical not needed - she was just passed out. Maybe they'll be getting more. I'd really like to know what her movements were after Kim left Kroger's, in relation to LE, her BF, and the hospital.
If the races were reversed and Nifong tried his DNA dragnet on the entire team, the ACLU, NAACP, SPLC, NOI, Jackasson and Dumb-ton would be there and in court in a Harlem heartbeat.
Actually there is additional factual info on some of the other FreeRepublic threads dealing with this case.
In particular I recall reading a post, citing its source, saying that Kim told a defense investigator that the accuser was with Kim in her car from the time they left the house until they arrived in the Kroger parking lot.
Considering her felonious criminal history of viewing her "dance" customers as ripe for being ripped-off, up to and including stealing one's automobile, then leading the cops on a multi-county chase while driving at more than twice the legal limit, and then trying to run one of them down, I would speculate that this lady is highly reckless and filled with some sort of serious rage. God only knows what all she's capable of, and God and her victims only know what all other crimes she's committed against her johns and dance customers who were too embarrassed or too married to do anything about it.
I'll make a bold prediction here. The case will be dropped, and the blacks will take to the streets in Durham and other cities around the country. They are already upset that the Mexicans are getting more street TV time.
ping
Excellent recap. I think the DA jumped out in front of this way too fast, without waiting for the investigation. If he had managed it better, there would have been every opportunity for him to appear even handed and in the pursuit of justice.
Instead, he not only potentially smeared a bunch of people unfairly (and by implication many others), he potentially hurt his own case if additional information is uncovered to support the claims of the victim. Not only that, he took the incident and turned it into a potential race war. In a situation like that, nobody is going to win in the end.
I believe one of the biggest career ending decisions a DA can make is to go too far, too fast and appear either agenda driven or stupid. In this guys case, he is teetering on the edge of both.
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