Well, to amend my post, Coman didn’t withhold the evidence in Gell’s first trial, since he didn’t try it, but he damn sure knew about the practice, as some googling will tell you. Sorry about that.
The North Carolina AG office is fucked up!
I’m not sure what point you are making regarding Coman or how you draw your conclusion regarding the state AG office.
According to your link, despite the exculpatory evidence that his predecessor had suppressed, there was still evidence (in the form of eyewitnesses) that made Gell a valid suspect. In addition, the defense attorneys (several of whom are now defending the students in the current trial), have praised Coman. From your link:
I would like to apologize to the rest of my gender, to jocks in particular, and the world at large I suppose, for being so willing to believe what was alleged just because the alleged perpetrators were male jocks. I am a bigot. I will try to remedy that.
Tom, I made a weak assertion, deserved to be called on it, will reply more when I am awake tomorrow, but here is another link showing Coman is not lily-white as may seem.
http://www.newsobserver.com/114/story/533943.html
Coman gave Hoke and Reeves a pass. Read the last para.
I will respond tomorrow.
Oh, and tom, you certainly are astute enough to research this yourself, and I am not just relying on the NewsObserver.
And that would be Graves, not Reeves, and I Will stand by my assertion that the NC AG’s office is corrupt as they come.
Coman backpedaling: http://www.newsobserver.com/208/story/249929-p2.html
The charges I have in mind are for lying to the Court (not exactly perjury per se, as he was not under oath, but lawyers as officers of the Court are implicitly always under an obligation to tell the truth) and criminal civil rights violations (for depriving these kids of their liberty under color of law). I’m far from persuaded that both would not fly here. I think his actions were, necessarily, criminal in the legal sense.
the lying to the court - grounds for dismissal from job? sure
grounds for disbarment? absolutely.
grounds for contempt of court charge? you betcha.
grounds for criminal action? if he’d been under oath, yes, if not, I’d like to see some citation of the statute that would permit that.
criminal charges for Civil rights deprivation? I think you’re on even shakier ground there. can you explain what your line of reasoning is?
FWIW, there was a lawyer discussing this on Fark yesterday, referring to Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. § 1983.:
bolding added. Note that the Farkee poster does not seem to claim that what he was describing could be charged under criminal law.
I agree that it sucks to be wrongfully accused. I also believe that the accusor was wrong to have done so, but remember, there’s scads of folks who actually got convicted on flimsy evidence, where testimony showed that the accused was elsewhere for example, and the prosecutors on those cases were not charged w/civil rights violations. So, I’m hard pressed to believe that even in a bizarro circumstance like this, that there would be criminal charges for Nifongs actions.
A crappy, wrongful, not legal line up for example - the normal redress for that is that the evidence from the crappy wrongful not legal line up is “evidence thus obtained cannot be used in court”, not “criminally prosecute the prosecutor”.
The bar is (rightfully) going after Nifong for his (apparent) “against lawyers code of ethics” actions wrt the DNA exculpultory evidence, his inflamatory statements etc. Hell, I remember when Nixon made a statement to the press about Charles Manson being guilty (during his trial), the headlines were shown in court, and the only thing that happened from that was the jurors were questioned about if it effected their ability to act as jurors, so unless there’s a seperate criminal law in that state wrt prosecutors and statements they can/cannot make to the press, again, I’m hard pressed to see a viable criminal case.
To close the loop:
Yes, I was thinking federal criminal liability for abuse of authority under color of law. And I do think it’s potentially viable. I think one of the elements (IIRC) is force or the threat of force (this usually comes up in brutality cases), but I think being handcuffed and jailed is that or pretty close to that . . . .
And I was thinking, inter alia, criminal contempt under the North Caroline Statutes:
ok, # 6 seems to fit.
Yes it does. As does No. 3 (after the Court ordered disclosure of all potentially exculpatory material).
Nifong says he’d do it all again, but then that’s about all a lying dumbfuck redneck whore of a disgrace to the Bar could say in these circumstances, I suppose.
Dear Mr. Nifong,
If you truly believed that a rape occurred that night, why did you not attempt to discover the identity of the four or more males whose DNA was found in the naughty bits of the accuser, instead of indicting three men who definitely did not leave any DNA there?
Sincerely,
Criminal Law 101 (Just guessing. IANAL.)
Not even a criminal law issue.
Just a don’t-be-a-dumbfuck-who-ignores-all-evidence-contrary-to-his-unsubstantiated-impossible-theory issue.
But you’re right, if he really believed she was raped by someone, and given the shakiness and inconsistencies of her allegations from day one, wouldn’t he look into available evidence, which was additive to or different from the dubious eyewitness “evidence?” Like, maybe she was raped, at the party, but by a guy who wasn’t in fact a lax player? Or maybe she was drugged and the “rape” took place elsewhere and she mis-remembered it? Those are not very plausible theories, but they might be at least not-completely-implausible and illogical alternative ways of investigating the case.
His choice, though, makes no sense, except if you assume he is an utter moron or a corrupt goon bent on a frame job. Whicih of course he is.
If he gets slammed in the ethics proceeding, I think the three things that will be his undoing are, in rough order, (1) misrepresenting to the Court what he had turned over, in response to a direct question (courts HATE that and lawyers know it); (2) commenting “why would innocent people need lawyers?” (which is crapping on every person’s Constitutional right to have counsel); and (3) The sheer volume of his jury-pool tainting comments.
February 5 hearing postponed. Am I reading too much into it, or does it seem that the new prosecutors might be open to, I don’t know, examining exculpatory evidence from the defense?
Nifong responds to the State Bar Complaint. Lotsa goodies here, kids.
K C Johnson breaks it down. My favorite part is “I don’t remember.” As one poster in the comments section reminds us, “It’s not a lie if I believe it.” – George Castanza