What puzzles me is why you see this inaction as damaging to the lacrosse players more so than the alleged victim. If I told the police that I’d been gang raped and assaulted by a bunch of atheletes and had a medical exam to support my claim, I’d be made as hell if they waited 3 whole days to check things out.
But I still am going to withhold judgment until all the facts are released.
They used false names, don’tcha know, and GHB, and condoms. Come on, like most brutal, spontaneous gang rapes by drunk dumb jocks, this one was METICULOUSLY PLANNED!
Why don’t you wait and see what happens? Maybe she’s lying, maybe they are. I don’t know.
I’m sure if it turns out that these guys did to this, you’ll spend as many pages explaining why statistical data can be wrong (even in the absence of other evidence), what scumbags these guys are and what a lying shithole defense lawyer they had, for playing to the press…just like the D.A. did.
You won’t do a,“I guess I was wrong…” and disappear will you?
Right?
Just pointing out that saying “The defense attorney and the lawyer for the witness are saying contradictory things” (nonjudgmental) is different from saying "This little snippet confirms, for me a least, that information from the defense may not necessarily be the God’s honest truth (implication that defense attorney is being untruthful). Particularly in the context of stating we should reserve judgment. Saying something confirms for you that the defense may be lying and then saying we should reserve judgment is disingenuous. S’all…
Regarding raising the question of her being drugged: See above where I said it’s possible, and even found for you a statement from the security guard that he did not smell alcohol. I then merely pointed out circumstances that might disincline one to go down that particular road at this juncture.
Ahh, “of late”, yes. T’would indeed be difficult to find substantive comments from Mr. Nifiong “of late”. General trend: Nifong engaged in extensive and frequent interaction with the press. As information problematic for the case arose, he “no commented”, which borders on cowardly for a DA in such an inflammatory case who was so keen to engage the press. He is not solely an advocate for the alleged victim but also represents the community, my community, which is experiencing significant friction. I find it outrageous that he wouldn’t comment on the DNA results, for instance, after pursuing a court order to compel 46 players to submit samples (while having an ID from the witness, unless…well, see above). All this posturing and then…“no comment”. Why? Why not say what the DNA results said - it’s factual after all and he can even add context regarding what that tells us, and doesn’t tell us. Instead we are reduced to having the DA “not contradict” what defense is saying. In the shit-storm that is this case, is that at all helpful as the district attorney, given the context, community tenor, and his previous behavior?
I said “perhaps”, and meant it. And yes, I am making some inferences - assumptions really - chiefly regarding her interaction with defense counsel. My assumption, not unreasonable: statements are consistent across interviews and defense counsel pinned her to a sequence of events as good lawyers (for defense and prosecution) do. Taken in context, the whole quote implies the possibility of a change in story. She makes several statements. Defense counsel asserts her statements are consistent with the player’s timeline. She says there is “a lot wrong” with the player’s timeline. Either she left out details or is altering details. Both of which constitute changing the story. Third possibility is defense counsel conducted an inept interview at least more than once. There are likely more possibilities (like disagreement overwhat the definition if “is” is). However, I was merely responding than if one makes an implication that defense is “telling less than the God’s honest truth” from that quote (while omitting the latter part), it is equally reasonable to conclude from the very same quote that perhaps her story changed.
Jake.
I’ve never said she was lying. I don’t know if she is or if she isn’t. I’ve said that if these guys did it, I’d pull the switch. No joke. You’re reading along, right?
I’ve said there are factors based on what we’ve seen to date that leave me thinking any prosecution theory is iffy based on the current knowledge, and leave me looking to other data points to fill the holes. If those turn out to have been the wrong data points, then I’ll say, okay, man bit dog in this case, let’s send these guys up the river. I wonder if those who have been calling me racist, etc. will show similar decency. No, I don’t really wonder.
By the way, as far as I know, the defense hasn’t convened a pep rally to support the players, as the DA did by appearing on the campus of the accuser, to the cheering of the mob.
By the way, I’ll be sticking around because if the DA turns up with a video and confession from the players that definitively demonstrate their guilt, I will still believe he is (as far as I can tell) culpable of serious ethical infractions by virtue of his public statements AND by virtue of his having contacted (through the police) represented parties. I still haven’t gotten anyone to address that stunning fact.
