Posted on 03/02/2007 3:19:00 AM PST by ricks_place
Durham District Attorney Mike Nifong and the lead investigators in the Duke lacrosse case have different recollections of the first time they huddled at the Burlington laboratory that provided DNA testing for the prosecution.
Durham police Sgt. Mark Gottlieb and Investigator Benjamin Himan each listed in their case notes that they were at DNA Security on April 10, a week before any indictments in the case.
And Himan noted that Nifong was present at the meeting with Brian Meehan, head of the private lab.
But in a letter to the N.C. State Bar released this week, Nifong said he could not recall the event, although he acknowledged that a meeting occurred.
"I can only report that I have no recollection of that meeting and that I have no documentation or other evidence that I ever attended such a meeting," Nifong said in the Jan. 16 letter.
(Excerpt) Read more at newsobserver.com ...
Doesn't recall? Gee, Mr Nifong wouldn't lie, now would he?
I am not convinced that our system has anything to do with justice.
But I do believe that this is a battle. I mean, look at the very people who are involved in this—they have popped up in other settings. This is—the great story here for anybody willing to find it and write about it and explain it is this vast right-wing conspiracy that has been conspiring against my husband me since the day he announced for presidentI indicted the lacrosse hooligans."
1. I don't recall a meeting.
2. I was distracted and couldn't give my full attention to the case.
3. Other people who were helping me weren't reading the material, they were just copying it. It's their fault, not mine! Oh, I know I was the lead investigator, but why do I have to do everything?
4. Never, and I mean NEVER, did I expect such a spirited response pre-trial. It's simply not fair to the prosecution when people have the means and the will to fight for their freedom.
5. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know that the test results didn't implicate any of the defendants. However, in my professional opinion as a prosecutor, that doesn't mean it was favorable to the defense, so I didn't think it was necessary to let them know about it.
That pic of Nifong reminds me of BJC and his "I did not have sex with that woman, Ms. Lewinski" rant.
Nifong: "I did not have a meeting on April 10th with that man, Mr. Meehan, I never did".
Didn't he TAKE OVER this case from the police? And now he's trying to say he didn't give it his full attention?
Weasel words.
Good summary.
All that's missing is the steel balls.
I just showed that quote to my husband; after his head stopped spinning, he said, "Well, maybe THEY don't remember the party, so let's drop this whole thing."
That's just a ridiculous statement on his part; notice he is flat out denying the CRIMINAL charges.
And yet we get:
But Nifong said he did not see the test results as necessarily favorable to the defense. "They neither suggested that no assault took place nor that the assault was committed by someone else," Nifong said.
And most preposterous of all:
In one of the letters, Nifong said he feared the bar was "looking for a prosecutor" to punish for the misdeeds of other prosecutors whose misconduct has recently come to light and who have gone largely unpunished.
That isn't going to exactly make them happy, you think?
He said he had never before encountered such determined pretrial resistance. "A well-connected and well-financed (but not, I would suggest, well-intentioned) group of individuals -- most of whom are neither in nor from North Carolina, have taken it upon themselves to ensure that this case never reaches trial."
I bet the mothers LOVE that remark. How dare them try to defend themselves.
As has been said before, if I had had a case in front of him, I'd be combing through my case.
Oooh, I LIKE that! Your honor, my clients remember that there may have been a party, but they don't recall being there. Can we just drop the case?
Tell your husband to join the defense team, because in that one sentence he cut through months of nonsense by the FONG!
Has Nifong started complaining about the lack of strawberries yet?
I think the bar is going to love that remark. Y'all just pickin' on me because of something someone else did. Oh yeah FONG, that's really using your head! LOL
Thank you.
http://www.newsobserver.com/1185/story/548945.html
Published: Mar 02, 2007 02:04 PM
Modified: Mar 02, 2007 01:58 PM
In TV interview, Easley again criticizes Nifong
From Staff Reports
Gov. Mike Easley talked politics this week with PBS talk show host Charlie Rose, a North Carolina native. Easley, a former prosecutor, was asked about one of North Carolina’s most talked about prosecutors over the past year — Durham District Attorney Mike Nifong.
In January, Easley told a New York University crowd that picking Nifong to be Durham’s district attorney was the worst appointment of his career.
On The Charlie Rose Show that aired Wednesday, Feb. 28, he elaborated on that appointment.
A portion of the script from that show follows:
CHARLIE ROSE: Speaking of legal issues, the lacrosse team. Some of the players who were first accused of rape, and there was a prosecutor over there, Nifong I think his name was.
MICHAEL EASLEY: That’s right.
CHARLIE ROSE: He was appointed by you?
MICHAEL EASLEY: He was appointed acting DA by me. The district attorney, a very good district attorney, I appointed judge, and I wanted someone who wasn’t going to run, that was a long-term prosecutor, just to hold the office together until somebody was elected. And our staff interviewed him. He said he wasn’t going to run, and we didn’t think he would. And then he got out and started running.
There’s a totally different standard you set for somebody who is going to be the elected district attorney and get into politics, and then there’s somebody who you want just to run the office. Because when you get out there and start making political comments, it requires a whole lot of different talent, a whole lot of different skills that obviously he didn’t have. And he would not have been appointed had we known he was going to run.
That case is now with the attorney general’s office. He turned it over to the attorney general. It’s with a good team there.
CHARLIE ROSE: He was forced to turn it over to the attorney general, wasn’t he?
MICHAEL EASLEY: No, he ...
CHARLIE ROSE: He volunteered to do that.
MICHAEL EASLEY: Well, he was under a lot of pressure, though. You’re correct about that. He voluntarily did it, but -- volunteered to do it, but ...
CHARLIE ROSE: He handed over the prosecution to someone else. And the rape charges have been ...
MICHAEL EASLEY: They’re under investigation.
CHARLIE ROSE: Under investigation.
MICHAEL EASLEY: Right now. What’s happened is the prosecution team at the attorney general’s office who I know is very, very competent. They’re looking at it, giving a whole fresh look, and they’ll make a determination. And if it is a good case, they’ll try it; if it is not, they’ll dismiss it and be done with it. But I can tell you, the crowd that has it now is going to do the right thing.
CHARLIE ROSE: The prosecutorial team.
MICHAEL EASLEY: Yes.
CHARLIE ROSE: Yes. Because they’ve got some very good defense attorneys there, too.
MICHAEL EASLEY: They do.
CHARLIE ROSE: From the North Carolina Bar.
MICHAEL EASLEY: And what’s unfortunate about it is, once a prosecutor says the wrong thing or says something that they shouldn’t say, then it’s on. I mean, the fight’s on. The defense attorneys don’t have a lot of choice but to defend their clients. So then the whole thing is getting tried in the press, and everybody loses on that. It looks bad for the team. It looks bad for Duke. It looks bad for the state. It looks bad for the judicial system. And that’s why you want somebody who understands the media ...
CHARLIE ROSE: Fair to say you would not have appointed him if you had it to do over?
MICHAEL EASLEY: That’s correct. I would voluntarily not appoint him, just as he voluntarily turned the case over to the attorney general.
"I cannot recall"
Worked for the clintons every time!
Did he dump his first wife for the present one?
Absolutely bizarre.
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