Despite the fact there is no DNA evidence and the accuser’s story has more holes in it than Patrick Kennedy’s excuses for wrecking his Mustang, CBS radio news is reporting that the Durham DA is handing down a third indictment in the Duke rape case.
I can’t WAIT for the civil suit these kids are going to bring.
Kevin adds: Dave Evans, co-captain of the Duke lacrosse team, was indicted for first-degree rape, first-degree sexual offense and first-degree kidnapping by the grand jury in Durham, North Carolina.
TalkLeft’s Jeralyn Merritt, a defense attorney who knows Evans’s attorney Joe Cheshire, liveblogged the press conference. Here’s how she paraphrased it…
- “They have evidence where David Evans was each and every minute of that evening. This rape did not happen and could not have happened. They have presented the info to the DA’s office and they have refused to listen.“
Hmmmm.
1. I get the feeling Nifong is trying to pile on everything he can to force a plea deal. Without a successful conclusion to this case he’s completely screwed.
2. And yes, I do think the civil case brought against the DA and Durham county will be epic.
3. What I found curious was that the very timeline used by Nifong to get an indictment was refuted by Nifong with respect to one of the indicted players who had ATM and taxicab proof that he wasn’t present during the time the rape was supposed to have taken place.
I hadn’t imagined that such evidence was so mutable.
This is just wrong! The lives of these three men is forever damaged.
Plea deal? Why the hell would any of these guys take a plea deal? It would have to be so watered down – basically, copping a plea to underage drinking or giving alcohol to someone underage. Because I doubt any of these guys will accept any sexual assault plea.
I wonder: can DAs be impeached?
“They have evidence where David Evans was each and every minute of that evening. This rape did not happen and could not have happened. They have presented the info to the DA’s office and they have refused to listen.”
If true, then the DA is going to look like the biggest idiot in the state. Given that he’s competing with Tax-Hike Mike Easley (our governor, a pox upon him), that’s saying something.
I think ed’s right, though: the DA is putting the screws to the kids to force at least one of them to cop to SOMETHING.
Either that, or he’s got some pretty damning evidence that he’s keeping close to the vest.
Be interesting to see how this all shakes out.
Hmmmm.
What I believe is going on is this:
Nifong is refusing to meet with defense attorneys because he has a positive legal requirement to take into account exculpatory evidence when it’s presented to him. However if Nifong refuses to accept into his possession such exculpatory evidence, or even discuss such evidence with defense attorneys, then he doesn’t have to apply that principle.
A legal maneuver similar to sticking fingers in one’s ears and shouting “la la la” over and over again. And one that I don’t think will hold up in court.
Meep, we’ll probably get an answer to that very soon.
Nifong coerced the cabbie by indicting him on a 2 1/2 year old charge when he indicating he would testify on behalf of the kids, and let go a probation violation for the second stripper in exchange for her changing her story.
Can you spell prosecutorial misconduct?
This whole thing reeks.
Why is it all the Republican blogs are pro-rapist?
Naw, surely it’s just a coincidence ….
“I wonder: can DAs be impeached?”
I wonder if DAs can be imprisoned for lying to Grand Juries? Oh, that’s right. Only if they’re a Republican.
“Why is it all the Republican blogs are pro-rapist?
Naw, surely it’s just a coincidence ….”
Nobody here is pro-rapist. I haven’t heard a positive word here uttered about the whore’s boyfriend — you know, the guy who left his DNA in her.
Why would anybody support a woman who simply makes people less liable to believe rape charges without substantial evidence behind them?
Well, considering how much the left hates women unless they have a fetus vacuumed out of them, it’s not shocking.
-=Mike
meep said: I wonder: can DAs be impeached?
Durham County has the Next Best Thing – Nifong is up for re-election this year. He has staked his campaign on this case, and if it fails then he is deader than dogsh!t come November. I fear that the only reason he is keeping the pressure on the Duke kids until at least November is that he is playing on the racial polarization angle for electoral purposes. If that is the case, than it is the vilest sort of election shenanigans and must be exposed.
Come November, this case will mysteriously disappear either by the DA dropping the case for “insufficient evidence,” or by a judge’s directed verdict on the preliminary hearing.
Sadie – why is it that paleofeminist lesbtard blogs like yours are always reflexively pro-perjurer? You should spend time on Jeralyn’s site reading ALL the posts – not just the ones you agree with. DA Nifong is getting shredded there. And how do you feel about the DA putting the screws to the taxi driver, nailing him for the 2-1/2-year old misdie warrant? Does that prove that the taxi driver was just another part of the lying patriarchy? Sheesh.