By the way, “keeping an open mind” is a bit disingenuous. A scale-tipping factor (for me, at least) is that these guys were arrested and face criminal liability – serious liability. If they’re lying and they did rape her, then fine. But if they’re not, then she is, and believing her, or even “keeping an open mind,” means committing a serious injustice. It’s the DA’s job to make sure he doesn’t do this – and in doing so, the presumption of innocence means he has to be more solicitous of the rights of the accused than of the right of a putative victim to be believed. If you don’t like this, fine, but that’s how it works (is supposed to work) in our system. Tie does not go to the “victim.” If I had confidence the DA were evaluating this calculus correctly, maybe I could say “withhold all judgment.” But the DA (who is not similarly situated to the defense counsel), by his ethically-compromised behavior and showboating, has not covered himself in glory in such fashion as to earn my implicit trust.
Are you disputing that the events described actually occurred? Yes or no?
Something newsworthy happened. Reporters interviewed defense attorneys. They onterviewd the school. They tried to interview police and the DA, who refused comment. Should the reporters kill the story?
I guess you are. Which is odd because not even the police are disputing that they tried to interview the students. Welcome to tinfoil territory, where you can cheerfully ignore The New York Times, FOx News, ESPN, The Baltimore Sun, et. al. Man, those sneaky defense lawyers sure can sling one right past the big boys, huh? Or maybe, just maybe, it actually happened, as Duke University confirmed in the articles.
Got it. Not slanted towards. Just told from their side. Any other equivocations you want to toss in? Did it ever occur to you that simply relating the facts of a story, facts which are in dispute to no one in the world but you, are not telling the story form one side or the other but simply telling the story? Or that adding quotes from the defense, and offering equal time to the prosecution is the definition of fair journalism?
The fact that the interviews took place is all you have to accept to concede my point, an act which your attempts at weaseling out of any meaninful dialog indicate, to me at least, that your unwillingness to do so borders on the pathological.
It implies that without saying it. I wonder why the defense attorney won’t say it. The defense attorney is grandstanding as much as the DA was, and everyhting he says should be taken as spin. The DA clammed up, which is good, or at least better late than never. There’s an indictment on two players, which means that the charges are not wholly nonsensical. It has no bearing on their actual guilt or innocence, but if the defense attorney was correct in all the statements he’s made in the past two weeks, I don’t see how anyone could have indicted them.
What is the appropriate conclusion if, in the absence of other evidence (looky there, I used the favorite disclaimer of the week!), you have two contradictory statements that are on the opposite sides of truth? Is it judgmental to say that either one of them may be false? No it is not. It’s logic at work. Novel concept, I know.
Since people are suggesting I’m being biased , let me say this: I don’t know what happened in this rape case. I really am trying to be as objective as possible. It’s obvious that not all the facts are out there. There is no need to take sides when none of us are directly connected to the particpants. Some evidence raised by the defense looks bad for the accuser. But there looks as if there is evidence that something untoward happened to the accuser on the night in question. So I withhold judgement.
At the end of the day, we still don’t know anything about any of these people, so it’s best not to jump to their defense. I know I’m not going to go on record saying that I believe the accuser and risk having her turn out to be a lying whore. So why would anyone go on record defending these guys’ innocence, without knowing for sure whether they deserve it? It’s best just to wait.
I’ll ask again. If it turns out these guys did this, will you devote as much energy praising this “victim”, for standing up and reporting an often under-reported crime, as you have done finding reasons to doubt her?
It’s a imple question.
“Pulling the switch”, is something you can’t do. You can however devote 10 pages explaining why, in this case you were mistaken.
Will you do that?
You do understand the ethical obligations incumbent on the DA are different to those on a lawyer for a private party defendant? It’s in the ethics rules, and it’s a function of the presumption of evidence, the fact that the DA has the coercive power of the police behind him and the defendant doesn’t, and the Constitutional right against self-incrimination. While AFAICT Nifong has held his own in starting, and (when he thought he was going to hit a home run with the DNA) holding dozens of press conferences, the “trying the case in the press” angle. But regardless of whether he or the defense counsel have been a shade more aggressive, and regardless of “who started it,” becuase it’s an apples and oranges comparison. Defense counsel have duties as zealous advocates to make sure that their clients are not convicted unless the State has proof beyond a reasonable doubt. A DA has a duty to his client (who is the People at large, not the “victim”) to see that justice is done, which includes not bringing dubious charges (put differently, a DA’s duty is most certainly not to convict every accused nor to believe or vindicate every putative victim). I have my opinion on whether the ethically-challenged Mr. Nifong seems to have fulfilled this duty, YMMV, and any new facts that may emerge could change either of our views.
All very interesting, and beside the point. The defense counsel may be allowed to try the case in the press, but that doesn’t mean you shoudl believe anything he says.
I don’t know. Just because the lawyers say something happened doesn’t mean it’s true as they state it.
Just like with those damn statistics, the content of the article is not in dispute. The reporter correctly attributed statements where appropriate. The issue comes in with respect to how much weight you give the article (and others like it) when you are evaluating the case. So no, the reporters should not have killed the story. The reader of the story should not treat everything in it as gospel, though.
