LIVE THREAD: NC Attorney General Announcement at 2:30pm Today (DUKELAX)

ABC 11 WTVD ^

[Howlin]

RALEIGH, N.C. — Three members of Duke University's lacrosse team could learn Wednesday whether state prosecutors will drop the remaining charges accusing them of sexually assaulting a stripper at a team party more than a year ago.

"I think it's likely that they will do that," said Wade Smith, an attorney for charged player Collin Finnerty. "We certainly hope that would be true. But until we hear it, we're not going to acknowledge that's the truth. We'll wait and see."

The state Attorney General's Office has scheduled a 2:30 p.m. news conference to discuss the case. It is unclear whether Attorney General Roy Cooper will be at the news conference at the RBC Center, which can accommodate the crush of national media interested in the case.

The Associated Press, citing sources close to the investigation, reported Wednesday morning that all charges would be dropped in the case.

The Attorney General's Office took over the case in January after Durham County District Attorney Mike Nifong was charged with several ethics violations tied to his handling of the sensational case.

No notice of dismissal had been filed at the Durham County Courthouse by early Wednesday. But a spokeswoman for the Attorney General's Office told WRAL that the investigation into the case has been completed.

"We are relieved that this day has come,” Smith told WRAL. “There will not be a celebration because this has been a train wreck.”

The families of Collin Finnerty, Reade Seligmann and David Evans arrived in Raleigh Tuesday. Officials told WRAL that the three lacrosse players would be present once a decision had been made as to how the prosecution would proceed with the case.

A grand jury indicted the three players on charges of rape, kidnapping and sexual offense last spring after a woman told police she was assaulted at a March 2006 team party where she was hired to perform as a stripper. All three have steadfastly maintained their innocence, with Evans calling the allegations "fantastic lies."

Nifong dropped the rape charges in December after the accuser changed a key detail in her story. He recused himself a few weeks later after the state bar charged him with violating several rules of professional conduct.

Among the ethics charges, Nifong is accused of withholding potentially exculpatory DNA evidence from the defense and lying to both the court and bar investigators. Nifong faces a June trial before the bar and could be disbarred if convicted.

Nifong faces a Friday afternoon hearing in the ethics case, and he spent Wednesday morning with his attorney in Winston-Salem.

Nifong's recusal put the players' fate in the hands of Cooper, who promised "a fresh and thorough review of the facts" when he took over the case in January.

Smith said the players, their families and the defense attorneys were pleased that the special prosecutors took over the case, saying they brought "sanity to this situation."

“The special prosecutors have looked under every rock, and they have searched for evidence in places even the defense did not,” he told WRAL.

While Evans graduated the day before he was indicted in May, Duke temporarily suspended sophomores Finnerty and Seligmann in the wake of their arrest. Finnerty was also convicted in July in an unrelated assault case in Washington, D.C., and sentenced to six months of probation.

Finnerty and Seligmann were both invited to return to campus, but neither has accepted. John Danowski, the former coach at Hofstra who took over the Duke program last summer, has also said that both are welcome to continue their lacrosse careers with the Blue Devils

[Alia]

We've all had some good, close moments while dissecting, analyzing, championing JUSTICE -- and since the day it happened. :)

And some nasty ones with others, too. lol. I caught a tad of Sean while driving; some woman was on ranting about the boy's "bad behavior in even having a party". My mind went to FR flashbacks on similar comments: "Too damned bad they got nailed -- they deserved to for their immoral behavior in having a party in the first place."

snort.

[Alia]

I was tied up in a meeting, groan. I wondered if I should leave the meeting, drive to a Kroger’s and claim I was taken advantage of in every way possible by a stapler, some tape, and an ergonomically designed chair.

[Alia]

You’ve done amazing sleuth work throughout this ordeal, maggie.

[Enchante]

"And wouldn't you know, and I checked it myself, every last one of them dumped out at the same time. FOX news, CNN, MSNBC, Court TV."

They sure wouldn't want anyone to hear a true assessment of the despicable and incompetent coverage of this whole affair. Loathsome MSM hacks will make every effort to prevent the public from learning any details now, and will quickly adopt an attitude of "ho, hum, old news"...... watch how fast this entire story goes down the Orwellian memory hole (if the MSM can pull it off).

[Alia]

My big corner early on was pointing out that consensual sex acts can register or appear as "rape" -- corroborating evidence would be required in either case.

I learned all this from men in years earlier, who had been falsely accused of rape -- and these stories never made the news.