The shame of it all that the kids are ruined. A fortune in legal defence costs. A permanent arrest record. A real possibility of a reverse OJ jury, a jury that will convict no matter what the evidence is. If Nifong doesn’t drop the charges later on after the election, then the jury will be a black version of a Klan jury, a conviction no matter what.
Sure this will overturned by the appellate court but the kids will still have been sent to prison.
What will happen to Nifong? Nothing. He is immune.
The taxpayers of Durham will pay a bit of money, but not Nifong and his prosecution staff.
The old Klan: Democrats. The new Klan: Democrats.
Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
“Nobody here is pro-rapist. I haven’t heard a positive word here uttered about the whore’s boyfriend — you know, the guy who left his DNA in her.”
That’s because you are only following this story on the pro-rape/rightwing side of the internet. Apparently you haven’t heard about the two sets of lacerations (two, in two different locations), the DNA match between the fingernail sample and the third suspect, and the lacrosse players insistence that no one followed the victim into the bathroom, when her money, fingernails and cellphone were all found there the next day, indicating that something took place there.
The defense team is doing a masterful job of trying this case in the media, contaminating the jury pool well in advance to guarantee the perps walk.
I guess my question is, why all this pussyfooting around? Why doesn’t the Rightwing just go agead and declare rape legal, and be done with it? You know you want to.
“That’s because you are only following this story on the pro-rape/rightwing side of the internet. Apparently you haven’t heard about the two sets of lacerations (two, in two different locations), the DNA match between the fingernail sample and the third suspect, and the lacrosse players insistence that no one followed the victim into the bathroom, when her money, fingernails and cellphone were all found there the next day, indicating that something took place there.”
And you’re missing that:
1) She initially claimed 40 men raped her. She changed it to 3.
2) The lineup where she “identified” the players did not contain any non-lacrosse players.
3) One of the 3 indicted has an airtight alibi, with pictures from an ATM machine showing that he wasn’t even AT the house.
4) There is still zero evidence that she had any form of sex at the house.
5) And finding a DNA sample ON TOP OF THE FINGERNAIL in a bathroom the players regularly used for months beforehand is hardly a problem. That the only semen found on her ANYWHERE belonged not to a player, but to her boyfriend, is a problem.
6) She was bruised when she got there.
7) She was smiling in pictures one minute after the rape allegedly occurred.
8) Nobody disputed that the whore went into the bathroom. That her cell phone, etc were there is proof that she was there. Stunning turn of events.
9) The DA tried the case in the media before the defense did anything. Screw the DA for having such a weak case and ruining the lives of innocent guys.
Why not just go ahead and admit that innocent til proven guilty is meaningless to you, Sadie?
As for the rightwing wishing to “legalize rape” — I do seem to remember rape allegations against a recent Democratic President. Not so much against any recent Republicans.
-=Mike
Why doesn’t the Rightwing just go agead and declare rape legal, and be done with it? You know you want to.
Because that is an insane concept. We on the right are strong on crime laws and punishment. Rapists are the worst scum of them all. No one on the right will ever defend a rapist.
But, in a situation like this where the DA is obviously politicising things — promising indictments based on DNA results and then ignoring his own statments — and where a preponderance of what we know about the evidence seems to be exculpatory, we will question the motives of those involved.
It is bizarre that you can take our comments here and twist it into wanting to make “rape legal”.
It saddens me that there are people like you out there pretending to be a normal functioning part of society. If you seek help now, you may be able to live at least part of your life as a happy person.
Sadie, there’s a phone call for you. Someone by the name of Juanita Broddick.
With the taste of his own foot still lingering in his mouth, District Attorney Mike Nifong has another piece of evidence blow up in his face, I wonder how’s his ulcer is doing?
So would it be his own aura or is it the universe’s way of getting back at Nifong for destroying these young boys lives?
It would be funny if Nifong’s ulcer leads to a colonoscopy, or would it be “ironic” or “poetic justice” that he screws 47 boys over a false rape claim and have to take a 36 inch colonoscopy tube up his @ss for his part in the fiasco he created.
They are innocent! The drunken black stripper with the long criminal record and history of making false accusations…lied.
• Stripper made a false claim of rape by three boys in 1996.
• Stripper made a false claim of kidnapping in 1998
• Stripper charged with larceny, auto theft, and trying to kill a police officer in 2002
• 1st round of DNA shows no link to the lacrosse team.
