Posted on 04/18/2006 3:26:57 AM PDT by Mad-Margaret
DURHAM -- A day after a grand jury indicted two Duke University lacrosse players in connection with a reported rape, two men emerged from a sheriff's deputy vehicle and were led, handcuffed, into the magistrates office at the Durham County Jail at 4:54 a.m. today.
The arrests stem from a party that began March 13. The accuser, who is a mother of two, an N.C. Central University student and an escort service dancer, told police March 14 that she was sexually assaulted by three men in a bathroom at an off-campus house shared by three lacrosse team captains. The accuser is black; she said her rapists were white.
Defense lawyers said players maintained that there was no sex at all. They said the accuser concocted the story, that she was drunk and injured late March 13 when she arrived at the three-bedroom house at 610 N. Buchanan Blvd.
"... Two young men have been charged with crimes they did not commit. This is a tragedy," Bob Ekstrand, who represents team players, said Monday in a prepared statement. "For the two young men, an ordeal lies ahead. They do not face it alone; they face it with the love of family and friends and strengthened by the truth. They are both innocent."
Superior Court Judge Ronald Stephens sealed a manila envelope containing the indictments shortly after the grand jury finished its business Monday. The judge cited a state law that requires everyone involved in a case, including witnesses, to keep the indictment secret until a suspect is arrested.
Last month, a judge ordered DNA tests on the team's 46 white players; he excluded the only black team member. The players' attorneys say the tests showed none of the players' genetic material on or in the woman.
Nifong, bolstered by a medical exam that found injuries on the woman consistent with sexual assault, says he is confident that she was assaulted in the university-owned house. Nifong said last week at a forum at NCCU that the accuser identified at least one of her attackers.
Until Sunday night, the only other witness, the second woman hired to dance at the party, had remained silent. In television interviews, she told her story.
The woman's attorney, Mark Simeon of Durham, declined Monday to make her available for an interview. She spoke on the MSNBC cable news network, which did not identify her and showed her in silhouette. Simeon confirmed that it was his client on MSNBC.
The woman told MSNBC that she did not witness a rape and does not know whether one occurred.
The woman said she arrived thinking that she would be dancing at a bachelor party of 15 people. She was not expecting a party of lacrosse players, many of whom she said were in a drunken stupor. The woman said she was infuriated to learn that some players photographed her dancing.
The accuser did not appear to be on drugs or to have been drinking when she arrived, the second dancer said. She was "absolutely fine and in control of herself."
When the accuser left, less than an hour after she arrived, she was incoherent and stumbling, the second dancer said.
"She couldn't really walk on her own," the woman said. "She really couldn't get her thoughts together enough to answer any questions. ... She was a different person than I met at the beginning."
The second woman said she was the person who called 911 as the party was breaking up, to complain that some lacrosse players had used racial slurs. "The boys hollered the 'N' word," she said. "I was upset and called 911."
She said she pretended to be a passer-by because she didn't want people in her life to know about her job as an escort service dancer.
It is unclear how that woman's story would affect the case. Players' attorneys have said she would only help them. By day's end Monday, Nifong left without talking to reporters; it remains unclear what evidence he has.
Throughout Monday, there were many more reporters on the sixth floor of the courthouse than the 18 members of the grand jury panel. Reporters tracked the district attorney's movements in minute detail. Just after noon, Nifong emerged from his office and walked across the hallway to the bathroom.
Reporters surrounded the bathroom door in a crowd that included five television cameras, three still photographers, sound men with boom microphones and at least a dozen print reporters. At the sound of flushing, the group tensed, raised cameras and prepared. Nifong did not emerge with news.
"I no longer get to go anywhere in my community without people knowing who I am," said Nifong, who faces two challengers in a primary election May 2. Staff writer Anne Blythe can be reached at 932-8741 or ablythe@newsobserver.com.
"When this turns out to be a phony charge, how would you characterize a black woman falsely accusing two white men of rape, allowing the black community of Durham to turn out in her favor, and Jesse Jackson to make a big show of coming to town and awarding her a scholarship?"
It wouldn't be "Black Opportunism".
It would be the acions of a vile, totally reprehensible individual who would then deserve the same punishment these guys are facing.
Amen, these students are utter idiots and are disgusting. Just like M. Savage says, many colleges are not institutions of lower living.
They should never have put themself in that spot, and Andrew Wilcow, WABC radio host, had a great segment on this.
Spoiled rotten, no street smarts, brats, but I don't think rapists.
Four minutes 'til Abrams.
That's right. In fact, up thread, another freeper posted the words from the DA a week or so ago when he said she hadn't made an ID yet!
I know that. I wasn't suggesting that the DA said it, but "they" in this case was the media.
"Hon, you could just look in a dictionary and find out the meaning of the word orgie. "
Personal experience is always clearer, no?
We will see who the fool is when this is over.
And if they ARE guilty, I don't think people who thought they were not are "fools", just mislead.
But if a "date-rape" sort of drug was used, doesn't that beg the question of how she was able to fight tooth and nail against her supposed attackers, and, not long after, be yelling and hollering at the hospital?
Wow. Talk about jumping to conclusions. Let's see -- they go to college and play lacrosse so they must be spoiled rotten and brats. Some days Free Republic is just an embarrassment.
They were sishing for evidence. The only DNA on or in the accuser was her own.
Gotcha.
Dan Abrams on now.
11 a.m., to drop off her car.
I think he's the middleman.
Whose personal experience? You are accusing me of going to orgies because I know the meaning of the word? You have an awfully low threshold of evidence, don't you?
"It's not clear why you feel that seeing a stripper is such an heinous act."
I don't.
But for the whole team to have a party involving a bunch of strippers they personally hired, and possibly did more than just look at is extremely stupid and has done themselves and the school damage.
Don't you agree?
Also, as another freeper pointed out, it couldn't have happened the way Rita said because the DA himself admitted early last week or the week before that the accuser hadn't ID'd anyone.
Isn't that a bit cynical? ;-)
Did the players all volunteer their DNA? If not, did a judge really REQUIRE a sample from them without even knowing if any was recovered from the accuser? Is that possibly true?
Maybe you're right, we'll see.
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