[Alia]

Lawyer talking about heroes and cowards. It is fantastic

praying I can find a transcript of this... I wanna read this/hear this.

[Alia]

Pinging you to this thread point and on forward.

[abb]

Pics
http://triangle.johnlocke.org/blog/

[Alia]

Very thoughtful of you, abb. You have been without cease on working and publishing the Duke LAX case at FR. I've appreciated very much, =all= of what you have done.

From your link:

1) The biggest losers today are Durham DA Mike Nifong, The Herald-Sun and the City of Durham. Nifong, for obvious reasons, is in big trouble. But Seligmann attorney Jim Cooney took special pains to single out the cowardice of The Herald-Sun, a newspaper where I spent 19 years as an editor. If the hometown paper had just once pointed to Nifong’s abuse of process, Cooney said, all of this might have been avoided. But they didn’t, to their everlasting shame. I’ve said before that if the previous regime — pre-Paxton Media — had been in charge, we would not have abandoned our duty as the public watchdog the way the Paxton-led Herald-Sun did. And also, Durham. Durham came off as a Third World cesspool of corruption today. First, the state’s attorney general blasted the district attorney in the strongest terms. Then Evans attorney Joe Cheshire and Cooney both cited the lack of professionalism among Durham’s police and DA’s office, and also the behavior of so-called “community activists,” white and black, who fanned the flames of racial hatred for political ends. Durham should hang its head in shame tonight.

2) The media took a beating. All of the lawyers made clear that it was the media nationally, like The Herald-Sun locally (and, I might add, The News & Observer, which is certainly not without fault), that ignored the facts for what they thought was a better story: rich, white lacrosse players rape poor black mother just trying to make her way through college. It was always a crock, and now they know it. Cheshire pointed out their sins to them in person today. Katie Couric, Harry Smith and Greta Van Susteren were there to hear it first-hand. It was wonderful to see.

[Alia]

Starting at #664.

[abb]

NandO admits what they withheld last year!

http://www.myrtlebeachonline.com/mld/myrtlebeachonline/news/nation/17062683.htm

Mangum, a mother of three children ages 6, 8 and 3 months, was enrolled last spring at N.C. Central University. On March 24, 11 days after the party, she granted a short interview with The News & Observer, her only media interview to date. Mangum made allegations of racism, claimed to have only a short history as a stripper, and said she believed the other woman hired to dance with her also had been assaulted.

[abb]

Mangum made allegations of racism, claimed to have only a short history as a stripper, and said she believed the other woman hired to dance with her also had been assaulted.

[kidd]

I did notice that the “headlines” on the bottom of the screen that were displayed on CourtTV stated that the AG had dropped all the charges against the Duke lax players, but made no mention that the three men had been proclaimed innocent.

It was quite blatent

[Eva]

This is from a thread from March:

I have the pdfs of the original ad, plus the list of the 88, that I downloaded from a duke.edu server last Spring. From the department of African Studies, or some such.

FReepmail me your email, I’d be glad to send them to you, if someone doesn’t have them hosted somewhere, and you want them.

Here’s the list, cut’n’pasted from that.