• 2nd round of DNA shows no link to the lacrosse team
• DNA proves stripper had sex with boyfriend/pimp which accounts for the “rape kit” evidence of recent sexual activity.
• Innocent boy who picked up finger nail and threw it in the trash left his DNA on the fake press-on nail and will be charged for rape.
The stripper’s account of the night has serious integrity issues:
1) First she claimed 20 boys raped her, then she narrowed it down to 3 in a bathroom
a. The bathroom is absolutely and completely devoid of any evidence of a rape. Where is her DNA? Urine, blood, vaginal fluid, saliva, or tears?
b. Many people’s DNA were found under her nails but none from the innocent lacrosse boys.
c. She lied about losing her fake finger nails in a desperate struggle in the small enclosed bathroom, but pictures show that she removed her nails before inadequately performing her routine. No scratches were found on any of the innocent lacrosse boys’ bodies.
d. The 2 innocent boys she “eeny meeny miney moed” to be her rapists weren’t even at the party the time she claimed the rape occurred. She claims that she’s 100% sure, but she told her father that she’s not sure.
e. She took drugs before coming to the house, something illegal.
The stripper obviously lied, and she’s putting these innocent boys and families through hell. She deserves to be in prison for the rest of her pathetic life. She is worthless as a person and human being. Her one lie destroyed innocent boys. I hope her and Nifong’s aura catches up to them and they both get what they deserve. I hope everyone wishing this rape claim to be true, in spite of all the evidence that it never occurred, gets what’s coming to them.
Nobody here is prorape, but just because a woman lies about a rape, doesn’t mean she should get away easy. This lying-black-stripper-with-the-criminal-record-and-a-history-of-making-false-accusations continues to put alot of innocent people through hell.
Just because a woman makes a claim of rape, doesn’t mean everyone should rush to believe her. Almost half of all rape claims are false.
I was surprise of how many false rape accusations have been made by several independent surveys reveal that 42% to approximately half of all accusations made are false. Most cases involve divorce battles involving the custody of children, some for revenge for withdraw of affection, monetary gains, an excuse for infidelity, or misidentification.
• According to the FBI, one of every 12 claims of rape filed in the United States are later deemed ‘unfounded,’ meaning the case was closed because the alleged victim recanted or because investigators found no evidence of a crime.
• Howard County Police classified one out of every four rape allegations as unfounded in 1990-91.
• The National Association of Schoolmasters/Union of Women Teachers says around 600 teachers a year are falsely accused – a trebling since the 1989 Children’s Act.
• Citing a recent USA Today article, discussing the miracle of DNA and FBI studies of sexual assault suspects, DNA testing exonerated about 30% to 35% of the more than 4,000 sexual assault suspects on whom the FBI had conducted DNA testing over the past three years.
• Purdue sociologist Eugene J. Kanin, in over 40% of the cases reviewed, the complainants eventually admitted that no rape had occurred (Archives of Sexual Behavior, Vol. 23, No. 1, 1994).
• 1985 the Air Force conducted a study of 556 rape accusations. Over 25% of the accusers admitted, either just before they took a lie detector test or after they had failed it, that no rape occurred.
• 1996 Department of Justice Report, of the roughly 10,000 sexual assault cases analyzed with DNA evidence over the previous seven years, 2,000 excluded the primary suspect, and another 2,000 were inconclusive.
• Linda Fairstein, who heads the New York County District Attorney’s Sex Crimes Unit. Fairstein, the author of Sexual Violence: Our War Against Rape, says, “there are about 4,000 reports of rape each year in Manhattan. Of these, about 50% simply did not happen.”
• Craig Silverman, a former Colorado prosecutor known for his zealous prosecution of rapists during his 16-year career, says that false rape accusations occur with “scary frequency.” As a regular commentator on the Bryant trial for Denver’s ABC affiliate, Silverman noted that “any honest veteran sex assault investigator will tell you that rape is one of the most falsely reported crimes.” According to Silverman, a Denver sex-assault unit commander estimates that nearly 50% of all reported rape claims are false.
Hmmmm.
Thomas Sowell on RealClearPolitics has the best answer:
Nifong is waiting until 2007 for the media spotlight to shift to some other story so he can quietly deep-six this case.
Mike, does the SC in your name stand for sick creature? Why do you keep referring to the ALLEGED rape victim as a whore? Would you like someone to refer to your mother or your wife in the same way?