Which looks bad, yes. It still doesn’t give me the same “crackerjack police work” conclusion that you reached.
See above. I now know that it’s wrong that the police attempted to attempt to talk to the students without going through their lawyers. It still doesn’t automatically convince me that the police are mishandling things, at least from the defense’s side, but I’ll agree that they have made some mistakes.
Happy now?
No, I will not “explain” that, because I will not have been “mistaken.”
Because I have **never said she was as a factual matter lying ** (eye on the ball, holmes).
I have never said that the somewhat-to-highly-improbable nature (based on what we know) of her claims guaranteed or determined that those claims were impossible or in fact untrue.
So, no mistake!
If I post “Good, these guys are guilty, thank God they’re going to jail and the People have gotten justice, WTF is wrong with an athletic program that tolerates punks like that?” and a retard or two proceed to say they shouldn’t go to jail, or (as happened to me in this actual thread) continually impute racism or some other dumbass Genetic Fallacy slur intended to discredit my arguments – then I’ll respond.
Simple stuff really.
I’m not taking as read anything the defense counsel says, except to the extent that I know the kind of statements lawyers make when they’re being weaselly (think, “my client is not guilty of any crime,” which could conceal a whole raft of "he did it, but . . . " equivocations), whereas some of defense counsel’s statements here are of a less-frequently-made, factually-falsifiable variety – but that’s admittedly a gut reaction and I don’t take it as established.)
Actually, I think the prosecutorial misconduct does have some relevance to how we evaluate the DA’s decision to indict.
(1) A prosecutor who would be so reckless as to violate the ethics rules by contacting a represented party outside the presence of counsel might be similarly reckless in pressing an unfounded case to indictment.
(2) A prosecutor who would improperly contact the accused and try to search their rooms without a warrant (AFAIK) the last weekday before the GJ sits might strike some as a prosecutor driven to desperate measures by lack of other substantive proof.
No guarantees, of course, but anyone else have an explanation for the Durham cops’ apparent behavior last Friday?
I see it as damaging to the credibility of the police and the quality of their investigation, which is the point where you and I began to argue.
More weaseling. “As they state it?” What the hell does that mean? The police were on campus and attempted to interview the players. That is all you have to stipulate. What is so hard about that?
I am rarely happy. I will be satisfied when you concede that I have convinced you that the DNA was taken from the students two weeks before the poilce made any attempt to rule out suspects by interviewing the students at the party. This is the statement you asked me to support, and this is what all of our back and forth has been about.
Explanation I’ve heard is that since they weren’t charged, police were under no obligation to refrain from attempting to interview them without counsel present. Not saying that is ethical or correct behavior, just the explanation from the city. I’m a bit fuzzy on it, could also be that the players they tried to interview were not under suspicion at the time of the attempted interview (police looking to establish presence of the now-indicted suspects at the party by interviewing other players), so no prohibition regarding represented parties. Sorry to be a bit vague, as I forget the exact wording the city manager used and can’t locate a cite quickly, but the explanation definitely had to do with their non-status as charged or suspects, and hence the city interpretation was they were free to request an interview just as with any other citizen
Jake
No, you’ve spent 10 pages moaning how statistical data in the absence of other evidence (patent pending) goes to her credibiity. Because lord knows, you have access to everybit of information regarding this case. At every turn, you find a way to cast doubt. And now you fall back, on the,“Well I didn’t say she was lying…” Sad.
You make empty platitudes…'I pull the switch…"Sure…sure. but are you willing to even at this juncture to say, “If”, this happened to this young woman and she stood up pressed charges, she’s pretty damn brave.
Can you say that Huerta88?
Can you forget about the DA. Can you forgot about your statistics? Can you say, if this really happened, this is a pretty brave woman?
I know I can say, that if this didn’t happened…those guys are pretty tough and deserve every support and any compensation they can get, especially if the DA, broke the rules.
I am willing “at this juncture” to say that (if she is telling the truth) she’s a damned unfortunate, wronged woman. Brave, too.
Satisfied?
Wronged by you, too? If she’s telling the truth, of course.
Hmmm. Does not compute, if so.
Doesn’t precondition the ban on a charge having been made or issue having been joined. And to suggest that any of the players was not “a suspect” (assuming this were relevant under the rule, which for the above reason, I think is not so), would be gross imposition by the DA or his minions. He forced the whole team to give DNA and, unless he privately informed some that they were definitively cleared, all have been under a cloud of suspicion and possible indictment. I just don’t see a way around the ethical violation, and if the excuse you attribute to the City is all they’ve got . . . .