Abe, Stan (Art, Art History, and Visual Studies)
Albers, Benjamin (University Writing Program)
Allison, Anne (Cultural Anthropology)
Aravamudan, Srinivas (English)
Baker, Houston (English and AAAS)
Baker, Lee (Cultural Anthropology)
Beckwith, Sarah (English)
Berliner, Paul (Music)
Christina Beaule (University Writing Program)
Blackmore, Connie (AAAS)
Jessica Boa (Religion & University Writing Program)
Boatwright, Mary T. (Classical Studies)
Boero, Silvia (Romance Studies)
Bonilla-Silva, Eduardo (Sociology)
Brim, Matthew (University Writing Program)
Chafe, William (History)
Ching, Leo (Asian & African Languages and Literatures)
Coles, Rom (Political Science)
Cooke, Miriam (Asian & African Languages and Literatures)
Crichlow, Michaeline (AAAS)
Curtis, Kim (Political Science)
Damasceno, Leslie (Romance Studies)
Davidson, Cathy (English)
Deutsch, Sally (History)
Dorfman, Ariel (Literature & Latin American Stds.)
Edwards, Laura (History)
Farred, Grant (Literature)
Fellini, Luciana (Romance Studies)
Fulkerson, Mary McClintock (Divinity School)
Gabara, Esther (Romance Studies)
Gavins, Raymond (History)
Greer, Meg (Romance Studies)
Glymph, Thavolia (History)
Hardt, Michael (Literature)
Harris, Joseph (University Writing Program)
Holloway, Karla (English)
Holsey, Bayo (AAAS)
Hovsepian, Mary (Sociology)
James, Sherman (Public Policy)
Kaplan, Alice (Literature)
Khalsa, Keval Kaur (Dance Program)
Khanna, Ranjana (English)
King, Ashley (Romance Studies)
Koonz, Claudia (History)
Lasch, Peter (Art, Art History, and Visual Studies & Latino/a Studies)
Lee, Dan A. (Math)
Leighten, Pat (Art, Art History, and Visual Studies)
Lentricchia, Frank (Literature)
Light, Caroline (Inst. for Crit. U.S. Stds.)
Litle, Marcy (Comparative Area Studies)
Litzinger, Ralph (Cultural Anthropology)
Longino, Michele (Romance Studies)
Lubiano, Wahneema (AAAS and Literature)
Maffitt, Kenneth(History)
Mahn, Jason (University Writing Program)
Makhulu, Anne-Maria (AAAS)
Mason, Lisa (Surgical Unit-2100)
McClain, Paula (Political Science)
Meintjes, Louise (Music)
Mignolo, Walter (Literature and Romance Studies)
Moreiras, Alberto (Romance Studies)
Neal, Mark Anthony (AAAS)
Nelson, Diane (Cultural Anthropology)
Olcott, Jolie (History)
Parades, Liliana (Romance Studies)
Payne, Charles (AAAS and History)
Pierce-Baker, Charlotte (Women’s Studies)
Pebles-Wilkins, Wilma
Petters, Arlie (Math)
Plesser, Ronen (Physics)
Radway, Jan (Literature)
Rankin, Tom (Center for Documentary Studies)
Rego, Marcia (University Writing Program)
Reisinger, Deborah S. (Romance Studies)
Rosenberg, Alex (Philosophy)
Rudy, Kathy (Women’s Studies)
Schachter, Marc (English)
Shannon, Laurie (English)
Sigal, Pete (History)
Silverblatt, Irene (Cultural Anthropology)
Somerset, Fiona (English)
Stein, Rebecca (Cultural Anthropology)
Thorne, Susan (History)
Viego, Antonio (Literature)
Vilaros, Teresa (Romance Studies)
Wald, Priscilla (English)
Wallace, Maurice (English and AAAS)
Wong, David (Philosophy)

14 posted on 03/23/2007 6:57:37 AM PDT by FreedomPoster (Guns themselves are fairly robust; their chief enemies are rust and politicians) (NRA)

[JLS]

Thanks, I was switching back and forth. I also went over to the CourtTV Duke board to see that they had no activity. They should be ashamed.

[Freedom'sWorthIt]

Nandy Grace is not on her program tonight - natch.

Hallelujah that the Democratic AG Cooper came through with the RIGHT decision today! Thank God! Thank you Joe Cheshire for always being the fierce voice portraying the total injustice of what has gone on this year. Thank you, young men, for being so well-spoken today. Thank you, Howlin, abb and others for keeping the facts front and center in this case for over a year.

Thank God for North Carolina this decision has been made.

But when "losers" are mentioned today - I think they should say something about the Democratic Party leaders in NC - including Easley - who - unless I missed it - had no words of condemnation for their fellow Democratic politician Nifong when he so obviously took a false accusation and rode it into re-election. If any of these NC Dem Party Leaders spoke up - sorry - I missed it. Shame on you, NC Democratic leaders - until today - finally - Cooper steps forward and does the right thing. About time.

[sissyjane]

I knew I shouldn’t have gone to my group today!

Thanks for the pings.

[maggief]

You are too kind, Alia. Thank you. Someone has to do research. MSM won’t.

Pajama media/blog hooligans rule!

[bvw]

Yes, sir. Rather be a friend of Jack D’s than a friend of Bill W’s. But either is a good friend, some for the one, a few for the other.

[AnAmericanMother]

This is killer:

"2. There is insufficient evidence to warrant prosecution for the following reasons:

The re-investigation of this matter indicates that this individual is innocent of the charges brought against him and in the interest of justice these charges are dismissed."

That is COMPLETELY DAMNING!

In my misspent legal career I must have read hundreds of dismissals of criminal charges . . . I have NEVER seen one like this!