I know she stripped for a living, but I thought a whore was someone who had sex for money? Of course, she may have been having sex for money, so if that was the case, I guess she wasn’t raped—at least in her mind until the young men decided not to pay her.
Mmmmm, rich southern white men, poor southern black female, all participating in sexually charged indecorous behavaior. Dammm; this all sounds so familiar.
“Mike, does the SC in your name stand for sick creature? Why do you keep referring to the ALLEGED rape victim as a whore? Would you like someone to refer to your mother or your wife in the same way?”
If they stripped for money, it’d be an appropriate term.
Since they do not — then it’s not my concern.
“I know she stripped for a living, but I thought a whore was someone who had sex for money?”
Yes, she is the stripper who was pure OUTSIDE of the whole “getting naked in front of random dudes” thing.
“Mmmmm, rich southern white men, poor southern black female, all participating in sexually charged indecorous behavaior. Dammm; this all sounds so familiar.”
Yes. Sounds like you’re playing Uno with the race card again.
-=Mike
“Apparently you haven’t heard…. and the lacrosse players insistence that no one followed the victim into the bathroom, when her money, fingernails and cellphone were all found there the next day, indicating that something took place there.”
The cellphone was not found in the bathroom. She left it outside (you can see it on the ground in one of the post 12:30 AM pictures) and one of the players took it inside after they left. Her money was in her makeup bag, and she had that with her at 12:30. There is no indication that the makeup bag was found in the bathroom either. It was probably dropped outside with the cellphone when she fell.
Mike Nifong said, as reported, on April 11, 2006
“I would not be surprised if condoms were used,” Nifong said in an interview last month. “Probably an exotic dancer would not be your first choice for unprotected sex.”
Which is interesting since the SANE Nurses report Said the “victom” said there was NO COMDOMS USED.
Think about it…………..
IF Nifong said he believed there was a rape, and
IF Nifong made that determination from the accuser’s statements AND the results of the SANE examination, and
IF Nifong read the examination then he knew at the time the accuser said NONE of the boys wore condoms, THEN
The statement you above would have been KNOWINGLY based on a false premise and solely intended to incriminate the boys to make a case he knew wasn’t supported by that evidence!!!
Nifong was trying to mislead the media and criminalize the players when he knew the evidence was exactly the opposite!
I really should proof read before I click post.
Evidence in the records released by the DA:
When investigators questioned the stripper after DNA tests on the semen found inside her vagina and rectum didn’t match any of the Duke players, the stripper admitted to having had sex with at least three men around the time of the alleged rape. The stripper named her boyfriend and two men who drove her to Duke.
• When questioned, the “drivers” said they would drop her off at several places, including hotel rooms.
The parents of the boys should sue the stripper and the stripper’s parents, then turn the debt over to collectors to hound them for the rest of their lives. The stripper should end up in jail for a couple of decades, and the DA’s office and the city of Durham should pay all defense fees and damages done to each lacrosse player.
Is Nifong trying to hide the stripper’s cell phone that may proove that she was on the phone at the time she claims she says a rape occurred?
A Special Prosecutor In The Duke Rape Case?
Susan Estrich wants DA Mike Nifong to appoint a Special Prosecutor in the Duke lacrosse rape case. Ms. Estrich believes that Mike Nifong, is outmatched for Bob Bennett hired by the Duke team parents, and wants NC’s attorney general to hire Bennett’s equal to represent the state?
Why not hire Bennett’s equal to represent the state? Bringing in the top guns for a complicated case would be one thing, but bringing in the high-priced talent in order to attempt the transformation of a pig’s ear into a silk purse would be a waste of the taxpayer’s money.
Nifong claimed that a date rape drug was used but a discovery motion filed by the defense learned that there wasn’t any toxicology done. The question of a “line-up” that guaranteed a Duke lacrosse team member would be chosen. The absolute refusal of Nifong looking at exculpatory evidence of any kind, and he continues to ignore evidence that the crime never occurred.
There is no way three drunken men, inside an enclosed bathroom with a woman violently clawing and fighting would leave absolutely no DNA behind at the alleged crime scene. Where’s her tears, sweat, saliva, and other bodily fluids? If condoms were used, were are the condoms, wrappers, boxes or evidence of lubricant on or in the alleged victim? The scene described by the alleged victim is one of violence and chaos, yet even in the most calm and best of situation, anyone who has ever had sex with a condom knows that there is no way to remove a condom without touching DNA evidence from either yourself or partner.
Ms. Estrich states: “The price to date has been paid by the accuser, who has been called every name in the book”.
Really? Some think that the defendants have paid a higher price. These boys had their names, photos, addresses, personal information attached to “gang rape” in the national media and internet, they had “wanted posters” posted all over their school and community, daily protests by many sexist and racist political groups identifying these boys and calling them gang rapists, Meanwhile, no mainstream media outlet that has published the accuser’s name, let alone called her a liar.
Ms. Estrich’s second point, “that the treatment of the accuser may chill other women from coming forward”
This depends on whether you think public opinion has turned because of brilliant defense maneuvering, or because of an embarrassingly weak case where evidence points to the accuser making false claim, and a DA who has a political agenda.
Ms. Estrich: “Let Nifong pick the prosecutor; if his handpicked choice believes there is no case, …then so be it.”
My guess is that Nifong will have no interest in appointing a special prosecutor prior to his election in November – in terms of Nifong’s job preservation, which seems to be his motivation here. Having a special prosecutor dismiss this over the summer will be even more politically embarrassing than having Nifong take responsibility for his own behavior.
Frankly, as best I extrapolate Ms. Estrich’s view, if the Duke Stripper replaces Tawana Brawley as the shorthand for false accuser, that will chill real rape victims who will fear that they will not be taken seriously. The only non-chilling outcome would be prosecutions and convictions, and that is not going to happen based on the evidence we’ve seen.
Police investigating the Duke University lacrosse team on rape allegations “omitted” notes from a second dancer at the party, who told authorities the alleged victim had been drinking, was acting “crazy” and that her colleague’s accusation was a “crock,” a defense attorney said Thursday. In court documents filed Thursday, attorney Kirk Osborn said that Durham, North Carolina, police “intentionally, deliberately and/or recklessly omitted” information from a probable cause affidavit — information Osborn says would have persuaded the judge not to file felony charges against three of the players. The district attorney’s office did not return a call seeking comment.
http://lawdogbehindthebadge.blogspot.com/2006/06/latest-on-duke-rape-case.html
http://johninnorthcarolina.blogspot.com/2006/06/duke-lacrosse-how-da-and-some-police.html
http://moneyrunner.blogspot.com/2006/06/more-on-duke-rape-case-second-dancer.html
Another police note obtained by the defense says the alleged victim acknowledged having two beers before arriving at the party and that she and Pittman both had a rum and coke after their arrival.
The accuser also told police that she used a vibrating sex toy during a dance in a hotel room for a male and female, but she told police that she had not had sex in the week before the party, the note says.
However, a male friend of the accuser said that he had sex with her that week and that he drove her to three other sexual encounters, according to the friend’s statement.
Osborn also claims in the court documents that the nurse who examined the alleged victim was in training and not yet certified.
http://www.cnn.com/2006/LAW/06/08/duke.lacrosse/index.html?section=cnn_topstories
While we are on the issue of lies. What about the initial lie that set this horrible circus into motion? The one about this being “a bachelor party for five adults”, when it was none of the sort. As far as I am concerned, there isn’t a clean hand in the bunch. The entire crew from players to strippers are of questionable ethics and morals. I don’t recall strippers/escorts being a “must have” when I attended parties in college. As in the drug culture, the user is just as bad as the dealer.
When the stripper “eeny meeny miney moed” the boys out of a line up that guaranteed only Duke Lacrosse boys were chosen, to the DNA (or lack of), the boys’ alibis, the 2nd stripper changing her story to profit from this scandal, the cab driver, I didn’t think this case could get any weaker, but then evidence reveals that stripper lied to police about not having sex for a week, then later confessed to having sex with her boyfriend and two other men who drove her to the party, and using a “vibrator” in a performance prior to the Duke party.
And again when you think that this case couldn’t get anymore ridiculous, from Nifong’s own reports we find out that the police omitted important information including that the stripper claimed that the 2nd stripper, Kim Roberts Pittman, helped the boys rape her.
The stripper originally claimed that the second stripper helped with the rape!
Just when you think this case hit rock bottom, there’s about 50 feet of crap, then you find a sub-basement where in the corner Mike Nifong is clutching this case like “Gulum”, from the movie Lord of the Rings, clutches the “ring of power”.
If Mike Nifong doesn’t get disbarred after this, then there really is a corrupt system in Durham that protects rich white guys. In Nifong’s case – stupid rich white guys with transparent political agendas, but maybe I’m wrong. Maybe Nifong can turn a pig’s ear into a silk purse.